Reconditioned – eco friendly shopping!
Sorry I’ve been a bit quiet – I have been without a laptop for several months, and this has really limited what I’ve been able to do. However, I am now back on line – thanks to a fantastic company called the Laptop Centre, which sells refurbished laptops.
When my laptop brokedown, I believed it best to try and get it fixed. I believed this for several reasons:
1. Buying a new laptop had not been budgeted for, therefore was going to be costly.
2 A new laptop requires significant amounts of the earth’s resources, just for me, just to run my little business and play on Facebook 😉
3. I despair of society’s “throw away” mentality and dream of a time when we revert to “Make do and mend” as a way of conserving money, resources and each other!
4. Discarded house hold appliances, gadgets etc are difficult to recycle and take years to biodegrade.
So, after 9 weeks of waiting for the manufacturer of my original laptop to let my repair man know when they could get a spare part and how much it would cost, I decided I was going to have to bite the bullet and buy a new laptop.
Then, I had a chat with a good friend and pointed out my reticence bearing in mind the 3 points above and she introduced me to the Laptop Centre. All my problems solved at once!
So how does it work?
Well, our throw away mentality society means that when the new best thing comes out, many people “upgrade” immediately, casting off perfectly acceptable gadgets in pursuit of the NEW.  Clever entrepreneurs snatch up these discarded gadgets, clean them up, strip any data, check all the parts are working and sell them on. So I got a bargain – a perfectly good, business grade laptop, in full working order, with 12 months warranty, for less than £200. I am back on line, without using any new resources, and at an affordable cost!
Spurred on by this success, when I needed a “new” vacuum cleaner recently, I found a local sales man that sells reconditioned Dysons. Another bargain grabbed without impacting too deeply on the earth.
What’s the best “reconditioned” thing you’ve bought?
Do second-hand baby clothes count?! I’ve not bought new for a loooong time, unless there’s a clear need (like for potty training!), and won’t need to buy any new for the next baby.
My landlord always supplied reconditioned washing machines. I’m not sure it’s the best advertisement for them (or is it me?!)that I was only in for a year but went through three machines!!
Second hand clothes are always good – I love a nearly new bargain!
3 washing machines in a year – yikes!
I have bought a reconditioned laptop in the past, though current gadgets are to OH’s spec! I get his old phone though! On some appliances need to weigh up energy use too. What I never get is how sometimes it costs nearly as much to fix something as buy new! Now that is DAFT!
It totally is – it frustrates me beyond that it costs nearly as much to repair as replace!