When Andre LeBlanc opened Around the Bend Electronics Ltd. in Meteghan in early 2026, it was not the result of a long, carefully paced life plan. In fact, it began with an abrupt surprise, a closing door, and a quick decision to keep an important local service alive.
For 16 years, Andre had worked at Seashore Electronics, a familiar rural shop that had once been a Source store, and before that, part of the RadioShack family. Over time, he had become much more than an employee. He handled the ordering, knew the suppliers, understood the customers, and had learned the business “top to bottom.”
Then one day out of the blue, while counting the cash, the owner told him he was selling the building, retiring, and closing everything down.
The news stopped Andre in his tracks, and left him with a major decision to make.
“It was either do nothing and lose my job, or kind of get going and figure something out,” Andre says.
It didn’t take him long to reach a conclusion.
By the next day, he had a meeting set up with CBDC Digby Clare. Within about three months, Andre had gone from learning he would soon be out of a job to standing inside his own building, renovating what had once been an old restaurant. The restaurant’s name had been Around the Bend, and Andre kept it.
“I just figured I don’t want to go learn how to do something else,” he says. “I’ve been doing this long enough. I can just do it myself.”
With support from CBDC, including guidance from Rose Madden, Andre secured financing to buy the building and purchase leftover inventory from the former business. Additional support from CDENE helped him build out a business plan, something he laughs he might not have managed alone.
“They helped me build out my whole business plan, which was amazing because I’m really terrible at homework,” he says.
The community also made it clear there was a need. When the previous store closed abruptly, people started looking for Andre. Some stopped him out and about in the community. Others knocked on the door before Around the Bend Electronics was even open, and while he was still renovating.
“We’re hammering away, we’re doing all sorts of stuff, and they’re like, ‘Are you open yet? Can you do this?’” he says.
That demand makes sense. In Clare and the surrounding region, Andre is the kind of ‘do-it-all’ person many people call when technology stops behaving. He sells electronics, phones, accessories, guitars, strings, surf gear, and Bell products. He delivers and installs TVs, connects satellite dishes, hooks up sound bars, sets up security cameras, and solves the small but urgent problems that can make everyday technology feel impossible.
“I’m the person that fixes everyone’s Facebook, all their tablets, all their TVs,” he says.
Around the Bend Electronics is, as Andre describes it, “three or four little businesses kind of all in one.” One section is a Bell authorized dealership. Another is a compact electronics store stocked with TVs, Bluetooth speakers, headphones, chargers, cables, and parts. Another is a music store carrying guitars, strings, stands, microphones, and the gear local musicians rely on.
That music section matters in a region with plenty of talent and few nearby options.
“There’s no other store in this area,” Andre says. “You can’t even go to Yarmouth or Digby to pick up a bunch of strings.”
The newest addition to the business comes from Andre’s own life outside the shop. A longtime surfer, he knew how far people in the area had to travel for even basic surf supplies.
“I’ve been surfing for the past 20 years, and I have to drive all the way to Halifax to get a bar of wax,” he says.
So he ordered surf equipment, including boards, wetsuits, wax, and accessories, and is preparing to offer surfboard rentals for the local surfing community. Eventually, he would like to separate that part of the business into a small seasonal beach shop near his home, where people could pick up a board, grab an ice cream, and head for the water.
Andre’s knack for technology goes back to childhood. He remembers being a “90s kid” with a computer tower full of lights, multiple screens, video games, and a habit of fixing computers for friends. He later studied computer service technology at NSCC, though he says the real learning came from years of hands-on problem-solving.
“You learn the basics, and then you kind of have to figure out the rest as you go,” he says.
Customers sometimes see his ability as almost supernatural.
“People tend to think that I have some sort of weird magical electricity power or something like that,” Andre says. “When there’s a problem, I typically touch it and the problem goes away.”
He laughs about it, but that calm confidence is part of what makes the business work. Even the early financial pressure of ownership has not shaken him much. His proudest achievement so far, he says with characteristic humour, is simple: the bank account has not hit zero.
“It’s working,” he says. “It’s doing its thing.”
Around the Bend Electronics is still new, but Andre is already thinking ahead. He hopes to eventually hire a few employees, give himself enough breathing room to surf in the morning once in a while, and keep building the business in ways that fit the community around him.
For now, he is doing what he has always done: answering questions, solving problems, ordering what people need, and keeping one more essential rural service close to home.
“If there’s something you like to do, just do it,” Andre says. “That was my theory.”