alfredauto

If a customer balks at a job and I think they are going to get it done cheaper I offer a cheaper alternative. "You know Mrs. jones if you prefer lesser quality parts we can put them in and save you money. There's a reason someone else can do the job cheaper...cheaper parts. I assumed you wanted the best for your vehicle " most times they just buy the good stuff anyway

We had one come off a Ford Explorer after 700 miles. I torqued them with a torque wrench. I think there might have been an issue with the wheel lug nut seat was screwed up after 200k miles who knows, what I do know it cost me a wheel bearing assy, 6 lug nuts, and one new wheel. Plus I got threatened with a chargeback and a couple lawsuits even though we did the comeback repair for free and there was no injuries or property damage (except the wheel and studs which we covered). Wheel offs are my nightmare. I tell everybody "you need to check the lug nuts after 25 miles we do it free" and it's on the repair orders but nobody checks them.

The dealers in my outlying areas are becoming very commercial friendly. They see the opportunity. They come down from 100 miles away every day so we can put their parts on cars they aren't going to normally see, I like buying from the dealer the parts fit right and don't advertise free diagnosis.

We have a free Yelp listing. I personally hate that anyone can leave a negative review even someone who flunked inspection and got their sticker scraped from coming in expired.

That's a good idea gonzo. I can force myself to golf But I'm not eating mayonnaise. (Joke from undercover brother)

I personally don't care what an employee does on his/her own time unless it affects my business. Everybody gets regular counciling on "don't get arrested don't cheat on your wife we all can't afford it"

I pay 1% gross monthly to my hourly lead tech. It's super easy to calculate & There's no restrictions. I've been paid bonus on labor before and it leads to some unethical behavior.

I'm with joe. There's not much selling in my waiting area, it's all relaxing. There's no tv either, people routinely comment they like the quiet time to unwind.

I removed carfax from my system. They take and don't give back. They use my data to make money, I should be able to access it. I told the rep it's $29.99 per car for the data lets swap for carfax reports or stop calling. You know how that went over. Then they tried pretending they work for Mitchell to remotely reinstall their mining software. Sorry.

We do code reads for free. Diagnosis costs $90. "What's the code?" "P0430" "what's it need?" "Diagnosis".

We stock about 400 tires and get deliveries twice a day. That's 100 sizes in stock ready to go. If you stock less than say 30 sizes it's probably a waste of space and money because chances are you wont have what the customer needs. Turn rate goal is 6x/yr or I swap in something different. That said, I don't stock things like brake pads and spark plugs. The parts stores deliver in 20 minutes so I save my money. We used to make $150-$200 on a set of hoops, now I'm happy to make $80-$100. Too much competition. I'll put on a set for $60 if I have to to keep that person from going down the road to a competitor (on something easy like steel wheels) Carry out to local shops I don't make anything except the program dollars.

I must be an outlier on this one. January was our worse month in 6 years. I thought the phone was broken because it didn't ring. But the last 3 months were 20-30% above last years numbers which were good. The country has not recovered from 2008, that's for sure. No jobs or job uncertainty means no tune ups for us. The good news is as the new guys go under due to inability to pay huge loans guys that have been around awhile get a bigger piece of the pie. Tyrguy - if it makes you feel better our tire sales are garbage. I sold less tires in the last year than I did when I first opened. I blame it on Internet competition. And Walmart and the huge chains are competing with the internet making it so unless you are paying guys peanuts to do tires or your selling the cheapest shit available your prices are going to be higher.

I use Mitchell manager which is the same as snap on I'm pretty sure. The trick is to figure the average cost of things like wheel weights brake clean antiserize and put them into the canned jobs. (Extremely basic/inaccurate math here) So a tire mount/balance for $20 has a profit of $17 In the program. $3 for valve stem, weights, bead sealer. An oil change for $40 nets you $20. Like I said just average the cost of oil filters for the last 100 cars and come up with a number. Or another way is not offer a standard one price service and put the costs in for each job. Once you know the profit on your jobs subtract the labor costs and utilities on an excel spreadsheet at the end of the month. If your bank account is short there's a couple reasons. You might not be putting all the parts/materials used into the system. Someone might be stealing. You might not figure credit card fees, surcharges, billing mistakes, or petty cash for lunch or gas or whatever. Don't get me wrong, learning to account for every dollar is a massive pita at first. It sucks and not many people want to do it. That's why accountants exist. But you can do it yourself. Is it worth the $500 a month savings to do it yourself? I can't answer that one. I enjoy doing my own books. I also change my own oil. And I have guys on payroll that can do that with precision.

We average 2%. Figure it into your labor rate or parts markup. I only get worked up on it when I do my taxes and see the yearly cost to get paid. I get worked up because of my electric & phone bill too, how much to run some lights and talk on the phone??!!?

AAA used to mean something 15+ years ago when they were the only real player in towing insurance, now anyone under 35 has towing through their insurance co. and always had it. The only triple a tows we get are from kids who's grandparents signed them up via AARP. I remember going in to get highlighted route maps from them. I studied the AAR material when I opened up but decided it wasn't good for my business.

We use oilchangestickers.com and buy a roll of 1000 at a time. Very reasonable.

Direct mail coupons definitely scream "we are slow and need work" in my opinion. There are better ways to increase car count. The way that works best for us is to ask happy customers for referrals at check out. We are in a college town so my version is something like this: "Thanks Ed how's business?" "We've been swamped but with the kids gone for the summer it should relax a bit. We are running a bit low on waste oil due to the cold spring, if you know anyone that needs an oil change send them in we can probably do it while they wait". So when someone comes in and says "hi Mrs. Smith is my brothers cousins sister in law" we'll change the oil, inspect the car, and unless something is unsafe just plant the seed for future work. Gaining lifetime customers is our priority, milking everybody every time they come in doesn't work n small town USA.

Reading articles like this is frustrating to say the least. It puts us in a defensive position at the counter, and God forbid if the car has multiple problems we become crooks or feel we need to work for free. Brake pads only in New York? Is that even remotely possible? So say we try and save the customer money with a $100 pad slap. The rotor has rust all the way through or s caliper piston is tight now we're crooks, or if we suggested it in the first place we're crooks. Oi

Haha too funny. I've come up with an easy way to avoid the inevitable on these beauties. "Sir, your inspection is coming up in 2 months and it's not going to pass because of the (rusted out frame or whatever) Are you certain you want to spend the money for just a few more weeks of use?" Then the other gate clangs open and the buddy swoops in "don't worry I know a guy who'll pass it, just get the alignment good" lol

I bought 10 - 55 gallon drums the first time, the second fill up they just pumped oil in my drums and saved me $.50/gal. That was NOCO, I also have a 275 bulk tank that I used to get filled. Now I buy cases of quarts same price.

book time (Mitchell) is 7.0 or 4.3 warranty time. That means it takes an experienced tech 4 hours to do the job when the truck is fairly new, 7 hours for everyone else with a service manual. If it took your guy 12 hours he is either slow or inexperienced or didn't review the proper R&R procedure before starting the job. That being said we rarely do heater cores that call for more than 3 hours because we don't do them every day, old cars have plastic parts that break easily, and it just ties up too much time. I can do 10 control arms or brake jobs in the time it takes to do one nasty Jeep or S10 heater core.

I had a competitor with a problem with condensation in the bulk tank. He didn't ruin anybody's engine but it made me rethink the savings of bulk oil vs just buying quarts. The last 50 or so gallons in his 275 gallon tank were used by me as waste oil because of the water in it. That presented another problem as new oil doesn't burn too good but I diluted it. Anyhow I went back to quarts after seeing that mess.

My rule is no side work in the shop. I discourage side work at home too, meaning stealing my customers equals no job.

Ever take a moment to consider BMW advertises the longest oil change intervals in the industry and also is the only manufacturer to train techs in walnut blasting away carbon deposits? Food for thought.

Don't. I tried initializing an intelikey for a Nissan and it turned into a no start. Had to tow it to the dealer. The scan tool isn't fully functional. Just a heads up. I'll spare the details but I had the Nissan service dept walk me through each step and the problem was Autels software.