The Impact of COVID-19 on the Global Repair Business

The coronavirus(COVID-19), the unpreditcable Black Swan, now is sweeping across the world and the real economy has been hit hard.

As for the mobile phone repair industry, the COVID-19 has also brought negative impacts on all related subjects. Businesses are shutting down.

Employees are unable to work on-site.

The productivity of home working can be threatened.

Supply is in shortage and logistics networks have been thrown into disarray.

Companies respond with pay cuts and staff reduction plans… What is even more terrifying is that this is only the beginning of the nightmare.

Source: World Health Organization

For repair shops around the world, some can still open but operate with a sharp decline in performance, resulting in increased losses since they cannot enjoy government subsidies.

As for repair shops enjoying government subsidies in some countries, their stores are closed by the government and the subsidy from the Government still cannot cover the operating costs and therefore are eager to resume store operations.

REWA has exchanged views with different mobile phone repairers around the world on the current situation.  How the current epidemic affected their work & life?

Jesse from SoCalDigital Repair gave his opinion that the pandemic did not harm his business.

Otherwise he had gain more iPad repair work because people stuck at home. He had purchase UVC sanitize station to sanitize every devices comes in and taking the necessary by caution.

However, Our friend Fei from Hong Kong are facing a tough challenge.

Since the social protest last year, many repair shops have gone out of business.

Due to the epidemic, his business has fallen off a cliff.

Now he is trying to use Facebook appoinment to save his business.What measures are they prepare to take to deal with this difficult situation?

Source: REWA Technology YouTube

Some YouTube fans share their strategies with REWA.

Meanwhile the owner of 911gadgets, Adrian, told us they are not prepared for this situation. Fortunately, they are allowed to continue doing business in central business in the state of California.

They plan to reduced expenditure or maybe come open a drive-thru repair shop during the pandemic.

Luis from Rdx Mobile México believed that crises generate opportunities and this is a great opportunity to diversify and grow their business. Now they doing succcesful home delivery.

REWA response to the COVID-19  

Since the outbreak of the epidemic, REWA has taken a series of actions.

First of all, REWA started home-office and online communication mode, therefore most of the work has been transferred online very quickly.

Secondly, for employees who must work on-site, REWA have purchased over 30 days stock of epidemic prevention goods, even with a higher price than normal to ensure the safety of our employees.

Then, in order to meet customers’ online learning demand during the outbreak.

We launched the REWA Academy. Just in the trial running, it has gained over 300 registration and more than 5000 broadcasting.

Last but not the least, we also take the initiative to stay in communication with our clients and updates on the progress of the epidemic.

At the request of our client, we have organized a number of qualified epidemic prevention supplies such as face masks, gloves, thermometer, isolation gown and so on.

REWA’s view on the global repair business  

The repair industry will experience a brief blowout growth, because of suppressed demand during the outbreak and pullback in demand before the epidemic can be fully contained within the next 1-2 years.

As the impact of the initial round of the outbreak eases, repair demand will pick up gradually in May and recover to the previous levels by the end of 2020. Here are the main reasons:

Take China for example, after people wake up from the panic of the pandemic, they will shift their focus more on economy and social activities.

Then all the businesses will recover gradually according to the intensity of demand.

In the first half of the year, global mobile phone shipments fell sharply and the launch of 5G smartphones also get delayed.

Therefore, consumers who planned to change a new phone are now more likely to keep the old device longer.

As the global economy is under recession and the power of consumption is weakening, repair your broken phone or buy a used one supposed to be a more economic option for people.

Unlike the development of other consumer services, the growth of the cellphone repair market seems to be more resilient during the economic downturn.

This might be a relieved message for us at this hard moment.

For more interviews, click on the video below to watch