commuting

Group Health Commute Challenge
Team Captain Toolbox

Team captains play a leading role in Cascade's Group Health Commute Challenge. Last year you collectively recruited over 2000 brand new bike commuters and cajoled another 8000 veteran commuters into riding more often. Way to go!

To help you a winning strategy for the Group Health Commute Challenge, we've assembled a simple toolkit including a sample timeline and inspirational ideas.

SAMPLE TIMELINE

This sample timeline will help you organize your team. You can find the full schedule of events on the external Bike Month website.

March	Start brainstorming Encourage your business to promote Bike Month Captain a table at the Bike to Work Breakfast
April	Registration opens April 1 Recruit new captains Recruit your team Plan a few fun activities for Bike Month Attend the Bike to Work Breakfast fundraiser on May 4 Plan a special Bike Month event at your workplace
May	Let's Ride! Challenge another team (or three!) Join us for the Captain's Bash at Pike Brewery on May 9 Join a Custom League Check in with infrequent riders. What's holding them back? Bike to Work Day is May 18 Stage a special event at your workplace
June	Celebration and Awards Party!

INSPIRATIONAL IDEAS

There are innumerable ways that you can build momentum for biking to work, among your team, your workplace, and your community. Below are our favorite suggestions gleaned from outstanding team captains of yore:

Inspire your team:

Ask team members to set goals.
Submit your team photo.
Create a short team video and be entered into our prize drawing.
Theme days (Lycra, business suits, super hero, etc)
Team feed: breakfast, lunch, or happy hour
Make sure new commuters have someone to ride with most days, but especially at the beginning of the month
Ride with each of your team members
Highs and Lows: ask your team to share their highs and lows of the day/week/month.
Challenge another team at your company.

Inspire others

Recruit and mentor new team captains.
Ask your business to promote the Commute Challenge.
Get your CEO to participate.
Share your successes stories via our blog.
Get your kids involved with Bike to School activities.

Email Templates

Feel free to use these templates to promote the Commute Challenge via email, online, or newsletters. Graphics and additional promotional ideas can be found here.

Recruit new captains

Dear ________,

Bike Month is coming up and I am captaining a team for Cascade Bicycle Club's Group Health Commute Challenge. The theme this year is "Let's Ride!" I'd like to encourage you to join the all-star cast of team captains.

As a team captain, you can significantly increase bicycle commuting at _________ (their worksite). Captains recruited over 2000 brand new bike commuters last year. Think about how valuable bicycling is to you, and multiply that by 2000...that's a lot of positive return for a modest investment of time on your behalf.

To start a team, you simply sign up online, recruit three to nine more coworkers to join you and encourage everyone to ride as much as possible throughout May. In fact, the hardest part may be coming up with a team name. (My team is ________________________.)

Cascade Bicycle Club offers up great support for captains, including a free t-shirt, free stuff to give your team, the legendary Captain's Bash at Pike Brewery with free beverages for you and a guest, a comprehensive toolkit, and prizes just for captains, including honors for Rookie Captain of the Year.

The challenge starts May 1st: start your team today!

Captain ________(your name)

_________(team name)

_________(business name)

Encourage business support

Dear __________ (title)

I would like to encourage ___________________(business) to participate in Cascade Bicycle Club's Group Health Commute Challenge. Bicycle commuting makes great business sense. Bike commuters are healthier and more productive employees. Bicycle parking is a fraction of the cost and space of car parking. Bike commuting is especially valuable to me as an employee because _____________________.

The Commute Challenge is a simple turn-key program that has significantly increased bicycle commuting among both new and experienced riders. Last year, 20% of participants were brand new commuters. That an impressive result.

What's more, it's very simple for businesses to participate. Team captains like me recruit and encourage riders. The riders track their own trips online. Cascade Bicycle Club provides a comprehensive business toolkit with email templates, newsletter blurbs, graphics, and inspiration.

At the very least, I'd like to ask you to promote the Commute Challenge to all staff. Please check out the Bike Month website for information and resources.

Captain ________(your name)

_________(team name)

_________(business name)

_________ Department