“How might we design a makerspace that serves our community?”
In the fall of 2023 we released a public survey in the Flathead Valley. We were looking for input to help design a makerspace that could best serve the wants and needs of our community.
Below is the written report of our survey findings. Thanks to Kathleen and Justin for putting this together! See our comprehensive results with corresponding infographics in the embedded pptx file here:
Motivation for Survey
The Flathead Valley is teeming with artists and makers of all stripes and crafts who are craving a communal space to work on their art, share resources, and build community. Many artists across the valley –professionals and hobbyists alike– have discussed this shared vision for a community makerspace, and in the fall of 2023 we began to build momentum to turn this vision into a reality. We wanted to start by asking people in the valley what they wanted to see in a space like this, to help us develop our ideas and get a sense of what the community at large would like to see in a communal makerspace. We also developed the survey to get the word out, and find other people who are motivated to help build this space. In doing so we have created a team of people with a wide variety of skills and huge collective motivation to bring a makerspace to life. Our hope for this survey is that it is an initial stepping stone to help us identify the services that people in the valley are most likely to utilize and work on bringing those to fruition first. We also are using the data collected in this survey to help us understand the demographics of people in the valley who are interested in using a space like this.
Our goal is to build a community makerspace that will be functional and fun for makers in the valley and will grow alongside our community. The information we have gleaned from the survey responses will help us to do that.
Methodology
We created an online survey with Google Forms. We chose Google Forms due it it being a free resource, ease of use, and for ease of distribution. We created survey flyers with both a QR code and a written link to the survey. The flyers were distributed around the valley, primarily in Columbia Falls, Whitefish, and Kalispell. Links to the survey were also shared on social media by those of us who created the survey and we encouraged friends and followers to repost the survey to reach as many people as possible. The survey was live for about 1 month, in which time we got a total of 123 responses.
Our questions were posed to gather information about what kind of art/making people in the valley are doing, what services potential users of the space would be interested in utilizing, how much people would be willing to contribute financially to this space, and where an ideal location for such a space may be. We also asked respondents to share names of other businesses and makerspaces that the respondents were familiar with or knew about. We asked for this information so that we could look into other successful community creativity ventures to gather inspiration from, and to learn from these places how to build a community oriented makerspace that has holding power in our own area.
Potential Biases/Sources of Error
We have identified a few potential sources of error that we would like to address. We feel that this survey was designed to eliminate as much bias as possible and in doing so we believe that the data we gathered is reflective of the community. It is impossible, however, to eliminate all errors or biases. One such error that is common with any kind of survey where information is provided voluntarily, is self selection bias. Self selection bias refers to individuals choosing to participate or not in a study or survey. When the choice is left to the individual, not all individuals who come across the survey will choose to participate. This creates a respondent pool that may not be representative of the population as a whole.
For example, someone coming across our survey may not self identify as an artist and perhaps choose to not respond to the survey because of that, irregardless of their actual creative behavior. This is self selection bias. Another example is that an individual who just doesn’t like to fill out surveys will remove themself from the survey pool, thus perpetuating the self selection bias. There are many reasons why an individual would choose to not participate in a survey. Short of forcing everyone in the valley to take the survey, this is usually an unavoidable bias that occurs in volunteer driver data collection.
In order to mitigate self-selection bias, we tried to make our call for respondents as broad as possible so as to not alienate anyone who may not identify with that label. We also distributed our flyers across the valley, in coffee shops, libraries, grocery stores, and as many community bulletin boards as we could find so that as many people as possible would see our flier, and hopefully feel compelled to take our survey. We also shared the survey across social media, encouraging others to share it so that the survey made its way out of our personal circles.
Respondent Demographics
Our survey garnered a total of 123 respondents. Of those respondents, about ¾’s (74.8%) fell between the ages of 20-40. We asked for respondents to share their zip code so that we could know where in the valley people reside. The majority of respondents (41.7%) are in Whitefish, followed by Kalispell (27.8%) and Columbia Falls (14.8%.) We also wanted to find out who might be interested in helping bring the makerspace to life, so our survey asked how much folks wanted to be involved. 37.7% of respondents said that they wanted to help where they can, 35.1% wanted to be kept in the loop, and 21.9% wanted to be leading organizers. Respondents voluntarily gave their email addresses and from those we sorted the emails into “organizers”, “volunteers” and people who want to be kept in the loop.
Finally, we wanted to understand the demographics of our respondents from an artistic standpoint. We asked people to describe themselves, in their own words, as makers. We wanted to know what kind of craft(s) people in the valley are doing to help us tailor the space to best meet the artistic needs of the community. We found that there is a wide variety of art and crafting happening in the valley, both on a professional and hobby level. The most common mediums and crafts people reported practicing or having strong interest in were painting, drawing, sewing and textile arts, ceramics, photography, woodworking, jewelry making, and printmaking.
Financials
We asked our respondents to tell us how much they would be willing to contribute financially to a makerspace, in the form of monthly membership or rental of personal studio space. The average value for monthly membership was $77.55, the median monthly membership value was $50, and the most common response we received for monthly membership was also $50. There was a large emphasis on affordability among the responses we received, which is in line with our vision. There were multiple suggestions for having tiered membership rates, both so that people could decide what level of involvement fits into their lives, and also to have a variety of price points so that people have the ability to participate at different price points. We got fewer responses about personal studio space, but the answers ranged from $300-$1000 per month.
Testimonials
At the end of our survey we asked respondents to share any additional notes or comments they had about the makerspace idea or the survey itself. We received an overwhelming amount of support and enthusiasm for having a space like this in the Flathead Valley.
“I really love this idea!! It's truly something that the area would benefit from.”
“Stoked to see some motion in this direction!”
“I’ve personally wanted to see something like this for a long time! I hope you can figure out a way to make it work.”
“So happy to hear someone wants to make a space like this!”
“Very happy to see this dream of a makerspace growing momentum and happy to serve this vision however I am needed.”
“I’m so excited for this! I think it would create an awesome community space”
“Thank you for putting in the time to create this form and for the work that you are doing for the art community in the Flathead valley. I am new to the area and long for a space like this to connect with others over the creative process and shared love of making!”
“Thank you. I mean it.”
“LOVE. I've been discussing/ dreaming of this exact thing. I'm SO glad I saw your poster. Rock on I can’t wait to see where this goes.”
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