Major Update to Our Volunteer Program
With Burning Man over and our pop-up going off without a hitch, we would like to thank our Volunteers. You are all the best, and we couldn’t do what we do without you.
This year we tried a new volunteer program for our annual pop-up. After spying on the Boise Bike Project and seeing how their volunteer program worked, we reached out to them to see what was what. They use a program called Volunteer Local, which they swear is the bees knees. So we looked into it and we loved it. We soft-launched it for the pop-up but now it is set up for real for real. For the pop-up, we had 38 individual volunteers contributing a total of 288 hours, all scheduled and tracked through Volunteer Local. We swear it is the bees knees.
Starting today we have scheduled volunteer opportunities both in our shop and at our production facility. We know you want to help and we have tried our best to make it as easy for you to help as possible. Well, Volunteer Local made it easy, Boise Bike Project told us about it, and now we are sharing it with you. We have volunteer shifts for opening our shop, closing our shop, and working at our warehouse. Please follow the link and see for yourself. We love our volunteers and wanted to get you more access, if these shifts get filled and stay filled we can always add more to get more people involved.
Annual Pop-Up Recap
Thank you to everyone who drifted through our annual 4th Street Burning Man pop-up in August, and a special thank you to our amazing volunteers. This is one of the most important events of the year for us, and without your support, we would not have moved the needle the way we did—THANK YOU! Our crew is still dusty, sore, and recovering from long days moving over 1,500 bikes and sharing stories with bike enthusiasts from around the world.
Each day brought its own unique set of challenges and victories. One memorable group from Mexico City spent several hours with us, hand-picking the 75 bikes that would best suit their camp. Our very own Tom Chapel airbrushed a beautiful map for guests to identify their respective residences. While this was a familiar experience for many of our employees and volunteers, we did have a handful of first-timers assisting—they were in awe of the volume of merchandise, bikes, and people that moved out the door throughout the week.
The support Reno Bike Project has garnered through Burning Man and Northern Nevada is remarkable and serves as a testament to the hard work RBP’s crew and programs are putting in to positively impact the community. We assembled customer e-bikes by the dozens, installed hundreds of saddles, racks, and baskets, and handled enough stuffed-animal-infested human playa vehicles to fleet up a community college. If the gypsum and silica don’t stay with you, the stories of the week certainly will.
Regardless of your feelings on Burning Man, witnessing the amount of bike-crazed individuals visiting our beautiful city to support our little nonprofit—and then inquiring about how to donate the bike when they’re done—is nothing short of inspiring. I’ve called Reno home for over 40 years, and I certainly have a newfound love and respect for the event and the burners that temporarily fill our stores, hotels, and bike lanes.
Keep on riding and stay safe out there!
Volunteer Mondays Continue Unfettered
Tool Time Mondays are still going strong. Every Monday we offer volunteer “Tool Time” and orientation (email [email protected] w/questions). Where volunteers are free to pop in or sign up, and get tasked with something that will put tools into their hands. Sometimes stripping bikes, mostly building kids bikes that get donated throughout our community. It runs from 10am until 2pm every Monday and on the first Monday of every month we will have a special night session, 5-7:30pm. It is a chance for volunteers to help us, help the community, and also get wrenching. Post Burning Man we have doing getting the shop back to it's normal glory. Feel free to pop in every Monday between 10 and 2 for some chill, no pressure, tool time w/Tom. Sign-ups available, follow the link.
Every Monday 10am-2pm
First Monday of the Month 10am-2pm & 5pm-7:30pm
Mountain Bike Practices Begin Again!
Our Tumbleweeds mountain bike practices are starting up again! There are going to be a couple of changes this season, mainly that we will be focusing more on weekly riding and less on races and events! The goal this season is for the Tumbleweeds to have fun riding and getting to know each other and the Reno area trails. We will be starting out with 1 practice a week, on Wednesday or Thursday depending on RBP's staffing abilities (and projected weather). Our coaches will also be rotating depending on availability, but everyone is excited to be able to participate in our weekly rides! Locations will change weekly, and Katie will send out the plan by the weekend before the ride.
The team is open to anyone aged 9 - 17 who is interested in riding bikes. We welcome all skill levels and levels of interest, whether you've never been on a bike before or have been mountain biking for years! We do have bikes, helmets, and water bottles available for use, but you are also welcome to bring your own gear if you want. There is no commitment requirement because this is all for fun-- show up for as many or as few practices as you want!
If you are interested in participating in practices, please reach out to [email protected]. In your email please indicate who will be participating, whether they need a bicycle, and if they do need a bike please let her know the approximate height and weight of the participant.
This week's ride will take place on Wednesday 9/8 from 4 - 7 pm, and we will meet at the parking lot outside of the Wilbur D. May Center at Rancho San Rafael Park. If you are planning to attend, please email Katie at the email address provided above.
September FutureCycle Update
Our FutureCycle Program has continued full force amidst the end of summer chaos! We currently have three interns who are all at different stages of their internships: Jason and Lukas are completing their Bicycle Repair Classes and moving on to the job skills portion of the program, and Skye is currently interviewing for her externship! She is hoping to go into bicycle repair or auto mechanics, and is super excited to continue the type of work she has been doing at Reno Bike Project. All three interns helped out a ton with our Burning Man Pop-Up! They were there from the set up, through the event itself, all the way to the bike donation clean up (a.k.a. the dirty work). They've been integrating really well into our little community, and it will be sad to see them move on to bigger and better things (though we will also be incredibly proud of them)! Our program has been supported by the Community Services Agency, NevadaWorks, and DETR, and we would not be able to do this without them.
