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

In case you've been living under a rock Apple recently did a 180 on repair and announced a new program that will allow its customers to purchase its fancy, expensive, exclusive genuine OEM parts. This is a huge win for the right to repair movement for consumers and I want to congratulate all of the folks that have been toiling away at this goal for many years (shoutout to Kyle Wiens of iFixit & Nathan Proctor of U.S. Prig especially - good guys who have been fighting the good fight for a long time).  RECENT UPDATE :  MacRumors has seen some internal Apple memo  and reported on 11/22/21 that 1) manuals will be available on the Apple Support Website and 2) that it’s online parts store will be operated by an unspecified third party. While this is a huge win for consumers it is NOT a win for independent tech repair shops or for the greater tech care industry. I repeat this is NOT A WIN for the thousands of tech repair people who own and operate small business...

While our country remains divided on who the next president will be, among other issues, one thing is clear – seriously just one thing because this election cycle was a bare knuckle brawl up and down the ballot all over the country – people all over the country want THE RIGHT TO REPAIR  and the freedom to do whatever they want to do with the stuff they own! In a clear, without a shadow-of-a-doubt, win (by knockout) 74.9%of the voters in Massachusetts said “screw you auto manufacturers, we want to be able to fix our cars when and where we choose.” This is a huge victory for the right to repair movement and will help companies in the automotive industry gain more market share. Let me repeat that for the people on the backrow. A right to repair victory means MORE BUSINESS for those that are in the auto repair business. It means more business for anyone and everyone in this industry. Especially the small business owners who support local communities across the country! QUICK H...

On Thursday, Amazon, Apple, Alphabet and Facebook reported a blockbuster quarter,   earning a combined net profit of $38 billion. After crushing much of their own competition AAAF (Amazon, Apple, Alphabet & Facebook) now want to crush small businesspeople too. And why not ? The federal government isn’t going to do anything about it! Afterall, these big ole huge monopolies tech companies spend a lot of money on the powers that be in Washington DC. Before I get to that lets take a minute to review their transgressions towards the tech repair, reuse & recycling industry first. APPLE Apple can best be described as the industries frenemy. Lots of Apple repairs along with high resell value for refurbished pieces makes them the ‘Apple’ of the industry eye. PLUS, people who work in the industry love Apple product despite how poorly they treat the industry. For the first 3-4 years of iPhone Apple didn’t care independent repair nor did they do any type of repair work in thei...

I had to double check my calendar last week to make sure it wasn't April Fools Day. Apple, you see, stunned the tech repair industry with the announcement that they would do a complete 180-degree turn on allowing independent repair of their products by now offering select companies access to, "...  Apple-genuine parts, tools, training, repair manuals and diagnostics...". Whhhaaaaat? This strange announcement stood out to me as more than a little bit odd since Apple has fought the independent tech repair industry tooth and nail ( or by pentalobe screw and tons of glue if you prefer ) for decades. Their early morning press release reminded me of the 2014 iFixit April Fools Day prank that had the repair community dazed and confused at the possibility of iFixit and Apple working together. Yah, right! Had someone started August Fools Day??? Truth is it was announced on   August 29, 2019,  the end of Summer , far  from April and seemingly ...

Those in the Tech Repair Industry (aka, cell phone repair) all know that Apple has the lowest hanging fruit (get it?) in that the iPhone screen replacement is by far the number one repair in the industry. So much so that some repair companies don't even bother fixing anything else. Even more so, that sooooo many repair companies have tried to incorporate all things Apple into their names. I have often referred to our industry as the 'i' industry.  Research on the Repair Industry As a long time business person (in other words I've been around the block a time or two) I have been surprised at how little research has been done in the Tech Repair Industry and how little attention the media pays to, what I truly believe, is one of the most important up-and-coming industries on the planet. Most news stories are fluff pieces on industry entrepreneurs (which are awesome BTW!) or pieces about dudes stealing private pictures of women when they have their phones fixed...