Noah Alassaf owns Athens iPhone Repairs and is fixing more than 30 iPhones a week.
Some Ohio University students have trouble balancing time between class and grabbing food in a dining hall.
However, one bobcat can do both of those and work at least 50 hours a week running his own business.
Noah Alassaf, a senior studying sociology-criminology and psychology, owns and runs Athens iPhone Repair for which, he said, he repairs no less than 30 iPhones a week.
“I’m constantly ordering (replacement screens),” Alassaf said. “Being on a college campus it’s kinda hard to keep up with the demand just because there is so many people.”
Before Alassaf bought the business in the spring, another student ran Athens iPhone Repair. Alassaf met him when he took his broken iPhone 3 to him as a freshman and, he said, that’s what made him want to learn to fix phones.
“After he fixed it I saw what he charged me and I was kinda interested to see how much money he made,” Alassaf said. “I looked up the part online and realized he made a good amount of money off a 15 minute fix.”
Alassaf added that his prices vary based of the model of iPhone and what is broken or needs fixed.
The businesses’ website lays out the prices for each situation. For example, a cracked iPhone 5 screen is $80, not including tax.
Alassaf said he keeps track of what other businesses are charging for the service and prices competitively.
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Alassaf said he hopes to learn how to repair other phones besides iPhones.
“I wanna start my own little store here in Athens and then from there branch out to different college campuses, starting in Ohio,” he said.
Andrew Downing, a senior studying journalism, said he had the charging port of his iPhone replaced by Alassaf for about $30 earlier in the semester.
“Going through him was definitely the better financial route, for sure,” Downing said. “I would definitely say that if people break their phones or something that’s definitely the place to go.”
Brittany Wilson, a sophomore studying interior architecture, said she has never cracked her iPhone screen, but if she did, she would consider calling up Athens iPhone Repair.
“It would be nice because it’s convenient and probably faster than taking it to Apple,” Wilson said.
Steven Fearnow, a sophomore studying sociology-criminal justice, said he has replaced his iPhone screen with a business from his hometown, costing him more than Alassaf’s businesses rate.
He added that Alassaf owning his own business is “pretty cool.”
“That’s pretty interesting that he could start up his own business just as a student and have ... peers come to him and he actually be able to know how to fix an iPhone screen,” Fearnow said.
Downing said he was impressed by Alassaf's repair skills.
“I was really surprised that just some fellow student was doing this and he’s really good at it too,” he said.
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