The top US electronics retailer didn't pick Silicon Valley, India or another high-tech hub to build its hospital for personal computers. It chose the Kentucky countryside, known more for race horses and bourbon distilleries than geeks and microprocessors.
Geek Squad, the quirky PC service division of Best Buy Co, opened its 15,300m2 Geek Squad City warehouse just south of Louisville late last year with a goal of cutting the time it takes to repair and return PCs, especially laptops.
"This is all about giving the customer a better experience," said Michael Rodgers, Geek Squad City's "ambassador," or spokesman.
Computers with broken motherboards, hard drives with death rattles and virus infections begin streaming into the warehouse at 5am from a nearby UPS air hub in Louisville, one of the key reasons that the business was built here, said Wes Snyder, Geek Squad City's top manager, or "mayor."
Snyder said the nearby city offered a tech-savvy work force. The state also offered tax benefits worth up to US$9.3 million.
Inside the facility's sprawling repair room, PC parts and precision tools are spread over the rows and rows of desks where hundreds of computer techs -- Geek Squad's "agents" -- fix more than 2,000 laptops a day. More than 700,000 PCs will be repaired here this year, Rodgers said.
Laptops are the majority of PCs sold nowadays, and the smaller and more advanced they get, the more complicated the repairs. The portable computers also endure more abuse than their larger desktop cousins, getting dinged, dropped and splashed with coffee.
"They're getting down to where you need watchmaker tools and very special expertise. It's not just swapping out a disk drive anymore," said Richard Doherty, president of The Envisioneering Group, a research company.
About half the laptops are repaired on the same day they arrive at Geek Squad City, but the average is about three days, Rodgers said.
Rob Enderle, an analyst with the Enderle Group research company, said the turnaround time is faster than any other computer retailer.
"From a store perspective, I'm not aware of anyone else doing this," he said.
Original or direct PC manufacturers like Dell can typically repair and return a PC in about that time, Enderle added.
Circuit City Stores Inc, Best Buy's main rival in the electronics retail market, launched its own PC repair service, called Firedog, in October. It offers in-home and in-store service, similar to Geek Squad. Circuit City declined to comment on Geek Squad City.
"Oftentimes what an industry leader like a Best Buy does is force others people to kind of follow," said Samir Bhavnani, a research director with Current Analysis.
Most of the thousands of computers sent to Geek Squad City could not be fixed by employees at Best Buy locations, typically because the store didn't have the proper parts.
Swift repair time is crucial in the PC business.
"Laptops are very personal and people don't like a personal element of their life to be out of their reach for two or three or 10 days," Doherty said.
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