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Buy from a local shop!
Posted on February 14th, 2010 6 commentsI am always looking at new ideas for the business. I see what the competition is doing and keep an eye on their prices. These “big store” guys like Best Buy and Staples drive me nuts. I’m sure some of them provide good services but from what I’ve heard and read most of them do not. The arrogant college guys/gals that you deal with are enough to make you suicidal. They do not offer advice, they are only trying to up sell. Most of the time they don’t even know what they are doing, they are as bad as overseas support that reads from a script. Now I can’t say that all small shops are good. I know there are a few local guys and shops that only care about money and won’t be honest with customers and provide good advice.
I was looking through a Staples ad a couple of weeks ago and something caught my eye. I really wish I would have gotten a screen shot or a copy of the paper ad but I forgot. I was also hoping that the “offer” would be advertised for a few weeks. They offered 3 different services for new computer purchases. The middle option, “Uninstall unwanted programs and icons” is what caught my attention. You have to pay Staples $99 to remove craplets?? Well at least they also install up to two programs for you also. Now how about I buy a computer from a local shop? Their price is probably going to be roughly $99 more than at Dell.com or from Staples, but at least it shouldn’t come with craplets! Well unless you are lazy and just sell Dell computers like a local shop does. I guess it is too much work to piece together quality parts and build a good system for your customers??
I have to give Staples a little credit here though, at least they realize that the computers they sell are not really ideal. However I don’t think that 10 minutes of uninstalling items from Control Panel is worth $99! It is nice to see Staples trying to help us little guys out a little with these services. If customers actually pay attention (which they usually don’t) to the big picture rather than being cheap, they would buy their systems from us little guys!!6 responses to “Buy from a local shop!”
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Ben Boatwright February 14th, 2010 at 20:39
I think that the large companies simply market on the ignorance of its customers. If a customer comes in to the shop where I work and needs a sound driver installed, or some other random task that doesn’t take much time, generally I will do it while they wait. Not only that, but I will make sure their antivirus is up to date, and that there isn’t any obvious other problems with the machine. If I do find other problems (I.E. virus, hardware failure, etc.) I will tell them about it and advise them as to a course of action (action which will be taken at a later date). I will then charge them 10 bucks, 20 bucks at the most, and that is if my driver disks don’t work and I actually have to go to the manufacturer’s web site to get the driver.
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Benjamin Burrows February 14th, 2010 at 21:00
I failed to even touch on that.
That is something else that we do. Memory upgrades are pretty much free and if we aren’t too busy we’ll take care of it that day while they wait.
If something sounds simple and one of us has the free time we’ll take a look at something while the customer waits. Most of the time we do not charge them anything but then sometimes we’ll ask for $10 or $20.High speed Internet helps us all out a lot too. We’ll remote into customer or client computers and take care of a few things quick over the phone. Or for clients sometimes it turns into a small “service call” where they are charged but that is usually minimal.
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C. Blanche February 18th, 2010 at 08:01
I would purchase a computer from a local shop but the problem is warranty service. I am mobile. I travel and if I have a problem with my laptop that I purchased from a local shop I cannot get any service without paying for it. If I purchase it from BestBuy along with a warranty, I don’t have the added cost for the warranty period, and the warranty is cost usually does not exceed the cost of one serious repair (like I got an lcd replaced when the laptop was in warranty).
Do small shops have a warranty service with a company that will service the computer in another city or state (OK we won’t go to country) but that is the question. You back your new computer builds but in a mobile society, is there a network of local shops that will service local shop builds from another location and it is covered under a warranty so I’m not paying out of my pocket other than for the initial warranty (during the warranty period).
My husband purchased a new laptop and even though he saw the benefit of purchasing local, he travels. HP, Toshiba, even Acer can service his computer no matter where he is, or have authorized service centers (sometimes local shops) that will service it under the 4-year warranty he purchased.
Until local shops form a network that can offer the type of warranty support stores like BestBuy and Staples can offer, it will always be a hardsell for non-tech customers to purchase from you. Unless of course, they have no plans to travel or move from the immediate area. And remember, the local shop network could sell warranties, a new revenue stream. You could sell warranties to service out of warranty laptops and computers (because that is what you do anyway) which would help your customers be able to control their computer repairs costs. Just an idea.
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Benjamin Burrows February 18th, 2010 at 08:29
Something else I didn’t touch on and really I was mainly focusing on Desktop computers. Very good points though that we are quite a mobile society and all of your concerns are valid.
There may be small networks already in the works? I have not checked into that because I personally do not believe in extended warranties, well at least not for everyone. I think in your case an extended warranty is a good investment, however in most cases they are just an additional revenue stream for the big stores.
The laptop and mobile market is a more difficult one to get into. Even with the efforts from Intel and others the “white box” laptops do not offer a great value or opportunity for small shops. I am not a big risk taker either so I haven’t jumped into building laptops. I have been checking and watching prices for the last 4 years though but they have not come down enough.
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Ben Boatwright February 21st, 2010 at 20:20
I know what you mean about warranties. The shop where I work gives a one year service warranty on every box we build, but unfortunately with the volume of repairs that we do, sometimes the customer has to wait a couple of days. We even do discounted virus removal for a year, and that has absolutely nothing to do with us! That’s all user error right there. You get a warranty through Best Buy or something, there’s no telling how long you’re going to wait, and whether your data will still be intact when you get your machine back. Manufacturers are no better…
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Ben,
I am a maintenance provider for Best Buy and had the opportunity to do some work near their Geek Squad area. The conversations I overheard were outrageous. One of Geeks was given “attitide” by a customer who could not log on to their laptop. Rather than discussing the options to the customer calmly, he went to the back room where he pretty much told other members that the customer can go get F’d. He decided the customer would have to pay for a reformat and there would be no option to save or recover any data from the drive. Understandably he was upset about the customer but the customer may still have irreplacable data that should have been saved. Thankfully I never depend on anyone for my computer issues, especially these Geeks with a chip on their shoulder. I feel sorry for those who are not computer saavy.
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