by unSeminary: Your parking lot is the very first of first impressions that guests at your church experience.

When was the last time you thought about how to improve that experience?

Is the parking experience at your church turning people off before they even get to your building?

What is your parking lot communicating to people who are looking to attend your church?

Recently I reached out to some church leader friends and asked the question: “What’s the biggest “facility lid” that is holding you back?” It was fascinating how often parking issues were raised as concerns that church leaders had. Here are just a few examples of what leaders like you had to say:

Not enough parking along with unpaved grounds too soggy to park on.We are full in the parking lot when our auditorium is only about 65-70% full. By far, the biggest issue is parking given we share a lot with another church that moved in across the street from us.

Your parking lot is an essential piece of infrastructure that can easily be overlooked by church leaders. If you don’t address the parking issues at your church, you might be limiting the redemptive potential of your church.

Consider what other people-oriented organizations do for parking. Have you ever stopped and looked at the amount of parking at Walt Disney World’s Magic Kingdom in relation to the size of the actual theme park? Or look at how much parking space a Walmart has in any town across the country? How does that compare to what your church is attempting to do with your parking? Here are five ways to improve the parking situation at your church that (mostly) won’t break the bank.

Get Clarity on the Issues

When was the last time you saw your parking lot on “game day”?

Most church leaders arrive before the majority of people get to the church and are gone long after the crowds have exited. This fact can give you a skewed sense of what happens with your parking. You need to get clarity on what happens in your parking lot during any given week.

Zoning bylaws have created a situation that causes parking issues in lots of churches. In most cases, the zoning requirements when your building was put together means that you don’t have enough spots to function comfortably as a church. The issue is compounded when you’re settling on the project costs because parking can be expensive to do well and means that fewer interior spaces are built in your building. These two realities have left lots of churches with not enough parking to go around.

Here are a few ways to get clarity on what’s happening in your parking lot on Sunday mornings:

Greet Guests // Spend some time on a few weekends in your parking lot greeting guests. You’ll pick up what happens and some potential areas for improvement. The real-life input from your people will be invaluable as you attempt to get better at this. Video  // Mount a small video camera, like a GoPro, on the roof of your building and record your parking in action. You’d be amazed how a time-lapse video quickly identifies problem spots on the operation of your parking lot. Data // It would be good to get some measurable data on how many cars use your parking lot. What is the ratio of vehicles to actual attendance? I’ve seen lots of time that it’s one car for every two people attending. Getting data on how your parking lot functions will give you options to move forward.

Get Team Members Out There … Every Week!

One of the fastest and most effective ways to improve your guests’ parking lot experience is to build a volunteer team to make it better!

Your team should focus on making the parking experience both “faster and funner” for your guests. If your team can help your guests get to their spots quickly in a more pleasant manner, that would be a win!

3 Ways Your People Could Make Parking Faster

Direction // Giving clear paths of exactly where to go as guests enter the parking lot will reduce hesitation and potential bottlenecks. Load Balancing // Rather than people just picking where they want to go, have your team fill the parking lot one section at a time. Fine Tuning // Sometimes certain spots are a little tricky to navigate for guests. Ensure team members are proactively helping people.

3 Ways Your People Could Make Parking More Fun! 

Extra Help // Empower your team to look for guests that need extra help getting from their car to the building. (Single parents, elderly, etc.) Lending a helping hand goes a long way! Music // What if your team set up speakers and had high energy music playing as people got out of their cars? This communicates joy and builds anticipation for what’s about to happen. High Fives & Big Waves // You’d be amazed how far a great big high-five or a goofy wave to kids in the backseat of a van go towards making a fun parking experience! ?

Ensure that you build a team that’s committed to being in the parking lot every weekend of the year. In the northern climates, that means suiting up your squad with winter jackets! In the south, that means ensuring the team is well-hydrated in those long summer Sundays!

Increase the Signage 

After your team has been in the parking lot for several weeks, it will become apparent where they could use some signage to help guests.

Signage can be a relatively inexpensive solution to making your parking lot experience better. You’d be amazed at how a few hundred dollars could go a long way to make this a clearer and more pleasant experience for your people. Here are just a few examples of simple signage to improve your parking experience:

Welcome | Thank You A-Frames // Simple A-frame signs that welcome guests as they arrive and then on the back, thank them for coming as they leave!Feather Flags // These add energy to the parking lot and can serve as guidance for people on which entrance to head towards. “New Here” Parking // Signs that help point guests towards special parking for people who are new to the church. Parents with Kids Parking // There might be a part of your parking lot that in which it makes more sense for parents with young kids to park. Walk This Way // Signs that point people where to head once they get out of their car.

Multiply Services 

Church leaders are most likely to see a packed auditorium and be motivated to launch a new service. Sometimes they will respond to children’s ministry workers who are talking about the fact that those environments are too full. However, a full parking lot is one of the last-to-be-noticed growth “pinch points” that could be holding back your church.

Count the number of available spaces, and work with your parking team to maximize those spaces or find other reasonable solutions. Like the main auditorium, if you are reaching somewhere around 70% capacity in your parking lot during a service, then you need to start thinking about adding another service.

If you don’t have empty spaces in your parking lot, it’s time to launch more services. 

The multiplication work that is required to launch another service will help your church develop new leaders and will stretch your team to reach new people. Particularly when you consider the financial cost of acquiring more parking spots, this is usually the best option.

Resurface & Restripe 

Finally, you might just need to exercise the most capital intensive option and change the parking lot.

A civil engineering firm could do a parking study on your space that could garner you more spots on the same size parking lot. They can look closely at the current “best practices” for parking lots and squeeze more cars in.

Over the years, the way we design parking lots has changed, and often a second opinion on the layout is worth the investment. (Also: you might have a volunteer within your church who does this work for a living and could give you an educated guess before you even invest any money!)

Investing in a resurfaced parking lot with a new parking scheme not only gets you more parking spaces but improves the visual appeal of the church. A freshly resurfaced parking lot looks fantastic! You’d be surprised at how economical this cost could be for your church to pursue.

Feeling the Growth Pinch? 3 Free PDF Resources for Church Leaders.  

If your church is feeling the pinch of growing, we have some additional resources to help you! These three PDFs are designed to be great discussion starters for your team. Use them to help guide conversations with your team around growth issues you might be facing. Click here to download free resources to help your church. In this download, you’ll receive 3 PDFS:

5 Ways Your Parking Lot Might be Holding Back the Redemptive Potential of Your Church5 Factors That Should Move Your Church to Add Another Weekend Service21 Easy Ways for Your Church to Be More First-Time Guest Friendly

Click here to download these resources!

Thank You to This Article’s Sponsor: HarperCollins Publishers

Grab Liquid Church: 6 Powerful Currents to Saturate Your City for Christ and read it with your team. It’s an inspiring & practical guide for reaching people in a post-Christian culture.

Pick-up your copy and enjoy the other free resources for your church at www.LiquidChurchBOOK.com

Source: 5 Ways to Improve Your Church Parking Without Breaking the Bank

The post 5 Ways to Improve Your Church Parking Without Breaking the Bank appeared first on Passion for Planting.

by Rich Birch: This weekend new guests will arrive at your church. Some will be visiting for the very first time, and they will want to know what your church looks like on a regular weekend. Church leaders who want to make a difference always look at how to make their church’s experience more compelling and engaging for new guests. Here are 21 things you can implement to make your church more first-time guest friendly:

Don’t Be Weird

As a general principle, please don’t be weird. Seriously, people coming to your church for the first time may be worried that it’s going to be strange and unfamiliar territory. They wonder if it’s going to connect with them and the life they are living today. Guests arrive at your church looking for people like them; they aren’t looking for people who are weird and strange but rather those they can connect with comfortably.

Clear Website

We all know that your church website is a critical communication piece for people deciding to check out your church. In fact, somewhere around 50% of new visitors will first visit your website to learn more about the church before attending. [ref] While it is important that your church website follows modern design approaches, it is even more critical that you consider the website from a first-time guest perspective. Ensure your website has everything they would need to facilitate their visit, including the following:

Easy to find address and service times
Access to past messages
Information on kids ministry
A sense of “what is important” to the church

“What to Expect” Content on Social Media

Your church can do a lot of different things on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and whatever other social media platforms you’re using. However, perhaps one of the best uses of these platforms is to provide a sense of “what to expect” for your first-time guests. Post lots of images from inside your environments so guests can see them in action. Use live video features of Sunday mornings to invite people to get in the car and join your church. Make highlight videos of your weekend experiences and share them. Think about these channels as a way to document and demonstrate what the life of the church looks like. (Check out what Road to Life Church in Northwest Indiana does with their weekly highlight videos on Facebook! So fun!)

Signage at the Road

First-time guests are likely very nervous when they drive up to your church. You can remove some of that fear by making sure that you have clear and compelling signage at the road in front of your church. Learn what the local bylaw limits are on temporary signage and go right up to those limits! Flags are a popular option for many churches because they might be categorized differently by your town, but they pack the same visual punch as other types of signs. “Sandwich board” signs are great tools to point people in the right direction in your parking lots. Even something as simple as branded safety cones give an added touch to indicate to first-time guests that you are ready for them.

Signage at the Doors

Count the number of doors on the outside of your church. Most leaders will be shocked by how many different ways people can get in and out of the building as we often think people only come in through one or two sets of doors. It needs to be super obvious where you’d like people to enter. If you have a door that’s better for families to arrive at then make that clear too. Think about this signage from multiple distances from the building. Is it obvious when they get out of their cars? What should it look like in order to direct the people who are 35 feet away? Is there something you can do for the people who are right at the door?

Decluttered Lobby

Entering the lobby needs to feel peaceful and inviting. Someone should be assigned the role of decluttering the space on a regular basis. It often seems like church lobbies can be magnets for all kinds of stuff over time, and we need to intentionally remove the visual and spatial noise to ensure that our guests can focus on their experience when they arrive. Be vigilant in removing anything and everything that isn’t 100% needed to help people throughout their visit. Be ruthless and even remove those extra plants and pieces of furniture that aren’t adding anything. Airports are a good benchmark to use with your team on how our lobbies should feel. A good airport is visually appealing, has great signage, and is designed to move people somewhere. Our lobby spaces should do the same!

Clear “Wayfinding” Signage Inside the Doors

A big part of our role when responding to first-time guests is to remove all the guesswork from their experience. Our job is to make it as simple as possible for them to experience what our church has to offer. Stand at the various entrances to your church and ask yourself how you could use signage to make it even easier for visitors to understand where to go. Too many churches are designed by looking at drawings, and we subconsciously assume people will be naturally drawn to where they should go next. This problem is exacerbated by architects who think their designs are inherently intuitive and put too much trust in subtle features like carpet colors and wall angles to move people along. As soon as people step into your building they should see clear and bold signage that answers four questions:

Where do I drop off my kids?
Where can I get a cup of coffee?
Where are the bathrooms?
Where is the service happening?

First-Time Guest Check-In at Kids Ministry

First-time guests who are also parents can be nervous leaving their children with your kids ministry team. In an age of “helicopter parents” you need to ensure that you go out of your way to make this entire experience as engaging and welcoming as possible. Your church no doubt has some sort of secure check-in process for kids ministry. At that location, it’s important to dedicate a team member to help first-time families through this process. Ensure this person is well trained and free to walk these guests through the drop off and answer any questions they may have. This person might not be busy the entire morning, but the moment a first-time family arrives they should jump into action and be ready to help.

“New Here?” Kiosk in the Lobby

Are guests a big enough deal to your church that you dedicate a space to them in your lobby? Have you ever noticed that first-time guests arrive earlier to your church than your average attender? What do those guests do when they arrive? If your church had a dedicated “New Here?” kiosk in the lobby hosted by some fantastic team members, they could start the connection process right away. During your service if you offer your guests a gift, then the natural place for them to pick it up would be this location. Too many churches lose the chance to connect with guests because it’s unclear where they should go after the service to pick up this gift. A dedicated “New Here?” kiosk provides a simple landing zone for guests and helps your volunteers prepare better than if they were at a general “information desk” fielding a wide variety of questions.

More Greeters and Ushers

Your church needs more team members dedicated to ensuring guests are finding their way. This means more than just “human signage”; greeters and ushers help to humanize the experience. They should be trained to guide people through their visit but also be keeping an eye out for people with that “I’m new here” look on their faces. When they encounter these guests, they need to leave their posts and help these people in whatever way they can. In order to do this, you need more greeters and ushers to backfill when these team members jump into helping new guests. Some churches designate specific members of this team to “swim the lobby” and look for people who might need a little extra care and connection. Either way, this team can’t be staffed at a minimum level and provide the sort of service that prioritizes first-time guests.

Sparkling Bathrooms

Bathrooms are a big deal. I’m convinced that guests make a lot of assumptions about your church based on your bathrooms. They need to be clean and in good working order; additionally, having a team member wipe down the counters multiple times on a Sunday morning is a nice touch. If you are looking for a way to add an extra “pop” to your bathroom, you could add those convenience baskets full of supplies like hand lotion, mouthwash, and other helpful items. Think about that time you went into a restroom at a theater or restaurant and it literally “wowed” you. Is there any way to aim your amenities towards that standard? The bathrooms need to be more than just clean; they need to sparkle!

Team Members in T-Shirts

A part of helping people who are new to your church feel welcomed is to ensure that they know where to direct their questions. We ask team members to wear t-shirts because it allows our guests to identify those individuals who can answer their questions. Prevailing churches have been employing this tactic for a long time, and it really does help guests know who to connect with. The t-shirts need to be in a color and design that stand out and get the guests’ attention. The goal of these shirts isn’t that your volunteers will wear them in other contexts but rather should stem from the intention to help your guests!

Put Away the “Backstage” Stuff

When you have guests over to your home you tidy up and put stuff away. You close the garage door because nobody wants to see the lawn mower and fertilizer when they first arrive. In our house, we put away the blender that normally sits on the kitchen counter because it doesn’t quite match the look we’re going for in that room. The same principle should be true at your church on the weekends. Look around your space and make sure you put away things that just don’t need to be out in the open. There’s no need to have that vacuum sitting out over there in the corner. That stack of chairs that gets used on Wednesday should find another home. We don’t need people to see into the utility closet where the HVAC system is humming along. All of those supplies that help prepare our spaces should be out of sight every weekend.

Calming People in Kids Ministry Area

Kids ministry can be a high energy, exciting aspect of our church. We need to have a lot of over-the-top, fun leaders that infuse these programs with lots of energy. However, this area can sometimes be overwhelming for people who are new to the church. Beyond that first moment when people are guided through the check-in process, it’s helpful to have team members roam the halls of our kids ministry areas during critical check-in and check-out times looking for parents to reassure. Lots of new parents struggle with leaving their kids and do the long, slow walk away while looking back. This is perfectly normal and understandable! Inviting churches will have leaders attuned to parents who are having a bit of trouble separating and will reach out to reassure them with a calm demeanor.

Unassuming Worship Leaders

Worship leaders who don’t assume that everyone in the room is on the same page are a gift to guests at your church. A worship leader that realizes that it’s not about the people in the first couple of rows but rather about engaging the guys who stand at the back sipping coffee is worth so much to your church. Worship leaders do this through knowing (and loving) their community, careful song selection, thoughtful verbal transitions, and a desire to constantly improve. It’s not about watering down the worship experience, but making it more broadly accessible to everyone in attendance.

Jargon Free Service

Language at our churches can be littered with confusing jargon if we’re not careful. Jargon, by definition, is a subtle social tool used in groups to define the boundaries of who is a part of the group. We need to go out of our way to explain exactly what we mean when we communicate. Our goal as leaders that want to create space for people in our churches is to break down these terms so that they are more inclusive. In fact, if you listen to those who excel at teaching churches filled with unchurched people, you’ll notice that a large portion of their time is spent on defining terms. Find the jargon in your midst and root it out! Here are a few terms to start working on removing or at least explaining to people when or if you do use them:

The Lord is working in my heart.
During my quiet time…
…a lost sheep, straying from the fold.
We will have a time of communion and fellowship…
…hedge of protection…
Let me share my testimony with you.
I’d like to share one of the burdens on my heart.
Do you know where you’re going to spend eternity?
Lord willing…

Clear Acknowledgement of Guests from the Stage

Going back to the example of guests visiting your house, can you imagine how weird it would be at Thanksgiving dinner if your large extended family had three to four guests with you and you never stopped to acknowledge them? In fact, imagine if everyone just spoke to them like they were always with your family for dinner all the time. By the end of the meal your guests would be totally creeped out by the fact that no one acknowledged that they were indeed visiting and were new to the family. When your church doesn’t go out of the way to acknowledge from the stage that there are guests attending it puts people in a strange spot. They are left wondering if the church never gets guests or, even worse, that maybe the church doesn’t want guests! A simple message of welcome paired with a clear “next step” is an important piece of the puzzle. Regular attendees might feel weird that you are calling out to guests every week, but you need to push through this resistance and keep acknowledging them!

Invitation to a Clear “Next Step”

How do people get connected at your church? If people want to go beyond just “checking out” the church and get plugged into community, what steps do they need to take? Having a simple, obvious, and clear next step for your guests reassures them that not only do they have the opportunity to get connected further, but it also lets them know what steps to take in order to do so. If it’s unclear to our guests what they should do when they want to get plugged into community, then only a small fraction of them will take those steps. It’s up to us to make it clear for them!

Parking Lot Team

I was recently visiting a growing church on a Sunday morning. After one service, myself and a senior leader left one of their campuses and were en route to another location. We got stuck in the inevitable long line of cars leaving the parking lot that happens at so many churches. This leader commented to me that they’ve never seen this line up because they are always inside the church at that time of the morning. As we chatted while waiting, you could see the wheels turning in the leader’s head about launching a parking lot team. Most churches would benefit from a team of people in the parking lot to help facilitate guests as they arrive and leave. This added level of care reassures guests that we are expecting them and helps ease this process as much as possible. We know how important first and last impressions are on people who attend our churches, so let’s invest in launching teams that will help us craft those experiences well!

Faster and Friendlier Follow Up

Many churches ask for guest contact information in some form or another. Lots of churches ask for this information in exchange for a gift that costs the church money to acquire. Most of our churches have invested significantly into database infrastructures to store and access guest contact information. All of those investments are wasted if we don’t follow up with our guests when they visit with us. How quickly? You should be following up faster than you are now. If you wait until Tuesday to email people who came last weekend, I would recommend moving that follow up back to Sunday evening. We should also be pushing towards our follow up being friendly and engaging rather than mechanical and digital. Phone calls or hand-written notes always beat out emails. We live in a world where people don’t just throw around their contact information. When someone gives you their contact information they are making it clear that they expect you to be in contact. Exceed that expectation and help people get connected!

A Compelling Reason to Come Back Next Weekend

Guests journey through visiting your church with one question filtering everything they experience: Why should I return to this church? From the moment their car enters your parking lot until they leave for home, they are wondering if they would ever come back. A part of our job is to give people a reason to come back the following week. Whether it’s a plug about a juicy question the speaker is going to talk about next week or something fun happening in kids ministry the following Sunday, you need to lace the experience with reasons for people to come back. Ask your guests to return the next weekend and give them a reason to do so! Ensure that you weave hints throughout the morning as to what’s coming up to encourage them to visit your church again!

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Source: 21 Easy Ways for Your Church to Be More First-Time Guest Friendly – unSeminary

The post 21 Easy Ways for Your Church to Be More First-Time Guest Friendly appeared first on Passion for Planting.

by Rich Birch: Believe it or not, your parking lot could be the thing that is holding back the potential of your church. In fact, your church might not be living up to its total calling because of what is happening at the parking lot. We call this site unSeminary. Today, we’re diving into an issue we can guarantee that no seminary has talked about anywhere before:

Your Parking Lot Might be Limiting the Redemptive Potential of Your Church!

Cars have a profound impact on the manner in which we “do” church across the country. As the adoption of the car took off in the first half of last century, our approach to churches changed and morphed accordingly. The local parish gave way to the regional church which ended up paving the way for the entire mega-church movement, which became a fertile ground for the multisite movement. We would do well to understand the impact of cars and connecting our parking lots to our ministry because they are so connected to what we do. Here are a few ways that parking lots might be negatively impacting your ministry.

A Full Parking Lot is Limiting Your Church

Obviously, most church leaders are inside their buildings when their services start. Your people might know that you have a problem and you’re never around to see it. Full parking lots are a great sign because that implies lots of people are attending your church. However, if they are “too full” like a packed auditorium, it can actually turn people off.

Most municipalities’ bylaws are inadequate to tackle the required parking spots per seat in the main auditorium. Lots of cities typically only require 1 spot for every 4 seats in your auditorium. (I know one city by us that only requires 1 for every 40!) My experience suggests that your church needs 1 spot for every 2 seats in your auditorium. Most legacy church buildings were not built with this much space and might get cramped every week.

If your parking lot is more than 70% full as your services are starting, it’s time to start looking for better parking solutions. You want your guests to be able to find a spot easily.

Four Tactics for Dealing with a Full Parking Lot:

Street Parking // Diving into your municipalities parking bylaws might reveal that your area allows street parking on Sunday. In many regions, the rules pertaining to weekend street parking are different during the week. It’s worthwhile investing the time to figure out if this type of opportunity exists on the streets around your building.
Cross Use Agreements // Look around your immediate neighbors and find someone who you could borrow spots from. Oftentimes, other businesses and organizations will be open to you using their empty parking spots. However it’s much better to approach them and talk about it rather than just starting to use it.
Park Your Leaders Off Site // Those who volunteer and lead at your church should be encouraged (or even required) to park off your location. Cast vision with them around the idea of creating more space for visitors and ask them to do the extra walk.
Shuttle Buses // Churches facing a more acute parking problem might need to resort to off-site parking that isn’t adjacent to their property and might need to offer remote parking supported by shuttle buses. This approach should ideally be the “last stop” before you look at building more parking spaces. It can be a great solution and provide good service for families connecting with your church.

Church Parking Lots without Volunteers Are Missed Opportunities

If your church doesn’t have people serving on a parking team, you must know that people within your church are missing out on a perfect service opportunity. Over the years, I’ve found that churches that have parking teams are actively engaging a group of volunteers that lots of other churches seem to be unable to connect with. I love the churches that have parking teams which espouse an almost superhero-like ethics as they serve outdoors all year long. “Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays this team from the swift completion of their appointed service” … even the postal service can’t claim that anymore!

Your church grows when more people get plugged in and they spread the word among their friends. As you get this group of volunteers plugged into your church, they will start telling other people. Also, churches develop faster when they see more people getting plugged into the community. As you move a group of people from anonymity to community through serving on a team, the church is inevitably strengthened.

5 Tips for Launching a Parking Team

Start with the Who // The team leader is critically important for this team. (Any team, really!) Find an outgoing team builder who doesn’t mind asking people to join the team. Typically these are high energy folks because it takes a lot to push and stay outdoors all year long!
Launch in a Mild Season // Please don’t launch this team in July if your church is in Florida, or in January if you’re in the upper peninsula of Michigan. Launch the team in a “shoulder season” where your team can effectively do its task before the heat or cold sets in.
Consider the Uniform // Give your people something to wear that will help them stand out while serving. Think about the different kinds of weather when considering various parts of the uniform.
Training! Training! Training! // Make sure to think through exactly what kind of experience you want your guests to have upon their arrival. Talk it over with the team before they start. Draw it out on a diagram or two for the visual learners. Oftentimes, theme parks do a fantastic job of parking people. Maybe you could take your people to visit a theme park to watch and understand what they do.
Celebrate Lots! // This team needs lots of public celebration and admiration. These people are considered to be heroes of the church because of what they do for you. Talk lots about them from the stage and celebrate their service. You can’t overemphasize how amazing this group of people really is!

Your Church’s Parking Lot is a First Impression … all week long!

The first thing that most people typically see about your church is your parking lot. This is not only the case on weekends when your guests arrive, but also all week long as most people just drive by your parking lot.

I’ve seen some churches with a small forest growing between the cracks in the parking lot by communicating that it’s a very long time since anyone parked there. We’ve all seen a worn out parking lot that hasn’t been painted since the Spice Girls were on Top 10 radio and it all looks far too depressing.

Stand back and look at your parking lot. If it were the only thing that people knew about your church, what would it communicate? For most of us, it is the only thing people know about and identify with our churches because they simply drive by and don’t come in. Ensure your parking lot communicates that your church is welcoming and open for one and all!

On a related note … have you ever stopped to consider what your parking lot communicates if it’s empty throughout the week? All of our buildings have their heaviest usage during the weekends, but does that mean they’re completely empty during the week? Does an empty parking lot throughout weekdays implicitly communicate that your church isn’t relevant to the lives of rest of the people? Just wondering.

Is Your Parking Lot Holding Back Single Parents?

Today, 1 in 4 kids are raised by a single parent. [ref] If your church isn’t seeing at least that number of single-parent-headed families in your church, the onus may lie on the parking lot. Traveling with young kids can be particularly challenging as a single parent. By the time a single parent has arrived at your church, they have already braved a lot to make that happen. The last daunting task is getting out of the car and across your parking lot into your facility.

5 Ways Your Church Can Be More Single-Parent-Friendly in Your Parking Lots

Designate “Parent Parking” Spots // You don’t need to make these “single parent parking spots” because people do appreciate some level of anonymity. Having spots that are closest to the front and have easy access to your children’s ministry is a gift to all parents!
Train Leaders to Look for Single Parents // The simple act of helping a parent with a stroller in your facility can be a sign of selfless love and care. Having team members walk with single parents and help their kids get into your ministry can make all the difference.
Have “Fun Transport” Options // Wagons are a simple yet effective tool that some kids love to jump into and get driven into church in style. A next level option would be to have golf carts or even a tram! (I love the tram at Disney World!)
Umbrellas Are A Must // Train your people to look out for parents on rainy days to meet them with an umbrella at the car. There is nothing more thoughtful than when someone steps up beside your car with an open umbrella on a rainy day to help you get your kids out!
Great (Obvious) Signage // If you have two or three kids in tow, you are focused on keeping them safe coming across your parking lot. It can be difficult to discern where to go. You can’t make your signage too obvious to people. Make it better, simpler and brighter so that a frazzled parent doesn’t need to exhaust their brainpower to figure it out!

Parking Lots Are a “Hidden In Plain Sight” Stewardship Issue.

Finally, parking lots are expensive. It’s not uncommon for parking lots to cost at least $5,500 per spot on a fairly low complexity build. [ref] As a point of reference, let’s say your church has 500 seats in the auditorium with only 100 parking spots. You’d ideally like to add another 150 spots to match the 1 spot for every two seats we quoted above. After factoring in all the design, drainage, curbing, painting, etc., it would be an investment of $825,000 for your church – assuming that you don’t run into any significant problems along the way!

Once parking lots are built, they become a recurring maintenance issue that often gets differed longer than it should; ultimately costing the church more than it needs to. If your church doesn’t keep up with resurfacing and patching on a periodic basis, you can be forced into a situation where major renovations need to be done at a massive cost. No one wants to invest massively in maintaining a parking lot when there are so many other pressing ministry needs, but ignoring its significance may have severe consequences down the road. You should be looking at regular maintenance of your parking lots on a bi-annual or at least annual basis!

We often take this resource for granted and hence, it’s easy to not invest in. Typically, the cost of a parking lot gets hidden as part of a major capital expansion. This is why we don’t consider what an important resource it is to the church. Challenge that mindset because it really is an amazing tool for our ministry!

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Source: 5 Ways Your Parking Lot Might be Holding Back the Redemptive Potential of Your Church – unSeminary

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