Just realized our tool library's loan policy was too strict after a rainy Saturday

We had 40 people sign up for the drill press in one week, but only 12 actually picked it up because we required a $50 deposit upfront, and when a guy named Marcus showed up with his busted porch railing and no cash, watching him walk away made me flip on the whole thing, so now we're trying no-deposit borrowing for a month, has anyone else tried dropping fees to get more folks in?

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troymorgan22d ago

The part about Marcus and his busted porch railing really got me, because we had the exact same thing happen with our community garden tools last spring. We asked for a $20 deposit on the tiller and a dad with three kids just put his head down and left when he couldn't cover it. That image honestly haunted me for weeks, like we were keeping people from fixing their own stuff over pocket change. So we ditched the deposit completely and switched to a "just bring it back by Sunday" rule. Borrowing went up like crazy, and sure, we lost one cheap rake, but the amount of goodwill we got back was way more than twenty bucks. Sometimes the fee is the whole problem, not the tool.