Green Tech Girl

Back in the day, I used to go to CompUSA with my live-in boyfriend as the quick alternative to Fry’s. Somewhere along the line, CompUSA degenerated into a shell of itself, a dirty, disheveled store with absent customer service.

I went to CompUSA about two years ago to purchase a new computer, with a $600 budget. Having found a model I wanted, I waited around for a sales rep to get the actual computer for me. (The boxes were in the back.) Twenty minutes later, after asking for help, I still had no response in a quiet, dead store. I walked out, telling the cashier that they had just lost a $600 sale. I was not surprised when the store closed down as part of a massive “gutting” of the corporation.

Across the street, I got an identical computer at Office Depot for the same price, with some of the most attentive service I’ve ever gotten at a store like that. (Alas, since then, Office Depot’s service seems to have faltered, apparently due to yet another greedy CEO.) I suppose I could have bought something online, but I did not want to wait for shipment…and I wanted to see what I was getting.

Some have speculated that CompUSA practically went out of business due to the Internet, but I submit that it failed due to its crappy customer service and lack of vision. Best Buy, which happens to be within walking distance of me, has the best computer service marketing campaigns ever with its “Geek Squad,” and having gone there on multiple occasions (by myself and with friends) I have never been disappointed in Best Buy’s staff. I think we need personal attention and local computer stores, not just online storefronts.

But what is very lacking to me is a good green computing store, both online and offline. I did a quick Google search and the only green computer store I came up with was the GreenMachineShop, from my school stomping grounds in Ann Arbor, Michigan, a somewhat homegrown affair with an out-of-date website. The machines were also not cheap, starting at around $1,500.

I’d like to see someone with the marketing savvy of Mac or PinkBerry come up with a simple, clean green computing store where you could get machines, components, and service. You could also bring your used print cartridges and old computers back for recycling.

If the machines were energy-efficient and cost-effective, I don’t see why such a store wouldn’t do very well. Better yet, they could offer a line of machines running on Linux. Maybe they could offer fair-trade tea in one corner, with wi-fi.

Hey, a girl could dream, but that’s where I’d shop for a new computer.