Burton Systems mac support

Ross-based Burton Systems offers Apple Mac support to the Herefordshire, Gloucestershire, Worcestershire and Welsh border areas, and is the only Mac support company for 30 miles. The company was set up in 2001 to address a clear gap in the local market.

‘I saw that people wanted a little bit more attention to detail and a bit more of a personal service,’ says owner Matt Burton. ‘I’ve definitely found a niche – there aren’t many rural Mac specialists around’.

Like many people in the area, Matthew had moved away to gain industry experience, but the lure of the Wye Valley proved too much, ‘I came back because I missed the fresh air, the pace of life and the countryside’ he says. ‘Herefordshire is quite a unique place.’

Matthew provides a service called ‘remote fix’ which means he can solve his clients’ Mac problems without them having to leave their home or office. ‘Customers go to my website where they can buy credit units of time and when they need assistance they initiate a secure connection and I remote control their machine,’ he says. ‘Once I’m done they close the connection and I can’t access again until they need me. It means I can work on a machine on the other side of the world if needs be’.

Most of his business, however, comes from a loyal and growing local clientele. ‘I’ve built up quite a client base over the years,’ he says. ‘People recommend me, so most of the business tends to be word of mouth, which is brilliant because it means customers are satisfied. They pass my details on because they’ve had a good service – I’d say around 90 per cent of the work I get is through recommendations. It’s taken a while to build a good client base, but generally with Macs, once you’ve found one Mac user you’ve found a small group of them.’

Based near to the town centre, Burton Systems is also a genuine home-based business. ‘I run the company from a street level workshop in the basement of our property – that means there’s separate street access for my customers to visit and drop in their computers,’ he says.

So what does the future hold? ‘I’m definitely interested in expanding. At the moment I do everything within the business, so if I’m to move forward I need to move the business into a position where I can employ staff. I’ve become an early reseller of Xsilva’s LightSpeed, a retail POS system for Mac, and I want to become national specialist in the software and grow my business with it, offering solutions, installations and support’.

And what’s it like running a business of this kind in Ross? ‘There are no traffic jams and there’s fresh air and a much more relaxed lifestyle,’ he says. ‘On the downside that means getting business can take longer to acquire, but once you’ve got the business it’s fine – people are very loyal. I don’t think I’ve lost many customers at all since I’ve been going’.

www.burtonsystems.co.uk