Refurbished and Used Electronics
Jonathan Brax founded Techable, an electronics e-commerce business selling refurbished devices, and SellMac, a device trade-in business. Since 2008 his work has covered the full path a used device takes: acquisition, evaluation, testing, repair, grading, listing, warranty and returns. He can describe what refurbishment actually involves, where it goes wrong, and why customer trust is decided by process rather than marketing language.
For media inquiries: jon@techable.com
Why this topic matters in practice
Refurbished can describe very different seller processes
One seller may wipe a machine and give it a quick visual check. Another may run functional tests, replace consumables, grade the cosmetics and attach a warranty. Two listings can use the same word for both, so the practical question for a buyer or a reporter is what specific steps a given seller performs.
Grading is where expectations are set or broken
Cosmetic grading is the part a customer can verify immediately on arrival. When the photographs and the grade match what comes out of the box, the rest of the conversation starts from a shared baseline. When they do not, the disagreement begins before the device is powered on.
Warranty and support are part of what a buyer is judging
For a used device, the buyer is also evaluating what happens if something fails. A clear warranty, a working returns process and someone who answers are part of the offer, alongside the specification.
Returns are an operational signal
Return reasons are direct feedback on a refurbishment process. Where returns cluster around one reason, it is worth checking the step upstream: a test that was skipped, a grade applied loosely, or a listing photo that was not of the actual unit.
Questions Jonathan can help with
- What actually happens to a device between being bought and being resold as refurbished?
- What makes consumers trust or distrust refurbished electronics?
- How is cosmetic and functional grading decided, and why does it vary between sellers?
- What do warranties on used electronics realistically cover?
- What are the most common reasons a refurbished device gets returned?
- How should a buyer evaluate a refurbished listing before purchasing?
Working on something along these lines? jon@techable.com
Current observations
What Jonathan is seeing in day-to-day operations at Techable and SellMac. These are his observations from that work, not measured data or a claim about the market as a whole.
Photos of the actual unit make condition clearer
Stock imagery leaves room for disagreement about what a specific device looks like. Photographing the unit being sold gives both sides something concrete to point at.
Battery condition and storage are areas buyers pay attention to
Consumables and capacity are where the age of a machine becomes visible to an owner, so they come up often in questions before a sale and in conversations after one.
Consistency matters more than any single sale
In this market a buyer's willingness to come back is built over repeat transactions, and a bad experience is hard to argue with after the fact.
Related work
- The Retail Exec · March 2025Techable's Jonathan Brax on How To Build A Successful Ecommerce Website
An interview about Techable, renewed technology, customer experience and e-commerce.
- Authority Magazine · March 20235 Things You Need to Know to Build a Highly Successful E-Commerce Website
A discussion about the early development of Techable, customer experience, e-commerce and extending the useful life of technology.
Background
Jonathan Brax is the founder of Techable, an electronics e-commerce business, and SellMac, a device trade-in business. He has worked in the secondary electronics market since 2008, across acquisition, evaluation, testing, repair, refurbishment, trade-in, resale, reuse and parts recovery. Most of that work involves Apple hardware, including Macs bought from consumers, businesses and liquidations, then tested, graded, repaired where it makes sense, and resold or parted out. He is based in the Chicago area and speaks from day-to-day operating experience rather than research.