They are young alumni who met as coworkers and soon became roommates. But it was inconceivable that Ben Levy, BBA ’04, and Aaron Vronko, BBA ’06, would still be together today as founders of a multi-million dollar iPod repair business. “It all sort of happened by accident in 2003,” says Vronko. “It was my junior year in college and Ben’s senior year. We had both been laid off from a local pharmaceutical company. I moved in with Ben and slept on the couch … we were broke,” says Vronko. “Ben’s iPod was in need of repair, and we were hard-pressed to find a service to fix it. We soon realized that other iPod owners were in the same boat. To save money, we tore apart the device to see if we could fix it ourselves.” Their inquisitiveness paid off as they managed to repair the unit. Then through discussion forum postings on the Internet, and as they searched for further information on parts and repairs, they
began to draw interest from even more iPod owners and businesses who were searching for help with iPod repair. At the
time, the devices were still fairly new— so no one really knew where to go for service. “Within a month, the whole thing
snowballed from repairing 3-5 devices a week to 20-25,” says Levy, “and it wasn’t long before we converted a second bedroom in the apartment to a work area. We both had our brothers working for us to keep up with the rising demand. It was quite evident that we had struck an opportunity in this niche market,” says Levy, who developed the concept that would become iPodMods, and later, Rapid
Repair.
The new company grew 50 percent in its first year and the duo moved the business out of the apartment to an office on West Main St. in Kalamazoo. Last year the business realized between $2.5 and $3 million in sales. Levy serves as the president and CEO and focuses more on the purchasing aspect of the business and scoping out new products to sell. Vronko handles the day-to-day operations. The two have learned a lot firsthand about running a business over the past four years. Levy worked particularly hard in the beginning by reaching out to others and forming relationships with clients. “Some of the clients ended up being some pretty big companies that we still work with today. Back then, there was slim to no competition, but now it’s an everyday battle with 50 to 100 competitors.”
Vronko talks about the important skills required of today’s entrepreneur – adaptability, persistence and passion. “We recognized early on that business environments change quickly and this means we have to have the ability to adapt to markets at the speed of change,” says Vronko. “We expanded to include other devices such as iPhones, Zune, and video game consoles like PlayStation3, Nintendo

Wii and PlayStation PSP.” And as new devices are rolled out, you can be sure that Rapid Repair will be upto-date on what’s out there. Last year, 12 hours prior to the latest iPhone release in the United States, Vronko flew to Paris to be one of the first to pick his up at a midnight iPhone release event—only to tear it apart to see how it was assembled. “Today, there is a real demand for the ‘doit-yourself’ market,” says Vronko. “We could have viewed this as a lost opportunity, but you’ve got to get your head out of the clouds, figure out a way to make operational changes and have the courage and persistence to adapt a plan until it works for you. Through our online assistance, we now sell parts and accessories for these do-ityourselfers.” Vronko says the passion to be an entrepreneur is the most intangible requisite. “If you can’t get up in the morning and be excited about making something happen for your business, you’re in the wrong place,” says Vronko. “You have to wake up knowing that every day you are ultimately responsible for sales, finance, labor, expenses, and every other facet of your own success. While most people understandably prefer the comfort and security of having a limited scope of functions of the company, an entrepreneur sees this responsibility as the  call to arms of each new day.”

As business continues to grow, Vronko and Levy are moving the business to a 4,300 square foot building in early fall. Rapid Repair employs 15 people. The Web address is: www.rapidrepair.com.

Aaron Vronko, BBA ’06
Aaron Vronko’s inquisitiveness was evident at an early age. He admits to always questioning how things worked while growing up and credits his parents for putting up with the question “why” a million or so times. A highly energetic individual, Vronko attended
classes at Grand Valley State University to obtain a Microsoft Systems Engineering certificate while still a junior in high school in Grand Rapids, Mich. He entered WMU as a freshman undecided in his major and admits he “bombed out” the first semester. He took the next semester off and landed a job at the help desk of a local pharmaceutical company where he worked for 2.5 years before losing his position, along with many others, through a merger. “I soon realized that I had to get my life back on track, so I enrolled in
classes at a local community college for a year before transferring back to Western as a management major.” He graduated magna cum laude in 2006 and from then on he began to devote all of his time to the business. Vronko credits his professors at the Haworth College of Business with “teaching me the sound fundamentals of running a good business,” and for “showing me how to advance business development.” Vronko married fellow WMU alumna Lindsay Scott, BS ’08, this summer.

Ben Levy grew up in Kalamazoo, but spent his high school years in Grand Rapids, Mich. Ben was an all-state wrestler. “My coach, Dave
Mills, helped me excel in the sport and also taught me many things about life and ethics,” says Levy. Levy chose Western because
he had a lot of family and friends in Kalamazoo, and it was far enough away from home to live on his own. He started as a computer science major, and then switched to computer information systems. Levy graduated with a Bachelor’s in Business Administration in 2004 with a major in computer information systems.

The original article can be found here.

Rapid Repair is dedicated to the service, repair, and modification of all iPod, iPhone, Zune, and other small electronic devices. The national company specializes in small electronics repair, with quality workmanship, speed and efficiency, and offering customer service that is second to none. Rapid Repair is headquartered in a 3,000 square foot building in Kalamazoo, Michigan, with 15 employees.

According to Rapid Repair’s spokeswomen, they just announced the first 240GB iPod upgrade, which will be available for all original iPod Video models. They use a Toshiba MK2431GAH 240GB 8-mm hard drive for the hack, making your old iPod video’s capacity double the current iPod classic’s space. She also says that they want to do it with the iPod Classic and Zune 2G as well.

iPodMods has recently gone public and offers a wide variety of repair services and upgrade options. Their competitive pricing puts them above the rest with a staff of professional installers, and technical savvy support specialists. iPodMods.com is not a 24 hour service, but it offers the same professional support at almost half the price of all the iPod repair centers on the internet.

All you need to do is visit: www.ipodmods.com and click on the repair service that fits your needs. So give us a try and call us at 1-888-POD-MODS

iPodMods has been doing repairs of iPods and many other different small electronics for over 3 years. They have opened the doors to the public and would like to help out iPod owners across the globe with their top notch support. They offer a wide variety of parts for most models and do repairs on ALL iPod types.

Check the site next week for premier customizations and modifications pages! Once the new modifications pages are available, we will start taking orders on this top secret project ONLY available at ipodmods.com!

Turn your iPaper weight into a working iPod again! For those of you who can wait more than 24 hours to get your iPod serviced, then this site is for you. We provide top quality service and repair and our technicians are specialists at repairing ALL iPod models. We will perform a detailed diagnostic of the problem and contact you with a repair quote prior to any actual repairs. All iPods that pass through our company go through a detailed 4 point inspection not available anywhere else!

Some competitor sites claim that they will be able to fix loose headphone jacks, and Fire Wire port problems. This is true, but you need to know that in some cases the Main Board will need to be replaced because the solder pads on your broken iPod’s Main Board may be unfixable. We will put it under the microscope and find out what can be done, and we will give you the lowest possible quote.

**iPodMods changed their name to Rapid Repair in April 2007**