Because one man was frustrated by cookie cutter “solutions” and the gobbledygook of “Geek Speak,” the rest of us with just enough talent to turn a computer on and off can rest easier knowing this his attention to detail and full-tilt transparency make computer and smartphone repairs considerably more tolerable.
A little over ten years ago, Jim Brock took his personal computer to a big box store to figure out what was wrong with it. It was closed up and turned off when he placed it on the counter in front of a young “Special Agent” behind the counter. Without even bothering to turn the device on, the “agent” proceeded to diagnose the problem, and spewed a few minutes of “geek speak” to explain why he was reformatting the operating system. In doing so, he placed Jim’s files on a disc and gave it to him. Because he had no idea how to reload the files, he had to access the disc anytime he wanted access to his documents.
Brock says he watched that repetitive behavior over and over and couldn’t get out of his mind the fact that there had to be a simpler way to resolve your computer issues.
Rather than stew about it much longer, Jim Brock took matters into his own hands and founded Simple Computer Repair. That was in January of 2008. He had three basic premises and promises to those who entered his computer repair business: No opinions. No speculation or guessing. No geek speak. Oh, and always a free diagnosis backed by if there’s no repair…there’s no charge.
It’s a concept that has worked remarkably well because he now has nine shops in ten years time. Three are in Las Vegas, where he founded the company. One is in Phoenix, one is in Colorado Springs, there’s one in Maumee, Ohio (a suburb of Toledo), on in Shelby Township outside of Detroit, one in Stevensville and his newest shop in the Orchards Park Shopping Center down the strip from the Benton Harbor Secretary of State’s Office and driver license bureau.
He considers his operations the “anti” shops when compared to the big box ventures. He says No opinions means regardless of the product, you’ll never hear, “Hey, that’s an old computer…you need a new one,” or “Gee, no wonder it has viruses, it’s not a Mac!” You’ll never get opinions from Simple Computer Repair.
No speculation means they’ll never guess at what might be causing problematic symptoms like the “Hey, I think it’s a bad hard drive.” They’ll get to work, right in front of you — if you wish — to find what’s wrong with your computer or other device. He says a lot of folks like the transparency and will watch for a few minutes until they get bored and leave to do other things until the computer is repaired. There are no hidden, back room, areas at Simple Computer Repair shops. The work benches are clearly visible so you know instantly that the tech is not looking at your files, your tax returns, your pictures or anything else. They’re too busy actually getting the work done for you.
No geek speak generally speaks for itself. Plain English terms and no charge if there’s no work completed. If there is a repair, Brock says it’s at a flat rate. He notes that many shops charge by the hour, but it’s a flat rate at his shops.
He considers his design to be a neighborhood repair shop. In fact, he generally focuses on a small geographic radius of the shop. He says the beauty of the industry is “it all scales out.” He explains, “Whether we’re in the deserts of Las Vegas or here in Benton Harbor-St. Joseph, we all have devices, smartphones, tablets, and the like and everybody needs cords and such. We do everything ‘open air,’ in front of the customer.” He notes, too, that he never has to worry about what the next generation of a device will be…”We just have to repair it.”
Brock was in the wireless industry for 18 years and was always worried about “disruptive technology,” the next great thing. Now he just concentrates on how to fix each generation for the masses.
He started Simple Computer Repair to be a nationwide franchise and now has nine shops. His newest, in the Orchards Park Center, is actually for sale. He decided that sometimes it’s easier to sell a business as a turnkey operation, “So,” he says, “We thought if we could build it, sell it, and then go build another one, and become our own franchise developer, we just get a marketing company to sell new ones.”
His Stevensville operation, however, will not be for sale. That’s the new home office — a family business with his wife Michele — because he has sons in the Lakeshore School system. It was actually a concept store designed to determine if they could function in a community of 7,000 people. He says it was an absolute unknown but is going very well, otherwise he wouldn’t have established the Benton Harbor store.
There’s a distinct advantage to the Benton Harbor store in that he is right next door to T-Mobile which is next door to Sprint, and “just two shopping centers away” are AT&T and Verizon. He calls those “solution partners,” because when somebody breaks their phone and returns to their carrier, if there’s no in house solution they refer lots of customers to Simple Computer Repair where they fix smartphones every day. He says, smiling, “We constantly take those guys cookies and pizza to make sure we say thank you” for their referrals.
The Simple Computer Repairs shops in Benton Harbor and Stevensville are considered Express stations, because unlike the first six units, they deal largely with the simplest of repair solutions. The original concept was a shop filled with advanced repair equipment for mother boards and micro-soldering, but those are “crazy expensive,” with a need for advanced technicians to do the work. He notes, “When we shifted to the more rural America, we agreed we couldn’t really do that due to the substantial investments involved,” so they eliminated the more comprehensive gear and if smaller express shops can’t handle more advanced repairs, they can still ship to the original flagships that have the equipment for that degree of help.
The express model helps keep operating costs lower and more affordable for everybody.
One unique part of the equation is that all accessories in house are just $5 each. That includes all sorts of cases for phones, tablets, data cables, charging cables, and especially popular — the 10-foot long charging cables, which even he uses to be able to read from a tablet or phone in bed even while his device is charging.
They also offer wall adapters, car adapters, power banks, car holders for the dash or windshield, lanyards for car keys and media sticks, ear buds, tempered glass, hot sockets for better gripping of a smartphone and lots of things.
Especially hot are those hot sockets which they are branding for local high school team colors and mascots including the Benton Harbor Tigers, Watervliet Panthers, Lakeshore Lancers and teams from Eau Claire, Bridgman, Coloma and beyond. They’re even selling directly to some schools at a discounted price so the schools can use them as fundraisers something Lakeshore, Coloma and Watervliet are doing in a huge way.
The shop also operates a non-profit subsidiary, Computers4Cause, wherein they refurbish computers and donate them to military veterans. They ask people to consider donating gear that is workable but being set aside in favor of an upgraded device. They will completely wipe the hard drive and donate them to veterans and as a 501-c-3 operation they can offer you a tax deductible receipt for your donation to the cause.
The shop, located at 1978 Mall Place also offers refurbished laptops. They don’t sell new computers, but will offer the occasional refurbished laptop for kids or as a back up computer for adults, and so on.
Brock is going after the Michigan, Ohio, Indiana and Illinois markets for his second hub of operations and is creating regional agreements with a nationwide franchise brokerage. He says they’re taking it slow, noting, “We really crawled and then we walked, but we haven’t started to run yet. We want to make sure we’ve got this right, and we really have to get into the franchise support business once we hit some critical numbers.”
As he noted, the Benton Harbor shop is for sale and interested parties can contact Lars Petzke of RE/MAX by the Lake if they are interested in taking over the franchise.
