A Brief History of Nerd

It has happened so much it has become a cliché – a nerd starts a company in the garage which grows into a hugely successful business. But as prevalent as these stories are, they seem to be the stuff of myth and legend. Nevertheless, ten years ago, in a cold dirty room designed for automobile storage, Colin Thornton started Dial a Nerd.

If you think back to ten years ago, computers were not as prevalent as they are today. The internet was something that only nerdy people had, and even then it was slower than a leisurely walk to the local library (remember those?). But Colin knew that the internet was about to boom, and the IT industry would soon explode with possibilities.

But during this explosion, nobody had thought about home users. IT departments were for businesses with multi-storey buildings, not for your friends and family. If you had a computer and it was faulty, if you didn’t know a nerd, you were in trouble. So Dial a Nerd was born, to fill that niche.

Since it began in 1998 with two friends from university, Dial a Nerd has grown into a national business. Many of our long standing clients will remember our small office above Paulo’s restaurant in Greenside – a two roomed office with no receptionist. The building where the office was has now been renovated into flats, but by that decision the nerds had grown beyond their first office. In 2003, we moved out of the greenside office, and into a renovated house in Parkhurst, where we remain to this day.

Through the years many people have come onboard to help spread the nerdiness to the country – Colin’s brother, Aaron, joined him to assist with the ever increasing responsibilities of sales & management, allowing Colin to meet Roberto Caprio who took Dial a Nerd to Cape Town, where we now have three branches. Paul Case helped spread Dial a Nerd to the north of Johannesburg, starting Dial a Nerd Bryanston. And developing beyond our humble beginnings as a home computer support company, Andrew Burns and Xavier Nel decided to help out small to medium businesses with the same care and concern we have always had for our home based customers by starting Network Nerds, now known as Dial a Nerd Business.

Looking back on the garage, it’s hard to imagine that Dial a Nerd has become such a large entity. New branches are opening all the time, most recently a branch in Glenvista in Johannesburg South. A business of two nerds has become a business of over one hundred. But these are still early days.

Thirteen years ago, Dial a Nerd was just an idea, which with nurturing and care has grown into a healthy company. But no matter how big we have grown, demand is still high.

Since the days of noisy 56k modems and boxy, cream coloured desktop computers, the desktop computer industry has exploded. Virtually every home has a computer, an iPod and various other gizmos. Most cellphones are computers now. And strangely enough, no matter how fast and shiny these computers have become, they still break down just as much. Some might even say more.

So when your computer gives you grief, or when the latest shiny gadget sweeps the world, we’ll still be there to help. It’s been a long road, full of virus scares and power surges. Lightning has struck many times since then, and hundreds of hard drives have clunked and whined and stood still to the dismay of all. And through it all, Dial a Nerd has saved the day.