Three years back I fixed a TV for a neighbor and it started a side gig

Last week I hit my 50th repair job out of my garage in Cleveland, mostly TVs and small appliances for people in my neighborhood. It started when I swapped a capacitor on a 2019 Samsung for free, and then someone told someone else. Any other repairers find themselves accidentally running a business?

4 comments

4 Comments

the_aaron20d ago

Three years ago my neighbor asked me to look at his dead Samsung and I said sure, figured it was a blown cap. Fifty repairs later I get what you're saying but here's my problem with this story - you killed your own side gig before it started by working for free. That first free fix tells everyone your time is worth zero. I charge a flat $35 bench fee just to look at something and I take half up front. Last month a guy brought in a 2019 Vizio and I quoted him $80 for the power board swap. He tried to haggle me down to $40 and I handed his TV back. That's the reality of this business, you get paid for your skill or you end up with a garage full of broken junk.

martinez.kim20d agoMost Upvoted

Man, "you killed your own side gig before it started by working for free" hit me right in the gut. I made that exact mistake years ago fixing phones for friends and it took me forever to dig out of that hole. People would hand me a busted screen and expect me to do it for the cost of the part like my labor was just a bonus. It's brutal because you want to be helpful but you end up training everyone that your skills are a favor, not a trade. I respect that you handed the TV back when he tried to haggle, that takes guts. Eventually you learn that saying no is better than working for nothing.

joel_martinez20d ago

My uncle had the same problem with his lawn mower repair business back in 2003. He fixed a buddy's mower for a six-pack and suddenly the whole neighborhood thought he owed them free tune-ups every spring.

riley4320d ago

I read somewhere that when you charge nothing, people also don't value the fix as much, so they're way more likely to blame you if something else goes wrong later. That flat $35 bench fee probably weeds out the time-wasters before they even get started, which is smart. Do you ever adjust that fee based on what kind of device they bring in?