Gasanddiesel

March was amazing for us. We picked up several engine jobs from people not keeping antifreeze in their engine over the cold winter.

April was slow. We barely broke even.

May is picking up, but not nearly what i want it to be. Still too much standing around time and doing jobs i don't want to do.

We are open 8:30-6:00. If I am there at close I'll take in just about anything that takes less than an hour that I can do.(no parts avaliable after 5 anyway). Oil change, tire repair/mount and balance tires, inspection, etc, etc. Any big work I set up an appointment.

If my mechanic is closing I tell him to use his judgement. If its 15 mins till close and an oil change comes in, do it. I'll pay him the 15 extra mins to finish it up.(my 2 guys are paid hourly).

I just look at it as good customer service. As long as the same customer doesn't make a habit of it, I understand. We've all been running behind before, or had a last minute problem, etc.

Not to over post but a comment on parts quality. Compare an economy Autozone bearing to one from Advance, Napa, Carquest, or any other store and tell me the difference. They are exactly the same part with a different sticker on the box. Same goes for anything rebuilt - it's almost all restickered A1 Cardone. We buy from the store that offers us the best price, service, and warranty. Right now AZ has the best parts and labor warranty we have ever seen. FYI rock auto shares the same warehouse as some major parts chains, the only difference is the price. The parts are the same at the bargain quality level. That said we try to put premium brand name parts on everything, it's way better for everyone.

 

 

I have noticed this tool. A canister purge valve that we ordered from oreillys in a pinch was a dealer bosch part in a standard/bwd box.

We buy from napa because they offer a 2 year parts and labor warranty that we can pass on to our customers when we install their premium parts. 1 year parts/labor on their "Value" brands.

Plus napa actually wants to help us. Sales rep comes by almost once a week, delivery times are good. Parts they stock is outstanding. And the prices are suprisingly close to advance's prices.

 

We only buy hard parts(for warranty to our customers) and diesel engine oi from napa(valvoline premium blue is an amazing deal). Most of our filters and fluids come from advance. Oriellys is really quick for delivery so we get things we need quick from them.

 

Bottom line is, you can hardly ever use one place for everything. Just see who is best at what, and what is hype.

Wow, your patience is saint-like. I had a recent scuffle with a crazy customer, but I'll post that later.

I am still fairly young, but I have learned this is almost how you have to be when dealing with the public. If you never get angry with an already irate customer, it steals their fuel. They almost expect you to blow up infront of a group of customers and then cave to their demands to redeem yourself.

If you keep your cool, focus, get the irate customer alone and calm them down they sometimes can turn into decent people, and occasionally good customers. At the very least, you end up looking professional and in control.

Most people just want assurance that they are not getting screwed. Once they realize that, they are good.

I am in nearly the exact same boat as you. I moved into an old shop that had been closed for 4 years, renovated it and moved in beginning of December. It's been up and down, some weeks slammed for several days others twiddling my thumbs. It is nervewracking and I wonder sometimes if I did the right thing. I know come warmer weather it will be busy, it's always been that way. For now though have to financially make it through this brutal winter. Nobody wants to do anything when it's -15 with -35 windchills, which seems like this whole winter. Good luck man, hope you do well, wish I had advice but I'm new her

My saving grace is that I was able to keep my fulltime job, since it is 2nd shift, 4-10s. I've got a great, trustworthy mechanic that runs the place when I leave each day.

We started strong, but an small snow "storm" killed the business. Ended as an off-week. Yeah, weeks like this make me nervous.

I just bought out a failing garage in December....slowly turning it around...

Been working on getting it cleaned up, new signage, paint, some cheap advertising, flyers, etc.

January Started slow. New years week was bad. The week after new years we were did ok. Last we we were slammed. This week has been slow again. Its a little unnerving, but I know it will pick up in Febuary.

What are your shops doing in January? Just paying the bills or turning a profit?

Any tips on what to do when its slow? Whats a good way to get some people in the door? My advertising budget is next to nothing. I could do some mailers or flyers. Thats about it.

My shop just opened about a month ago. The week we opened we signed up for free accounts on yelp, google+, angies list and yellow pages, and got a simple website thru godaddy.com.

We also delivered about 400 flyers to subdivisions around our shop. Had 1 repair from the flyers already, 1 repair from the google+ page, 1 great review on google, 1 great yelp review and 1 great angines list review. I try to talk to customers who seemed really pleased and computer savy to post a good review for us. My reasoning is, if its free and it gets your name out there one more time, why not?

My wife works for a window cleaning company. Some of their customers would not have even called if they did not have a presence on angies list. I think its part of the future of the service industry. Not saying its good or bad, but its here and growing.

Hello everyone,

Just bought an existing, but failing, garage in my hometown about a month ago(I know, worst time of the year).

I've done some much needed cleaning and organizing, done a little advertising and changed the name. Seeing very positive results already.

Love the website and forum. Its been invaluable to me so far. Hope to learn more!

Josh B.

Mt Holly, NC

We use our brake lathe a good bit. Some of the medium truck rotors are expensive and hard to get. Of course, the odd ball "high end" car we see gets new rotors with each brake job. I've also noticed most newer GM cars are right at discard after the factory pads wear out. We measure each rotor/drum to make sure we can resurface them.

I just setup an account with them this past week. They are not my first call, but since they can get some medium/heavy truck parts same day or next day I will be using them some. I'm a new shop owner, and have been using Advance for most of my parts. When Advance doesn't have something Oriellys usually has it or can get it quicker than advance. Price is right around the same....sometimes cheaper. Their "quality" parts on hand doesn't seem to be that great. Most of their Moog suspension parts are a day out.