ipad air 1 not charging, doesnt see the charge cable

hi. my old Ipad Air first gen that stopped charging, when i plug in the cable it doesn't seen to see it i get nothing, no sound, no charge symbol and the battery is completely dead at this point. Apple shows they will charge almost $300.00 to fix it... And Best buy geek squad said id be better off buying a new one. is this what i get for brand loyalty? no one will repair this thing even though it stopped charging through no fault of my own but more like Apples fault for the shoddy design of the Ipad Air charging system? this thing started getting harder and harder to get to charge then, it took it longer and longer to charge once it saw the charger until one day it just would not charge anymore. is there a fix??