HOW MANY OFF-ROAD, DIESEL & TRUCK SHOP OWNERS ON HERE?

[TTP]

{I put this in the General discussion forum, if its not the right one please move it.}

 

I was wondering out loud today, if there were any other off-road, diesel or truck performance shops on here struggling with the same issues that I do on a daily basis, so I just thought I would ask.

I know that we are a special niche in the marketplace and our own struggles and issues. Alot of the information on this site we can incorporate, but some of it just doesn't apply to us. Now don't get me wrong, this site has been invaluable to me for answers to some problems that I have been struggling with, not to mention dealing with customers and techs. Just the answers I have received has helped me to save my shop from the brink of disaster and closing my doors.

But in our line of work, we have to deal with the DIY guy that thinks he knows everything because he either read it on the internet or one of his buddies told him how. And no matter what we tell them, they are always right.

I would love to know how you are generating sales, dealing with customer issues, how you price out a big build that is going to take more than a couple of days...etc

I was thinking if there are enough of us in this forum we could band together and help each other out. I know down here in my area, the competition is fierce, our markup on our parts is barely above jobber cost, because of the internet sites.

I feel we have some other issues that these general mechanic shops do not have to deal with. if you are interested in pursuing this idea then post up with your shop name and location and we will see how much interest this generates.

 

TTP

[TTP]

TEXAS TRUCK PERFORMANCE

TEXAS CITY, TX

 

We are a off-road/diesel truck performance shop that specializes in Jeeps. We do anything and everything related to them. Motor work, transmissions, gears, suspensions. We have small fab shop that we can make alot of the specialty parts that we need. We do motor swaps and long term builds. Here is a link to our Facebook page gallery.

www.facebook.com/pages/Texas-Truck-Performance/110471795674179?ref=hl&sk=photos_albums

 

I look forward to hearing from others on here.

 

TTP

[CARMandP]

CAR Maintenance and Performance

White House, TN

 

We are a general repair shop that is branching out into the diesel truck market. That market is huge around here and no one else in our area even works on Diesels. My tech also drives a cummins that we enjoy working on so that has stoked the interest for us. Would love to talk with someone in the market to get help. Include me in

 

Craig

[Spence]

We do performance work for both gas and diesel. It is a different bunch to deal with for sure.

 

Thanks for starting the thread.

 

Spence

[aorcustoms]

Anyone's Off-Road & Customs Northern Calif.

 

Thank you for starting this thread

 

We have been in business since 2001 and you are SO correct it seems like such a hassle dealing with no mark up and the person on the other side of the counter. We are just trying to help them out and they want to treat us like were ripping them off.

[xrac]

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[Joe Marconi]

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[TTP]

XRAC you are so right, most of the custom market is catered to the DIY guy, and they are the cheapest customers out there. But there are quite a few especially in the Jeep market that will pay to have things done. Those are the customers I go after, then ones who have the money know what they want but dont have the time to do it themselves, but are willing to pay someone else to build their dream. The problem is that they are very few of those types of customers.

I have to deal with a major chain store,(4Wheel Parts) that is also one of my suppliers. But they are always priced below me, and sometimes even priced below my cost when they hold a sale. The markup over jobber is usually about 10-15%, on a few products I get lucky on and get about 25-30%, but its a rare. And dont even get me started on tires! If I make 10-20 bucks above cost I'm doing good.

Our diesel market is much better, most people in general dont have a clue how to work on a Diesel. I once had a guy come in and ask me where the spark plugs were and why he couldn't find the distributor. We tend to be able to make better profit on the diesel work, when parts on a diesel break it usually not cheap to repair, you are usually looking a $1000.00 or more in most cases.

[Spence]

The money is there it's what you are targeting. We do a lot of the ones that don't know how but like having these modified vehicles. Or with the DIY'ers it's doing what they can't do. Also what they thought they could do and failed at it. Whatever the service is you can say no if it's not profitable. I have done this early in the conversation and found it to work well. If they find out they can haggle the cost of repair you are sunk from then on.

[sjdieselrepair]

Just wanted to say thanks for starting this thread. Have been on here a wile and this is this first.

S&J Diesel Repair is a diesel truck repair and performance shop. We specialize in the cummins 6.7 and the ford 6.0 and 6.4 powerstroke diesel engines. I will admit my parking lot is always full. They get towed in by the dozen. My biggest competition is the internet. I will give a customer a quote on a egr delete and oil cooler relocation job. They will complain how expensive it is and how there buddy can do it cheaper. A week later im towin the truck in and the customer has a cardboard box filled with parts and cans filled with bolts. Come to find out they bought the same aftermarket parts i get for the same price. THE INTERNET turns everyone into a mechanic overnight.

[TTP]

Well guys this forum is made for all of us to be able to learn from. I know there are alot more than just the 5 of us, that has responded on here servicing Diesels and Off-Road vehicles, maybe some more will speak up and be recognized. If we can get enough response, maybe we can get our own section on here to help and learn from each other.

I know when I first joined I was looking specifically for an Off-Road/Diesel shop owners forum, this was the best I could find at the time. I was hesitant at first to join up, but after looking at the forum and all it had to offer it was a no brainer. But, I know there are others who are looking for the same thing, but may not take the time to really look at this forum and all it has to offer and just skip on by. What do you say Joe? Got room for a bunch of Diesel/Offroad gearheads in here? Who knows maybe listening to our issues might be able to help you on some of yours.

 

Because first and foremost we are all salesman's, whether we like it or not. In our area we just have to sell the customer on purchasing our product first and then sell them on installing their purchase, instead of just doing a diagnoses and selling parts. What we do to some is considered a luxury not a necessity. So we have to work harder to make the sale.

I live in Texas where the pickup truck is king. It seems almost everyone has at least one truck. With the recent move to diesels, there is a lot of trucks that are aging now and alot of customers that do not have a clue on even where to start on working on them. I once had a guy call me to ask where the sparkplugs were... Thats where we come in. By providing an outlet that is not the dealer and showing professionalism and patience with these people.

OK. I will step off my soapbox now...KEEP THOSE COMMENTS COMING!! and tell any other shop owners you know or deal with about this forum.

 

JOE

[TTP]

One of the problems with the custom market is there is much of that segment that wants something cheap. Here in Evansville we have the Frog Follies every year. We literally have hundreds of customized hot rods built on old car chassis. These people as a general rule are terrible customers. Many of them are do it yourselfers and they are constantly shopping car shows and the internet. Many of them do not understand the difference in quality parts. By shopping the internet they can usually buy stuff as cheap as we can. It is hard to do business with that segment and make any money. In additional a car will have a brake setup off of one year and a totally different setup under the hood. These cars are hard to work on and waste a lot of time. While we are not a custom shop or in the truck market our general strategy is not to work on that kind of stuff period. We concentrate on the customers where we can make our full margins. My suggestion is that if you are doing the installlation of customer supplied custom parts charge a premium on your labor hours (at least 15%-25%) and be sure to charge a fee to cover shop supplies and miscellaneous.

 

I can understand where your coming from, they are indeed a different customer than what you as a general service shop would be accustomed to. Most of these Hot Rods are unique and one of a kind. Very few of these guys could afford to have someone else build their dream. So they do it themselves, sometimes with bad results. When you do get one these customers though you have to think outside the box. I know many of the general repair shops are not equipped to service these types of customers, thats where the specialty performance shop comes in.

 

For example we do Jeep V-8 conversions, ever try to call the parts house asking for a part to a Chevy 350 and tell them thats it in a Jeep. Most of these parts jockey's are wet behind the ears, if its not in the computer in front of them, then it dont exist. And dont even get me started what happens when you tell them to look in a book! Most of them don't know they exist!! So we tell them the part we need came off of a (the door vehicle) and that usually helps sometimes. And these new computerized motors, ever try to mate an OBD1 system to a OBD2 system? They both use a different protocalls and a different bus, but it can be done, but its not fun.

Anyway back on subject..Those customers are harder to deal with in a way, but most already know what oddball part is on their rig, so half the battle is already won for you. It the guy that just bought a great deal from someone else who doesn't have a clue, thats the guy to watch out for. He will waste your time asking a thousand questions and then one of two things happens, he gives you the job or he goes home and tries to fix it himself. I will provide those people a few simple answers and then I politely tell them they need to bring in the vehicle for further diagnoses, when they start to hem haw about that then I know they were just fishing for answers and are not willing to pay for anything, just wasting my time.

 

I appreciate your advice to CYA, but in most situations its not possible, especially in my area where there are several shops in a 20 mile radius ( I can think of 6 in my area) that will happily do the same thing for cheaper. For others not being located close to a major city then they can probably charge a little extra and still get the job.

[TTP]

Anybody else out there on this forum? Please post up and show your support.

[OverlandAuto]

Anybody else out there on this forum? Please post up and show your support.

 

Very interested in this segment, specifically the off-road side of the business. I currently have a General Repair Business and am thinking of adding a couple bays next door for off-road. Off-road is my personal hobby therefore my interest in that market. It appears to me there will be little to any markup on the parts side with the Internet so the business model has to be supported by labor charges.

[TTP]

Very interested in this segment, specifically the off-road side of the business. I currently have a General Repair Business and am thinking of adding a couple bays next door for off-road. Off-road is my personal hobby therefore my interest in that market. It appears to me there will be little to any markup on the parts side with the Internet so the business model has to be supported by labor charges.

 

WELCOME! to the forum.

You are quite right about the parts, there is very little room for profit. If you get with some of the major warehouses, you stand a better chance of making some money. When you get ready contact me and I will give you some names of suppliers.

 

JOE

[Dsl_truck_tech]

What a great topic. So good I just had to register. I am a diesel shop owner also. At least that's what my business name says and how I market it. BUT.... that's not all I work on. If I did, I wouldn't survive. I work on just about anything. I found out fast you have to difersify to stay in the game.

 

Sure if I could have it my way I would just be working on diesel pick-ups and semi trucks. Instead I'm doing oil changes and brake jobs on the family mini-van. Don't get me wrong, I still love what I do (and I still make money at it), but it's just not what I invisioned my company to do.

 

Yes there is a special niche out there for the "diesel shops" or the off-road performance shops (which is how I advertise the business), but my bread and butter seems to come from the everyday maintenance items, ie: oil changes, brakes, tune-ups, window motors, diagnostics, wheel bearings, & ect. I'm sure you get the point. Oh, and most of those maintenance items are on the gas rigs my customers have not their "diesels".

 

Yes there is a market out there for a good diesel shop. I've had customers tow there pick-up truck a 100 miles for me to work on it because they know I will do a good job and they can trust me and my work. I even had a customer haul his Toyota 4 runner with a diesel in it from PA, because he said he could find a shop to work on it, but that's for another story.

 

My point being, you can be the best and only shop around with a niche, but sometimes you will have to take those smaller jobs that don't profit has good just to stay in the game, but in the end, it all pans out the same. Whither you do 5 jobs for $200 a job or one big job for $1000. Being diversified is the key.

 

That's just my 2 cents.

[Alex]

If there is enough interest, we could start a separate forum for "off-road performance shops" or something similar.

[az mike]

We do a big percentage of diesel pickup work. A lot of our customers are either farmers or horse people. When Ford started with the 6.9 in '83 one of my customers bought one of the very first one's sold. Being we did all their work (about 6 trucks) I decided to be the best diesel pickup mechanic around. Today my shop is utilized by people all over Arizona, including other shops. I get my share of the DIY guys looking for info. I give them a little time and then tell them I need to get back to my business. So far we've gotten quite a bit of work from them but even more referrals. Though we don't get too deep into the true high performance part I do have my recommendations for products and ideas. I never argue over what's better, just tell them that my experience is this and that's what we recommend. It doesn't hurt that at the local truck and tractor pulls I blew out the competition with a near stock 2003 Ford 6.0. I prefer to make my money with proper diagnosis and being able to do the job right and usually at a better price than the other shops. There is so much misdiagnosis out there that we get a lot of work after the other guys did it wrong. But as many of you have said we do the Kia's, Hyundai's, the Focus's, Cavalier's and whatever else they drive. I want ALL the cars and trucks in the family. Fewer customers with more vehicles is a better way to go in my book, instead of the other way around. Just my 2 cents worth- and I still may be overcharging!

[rhc320]

We do all diesel in our shop we have 7 techs and book about 3 weeks ahead. Our web site is grdiesel.com in Fredericksburg OH It is a tough business to start with. We build trucks from all over the US. But you have to do a good job We price our work a profit and let our quality speak for its self We have an in house dnyo our own machine shop with a vertical machining center to make our own parts so if you guys that need parts like dual turbo kits dual fuel pump kits call our contact us we would be glad to help you out. We need to work together and save our business from chop shops that are making kids trucks smoke and giving diesel a bad name If you want to call our phone number is 330-695-2039

[Moremph]

We are a Diesel Specialty Shop In Foster Ky, Cincinnati Ohio Market. We do 95% diesel work and 90% of that is pickups. We specialize in the powerstrokes that is where we have made our market niche however we do our fair share of duramax and cummins work. Since we moved into our new facility 3 years ago we have pretty steadily been few weeks backed up. I Found this forum recently (because I have always been an avid diesel forum user and new thier had to be a place similar that would help me in my shop) I want to grow my buisness and not become stagnet. We have made a good name in the area and reguarly work on stuff from well over an hour away. The Diesel Market is very tough, In our area everybody with a 2 car garage and a premier account is a diesel performance shop and sells for pennies over cost. The internet and the sales tax scam that it has cost is another rant I will not get into today!! It is extremely hard to Make it as a "Performance" shop you are most definatly have to have your own product to be a succesful performance only shop. For the rest of us you have to make your bread and butter on your day to day repair work and your bonus money on your performance stuff!!!

 

Mph Enterprises

MPHDiesel.com

[TTP]

So glad to hear there are others out there lie me! Its a tough business, but one I like. We have also diversified to include the general repair work too. In this economy you just dont have a choice. I agree with RHC320 and AX Mike you have to price for profit and do top quality work. But you have to take the regular jobs sometimes to pay the bills.

Great to hear from everyone, keep those comments coming!

 

TEXAS TRUCK PERFORMANCE

Joe Pazdera

[ADP]

My shop is Abilene Diesel Performance

 

I can agree with everyone here. It's very hard to stay up and running with the internet these days. In my area there is 3 diesel performance shops that started after I opened mine. One of them was started by my pervious employee after he quit and opened his own shop. With the internet and all the shops around us it's hard to make a profit. Good to hear from other diesel shops.

[Moonlight]

I don't get on the forums much due to I stay very busy. I did notice this thread and scan through it. I do sympathize with you guys in trying to compete with the internet, its become a tough situation in doing performance upgrades and accessories. You just can't compete with the guy that sitting in his underwear in the basement selling product with no support. I do however think most companies are trying to curb this problem but it still exists. If we can be of assistance to anyone I am always willing to help a fellow brick and mortar shop.

Also a note I picked up on as I scanned the thread. I find as a diesel truck repair and performance shop that we are in a much different arena than our fellow auto shop friends. While they are selling several jobs a day with ARO of $300 and 80% GP we find that we have much larger jobs that may carry for days so our average ARO hasn't been under $1000 in years and to have tickets over 10k is pretty normal. We all know small jobs are bread and butter that bring big GP we find our GP much lower. I look at it this way if a big chunk of the ticket is parts and upgrades then i will take a 45% GP on a 10k ticket any day over a 80% $300 ticket. You're never going to see great GP when your selling a $8000 engine or transmission verses a guy selling a brake job. We would all like to see more and I think it is possible but until we can curb this internet problem its not going to happen on the performance aftermarket side for sure.

 

Take care of your diesel customers. They can be a very loyal group that see the value in taking care of their trucks.

 

I learn everyday but I have been doing this since 1996 so if i can help some of you find an easier way let me know.

[juanpablo4219]

This is nice to hear and glad that this was brought up.

 

I recently open an automotive services shop and I want to build the next phase/niche of the shop around the off roader and diesel customer.

 

Why you might ask?

 

Well somebody just mentioned it, the small jobs are the bread and butter but the off roaders and Diesel Customers are the big jobs.

 

I am an Off Roader and use a diesel truck to pull my rigs.

 

I agree with moonlight, with the exception that I just started my shop last year.

[ncautoshop]

In my opinion the clientele for this diesel side has changed drastically, the age has decreased and the drama has gone up. We still do a good bit of performance work, but for a select group. I feel I do much better financially and stress wise on the typical automotive repairs. Also much more rewarding for me personally. I liked diesel performance, but I don't think when it's all said and done that it's as financially lucrative or rewarding as a typical repair work.

 

Sent from my SCH-I605 using Tapatalk 2

 

 

[TTP]

I have to agree with ncautoshop, offroad and diesel work is not as financially rewarding as it used to be. The internet has a lot to do with it. Too much info is now out there about how to repair your own stuff and the prices on parts on the net make it really hard to turn a profit. Offroaders are the worst. They all think they can fix themselves, till they scew it up and bring you a basket case and expect it to be fixed for that same price you quoted them when they came by for an extimate,or even cheaper now that they have already "done half the work" by tearing it apart for you. SMH.

We are gearing up to start pushing the normal work, AC, alternators, starters, etc...thats where the money is, billable hours, lots of quick small jobs, that turn a profit.

[Sharp'S]

We don't do much for diesel work around here but we love our Jeep and other off road work. We have spurts where every bay and every hole on the lot is filled with a Jeep and then there's weeks where we have nothing but Escorts, Grand Am and anything Mitsubishi.

 

A lot of the Jeep people around here are DIY so it's hard to build the niche. Plus this entire county has been seriously unemployed for years now and custom tube doors and lift kits aren't necessity. Our regulars spend several hundred per visit though and the economy here is picking up so there is hope. In the meantime we're collecting equipment and hoarding Jeep parts and making bread and butter off the electrical jobs nobody in town wants to mess with.

[cdhowell]

New guy started off doing Bedliners. Then off road. Then repairs. Tough gig nowadays.