diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
index 1fc5d9f24..2a8a6ac7c 100644
--- a/Makefile
+++ b/Makefile
@@ -27,6 +27,10 @@ bootstrap: generate-version-file ## Set up everything to run the app
 	createdb notification_api || true
 	(. environment.sh && flask db upgrade) || true
 
+.PHONY: bootstrap-with-docker
+bootstrap-with-docker: ## Build the image to run the app in Docker
+	docker build -f docker/Dockerfile -t notifications-api .
+
 .PHONY: run-flask
 run-flask: ## Run flask
 	. environment.sh && flask run -p 6011
@@ -39,12 +43,20 @@ run-celery: ## Run celery
 		--loglevel=INFO \
 		--concurrency=4
 
+.PHONY: run-celery-with-docker
+run-celery-with-docker: ## Run celery in Docker container (useful if you can't install pycurl locally)
+	./scripts/run_with_docker.sh make run-celery
+
 .PHONY: run-celery-beat
 run-celery-beat: ## Run celery beat
 	. environment.sh && celery \
 		-A run_celery.notify_celery beat \
 		--loglevel=INFO
 
+.PHONY: run-celery-beat-with-docker
+run-celery-beat-with-docker: ## Run celery beat in Docker container (useful if you can't install pycurl locally)
+	./scripts/run_with_docker.sh make run-celery-beat
+
 .PHONY: help
 help:
 	@cat $(MAKEFILE_LIST) | grep -E '^[a-zA-Z_-]+:.*?## .*$$' | sort | awk 'BEGIN {FS = ":.*?## "}; {printf "\033[36m%-30s\033[0m %s\n", $$1, $$2}'
@@ -177,8 +189,3 @@ disable-failwhale: ## Disable the failwhale app and enable api
 	cf unmap-route notify-api-failwhale ${DNS_NAME} --hostname api
 	cf stop notify-api-failwhale
 	@echo "Failwhale is disabled"
-
-.PHONY: run-celery-with-docker
-run-celery-with-docker: ## Run celery in Docker container (useful if you can't install pycurl locally)
-	docker build -f docker/Dockerfile -t notifications-api .
-	./scripts/run_with_docker.sh make run-celery
diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 223870d3e..479277228 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -61,10 +61,19 @@ export PATH=${PATH}:/Applications/Postgres.app/Contents/Versions/11/bin/
 
 ### Redis
 
-To switch redis on you'll need to install it locally. On a OSX we've used brew for this. To use redis caching you need to switch it on by changing the config for development:
+To switch redis on you'll need to install it locally. On a Mac you can do:
 
-        REDIS_ENABLED = True
+```
+# assuming you use Homebrew
+brew install redis
+brew services start redis
+```
 
+To use redis caching you need to switch it on with an environment variable:
+
+```
+export REDIS_ENABLED=1
+```
 
 ##  To run the application
 
@@ -82,6 +91,18 @@ make run-celery
 make run-celery-beat
 ```
 
+We've had problems running Celery locally due to one of its dependencies: pycurl. Due to the complexity of the issue, we also support running Celery via Docker:
+
+```
+# install dependencies, etc.
+make bootstrap-with-docker
+
+# run the background tasks
+make run-celery-with-docker
+
+# run scheduled tasks
+make run-celery-beat-with-docker
+
 ##  To test the application
 
 ```
diff --git a/app/config.py b/app/config.py
index 5277945c3..37b0f4619 100644
--- a/app/config.py
+++ b/app/config.py
@@ -428,7 +428,7 @@ class Development(Config):
     NOTIFY_EMAIL_DOMAIN = "notify.tools"
 
     SQLALCHEMY_DATABASE_URI = os.getenv('SQLALCHEMY_DATABASE_URI', 'postgresql://localhost/notification_api')
-    REDIS_URL = 'redis://localhost:6379/0'
+    REDIS_URL = os.getenv('REDIS_URL', 'redis://localhost:6379/0')
 
     ANTIVIRUS_ENABLED = os.getenv('ANTIVIRUS_ENABLED') == '1'
 
diff --git a/scripts/run_with_docker.sh b/scripts/run_with_docker.sh
index b423a7923..70933d111 100755
--- a/scripts/run_with_docker.sh
+++ b/scripts/run_with_docker.sh
@@ -9,11 +9,14 @@ source environment.sh
 AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID=${AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID:-"$(aws configure get aws_access_key_id)"}
 AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY=${AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY:-"$(aws configure get aws_secret_access_key)"}
 : "${SQLALCHEMY_DATABASE_URI:=postgresql://postgres@host.docker.internal/notification_api}"
+REDIS_URL="redis://host.docker.internal:6379"
 
 docker run -it --rm \
   -e AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID=$AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID \
   -e AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY=$AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY \
   -e SQLALCHEMY_DATABASE_URI=$SQLALCHEMY_DATABASE_URI \
+  -e REDIS_ENABLED=${REDIS_ENABLED:-0} \
+  -e REDIS_URL=$REDIS_URL \
   -v $(pwd):/home/vcap/app \
   ${DOCKER_IMAGE_NAME} \
   ${@}