My Journey to CES 2022 - Tech Care Meets the Consumer Tech Association

It’s been a long journey to my very first Consumer Electronics Show (CES). Despite having been in the tech industry my entire career, having one of my own companies featured in a CTA publication, and having been a passionate lover of all-things-tech all my life this will be my first CES. I couldn’t be more excited to be attending with the express goal of finding new opportunities for the incredible people of the tech care industry.

This trip comes at a critical crossroads for both the consumer tech and tech care industries. An inflection point, if you will, where working together is more important now than at any other point in our past. Put simply friends this is a supply and demand issue. That has a very simple solution.

Consumer tech is seeking to becoming more ingrained in our lives but the lack of a more robust tech care (repair, support, reuse, and recycle) system is slowing progress. On the other side members of the tech care industry are chomping at the bit to help people take care of their tech.

SIMPLE SOLUTION: We need to work together to help both sides get what they want!

Big tech wants to maintain control of their products while tech care people just want to make a living doing what they love. BOTH sides have one big thing in common which is an unrelenting desire to help people with their tech. There has to be a way forward.

Frustration from right to repair advocates, who just want to “fix what they own” is also reaching a fever pitch as they head into legislative season with a ton of momentum. Big tech, in an effort to maintain control of their product, are trying to establish subscription models in an effort to create more recurring revenue and lock customers into their ecosystem. Both sides will need to learn to compromise or risk years of costly legal fights and bad PR.

THE BIG PICTURE DUMMY

Big tech companies I love ya. You make some pretty cool stuff. But you’re going to have to leave some meat on the bone for all of the hard working small business people who just aren’t that into you!

It's what the customer wants! Consumers just want an easy way to have someone help them take care of their tech. They want simple and local options for tech care. They don’t want to be forced into crawling back to you for help. I know this better than most.

I’ve dedicated my career to tech care. I know what I'm talking about.

I started my career working for the cellular carriers, who quickly became the foundation of what we now think of as Big Tech. I was a corporate sales rep who built my reputation on helping my customers learn how to actually use this new technology. I just wanted to take care of my clients the best way I knew how. In an industry focused on “gross adds” I garnered a reputation as a very successful sales person with creative ideas on expanding our user base.

After tours with the early innovators (Cellular One, APC Sprint Spectrum, and VoiceComm/T-Mobile) I decided to set off on my own when my ideas for a better customer experience kept getting rejected. I launched my own brand, WiGo Wireless (the origins of this blog BTW), to rave reviews. Our desire was to make the customer experience into more than just a “gross add” by adding value to their purchase/investment in technology.

Our stores were so different than anything else in the market that employees from the Consumer Tech Association (CTA or known then as CEA) would buy from us and refer us to people all over the country. CTA also featured our store in an annual publication that went out to all of their members called Winning at Wireless. CTA knew that we took care of our customers.

Believe it or not we even worked closely with Apple. The first Apple store in the country was just up the road from us in Tysons Corner VA. We sold devices (often imported from other countries) that would sync more easily with Apple product. We both wanted the best experience for our customers and Apple knew we would take care of them the best.

When we were the first company to introduce Bluetooth products on a largescale in a retail environment tech people from all over the DMV would visit, send us customers, and buy gifts for their staff. When we introduced wireless tech training classes they came in larger numbers. All in an effort to take care of our customers.

We launched repair services simply because it was a logical way for us to take better care of our customers. We also started recycling services by working with an innovative entrepreneur named Seth Heine who had launched a small business named Collective Good. We setup a unique display to promote tech recycling and his Mom came down to take photos for PR. Seth and I were both committed to taking care of tech, meeting his Mom was a bonus.

Just as we were closing funding rounds and entering into negotiations to open our first store in another city, in NYC at Trump Tower (long story), the iPhone hit the market and all but crushed our dreams of major expansion. iPhone mania took over the world and we weren't allowed to sell it despite all of our success Apple wasn’t interested in working with small business. The revenue arrow was now pointing down and we sold the stores just to make our early investors whole.

I tried everything I could to sell or even just giveaway the repair business, which had become the only profitable part of our business, to no avail. No one wanted it. They all thought it was a losing proposition. So I decided to spin it off into a separate business and the WiGoClinic was born.

TECH REPAIR IS BORN

This venture into tech repair was not only extremely profitable but even more rewarding than any other aspect of tech care that I had encountered in my past. People desperately needed tech repair services because none of the big tech companies had the foresight to offer this important local service. Our business grew quickly as we opened shops all over the DMV.

Soon a new industry was born as brilliant small business people opened up tech repair businesses like mine all over the country. Much smarter business people than myself found ways to expand nationally with brands like uBreakiFix and iCracked. Soon after the team at Merry Meeting Group in Ohio took control and turned around the CPR brand. This was followed by Batteries Plus getting into the tech repair business as well to create major brand recognition for the industry. But despite these big brands the industry has continued to be dominated by smaller local independent shops that serve communities all over the world.

WHY, YOU ASK?

Two reasons really, 1) It’s what the customer wants (see above), and 2) Tech Care people are fiercely independent. Customers want a place that is simple and easy for service and tech care people don’t want to work for big tech companies.

Think of the tech care professionals that we all know, the company IT person. Are they not the most independently minded people at most companies?

Sometimes they go too far. I mean look at the leaders in the right to repair movement. They often – to their own detriment – criticize big tech companies and their products. Biting the proverbial hand that feeds them. I mean look at repair.org right now. While the tech world celebrates new products at CES this week it looks like they will sit in the peanut gallery to draw attention to what they like to call the “Worst at Show”. Why??!! There take no prisoners approach to a solution seems misguided at best.

In the meantime, small business owners all over the country struggle because big tech companies can’t figure out a way to play nice in the market and people claiming to represent the industry can’t be civil. In both cases they can’t see their hand in front of their faces because the solution is simple (Again, see above).

NOW, let’s look at some cool new tech from CES 2022 today: