Yep. A lot of the ones styled after the “bring your work in and give it to Bob to run on the machine” spaces are like that. You may get help with issues or you may get a “too bad it didn’t work, let me know when you fix the file”. Lots of good things on the education side (classes etc) usually but that kind of moderated or gate keeper access would make me nuts.
Ours is a more collaborative approach - akin to what the spaces originally started out as. Every member is encouraged to be visible and if they’re interested (don’t need to be an expert) in an area to take a lead or work with the other folks who are in that same area (3D printing, lasers, woodworking, etc). Most all of our classes and specialty groups came out of a member who said “I’m interested in this and I’d like to make sure it’s successful here”.
Once someone is checked out on a machine, they get to use it on their own and on their own schedule. They don’t have to hand things off to anyone. And pretty much everyone shares the stuff they’re working on and are more than willing to help out anyone else who is doing similar stuff and has a question or an issue. I swear it’s as much a social club as a workshop
Ours was much like yours where everyone was invited to take the lead in an area in which they were knowledgeable (or at least interested in). My wife and I dug in and figured out how a donated embroidery machine worked, then taught classes to others. All well and good.
The dark side was that the space also operated as small business incubator, and the entire setup was leveraged in their favor. If one of them needed the pick & place for a week, they got it – never mind it was only in use about 2 hours a day. No system to reserve time on printers, cutters, cnc, machine shop, wood shop, etc. – just show up (30 min drive for us) and hope one of the core group wasn’t camped out.
As “the largest maker space in a four-state area” they went after a lot of grant money (and got it). These were STEM ed grants for the most part, but somehow most of the $$$ went to the incubator guys. I told the Board how inappropriate this was, but since the Board was made up of the incubator guys… Well, you get the picture.
I’m not claiming that all 'spaces are like that, but that was my experience. I sincerely hope I’m the only maker in this group that has encountered anything like it.
I don’t know of a lot of makerspaces that survive entirely on member fees. There’s a huge amount of volunteer work, grants, donations… (I think that one of tech shop’s problems may have been to try and put things on a purely business footing.)
That was a huge bummer to hear, but I hope there will be more places and people willing to fill the space. You guys are awesome for circling the wagons and helping out with the discounts to the members.
This is one area we have ready but haven’t implemented yet. We have an online system available for reservations (& a web cam view you can actually see what’s going on in the space to see if your machine is unreserved but someone is using it anyway ) Once we get to the point there’s contention for devices we’ll implement required reservations but it hasn’t been an issue for the past couple/three years.
We also don’t charge members separately for machine use. Some of the others I’ve seen have both a membership & an hourly machine charge. We just budget for consumables and machine maintenance as part of the operating expenses. If someone stops in when we’re open to the public (volunteers man the space) we allow non-members to use the facilities but then they pay for the time.
We do have reserved space available where a member can rent a portion of the space dedicated to them for a business startup but other than no one else can mess with their stuff, they don’t get any more priority than anyone else.
There’s a bigger one being built near ours that’s oriented more toward the business incubator model but they’re in a multi-year fundraising effort because they’re looking to follow more of the professionally staffed space model with the additional costs that entails. I think they’ve already raised about 1.5M and they’re still looking for more before they build out their operation. That’s a lot of money & an awful big operation.
We’re a 100 member 5,000 sq ft kind of place. Easy to keep it intimate.
I’m happy to hear these companies supporting these Makers. Form2 by FormLabs will probably be my next acquisition after my Glowforge has gone through some passes around the circuit.
It’s in CT. The “clean lab” isn’t a clean room though - it’s “not the dirty dusty sawdust filled lab across the hall” kind of clean That’s where we have the 3D printers, laser, CNC (in an enclosure w/vacuum dust collection), glass bead area and large format vinyl plotter/cutter. The electronics lab is a separate room and also kept debris free for obvious reasons.
Unfortunately, I’m someone who is now without the tech shop here in Detroit due to this fiasco (and yes, I’ve heard from another member more in the know and it is possible someone higher up months ago knew this would be happening) and still waiting for my glow forge to show up (my account says Jan. 9th) so I’m out of luck for access to the lasers. I purchased on Oct 22, 2015, probably no hope of being moved up or any kickback the way it reads? And stinks does not even begin to cover it!
The San Jose techshop stayed pretty busy (esp. laser cutters/engravers). Unfortunately, I don’t think we have any sort of replacement yet (there are a couple maker spaces in SF, but nothing really in South Bay).
I was interested in joining techshop and learning some new things - but then they cut back on their classes, and all that was left was simple stuff I already know (well, except for how to use the embroidery machine).
Glad to see some companies supporting the former techshop members with some discounts. I know several of them are now tool-less and some don’t even have their materials (in a locker at the shop).
To be honest, that one surprised and delighted me most.
I’m EXTREMELY lucky that my Pro shipping coincided with everything in that I just got my shipping notice, so I’m only out of business for a week.
As an avid TechShop community member, I can tell you we’re devastated. I’m watching a few Facebook groups and we’re trying to do whatever we can with other local makerspaces. In Phoenix, a lot of the maker community has stepped up and in to help get projects completed. (I’m even looking at renovations to see if I can host a small makerspace at my home. That’s how we are.)
So, thank you for a little beacon of light during our dark times.
Those offers are amazingly generous! Thank you to Dan and the others who made it possible.
I was fortunate enough to receive my Glowforge pro days before the announcement and already have a CNC router on the way as well because our volume had started exceeding what we could comfortably do at techshop… Though I also was planning to spend this weekend over there using the larger lasers to make some custom jigs for the GF and cutting some wood and acrylic down to size… Now I’ll just have to make due with what I’ve got on hand.
It could be a lot worse — some people’s personal tools and in-progress projects, or even client property, are now completely inaccessible to them as the doors were chained up fairly quickly and the bankruptcy trustee isn’t actually responding to emails.
It’s a huge blow to the maker community, made even worse by the horrid communication (or utter lack thereof) to their members.
At Glowforge, we are making our desktop lasers available at an exclusive lower price for TechShop alum. We will refund $500 for the Glowforge Basic and $1,000 for the Glowforge Pro. To redeem after purchase, email proof of membership (current as of 11/15/17) to support@glowforge.com and we’ll immediately credit the account. This offer is also good retroactively to any alum who purchased a Glowforge within the past 6 months. This offer is good through December 31st, 2017.
Ok - so, does this mean that TechShop members purchasing between now and Dec 31 also get that $500-$1k off? (I know I’m out because I purchased mine 2 years ago, but I have some TS members asking.)
Also - How do you prove current membership status? For a weird example: I have a badge with my picture on it. I have a receipt for a month’s membership that I paid for in October and activated on November 8. I don’t have receipt proof of current active status, but I have photos (maybe) of me in and lasering as recent as 2 weeks ago? Should I get a testimony from one of the former employees? I mean, there’s no real other way to prove it in a weird case like mine.
That’s a really good point. It becomes especially problematic for those of us who had lifetime memberships (yeah, that was a colossaly bad investment as it turns out) and haven’t had a receipt for years… And given their disorganization around such things, they may not even have sent one.
TechShop came here guessing about 7+ years ago and talked to a group of us (belonging to a Makerspace) and proposed starting memberships at $125+ every month. The idea died at that point.
Absolute best things I got from our Makerspace when it was active? The friends I acquired and still have … and my fiance’. We became best friends while he was teaching me to build my first 3D printer…and fell in love before I built my second one.
Unfortunately the $ and being able to keep a membership with rising rental costs caused a decline in membership.
