Make San Antonio Membership Drive Update

A big thank you to all those who have supported us, gave us feedback, suggestions and well wishes. We appreciate all the help during this membership drive. As our membership drive comes to a close, we're well aware that we will not be reaching our 100 member sign-up goal. Therefore we will not be charging the members who did support us. Although this is a huge set-back for us we are going to take what we've learned through this process, make any necessary changes to what we had originally envisioned, discuss with our team how to proceed and continue to update you on our progress.

What's Next for Make San Antonio?

• We are going to bundle all our progress and set-backs to this point and present that to prospective investors to gauge interest. There are several avenues we can pursue beyond this investment but we would love to have a local investor mentoring and backing us in this endeavor before we move forward.
• Our January Second Saturday event was postponed due to inclement weather but we have committed to participating in an upcoming Second Saturday so we will be curating an art show at the Lullwood Group on April 11. Mark your calendar! 

Here's a recap of what we accomplished during our short push to our membership drive and the all of the lessons learned.

Lessons Learned:
The concept of a comprehensive makerspace (that doesn't actually exist yet) is a hard sell. What we had envisioned was to sign up people who were already familiar with the makerspace model and were excited about this type of space coming to San Antonio. Instead we came across many people who were not familiar with what a makerspace is and the benefits that this type of space would bring to the San Antonio community. We were eager to share our knowledge and enthusiasm of makerspaces with all those willing to hear us out. Many people suggested that if we already had a space where they could visit, see our vision and use some of the tools they would be more willing to back us.

Pricing was a question that most prospective members had which relates quite heavily to the above. Asking for a signup of $55 without seeing the value returned in that investment was what many people had difficulties with. Our pricing for our membership drive was set based on comparable makerspaces around Texas and the nation but we have since decided to work on different methods of membership as an initial option. We want our pricing to be customizable so that as members grow into the space they can add or remove certain areas of their membership and grow their skill set accordingly.

New Year | New Updates from Make San Antonio

Make San Antonians,

We have been busy moving forward with creating a space for makers to call their own. It's been quite a bit of work but we are starting to see the effort we're putting into creating Make San Antonio start to come together. Our vision is becoming a reality. Thanks to everyone who has signed up on our website and supported us through social media! We have been building a local buzz and hope makers in and around San Antonio benefit the most from each other and this space.

Our progress so far:

We were in the news! The Rivard Report published an article about how we came together, and where we're headed. Check out the article, Make San Antonio: Building a Community of Makers. 

Our team has met with some mentors and investors who have helped reinforce our Make San Antonio model and helped us refine the next steps for the business. We have also started narrowing down possible locations for our makerspace and the field now consists of just a handful of excellent buildings but we're always open to run suggestions through our list of criteria. Reach out to us if you know of a great space we should consider.

Here's a sneak peak of a possible build-out of our favorite of these locations: (5,600 sq/ft with 20+ parking spaces located close to downtown)

Here's what's coming up next for Make San Antonio:

Thanks again to all those to rushed to our aide and submitted artist proposals during our call-out. If you had not heard, our January 2nd Saturday Art Show at the Lullwood Group was postponed until spring 2015 due to inclement weather but we have regrouped and have some amazing makers signed up to present at our event. We'll keep you posted on further details! 

Also, just in time for Valentine's Day, look out for our Make San Antonio Membership Drive kicking off in February! We're going to be giving our first contributors membership perks and exclusive rights to dictate how the Make San Antonio space will look and what type of equipment we should focus on. We'll be working on a video shoot this Saturday, January 31, interviewing local makers for the membership drive. We provide food and snacks, you provide a few words about your love of making. If you're a maker, and would love to share your love of making, contact us at makesanantonio@gmail.com, and we’ll share more details.

Feel free to contact us at makesanantonio@gmail.com with any questions, comments or ideas.

Let's see what we can make together!

Thanks again for all your support.
Make San Antonio Team