Scheduling a Class
Note: these instructions were composed in November 2010 and involve creating a new advanced-maintenance-class posting on Eventbrite, based on the current (December 2010) Advanced Maintenance Class posting. The steps should be generalizable to other types of classes. If you have any questions about setting up a class, the first thing to do is email the Education Coordinator.
Contents
Give Yourself Some Lead Time
Post a class as far in advance as possible! At least two weeks is necessary for a class to fill up, but four or five weeks is a better lead time, especially if the class is a one-off or idiosyncratic one, like touring or wheel-building.
Creating a Class Page on Eventbrite
- Log in to Eventbrite.
- Login email: classes@bikekitchen.org
- Password: ask the education coordinator for password
- Go to the "My Events" page if you aren't directed there automatically. You will see a listing of Bike Kitchen events, grouped into "Live Events," "Drafts" and "Completed." These categories should be self-explanatory.
- The easiest way to create a new class is to copy an old class that's similar. Imagine for the moment that you want to post a January 2011 Advanced Maintenance Class. Click on the link (Either in "Live Events" or "Completed") for the "December 2010 Advanced Maintenance Class at the Bike Kitchen"; you will be taken to that event's page, where you should see "Manage," "Edit" and "View" tabs.
- You should also, on the right, see a set of buttons labeled "Unpublish," "Cancel," "Delete" and (most importantly) "Copy." Clicking the "Copy" button will pull up a page titled "Copy this event." You should put in your new event name (Here we'll use "January 2011 Advanced Maintenance Class at the Bike Kitchen") in the provided field and then click the "Copy Event" button. BAM. You'll now have a page for your new event, with all the relevant information cloned over from the old event.
- Why do it this way? All of the ticketing information, the class description and the like will already be filled in. Thus to make this a January 2011 rather than a December 2010 page, we need to do just four things:
- Change the "Event starts" date and time on the right-hand side of the page. (Note that we use the start date and time of the first session of the class.)
- Change the "Event ends" date and time on the right-hand side of the page. (Note that we use the end date and time of the last session of the class.)
- Change any date and time information that is mentioned in the "Add Event Details" box on the left-hand side.
- Change end time for all ticket sales to the day before the first class meets
- Create an easy-to-remember link for the event. Notice that below the "Add Event Details" box there is a field where you can personalize the link for the event. A nice way to do it is to set up "bkmonthyearclass"; in this case, then, the link would be "http://bkjanuary2011advanced.eventbrite.com. (as of 2017 you have to save a draft and then go to the manage tab)
- At that point, your new class is ready to post. You might want to "Save As Draft" and preview the page to make sure everything looks right; once you're sure, click the "Save & Publish" button to take the event live.
- Now that the class is created, you need to add it to our facebook "events" page using eventbrite. Eventbrite will prompt you to do this after creating the event, you can do it later by going to "Manage Event -> Invite & Promote -> Add to Facebook". You will need to be a facebook admin for our facebook page.
- Once you have done this, you need to send some emails. Go back to the Classes page to see who needs to get some information about the class!
Some More Details About Our Class Listings
Explaining Class Meeting Times
Most online ticketing services are designed for events that meet once (A festival, say) or for events that meet several times but that sell tickets for each meeting (A band playing several gigs at a club, say). We by contrast have classes that meet several times but we sell one ticket for all the meetings. This means that we have to use the start and end times on these sites to specify how long the total class runs and then explain in the event details the times when each class meets.
Thus for example with these training classes: assume that the December 2010 class meets on three Sunday mornings, the 5th, 12th and 19th, from 9-11.30am. We specify the start time as 5 December at 9am and the end time as 19 December at 11.30am. Then in the details we write that the class meets in three sessions, with the dates and times.
If you are setting up a class that just meets once, this won't be an issue. But if you're setting up a class that meets multiple times, you'll need to bear this in mind.
Explaining Ticket Types
Again, it's worth noting the contrast between a concert and one of our classes. At a concert there might be 400 seats and two types of tickets, Floor and Box, with 350 floor and 50 box seats available. Thus you'd create two types of tickets, each with its own price, specify how many of each you can sell, and set a total event capacity of 400.
We on the other hand offer a whole bunch of different ticket prices, because we charge our members on a sliding scale. Thus members can pay $45, $55, $65, $75 or $85; non-members can pay the same, plus $40 for an annual membership. This means we have ten different types of tickets for a class that might only have eight slots in it! It's therefore important to set up the availability correctly.
Consider the Advanced Maintenance Class, which does have ten ticket types for eight slots. Each of the ticket types has a Ticket Name, a Price, and a Quantity Available. The Quantity Available is set to eight, the total number of slots in the class. This means that if the first eight people to sign up all wanted to buy, say, $65 Member tickets, they could. Since we have ten types of tickets, this might look like we have made eighty tickets available, but this isn't the case. Back on the editing page, right below the ticket types, there is a field to enter in the "Event Capacity." This is specified to be eight. The trick here is that the Event Capacity kicks in before the tickets' Quantity Available does. Thus if we've sold eight tickets of any combination of types, no more tickets will be sold, because the event is full.
For this reason, we don't display the number of tickets remaining at each price, because it would be confusing to buyers. This is important: if you are setting up one of these events new, then down in the "Additional Options" at the bottom of the page you need to uncheck the "Show number of tickets remaining on the registration page" option, which is checked by default.
Ticket Pricing and Fees
We have raised our ticket prices from what they were when we used Brown Paper Tickets, by $5. Why?
The price that members pay for the classes is virtually unchanged. On Brown Paper Tickets, customers paid a ticket-processing fee in addition to the posted cost of the ticket. On Eventbrite, You have the option to fold that fee into the cost of the ticket. It makes no financial difference to us and almost no difference to the members whether we bundle these charges, but it seems better to give people one flat price to pay.
We do have to set this up when we create tickets for the first time. When you choose to create a ticket, one of the last options in the pop-up box is "Service Fee." You can choose to ADD this fee to the ticket price or INCLUDE it within the price. ADD is the default; we want to INCLUDE.
Related to this, on the main editing page you will see below tickets an "Edit Payment Options" link. The default is "Credit Card Processing," but we prefer "PayPal Payments." PayPal charges much lower fees for processing payments than the credit-card companies, and Eventbrite charges a correspondingly lower fee at any given ticket price. Everyone saves.
Again, most of these settings are already configured for you if you copy an existing event.
Some Sample Event Descriptions
These are useful both for pasting onto an event page and for including in an email announcing the event.
Advanced Maintenance
Over three weeks we will cover the installation, overhaul, adjustment and maintenance of the bicycle's bearing systems (headsets, bottom brackets, hubs), freewheels and cassettes.
No previous bike knowledge is required or expected, but a willingness to learn and have fun is a must! Note also that you don't have to take the Basic maintenance class before you take this one; they require different skills and we teach accordingly.
Class will be hands-on, so bring a functional bike and be ready to get greasy.
The fee for this class is a sliding scale: $45-85 for Bike Kitchen members or $85-125 for non-members. Enrolling in the class as a non-member also buys you a year-long membership at the Bike Kitchen. Class size is limited to eight. If you do not currently have a membership you MUST select a ticket price that has "Non-Member" in the description.
Refund Policy: due to limited resources, no refunds or re-scheduling can be offered. If you are unable to attend a paid class, your new membership is still valid and you are welcome to visit us during regular shop hours and speak to our staff mechanics.
The class takes place over three Sundays, December 5th, 12th and 19th, all 9:00-11:30am.
To buy tickets for this class, visit http://bkdecember2010advanced.eventbrite.com
Basic Maintenance
Over three weeks we will cover what is included in a basic shop tune-up: installing and removing tubes and tires (i.e. fixing a flat), installing brake and shift cables, adjusting brakes and gears, chain maintenance and truing wheels.
No previous bike knowledge is required or expected, but a willingness to learn and have fun is a must!
Class will be hands-on, so bring a bike and get ready to get greasy.
The fee for this class is a sliding scale: $45-85 for Bike Kitchen members or $85-125 for non-members. Enrolling in the class as a non-member also buys you a year-long membership at the Bike Kitchen. Class size is limited to ten. If you do not currently have a membership you MUST select a ticket price that has "Non-Member" in the description.
Refund Policy: due to limited resources, no refunds, or re-scheduling can be offered. If you are unable to attend a paid class, your new membership is still valid and you are welcome to visit us during regular shop hours and speak to our staff mechanics.
The class takes place over three Mondays, December 6th, 13th and 20th, all 7:00-9:30pm.
To buy tickets for this class, visit http://bkdecember2010basic.eventbrite.com
Wheelbuilding Class
Be good to have one; we haven't done it in a while
