Jat Mann, Founder & Managing Director
Jat Mann is the Founder and Managing Director of PC PAL, the UK’s leading Computer Support Franchise. Jat originally qualified as a Chartered Management Accountant and progressed to be one of the youngest Heads of Finance in his industry. He also worked for a number of leading organisations including Bridgestone Motorsport, Lloyds Pharmacies and National Grid Transco.
Having always had a passion for IT and problem solving, Jat decided to set up a local computer repair service following an unfortunate encounter with a rogue local computer repair company. Having recognised a growing need for friendly and reliable computer support, Jat left his successful accountancy career and founded PC PAL in 2004, with the goal in mind to become the leading PC repair and support brand in the UK, offering customers an unrivalled level of service.
Having successfully established PC PAL, Jat is now spearheading the expansion of the PC PAL brand by rolling out the franchise network throughout the UK and abroad. Jat was also the youngest ever and first ethnic member of the Board at the British Franchise Association, where he was elected by the membership to serve a 2 year term as a Board member from December 2010 to December 2012.
Jat has recently also been asked to join the PCR Retail Advisory Panel which is a 21-strong select group of retailers and retail organisations, representing the buyers and decision makers that help shape technology retail. This advisory panel will form an important part of the magazine’s coverage of the PC and tech retail trade going forward, and help direct and address the issues which are important to retailers at store and head office level.
Julia Mann, Marketing & PR Director
Julia obtained her First Class Honours Degree in Textile Management at Leeds University in 1996 and also won the prestigious Coats Viyella prize awarded by the Textile Institue, beating off competition from entries from Australia, India, New Zealand and the UK.
Julia then moved from a technical textile role into marketing & PR, working for Courtaulds European Fibres, where she initiated an innovative and award winning range of viscose fibre brands, selling into high street retailers including M&S and BHS.
Following several years working in marketing & PR in the further and higher education sector, Julia created the brand of PC PAL and set about launching and promoting it in the Solihull area.
She is now working to ensure PC PAL becomes a distinctive, recognisable and valued brand throughout the UK through the expansion of the franchised network of PC PAL engineers.
Dee Blick, Marketing, Mentoring & Support Consultant
With 29 years’ marketing experience, Dee is a Chartered Marketer and Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing (only 3% of marketers worldwide attain Fellowship status). Dee has won ten awards for her press releases, adverts and media business articles, each one for generating the highest responses within the respective publication.
Dee is a bestselling business author (her books include ‘Powerful Marketing on a Shoestring Budget for Small Businesses‘ and the sequel, ‘The Ultimate Small Business Marketing Book‘, with her latest book ‘The 15 Essential Marketing Masterclasses for your Small Business‘ due out in August 2013. Dee writes for The Financial Mail Women’s Forum, Hamerville Publications, The District Post and Fine Sussex Magazine.
Dee also provides marketing support services & training to a very select number of clients, who have passed her selection criteria. Dee only works with one client in any sector and we are very pleased to have been chosen by Dee as her clients.
Dee has designed, developed and delivered a number of specifically tailored marketing masterclasses and workshops for our franchisees as provides continual mentoring support to franchisees on an individual basis.
Dee has been asked to deliver a key note speech at the British Franchise Association 2013 annual conference in London. You can visit Dee’s website for further information: The Marketing Gym.
Kiran Gauden, Head Office Administration
Kiran has over 15 years administration and customer service experience. Having completed her Business Administration degree she went onto work for several large companies working in the retail and HR departments.
Kiran has been a full time mum for past four years and has now joined us at PC Pal on a part time basis as an office administrator. If you haven’t guessed, she is married to Chris our technical support engineer.
Any spare time she has she likes to read, listening to music and eating out.
Chris Gauden, Senior Technical Support Engineer
Having spent several years at college studying electronic servicing, Chris joined a large multi-national repair company in 1997, fixing everything from televisions to computers.
During his time there Chris went back to college and gained a few more qualifications in electronics and also in 2002 became CompTIA A+ certified and more recently Chris has become MCDST certified.
After almost 12 years, Chris decided to move on and joined PC PAL where Chris has been able to put a lot of his skills to use from soldering to setting up wireless networks.
Chris is also an accomplished Apple Mac user and offer support to franchisees when they hit issues onsite.
In his spare time Chris enjoy watching films, listening to music and playing online games.