Today is a big day at Best Buy. It’s our 50th birthday, our golden anniversary, the big five-oh.
As we prepared for this milestone, we spent a lot of time in the company archives to learn about our journey from one tiny store in St. Paul, Minnesota, to a multinational retailer with 1,600 stores throughout North America, 125,000 employees and nearly $40 billion in annual revenue.
Here are five facts you might not know about the company’s first five decades.
Curiosity, 90 minutes and a little help from adults were all it took for 300 students to build their own laptops during a Geek Squad Academy camp in Minneapolis this week.
The “Junior Agents” put together the Kano computer kits on Wednesday and programmed them on Thursday.
“This is the best thing I’ve ever seen in my life — a little keyboard that I get to keep,” said an 11-year-old named Devin. The laptops can do just about anything — from surfing the internet to playing games to word processing.
A laptop is a critical tool for crushing it in school, but choosing the right one can be a challenge.
Let us help you. (After all, we are the nation’s No. 1 destination for laptops.)
We turned to expert Blue Shirt Steve Doiron, who works at our Best Buy store in Tempe, Arizona, just a mile from one of America’s largest universities. Here’s his advice for finding a laptop that will help you ace those classes (and provide some fun when you’re procrastinating).
Customers at a Best Buy store near Denver got quite a surprise Sunday afternoon when Super Bowl MVP Von Miller showed up in a Geek Squad Agent uniform, ready to work.
Instead of his usual Denver blue and orange, he wore the Geek Squad black and white, complete with badge displayed on his left hip. He tweeted he was on the clock at the store in Lone Tree, Colorado, and more than 100 fans showed up to see him in action.
Everyone knows time moves fastest when you don’t want it to. That ice cream cone you planned to savor is gone in a flash, and the vacation you couldn’t wait for flies by before you know it.
Summer always goes too fast, too, especially when you’re a student. All of a sudden it’s time to get ready to head back to school, and you’re left holding the (beach) bag.
There’s so much to do to prepare for a new school year that it’s easy to neglect the crucial task of making sure technology is working properly and ready to go.
You turn on your computer, only to find that you’re locked out of all of your files — everything from work documents to family photos. There’s an ominous message on the screen demanding that you pay a fee to regain access.
That nightmare scenario has become all too real because of ransomware, a type of computer virus that cybercriminals around the world are using to scam money out of unsuspecting individuals and businesses. It’s nasty stuff, and it’s on the rise.
Best Buy has launched a new back-to-school ad campaign that features comedian, actor and producer Adam Devine in a series of educational and humorous TV, digital and social spots.
Each element highlights a common scenario students face, and shows how to navigate awkward and difficult college tasks. Devine often partners with Best Buy Blue Shirts to demonstrate how easy it is to enjoy the best in tech for every situation.
“I hope our approach on how to tackle the tough college stuff helps show how easy Best Buy makes tech for families,” Devine said.
Bridging the digital divide has never been more fun for the 44 Washington, D.C.,-area youth who learned on Friday how to assemble computers for their personal use, thanks to the ConnectHome program, a White House initiative that is narrowing the digital divide for families in HUD-assisted housing.
U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julián Castro joined Best Buy and other ConnectHome organizations — including DC Housing Authority, GitHub, EveryoneOn and Kano — to celebrate the initiative’s one-year anniversary at the Best Buy Teen Tech Center in Washington, D.C.
Super Bowl MVP, self-professed geek and current ESPN Magazine cover model Von Miller dusted off his Deputy Agent uniform and returned to assist Agent Jay Lisby on some client house calls yesterday in Los Angeles. Von, who was deputized as an Agent back in April during the launch of the new Geekmobile, took time out of his busy awards show schedule this week to help out the Squad:
Geeks, today is your day.
Doesn’t matter what your thing is — technology, science fiction, TV shows — you should celebrate it on Embrace Your Geekness Day.
Geek Squad celebrates every day, with a dedicated tech-support army of Agents 20,000 strong.
We asked some of them what “geekness” means to them. Here’s what the Agents said.
Agent: Joshua K.
Role: Consultation Agent
Location: Davenport, Florida
My personal brand is where my passion shines: Tabletop gaming.
I regularly read rule books for new tabletop role-playing games for fun, searching for ideas I can use in my own campaigns.
Deciding to back up your data is the first step to ensuring that your important photos, documents and files are protected against loss or damage.
How you approach backing up that data can increase that protection.
At Geek Squad, we recommend you follow the “3-2-1 backup strategy.” That is, we want you to make sure your data is protected by having at least three copies in two different formats, with one of those copies off site.
When we talk about 3 different copies, we mean three totally different devices.
Too much sun or heat can be bad for your body, and bad for your tech, too. So, while you’re taking steps to stay cool this summer, make sure to do the same for your smartphone, tablet and other electronic devices.
High temps can permanently damage your phone’s internal components, causing the miniature circuit board to flex and warp and the battery to overheat. Direct sunlight can also hurt the screen, causing it to pixelate, crack and become unresponsive to touch.