articles link to it . please introduce links to this page from related articles ; try the find link tool for suggestions . october 2015 thriftycomputer type limited liability company industry consumer electronics founder elchonon hellinger headquarters miami florida united states key people elchonon hellinger ceo yosef hellinger coo products cell phones bluetooth headsets services retail sales of discounted unlocked cell phones headsets and other communication technologies number of employees 7 2012 website http www.thriftycomputer.com thriftycomputer is a miami florida based internet business that sells discounted new and refurbished cell phones and other electronics . founded by elchonon hellinger in 2004 when he was 19 he was later joined by his younger brother yosef hellinger . the company encountered financial troubles in 2009 and was forced to rebuild from the ground up . in addition founder hellinger suffers from a debilitating chronic illness that has created significant challenges . 1 founder background edit since infancy elchonon hellinger has suffered from neurofibromatosis type 2 which causes the continuous growth of benign tumors . by the age of 18 he was clinically deaf and tumors on his hands made everyday work painful . 2 3 to date he has had over 20 surgeries including an auditory brainstem implant at the age of 21 to regain his hearing . 4 business difficulties and subsequent recovery edit from the company s beginning selling out of box phones on ebay by 2009 the company had formed an llc expanded its inventory to include other wireless and computer supplies and was reporting 900 000 a year in sales . 5 however due to inexperience and internal mismanagement the company had gone into over 100 000 in debt and lost all of its payment processing privileges from paypal google checkout and credit card processing companies . 6 hellinger brought his younger brother yosef in to help him turn things around . they sold whatever inventory they had left on ebay in order to pay off their creditors and slowly re establish terms . two years later in 2011 the company reported between 40 70 000 month in sales from their website . references edit goh daniel . thriftycomputer.com a lesson in overcoming obstacles . young upstarts . retrieved 22 december 2012 . goh daniel . thriftycomputer.com a lesson in overcoming obstacles . young upstarts . retrieved 31 december 2012 . elchonon hellinger determined to succeed . house research institute . retrieved 31 december 2012 . kurlander steven . a holiday story about the meaning of perseverance and its role in success . sunsentinel.com . retrieved 31 december 2012 . warner andrew . interview interview how do you recover when your customers get angry with elchonon and yosef hellinger . mixergy . retrieved 31 december 2012 . lessons learned computer retailer suffers heavy losses rebounds . practical ecommerce . retrieved 31 december 2012 . retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title thriftycomputer & oldid 743550441 categories companies based in miamihidden categories orphaned articles from october 2015all orphaned articlespages using infobox company with unsupported parameters navigation menu personal tools not logged intalkcontributionscreate accountlog in namespaces article talk variants views read edit view history more search navigation main pagecontentsfeatured contentcurrent eventsrandom articledonate to wikipediawikipedia store interaction helpabout wikipediacommunity portalrecent changescontact page tools what links hererelated changesupload filespecial pagespermanent linkpage informationwikidata itemcite this page print export create a bookdownload as pdfprintable version languages add links this page was last modified on 10 october 2016 at 04 35 . text is available under the creative commons attribution sharealike license ; additional terms may apply . by using this site you agree to the terms of use and privacy policy . wikipedia is a registered trademark of the wikimedia foundation inc. a non profit organization . privacy policy about wikipedia disclaimers contact wikipedia developers cookie statement mobile view