Are Low Car Counts the Real Issue?

[Joe Marconi]

Car count is a key performance indicator (KPI) showing you the health of your business. But before we blame low car counts for the reason why we are not achieving our sales goals, we need to take the time to look at all the numbers; analyzing labor and part margins, average repair order (ARO) production issues, other critical KPI’s, customer retention and workflow processes. Only after a thorough analysis can we begin to work on the issue of car counts.

 

This is not to suggest that a shrinking car count is not a problem. Many shops are experiencing declining car counts for a number of reasons: increased competition from dealers and mass merchandisers, improved car quality, decreased factory scheduled maintenances, decreasing vehicle visits, and other of factors.

 

The key thing is to track all key numbers and vehicle visits per year, per customer. If you see your car count trending down and you are not meeting your sales objectives, and all other KPIs are in line, then you need to address this issue.

 

But, are you really losing customers? You may find that that customer visits per year is the problem. With increasing scheduled oil services and the perception that cars don’t need maintenance, this is a big problem. And it may be the problem for a declining car count.

 

A more proactive approach, selling preventive maintenance and other services will help. In addition, bump up your marketing efforts, especially with you existing customer base. And lastly, make sure you stand out by providing world class customer service.

[Dustin Rutkowski]

Spot on Joe!! Sometimes you have to read something like this to bring you back into reality. Just because car counts, Average RO, or Visits per year are down does not mean you have to sit there and take it. Analyze and React!

[mspecperformance]

Had a conversation with a customer today about oil service. We had just finished up an oil service for the Customer and also a Complimentary Oil Service Inspection. He actually asked if he had to pay extra or if it was included LOL he was very impressed by the digital inspection... Anyway back to my story... the customer asked about his next oil change interval. Shame on me I had just bought an lube sticker machine this week and we are setting it up today. I did not get a chance to give this customer a lube sticker however when asked about his next oil change I did notify him we will be sending a notification for his next oil change. He asked when we suggest he get his next oil change my response was 5,000 miles or 6 months. The customer then asked why so early since synthetic oil is made better, last longer etc etc. I responded by saying, "Sir you are completely right! Synthetic Oil and especially the German brand of oil we use is really high quality stuff and you certainly can run the vehicle a lot longer without absolutely having to change your oil HOWEVER... it is in our professional opinion it is "cheap insurance" to perform oil services more frequently so we can monitor oil level, oil quality etc. We also perform our complimentary oil service inspection during every oil change." This customer is on the penny pincher side of things and his response was, "oh ok, makes sense."

 

Systematically educating your customers is key! Systematic CRM is also super important. Something I am working on constantly.

Edited October 11, 2014 by mspecperformance