Fort Frances has a new go-to stop for all of your electronic repair needs.
Thunder Bay-based chain Marnics Mobile opened their newest storefront at 225 Scott St. in downtown Fort Frances last week, taking over the building that was most recently the home of The UPS Store. Now nestled between Causeway Insurance and Lidkea Optometry, Marnics Mobile specializes in electronic repairs, running the gamut from cell phones and tablets to laptop and desktop computers, and even video game consoles.
Dylan Viddal is the repair director for Marnics Mobile and has been in town helping to get the new location set up and ready for business. He noted that the business, started by brothers Marcus and Nicolas Cupello in Thunder Bay, is aimed at helping customers with their electronic needs, be it repairing something old or providing them with something new.
“If someone comes in to fix their electronics, we’ll have a solution for them, regardless of what needs to be done,” Viddla said.
“We are a retail store, but the brothers want to be that place for people to go and fix their electronics. That’s the whole basis for the company. It’s a place where people can say, ‘Hey, I broke my phone, I need a solution’ and it’s either getting it fixed or maybe upgrading to a new phone.”
The Marnics Mobile website has a feature where you can quickly get an estimate on what a particular repair might cost, and how long it could take. For something like a screen repair on a Samsung Galaxy S10 cellphone, for example, the Marnics Mobile site says the repair estimate is $329.99 and take approximately 2 hours to complete, where something like an HDMI port repair on a base model Playstation 4 is estimated at $159.99, but does not list a time for completion.
The Fort Frances location will have a qualified technician who can do micro-soldering for complex board-level electronic repairs, Viddal said. Anything that can’t be accomplished in store can be shipped to Thunder Bay, where bigger or more complex repairs can be undertaken. Marnics Mobile also has a technician they outsource who is qualified to do repairs on Apple products, meaning that Macbook Air that’s beginning to show its age could still be kept in top shape.
In order to do repairs, Viddal says the best course of action is to bring the offending electronic device into the store, where an employee can do a free diagnostic to determine the best way to proceed. Viddal explained that the best answer may not always be a repair.
“It’s a cost versus worth thing, sometimes,” he said.
“If someone soaks their Xbox, then they turn it on and it blows a few things, it might not be worth putting the hours of labour into fixing it. In terms of repair, with time and effort we can fix almost anything.”
To that end, the store offers refurbished items like phones, and also can accept trade-ins that can help bridge the gap to affordability. Viddal said that the store can also purchase electronics for parts in the event something like a tablet or console could be beyond repair but still have salvageable parts. Those parts can then be used in other repairs or refurbished items, which are then covered by a guarantee.
“We can always pull the cases and maybe a fan or something and use the parts that aren’t damaged for our own so we don’t have to outsource for a new fan,” he said.
“For customers we use new parts, but for refurbishing devices we’ll use maybe a used fan or something. We warranty and stand behind everything we sell, so if something comes back and we used a refurbished fan, and it turns out it doesn’t work out, we know we put a fan in that, and we’ll replace that.”
Marnics Mobile also has a partnership with Bell Canada, making it another location in town where customers can shop for new cell phone plans, or migrate their existing phone to a new network.
Viddal says the company is excited to be in Fort Frances and is looking forward to helping out with the town’s device needs.
“We’re excited for all the new people coming in,” he said.
