A repair shop saved my trip to the White House

T-minus six hours until I’m due at the White House. 

My phone battery is under 20% and, suddenly, not charging. How would I traverse the city without Google Maps? Was I really going to be at the White House without a single shred of photographic evidence to send to my family? Would I now need to buy an entirely new phone, and spend hundreds of dollars doing so?

Just a few days prior, I had been invited to attend the celebration of President Biden’s designation of two new national monuments in California. Together, the new monuments would protect more than 850,000 acres of the natural places we love. I was ecstatic to celebrate such a huge achievement.

But, after a morning of travel, my phone charge was steadily ticking down. And now, it wasn’t charging. When I was unexpectedly assaulted by the pressurized release of water from my bottle mid-flight, I hadn’t thought any of my electronics had been caught up in the dousing. I racked my brain for solutions, quickly heading out of the office in search of a bag of rice to submerge my phone in. As I launched out of the building and into the biting January air, a much more plausible option appeared: a repair store, only two doors down.

After I shared a frantic description of my plight, the repair shop worker fixed my phone in under an hour. Fully charged and with a renewed awareness of the importance of repairability, I was ready to make my day in DC count, navigating myself to meetings with legislators and photographing the very moment President Biden designated the Chuckwalla and Sáttítla Highlands National Monuments.

Unfortunately, repairing the products we use and need is not always possible. More and more, manufacturers of cell phones, medical devices, appliances and even tractors have implemented various legal, digital and physical barriers that prevent consumers from doing their own repairs or using independent repair shops. This means more cost to consumers and more waste. Americans dispose of 416,000 cell phones per day, and less than a quarter of all global electronic waste is recycled.

That’s why CALPIRG has long championed Right to Repair, a campaign that aims to give every consumer and small business access to the parts, tools and service information they need to repair products so we can keep things in use and reduce waste. After years of organizing, the Right to Repair Act was signed into law in 2023, significantly expanding consumers’ and independent repair shops’ access to repair materials needed to fix electronics and appliances. 

But, more needs to be done to improve transparency and help consumers know which products are made to last, and which products could quickly break. Consumers are still left in the dark when trying to choose a repairable device.

That’s why we want repair scores. Repair scores for products like laptops, phones, and appliances, are like EnergyGuide labels for repairability. They provide consumers with a 1 through 10 score that measures availability of spare parts, ease of disassembly, and longevity of support, before they purchase expensive devices. They will support market transparency and a race to the top for repairability.

To support this race, California can and should pass a resolution calling on the FTC and NIST to work with companies to develop a voluntary repairability criteria that’s fair for both consumers and manufacturers to ensure transparency in the market. With bi-partisan support, a resolution from California will be a powerful call to action. Our things should be built to last, not to break.