Meet The iPod Doctor
Ramon Reyes had a problem. He could only get sound from one channel on his iPod video player. At first, he thought his ear-buds were busted. But he replaced them with a pricey new pair made by Sony, and it didn’t make any difference.
So on a recent sunny afternoon, Reyes stood outside his office in lower Manhattan, chewing gum, and waiting for a visit from Demetrios Leontaris, better known as the iPod Doctor. Leontaris spends his days cruising Manhattan and tending to the needs of distressed owners of Apple’s ubiquitous portable music player.
Leontaris, a 33-year-old father of three, runs one of at least half a dozen iPod repair services that have sprung up in recent years in New York City. He has plenty of work. Apple has sold 150 million iPods since it introduced its digital music player in 2001.
Leontaris gets some spare parts – headphones input jacks, screens and batteries – from Chinese manufacturers. He extracts the rest out of used and broken iPods he buys from customers. He thinks he has about 50 of them lying around his house right now. “I’ve lost count,” says Leontaris, who also fixes Creative Zens, Microsoft Zunes, RCA Lyras as well as iBooks, MacBooks, Laptops and PDAs.
Photo by Christina Paige.
cassy on July 4th, 2008 12:33 am
One thing that makes this man so in demand in his service is being so proffesional. Coming on time and doing the job well is one factor for a business to be successful.
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