WiGoMan Blog - Tech Care (Repair, Reuse, Recycle) Industry Leader

No man is an island , or woman for that matter!  ( full credit to English poet John Donne ). Please allow me to take that thought a step further and say that no business is an island either. In other words, you and your business can't succeed on your own. Everybody needs somebody sometime ( queue, Dean Martin ). Friends, in the last 15 years I have seen a lot of tech repair companies rise and fall. I have seen honest hardworking people start high quality repair shops all over the country and I have seen cheats, scoundrels and opportunists try to do the same. I've seen good ideas and bad ideas tried over and over again. I have seen business after business enter the tech repair industry with so much excitement and passion only to see some of them fail, burnout or move on all too soon. Sound familiar? Not yet? It will be. Why? Because up until this year the tech care industry has lacked a true professional trade association that was designed to help the industry thrive...

The Tech Care industry is a fractured one, tribal in nature. A collection of thousands of companies in repair, support, reuse and recycling that often really only care about themselves and their own tribes' success. Sometimes that tribalism gets nasty. For instance,  I recently heard a story about a repair shop that once had to take out a restraining  order on the owner of a rival store. I often hear p arts suppliers who take every opportunity to trash a competitor over the "real" quality of their parts.  R2 certified recyclers saying that other R2 recyclers aren't REALLY following R2 standards .  YouTube personalities that constantly complain  about the work of other companies. Then there is the  folks who are supposed to be trying to help the industry move forward but put down companies that don't support a cause they claim should unite the industry. Now imagine for a second what this tribal cannibalistic industry could do if it worked toge...

As I walked into the conference area of the hotel in Nashville on the first day of ERC 2020 I realized that this year was going to be much different than years past. I took a deep breath as I prepared for non-stop interaction with many of the great people in the tech repair, reuse and recycle industry. I was really looking forward to shaking some hands, giving some hugs and getting up close and personal with my friends in the industry. But then it hit me like a ton of bricks as I heard an all to familiar sound...   ...my alarm clock that snapped me back into reality. As I awoke from my slumbers I decided that today -- since it was the first day of the virtual conference -- I would go ahead and take a shower before noon and even wear pants before logging into the first session of the  VIRTUAL ERC 2020  show. As I headed into my HOME OFFICE I took the opportunity to shake hands with my 13 year old daughter -- who is attending virtual school and working on her handshake...