Peanuts to Profits With Thor Schrock
Peanuts to Profits With Thor Schrock

Yesterday I attended the Nebraska Retail Federation’s annual awards banquet and accepted the 2009 Customer Service Business of the Year on behalf of Schrock Innovations.

I am no stranger to political and business gatherings, but those in attendance at the NRF ceremony were not from the circle I normally meet up with at events.

At our table we were joined by several higher-ups from JC Penny. Other sponsors of the event included Pamida, Walgreens, Target, and a few other big-name retailers.

We were among 30+ nominees for the award and some had traveled in from as far away as Kearney.

As each of the nominees was introduced we were asked to briefly talk about our company to the audience.

Its All About the Service

When it was my turn on the stage I asked the audience to raise their hand if they had ever had a computer problem. Everyone raised a hand. Then I asked people who had someone to help them with their computer problems to put their hands down. About 40% did, leaving a majority of people in the room with nowhere to turn for PC help.

I explained the Schrock Innovations was founded 10 years ago o help people with their computer problems – even if we were not being paid to help. I explained that the Schrock approach was about building trust and relationships.

Schrockies in the House?

At the end of my presentation I asked if there were anyt Schrock customers in the audience. 6 people raised their hands (not bad considering there was no one from Omaha and 1/2 of the crowd was out of our Lincoln service area).

I asked them in front of the crowd if they fel;t special after they worked with Schrock Innovations. They said that they did.

Thank You NRF

This award means a lot to Schrock Innovations and its employees. On the eve of launching the biggest sales event of the year, our Holiday Sale, this award reminds everyone of the reason we are in business. It’s not to sell hardware or software – we are in business to provide service. Everything else will take care of its self if we take care of our customers.

Schrock Innovations is holding a Windows 7 launch party this Saturday, October 17 in our Lincoln Service Center form 10-noon.

Stop by the Service Center to enjoy a dessert bar (dessert in the morning – AWESOME!), take a peek at our 2009 Holiday Special PC, and test drive Microsoft’s latest operating system, Windows 7, almost a week before your friends can.

I know there the Texas Tech game is that Saturday, so if you need a few extra reasons to make the trip Saturday morning here they are:

FREE DOOR PRIZES

Just stop by the launch party and sign in to win. We will be giving away more than $700 in prizes to people just for attending the party. You could win:

1. An MSI Netbook Computer ($400 retail value)
2. 320 GB External Backup Hard Drive ($120 retail value)
3. One of 2 $50 Schrock Innovations Gift Cards
4. A FREE Copy of Windows 7 Home Premium (available after October 22nd)
5. A 2 GB USB Flash Drive

TECHNOLOGY DEMONSTRATIONS

We will be showing off some of the fancy new technology behind this year’s Holiday Special PC that you will only find at Schrock Innovations.

• Take a peek at the latest hard drive technology, solid state. These hard drives have no moving parts, making them the most reliable storage device you can get in a computer today.
• Watch us beam video wirelessly to a TV on the other side of the Service Center using Windows 7’s new media sharing functions
• Watch one of our technicians produce a movie and beam it to a television without any DVDs at all in less than a minute!

I hope to see you there!

Christine Campbell DDS wanted to create a website that communicated her practices’ commitment to dental health while at the same time differentiate it from their competition.

She knew what colors she wanted and some site styles she like but needed help to make her vision a reality. She contacted Schrock Innovations to bridge the divide.

Schrock worked with her step by step to turn her ideas into a design she liked. Once the design was created the Schrock Innovations team went to work creating a flash intro page that matched her design. Brad then worked with Christine’s office personal to assist them with the creation of the page content.

Their unique content helped the website stand out amongst its competitors in search engine rankings.

Christine now has a site that is expandable and ready to change with the needs of her patents and practice.

I received a note today that Schrock Innovations was nominated for the 2009 Nebraska Retailer of the Year Award presented by the Nebraska Retail Federation.

Being nominated alone is a significant honor considering that previous recipients have included Bob and Vicki Rokeby, Gary Michaels, Merle Honerman, Robert Allen, Dick Campbell, and Rose Blumkin.

We will be attending the awards banquet to honor whichever business wins the award this Friday.

As part of the nomination process, the Federation asked that each nominee send in some information about their respective business. Here is what we sent them for consideration:

To Whom it May Concern:

When Schrock Innovations was founded ten years ago, the retail technology world was a different place.

Dell was just figuring out how to mass-manufacture PCs, Hewlett Packard was the only game in town for printers, and local OEM providers made their profits by selling hardware.

Schrock Innovations sought to differentiate itself by emphasizing service instead of specific products.

In fact, the first concept we introduce to new employees at Schrock is that we don’t sell computers. We don’t sell hardware. We sell the service that makes those computers and devices work for our customers.

The world has changed in the last 10 years – Now it is considered acceptable to outsource your technical support to India or to expect your customers to mail back defective products at their expense rather than exchanging them with a retailer.

At the same time we are all facing one of the most hostile economic environments in recent memory.

Schrock Innovations tightened its belt just like everyone else has been forced to do. Those cuts required our staff to work a little smarter and be a little more efficient.

But Schrock has never forgotten that its competitive advantage – its secret to business success – is our dedication to making our customer feel good about doing business with us.

The commitment to our customers’ experiences has been the consistent factor that has carried us through good times and bad over the last decade. It was the motivation behind opening a new $825,000 retail facility in Lincoln this year, and the key to a double-digit increase in sales and profitability YTD.

It is easy to get caught up in the numbers – the deposits, payments, taxes, and quarterly growth rates. It is more difficult to come into to the Service Center every day and look beyond the work in front of us to see the faces of the real people we are serving.

The satisfaction of these real people is what we live and die by at Schrock Innovations. As long as our customers are happy, everything else comes out in the wash.

Thank you for taking the time to consider Schrock Innovations for this award. We are humbled by our nomination and honored to be in the company of the great retailers of the state of Nebraska.

Sincerely,

Thor Schrock
CEO
Schrock Innovations, Inc.

Excitement is building for the launch of our 2009 Holiday Special computer featuring Windows 7 and a solid state hard drive.

With the launch party coming up on Saturday the 17th in our Lincoln Service Center, our commercials promoting the new system started running this week on TV and radio.

The official specifications will be released soon on the Schrock Innovations website, but until then watch this commercial to get a sneak peek at the most advanced computer available in Nebraska this Holiday Season!

ShowTek Events in Denver, Colorado wanted their website revamped so it would stand out against the competition.

Rob from ShowTek reached out to Schrock Innovations to build a site that would maximize its SEO benefits, and plays a song of the day. Rob wanted multiple video & images, simple navigation, vibrant colors, while at the same time have the website run completely from his own server in an easily updateable framework.

Brad went over each specific detail Rob wanted and then create a site design that would house the ShowTek Events vision of the new site. He created a unique design using a one button menu bar. Combining this with a BACK and HOME button, the site is very simple to navigate and makes it easy to find each product.

The desire to avoid third-party services and the ability to have a song of the day was solved by Schrock building a custom Flash player for their content. The Flash player also allowed the vision for a video gallery to play on the same page when you click a thumbnail.

To keep the updating easy, we built his site was built using PHP, CSS and JavaScript. Upon completion Brad met with Rob for a brief introduction on how to update the website and manage its content.

Now ShowTek Events has a site fitting their vision which is simple to navigate and update

Working in the Service Center at Shcrock Innovations we have at least one person every day on our bench who is infected with a program that attempts to steal their financial information simply by asking for it.

Big Dog Wraps & Graphics came to Schrock Innovations looking for a website to sell their unique graphics and provide their customers with the ability to upload their own designs.

More importantly, Big Dog wanted a site that would stand out from the competition and show off their products. After some preliminary design meetings, Schrock presented a proposal that featured dynamic image rollovers inside a Goth/Skater styling using a dark gray & burgundy color layout.

Brad in our development center worked closely with Jana of Big Dog Wraps & Graphics to create the style and coloring scheme they were looking for.

To improve the site’s scalability, we created a flexible CSS design to work with the multiple page layouts. A main menu was created alone with a side menu to showcase products, make navigation easy and help customers she how easy it is to have unique graphics printed and applied to their vehicles.

Once the styling was done we designed and coded their online shopping cart. The shopping cart was designed to make purchases simple for the customers and to be easily implemented on the back-end.

The September 26, 2009 episode of Compute This is now available online! Click here to listen to the show.

On this program Thor talked about the prototype 2009 Holiday Special computer and made one available to Chris to try out after the show.

In related news, Thor also announced that Schrock Innovations would be holding a Windows 7 launch party on October 17th at Schrock Innovations on 27th and Pine Lake Road at 10:00. You can try out the 2009 Holiday Special and get a sneak peak at Windows 7 before anyone else in town gets to see it!

The guys also took a number of calls during the show and covered a variety of topis. Some of the questions included:

* What kind of specifications should you look for in a good gaming computer?
* Should I use Norton’s Identity Protection or Internet Explorer’s ID Protection?
* Which is better in a camcorder? Mini-DV, VCD, or Hard Drive Based?

Tune into Compute This live every Saturday from 10-11 AM CST on KFOR 1240 and call in with your question or comment at 489-1240.

Schrock Innovations recently wrapped up a new fishing report application for the Nebraska Game and Parks website.

This application will give Nebraska fishers a whole new way to brag about their catches while helping others find the best fishing in the state.

What Does the New Application Do?

This new application allows fishers to upload a picture of their catch, the location where it was caught, and details about the type of gear that you used and your fishing technique.

Best of all, it gives the individual fisher the ability to rate their fishing experience overall.

The idea behind the application is to help raise awareness that Nebraska has some of the best fishing in the Midwest by SHOWING the proof and telling others where to go on their next weekend outing.

This is the kind of content that separates Nebraska’s Game and Parks website from those maintained by other states.

When Can I Upload My Pictures?

Expect the new application to go live in the coming months, so dig up all of your miracle catches and get ready to share your fish stories with the rest of Nebraska!