Repair Cafés attract 1.5 million visitors every year

89,000 volunteers, 60,000 events and 1.6 million items brought in each year… The figures from the global Repair Café survey are impressive. The research not only highlights our impact, but also reveals the challenges Repair Cafés face.

At the end of last year, we conducted our fourth global survey of Repair Cafés. What exactly are Repair Cafés achieving? And what do they need in order to function even better? The results are now in!

Responses from 30 countries

To begin with, the UK researchers were pleased with the strong participation in the survey. They received 946 responses from 30 countries, representing a response rate of 22.4%. The largest numbers of responses came from Germany, France and the Netherlands.

The survey showed that Repair Cafés are generally held at the same venue and usually take place once a month, although frequencies vary widely, from yearly to daily. An estimated 60,000 Repair Café events take place each year, attracting around 1.5 million visitors in total.

A committed volunteer community

Repair Cafés most commonly have between five and nineteen volunteers at each event, suggesting a total of around 89,000 volunteers worldwide. More than half of these volunteers are over 60, while only 5% are under 25. When asked whether they would like to engage more young people, both as volunteers and visitors, 86% of Repair Cafés answered yes. The data also indicate that more than 1.6 million items are brought into Repair Cafés each year.

The challenges of success

More than 80% of Repair Cafés record repair details on paper during events, while 45% later enter this information into an electronic system. Around 6% of Repair Cafés do not record any data at all. When asked about the challenges of running a Repair Café, respondents identified the following as their main concerns:

• finding enough suitable volunteers (31%);
• too many items being brought in (17%);
• finding people to take on leadership roles (18%).

However, these are challenges that stem from success. The vast majority of Repair Cafés report that they are running well, without significant problems.

A collaboration between the university and Repair Café

The Fourth Global Repair Café survey was conducted by PhD students Peter Counter and Beth Quinton at the University for the Creative Arts in Farnham (UK). The survey was supported by the Repair Café International Foundation and Professor Martin Charter.

Many thanks to everyone who took part in the survey!

More information

• The recording of the presentation (29 May webinar).
• The slides used during the webinar.