"Keith G" wrote in message
...

"Iain Churches" wrote in message
ti.fi...

"Keith G" wrote in message
...


Every business on the planet depends on the same thing for its success -
getting the supply and demand equation right. Should be simple enough
but, unfortunately, there's a lot can go wrong and many more businesses
fail than succeed. Offhand, I'd say the demand for repair work is on the
decline (for any number of reasons) and anybody that had been looking to
make a living from it should be thinking of supplementing his income
with other work....


Agreed. Here in ScandiLand we recycle almost everything. One often
sees five year old TVs, VCRs and CD players in the skips.


In the skips as in 'thrown out' or 'for recycle' - here (UK) a skip is on
its way to the landfill and those goods are 'not allowed' in skips...???

We have very little landfill material. Recycling places can be found in
all areas. There are huge skips marked "metal, plastic, wood, TVs,
computers etc etc. In fact the landfill material had decresed so much
by the recycling of all paper, glass, timber, cardboard, milk cartons etc,
and the composting of perishable food scraps etc, that most households
only require rubbish collection once every other week.

One good area seems to be guitar amp servicing and repair. I
share a workshop with two guys who do this, and are up to their
necks in work. Jobs range from new valves and re-bias and
cap changes to full rebuilds.

Some stuff lends itself to repair, some doesn't - for instance, I bet
no-one here has his socks darned any more and precious few will be wearing
shoes that are repairable. But the 'repair vs. replace' debate is an
interesting one - not everything should be repaired and certainly not by
untrained or even 'unlicenced' personnel....

In the case of guitar amps, vintage is still held in high esteem. So old
Marshalls, Engl, and expcially Hi Watts are looked after with lots of
TLC. They are built in such a way that they can be repaired and serviced.

Many are fifty years old and gigging six nights a week.
(The amps, I mean, not the guitar players:-)

Iain