Reap repair rewards

Repair cafés are places to meet, fix things and enjoy a good natter with other like-minded people who would rather repair an item than put it in the bin.

Find out more about them here: repaircafe.org/en/about.

Repair cafés are run by dedicated volunteers who enjoy a cup of tea with people from their community. If you don’t want to run one but have the skills to volunteer at a local repair café, please email craig.cornish@herefordshire.gov.uk.

Grant funding is available for those who want to run a repair café in Herefordshire. The funding scheme is designed to help communities cover the costs of setting up, expanding or restarting an existing repair café.

Successful applicants can get up to £2500 to hire a venue, and can help towards repair café membership insurance, tools, training, and promotions or expand an existing one to repair more items. More information can be found at www.herefordshire.gov.uk/repair. The scheme will open for applications on Monday 4 July 2022, and the guidance document and application forms will be made available via the above link then.

Repair cafés are brilliant for communities and the environment by encouraging repair and reuse. They:

• Use local venues, which benefits all residents
• Provide opportunities for residents to make the most of their repair skills and experience for the good of their community
• Support local climate and environmental work
• Build communities and relationships through repair (and drinking tea together)
• Save members of your community money by keeping their favourite items working for longer

We want to build on the great work being done at existing repair cafés. As well as helping existing ones to expand, we also want to establish new ones to build a repair network right across Herefordshire.

This will help prevent tons of everyday household items (including clothes, furniture, electrical goods, bikes, crockery and toys, etc from being thrown away. In doing this, we’re supporting Herefordshire Carbon Neutral by 2030 target.

All of which will help residents save money, reduce waste and reap the rewards of repair.