Computer One Plus to close

“The Computer One closing is not due to the economy,” said Froemming, store manager and co-owner. Froemming said the store has stable earnings throughout the Great Recession. A bigger factor, he said, is the move to mobile computing — just as phones and tablets. That move is steadily decreasing prices for computer hardware, Froemming said. With a disposable mind set, people are ready to upgrade and get rid of versus repair. And on the smaller devices, repairs end up back with the manufacturer.

“There is no longevity there at all,” Froemming said. The math was as well not in his favor. Froemming said he’d have to sell 30 mobile devices to make what he could on one computer sale. Repair work, a mainstay of the business, is as well changing as more people are savvy about backing up data and preventing virus damage. Printers once were a big part of the repair business. Now it’s more cost effective for consumers to just buy a new one.

Those changes and others in the industry make operating a successful small retail research business more difficult hereafter, Froemming said. With the store’s lease expiring this year, the family owned business decided to call it quits for the retail side of the their business.

Computer One Plus is owned by parent company Syvantis Technologies in Baxter. Janelle and Ken Riley and Froemming purchased Computer One from at that time Larson, Allen Weishair and Co. in April of 2000. Their research business was a family affair and an possibility to bring family members at the same time in a business setting. Janelle Riley and her husband were joined by her father Daniel Froemming and her brother Todd Froemming. They all brought skills to the group — accounting, network systems engineering, business administration, education and management.

The end their research company split into two segments

In the end their research company split into two segments, the retail store in the end at the North Pointe Centre in Baxter and the Syvantis Technologies, which focuses on business networks and systems management, information research and cloud-based computing. They specialize in “workplace mobility, allowing employees to work from anywhere anytime.” The company as well sells servers, computers and equipment.

Syvantis, now in the Fairview Office Park in Baxter, has been growing. So much so, Todd Froemming began splitting his days between the store and Syvantis. It was a challenge to disconnect from one job as a innovation consultant on accounting software for Microsoft products and at that time shift gears to sell laptops. So much is changing so quickly, Froemming said in five years, the current research landscape won’t even be recognizable.

Years ago earlier people moved from modems to high-speed cable connections, the store did major spring business as lightning strikes played havoc with computers. And Froemming said they included three-year warranties and antivirus programs with their systems, which is where the big box stores create add-ons to help recapture dollars. Froemming said they’d end up talking clients out of repairs as they could purchase a new system for less money.

“It’s in fact a good move for us so we can focus on Syvantis as that’s our primary business,” Janelle Riley, Syvantis president, said. Syvantis could be growing even faster, Riley said, if they could find candidates for research jobs here. The business has an international client base and saw a turn around from the recession in 2009. The recession really helped spur customers to see cloud-based computing because it was cheaper. “Syvantis is doing in the extreme well. We’ve had our two best years ever in 2010 and 2011.”

For Froemming, a downside to closing the store is no longer interacting with the clients he’s come to know. He estimates 90 percent of their business is from returning clients. Apple clients will now have to travel farther afield to get warranty work.