GardenShare (Finalist)
TBD
UPDATE: 2011/11/14
Thank you to everyone who spent the time commenting and voting for our project, GardenShare. Many of the questions you are asking, we asked ourselves when we set out to design this project. Please read through the comments and my answers. We feel that we have a strong business case to forge a path in a brand new economy - one that sees communities come together to reduce their reliance on STUFF, access shared equipment that has a reduced impact on the environment and teach each other a few things in the process. We will develop a strong business for this - one buoyed by a mix of membership fees, and partnerships with the private sector (mainly retailers and manufacturers). Summerhill Impact has always prided itself in finding unique solutions to common problems and getting people to TAKE AN ACTION. We believe there is pent-up demand for this type of initiative and the opportunities to create local action are boundless. When we de-clutter, and reduce our dependance on high-emitting equipment; when we meet our neighbours and learn from each other; when we build a movement of local participation, with local decision making - we are creating a better world in a carbon constrained economy. And, most importantly, we will have FUN doing it.
Thanks again...and we hope to see you in the next round!
Corey
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GardenShare is an initiative that aims to increase community sharing of typical household garden and lawn equipment, in an effort to reduce consumption, improve environmental health and build healthy neighbourhoods.
The Shared Economy is one of the biggest trends in the marketplace today. Following pioneers such as Autoshare launching the car sharing movement in Canada over a decade ago, many new entrants have entered this space. According to Frost & Sullivan, car-sharing revenues in North America alone will hit $3.3 billion by 2016. And Botsman says the consumer peer-to-peer rental market will become a $26 billion sector, and believes the sharing economy, in total, is a $110 billion-plus market.
Summerhill Impact’s GardenShare project builds on the concept that the public (especially the burgeoning “New Consumer” market of 25-35 year olds) are interested in environmental initiatives that may have additional value to them, beyond the “feel good”. GardenShare allows any homeowner to work with their neighbourhood to create a community garden shed, where members can access items such as lawnmowers, weed-whackers and power tools for the short time they need it. This avoids issues such as storage, up front cost of typical garden items and dependency on things that are used so infrequently (it is estimated that the average power drill is only used for 15 total minutes in its lifetime!). Clearly, there is opportunity to transform the superfluous consumptive habits of North Americans, by providing a simple way to deliver the service they need, without being locked to the product itself.
The objective of Gardenshare is to launch community garden sheds in 25-50 neighbourhoods in Toronto. We believe the appetite for such an initiative is here, and participants will be lining up to participate. We will use mobile technology and Facebook as the interface for participants and bring in partners (e.g. retailers, manufacturers) to provide added value.
The emissions reduction from the Gardenshare program is more indirect than direct. This includes:
- Reduced VKT trips to retail
- Reduced embedded GHGs in the manufacturing and shipping of heavy equipment
- Increased uptake of additional behaviour change – including xeriscaping, tree planting, rain barrels, local food
- Reduced heat island effect
Engaging the public in behaviour change and actions that lead to environmental and social improvements are essential for addressing climate change, improving air quality, increasing social well-being and supporting the development of progressive public policy.
Since 2000, Summerhill Impact (a national not-for-profit organization) has been committed to creating and implementing strategic initiatives which generate sustained environmental and social improvements, by developing partnerships and engaging the public, to influence consumer behaviour.
Some of our initiatives and results include:
- Mow Down Pollution (lawnmower retirement program) – 45,650 inefficient mowers and trimmers have been retired, resulting in the reduction of 748 tonnes of greenhouse gas and smog forming emissions
- Retire Your Ride/Car Heaven (vehicle retirement program) – 260,791 old gas guzzling cars have been retired and responsibly recycled since 2000, resulting in 9,900 tonnes of smog-forming emissions
- Switch Out (mercury switch collection) – 477,708 automotive mercury switches collected to date across Canada, representing 278 kg of mercury
- Switch the ‘Stat (mercurt thermostat collection) – over 68,000 thermostats collected, representing 138 kg of mercury
- Keep Cool (room air conditioner retirement) – over 45,600 room air conditioners retired, representing over 30 MW of energy savings
To date, Summerhill Impact’s work has focused on encouraging the public to take an action that reduces their environmental impact. Many of these programs revolve around getting the public to retire old inefficient products, in favour of better choice products. We feel, now, its time to ask people not to consumer in the first place. What makes GardenShare unique and innovative is that it will be the first opportunity for people in Toronto to reduce their superfluous consumptive habits, and join their community in an effort that helps them reduce their environmental impact and clutter and simplifying their life.
Like every Summerhill initiative, we leverage the needs and resources of the private, public and not-for-profit sector to create actions that sustain environmental results. Summerhill will work with home and garden retailers and manufacturers to leverage additional opportunities for the public to take action.
The venture is meant to be supported in similar fashion to many of Summerhill Impact’s social ventures – through leveraging private and public sector resources to drive social and environmental change. Governments, retailers and manufacturers all have a natural stake in an initiative like GardenShed and our approach is to balance our social and environmental mission against the needs and priorities of those natural stakeholders.
Self-supporting GardenShare will come from two key elements:
- Membership fees
- Partnerships with retailers and manufacturers – data about participants’ household behaviour related to gardening and home improvement is valuable to retailers and manufacturers of said products. Opportunities exist to leverage special offers with retailers on additive products (e.g. soil, mulch etc.).
Comments
Love this concept; there are
Love this concept; there are a few other Garden focused finalists here, opportunity to package something together?
Gardenshare
Our seasons are so shart that tools are only required for a few short weeks...what a brillant idea to share. It will save space, money and may even promote sharing of produce from the gardens!
who takes the risk?
It's a great idea - esp. in a crowded city with little space for storing bulky, little used items.
Will these sheds be 'manned' or will people who join have a key? How will you address security issues? What about breakage and regular wear/tear maintenance of the items? How will this be handled and how will these costs be covered? What about liability issues? If someone's injured using the drill - are there implications? Do your costs cover insurance/liability issues?
Sharing is great!
With the growth in urban and peri-urban agriculture in the GTA, this looks like a great idea to get safe, functional tools into the dirt-caked hands of the motivated.
Collaborations with organizations like Not Far From the Tree and other community gardening groups seems a no-brainer - especially those who help to support loca foodbank and soup kitchen movements: adding social value to your environmental and carbon-reduction initiative. Nice!
Program could set a new trend!
If this program is successful I can see it leading to more community collaborations and the sharing of additional items such as building tools, childrens toys, etc.
Not only could you share tools, but knowledge and experience as well. It would be great to have access to an "expert" when you need advice. This idea is ggreat for building a tight knit trusting community.
GardenShare
Sharing helps the pocket book and increases community spirit.
Community gardens along the hydro right-of-way should be targetted.
Garden Share
I think this is great- in the city we have limited space. When that space is taken up by tools I use 1-2 times/year it seems like a waste of storage space.
I guess it depends on what kind of equipment it would have, but there is an H&S component that needs to be considered if there ae gas powered tools.
Maybe there could be sponsorship from a major retailer? That would be great eco-branding!
Great Community Builder
I like the concept a lot... anything that connects people with others in their neighbourhood is great.
I could see this working in an online virtual world where the shed itself is virtual and participants add whatever items they are willing to share.
Gardening equipment "hub"
I like this idea. Every square foot of my back yard and shed is valuable to me (as is the case with most downtown folks) so I would see benefits. I would also sign up at the time that I thought I needed a new piece of lawn equipment - before buying a replacement mower I would think of this. Once I found myself at the shed I would also probably donate my own less-used equiment to the community pile - cleaning out my own shed (or garage).
I'd like to see each piece of equipment come with 'how to' tips on it. Also, I'd like to see ways of encouraging sharing of people's own equipment - from empty hooks for donated equipment in each Garden Share hub to community 'swap' boards (virtual and physical) in and around the Garden Share hubs.
I'd like to see more financial info - estimate how much each hub would cost, how much could be donated, how many homeowners might take advantage, how high the membership fee would have to be, etc.
Share Hubs
It is great if we could all share nicely and swap things, but sadly most people don't like lending, cause if it breaks...you bought it.
So when you get a group of people using the same stuff and it suddenly stops working you get a group of people all sharing something that is defunk.
It is hard to keep things organized and checked in and out properly.
I know that the library system does it well...put still books get lost.
How will you ensure that people will be able to rent, use and return things on time and in the same order as it was lent out?
Questions that have to be clearly defined more in order to set up your garden share program.
Certain questions to look back on and clearly define.
Who are the Supers for maintaining the sheds?
Who keeps the key and what is the process flow of getting access and validated for a share shed?
What if something breaks? How will this be handled and how will these costs be covered?
Liability and insurance issues?
If someone's injured using the drill - are there implications?
Why not go to Home depot and rent something?
A fantastic and feasible
A fantastic and feasible initiative for sustainable, urban living.
Real Impact!!!!
Real Impact!!!!
?
Nice idea - everyone shares
Nice idea - everyone shares access to better quality tools, rather than having extras sit around. I'd definitely sign up if it was in my neighbourhood!
Great concept, and if bike and carsharing are any indication, it can work!
Great idea, but I have a lot of questions -- Agree with earlier questions about security and how it would be managed - would a local organization need to be a local 'host'? Tools are unfortunately highly prone to theft, so it'd be good to know what type of security the shed would have. Who would deal with repairs and tool maintenance?
If similar to car sharing, it could work with an annual fee and a central office to sort out maintenance, but that limits how far it can spread and increases cost. Training for users on riskier equipment would be needed to avoid injury and damage (with cars the Province licenses, other insurance companies cover risk - who could do it in this case? would it be needed?)
This idea is in line with
This idea is in line with where we see markets evolving. A simpel approach to satsify consumer needs while making a positiive impact on the environment.
Sharing
The idea is great and consistent with emerging trends and vetures around the world.
I have the same questions:
1. What is the business model for membership? Who pays, how much, who collects, who does it go to?
2. Who controls access?
3. Do neighbours contribute their own items? How is inventory built?
4. I am suspicious about corporate engagement since you are actually threatening to reduce revenue (why sell one drill when they can sell fifty?). What corp partnerships do you imagine?
5. Where are these going to be located? Land is hard to secure, no?
great idea... more detail on the model is needed...
This sounds like an awesome
This sounds like an awesome opportunity to 'get people's feet wet' for more collaborative community involvement
Could libraries help?
Sharing is great -- reduced resource use, increased community, save money, etc. Just like peak energy use -- where the electricity system is built for the hottest, highest-demand day -- one can imagine peak demand days for garden tools, when the weather is nice and everyone wants the lawnmower, or whatever.
Is there some optimum amount of shared stuff, so that X% of demand is filled and some 'perk' for those who can wait, or some other way to address the fact that there will be peak days that the share-shed can't service everyone?
It occurs to me that LIBRARIES have perfected the art of sharing for centuries. Maybe the library system could be part of the sharing network?
unstash
To me this is the physical manisfestation of unstash, another project in this competition. Unstash operates its shared economy online. What sort of problems do you forsee in locating the physical space for these community sheds?
You mention using Facebook, but not in what way. Could you implement a similar system to unstash to ensure that everyone knows when tools are available?
Grows community spirit
Very cool idea, I already car share and the concept does seem to translate here. I think GardenShare could also help build a sense of community spirit and connection.
Having the most environmentally efficient tools would be important for me as a participant. The pollution from poorly operating/ inefficient fossil fuel burning yard tools is really bad - I would like good electric tools, sharp bladed push mowers and preferably organic soil amendments to be offered.
Interesting
Implementing this would be awesome, and will cut down on costs. Your idea seems very similar to unstash.
This would cut down on costs, but how does it reduce pollution? The equipment would be on for the same amount of time.
great idea
I always hate the idea of building a shed just to store stuff. Where do townhome mgmt companies store their things?
Garden of delights
In general I like this idea in terms of making community resources available. I am not sure though that there are real carbon emission savings that will be realised by this system. Perhaps that could be addressed by focusing on hand tools and push mowers rather than power tools.
I am also not clear about the target audience for the project. This seems to be directed at middle income communities, but I am not sure that in those communities access to tools is really a barrier and that this type of program would be taken up. However, there is a need in low income communities for access to tools and this kind of program might be better suited with that focus in mind.
I agree with other comments as well that issues related to cost, membership fees and security have not been adequately responded to in the proposal.
Urban Gardening
The good news is that urban gardening and farming are experiencing a renaissance in Significant amounts of food are cultivated by entrepreneurial producers, community gardeners, backyard gardeners, and even food banks, in vacant lots, parks, greenhouses, roof tops, balconies, window sills, ponds, rivers, and estuaries.
gardening has been connected to reducing risks of obesity (children and adults), coronary heart disease (for women and for men, notably menopausal women and elderly males), glycemic control and diabetes (adults, elderly men, and occupational injuries (railway workers).
This proposal can benefit all by: Cultivate a Healing Garden on idle land at your health department or facility. Work with local planners and policy makers to establish urban agriculture opportunities. Provide support for community-based gardening projects. Support the national 'farm-to-school' movement. Support a ''Garden at every school" program.
Garden share
This is very good initation. Sharing community place and gardens is very good proposal. People will learn to live together rather than living with same community people.
Strenght of this proposal is it will help people to live together and share their culture and moreover, it will help to improve environment.
Drawback is to see if poeple are really willing to share or not.
This proposal is kind of risky. i would like to see if poeple really help to make it happen or not. This proposal will be improved by working on this project as entreprenuer.
Great idea!
I love the idea of garden sharing but there seems to be a lot of groups in the city already doing this (Fresh City Farms, Carrot City, Not-far-from the tree). How will this project be different from some of the others that already exist?
I think working some of the existing programs would be a good start. You could also work with groups like the Green Change agents at the Jane and Finch Community Centre. They have already started working within the community to teach residence how to grow food on their balconies. I'd love to see more focus on growing food in Toronto's Food Deserts.
Great Idea
Most apartment/new homeowners do not have this type of equipment. This idea is great and I love the sharing aspect of it. I would hope it would simulate a sense of community between members.
I am sure many people also have old but good tools that are just sitting in sheds could be donated to the cause!
Nice, simple concept
I can see this one taking off in the not-too-distant future. Relatively simple to execute AND to comprehend the benefit to communities and residents. Great idea. Hopefully it would bring neighbours together in ways that they aren't, currently. And add value to neighbourhoods! I could see first-time home buyers giving preference to neighbourhoods with GardenShare sheds in them..
The average power drill only being used for 15 minute in its lifetime - mind blowing!
Can the GardenShare membership card get me discounts at participating retailers?
I think it is a good idea for
I think it is a good idea for this idea to be used for apartments/condos too and can be stored in a room at the bottom of the apartment. Also perhaps community gardens can be developed with volunteers maintaining them who like gardening.
perhaps friendly community contests and things like that such as a contest for the best looking squash or biggest vegetable, but I suppose that can be done amongst groups if they are up for it.
Damaged goods
I can see the issue arising from items being damaged and or need for replacement after being.
Have you made a general depreciation / maintenance vs. repair analysis
By cultivating a non
By cultivating a non-consumerist, cooperative attitude in communities, this program could be a great opportunity to promote the kind of values that will make positive environmental change truly sustainable.
looks great
Strength: inspiring closer-knit communities as people share tools etc
Weakness: need to factor in loss/maintenance/repair cost
yawp!
Wonderful idea with potentially impressive outcomes
I think there are great
I think there are great opportunities for partnership in this model - both within the urban gardening community but also with local foodshare organizations, farmers markets, urban NGOS - they will all provide good avenues to promote and educate Torontonians about this initiative.
Sharing is caring....
Sharing is caring....
GreenHeroes Likes GardenShare
The concept behind this proposal is a good one and GreenHeroes supports this initiative - the strength is that it builds community through sharing of resources. The potenial for people to share ideas and stories as well as tools is compelling and there could be place to do this on --line associated with each shed. Certainly the concept of partnership with a concept like this would be compelling for GreenHeroes - the idea that there could be local contests and events associated with the sheds - hubs of activity and action all over the place. Bravo!
This project would benefit from collaborators - not sure why GardenShare says NO to this in its proposal. Perhaps an oversight? We would like to share the following webisode with your team. Building community through planting has a lot of potential to renew hope in Canadian society as the late Wangari Maathai proved in Kenya.
Love it
Builds community in addition to environmental benefits
So much good can come from this.
As someone who has recently benefitted from being lent a number of very expensive gerdening tools (chainsaw, push wreel mower, tree pruner and rake) I can't agree with this idea more. Often you don't need these tools very often, and this would help avoid trips to big box centres or rental centres.
The only weakness I can see is that on beautiful days the tools would be in very high demand. Weather doesn't play as much of a role in other sharing programs.
Once a strong base of members was established, I think you could take this program to all new heights that would benefit the community and the environment.
For example, what if people who grew vegetables were given a discount on their membership or free membership if they shared their produce with food banks or opened their back yards up for teaching sessions.
Discounts could also be given to volunteers who organize a community greening session such as a litter pick.
Great idea
Best of Luck!
Best of Luck!
Garden Share
Brilloiant ides!!
Timing to build this program
Timing to build this program would work in your favour to have everything in place for the upcoming spring. Excited to see this come to life in my neighborhood!
What's promising about this idea is that it takes into consideration a few key trends including the notion of shared consumption, minimizing cost per user while increasing the # of uses, and promoting healthier living and eating.
Good luck!
I would pilot in 2 communities first and then leverage those communities to share their stories, best practices, and learnings to help promote the adoption in other communities.
I love this idea!
I love this idea!
Include shovels, spades, weeders, etc to encourage more veggie gardening too.
The ClimateSpark Social Venture Challenge is a project of:
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Good start
I love this idea of sharing barely-used garden tools and appliances. Just a question on the community sheds -- where would these be located? Would it be a locker in one of the big storage facilities, or would they be spread out and placed right in the community, or was it more of a 'virtual' shed where most people just store what they have in their own garage?
Suggest a partnership with other collaborative consumption projects here on this site?