CAZM

I have a opportunity to hire a second a level tech. Now here is my problem I only have 3 bays. I currently have 1 A level tech and a tire and oil change guy, and he will be moving to the front counter as my service advisor in January so I will have a spot to fill in the shop. I look at this 2 ways can I afford a 2nd A level tech with only 3 bays? Then I think this would really put a huge hurt on the place I hire him from which is my biggest competitor in town. He is probably the best tech in town and would bring a huge customer base with him. My future plans are to add on to the shop but I have at least 3 years till that happens. What are your thoughts?

any help would be great

I will be bring in a new Service Advisor to replace my current one when she retires. I have her replacement here already doing light auto repair. What I'm wondering is how do you pay your service advisor. What I'm paying him now is hourly plus a 10% labor commission. I'm thinking of keeping the pay the same just switching it from a labor commission to parts commission. Any help on this would be great. As I have to run this by my main office so the more replies the better to prove my point to them.

I'm pretty easy going on cell phones. I tell my guys this. I would much rather have your wife text you about something then have her call here and tie your time up even more on the phone then it would by sending you a text. My guys have shown me a lot of respect on this and I have not had to talk them about their cell phone use at all.

In Wisconsin an email or text will work for consent.

size is 3' X 7'91/2"

Were do you get your ideas for the sign quotes and sayings you do? Do you just come up with them or find them on the web

I pay them their hourly wage. Plus the area we are in you have to travel to get to most of the training so I also pay 48 cents a mile.

Contact who you are getting your Goodyear product from now. And tell them You would like to become A G3X dealer they should be able to put you in touch with there Goodyear rep

Well I pulled the trigger yesterday and order the sign. I was able to get some coop dollars from some of my manufacturers. After all said and done it will cost me about $23,000.00. I will be cutting all radio and print advertising which never really worked for me here so if I figure in cutting that it should come to a payment of $233.33 a month over 5 years. Thank you for all the advise you posted.

Elon, You bring up a lot of good points. I am on the busiest street in town and this building has been here for 30 years. I also have a very large Michelin sign out by the road, and yet we get people all the time that has lived here all their live say were are you located at. I have even drove by and the only reason I seen the place was that I work here. Now when I had the rental here for 2 weeks I had people I know say that we were definitely noticeable. Now when the sign was here we ran some very aggressive specials, and we asked every body that walked in the door what brought them in. Then we only tracked the sales of the people that mentioned the sign. My office manager that has been here for over 20 years paid a lot of attention to the people coming in, and she commented that there were several new faces that she has not seen in here before. We also get a lot of regulars that mention we didn't know you did that, and that would be one of the purposes of the sign is to let people know we more then just tires. I also have tried several other ways of advertising. Like newspaper and radio, and I have seen 0 return on it. Where as for the sign I can say that it is the most effective way for me to advertise.

Another update. After the sign was up for 2 full weeks it brought in a few more jobs, and lets keep in mind the sign was on a trailer so it was not sitting high up on a poll. After I ran all the numbers the profit the sign brought in was 493.00 dollars. The hard numbers for the sign would be $30,000.00 installed and that would include running electrical to the sign. So the payment per month over 5 years would be $500.00, and in 2 weeks the rental brought in 493.00.

I'm at my wits end. I have been the store manager for the location I'm at now for 8 months now. I have noticed that the first 2 weeks of the month is extremely slow and the second 2 weeks we are slammed. I have tried everything I can think of advertising wise to get more cars in here to fill the 2 week void but nothing is working. If anybody has any advise or ideas it would be greatly appreciated.

UPDATE ON MESSAGE BOARD. The company that is trying to sell me the sign is letting me use a rental for 2 weeks free of charge. I have had it for a week and a half now and I have several promotions running on it. So far it has brought in 4 oil changes, 1 set of 4 tires that led to up selling to a alignment, and 1 alignment, and the lady on just the alignment told us we were awesome and she would be recommending us to all her friends.

The current law on DOT#S is that you must present the customer with a card they can fill out and send into the manufacturer. You should be able to get these cards from your tire supplier. We actually register all the DOT#S for the customer here and you should be able to do that by going on the manufacturers website. We are fortunate here as our new invoicing system registers them live with the manufacturer as soon as we close the invoice.

My service writer does everything you are looking for know. And when she retires in February I will not have the 2 combined anymore. Way to much stuff gets forgotten. I hope biz will dictate me to hire 2 people when she retires but as for now it looks like I will be logging a lot more hours for myself.

Thinking about installing a LED outside Message Board. At 30 to 40 grand it is a big gamble. Just wondering has anyone done this yet and if so have you seen any results from it?

In my area the dealerships have taken the profit right out of selling tires, We now make sure every tire job gets a complete suspension check we never open the hood on a tire job. Most of the time we are getting additional work tie rod ends ball joints wheel bearings shocks struts brakes alignments

I still say word of mouth in both cases. Count this up to luck or whatever, about 2 years ago I had customer from out of the area swing into our local Taco Bell around 5:00pm with a flat tire. Someone one at Taco Bell recommended us. To make a long story short we got the customer to our shop and ended up selling them a new tire. Now here is the best thing, about 2 weeks later I'm reading the letters to the editor in our local newspaper and here is a letter from the customer that lived about 300 miles away saying how well they were serviced and treated by us. The point on this one is word of mouth from our locals and the customer from out of the area did a bunch of free advertising for us. As for the new residents that move to the area. I just had a lady come in last week that was new to the area and she stated that a co-worker recommended us. I myself have moved 3 times for my job, and each time I ask my coworkers where are the best places to eat, Who is the best Veterinary in town to bring my dog to and other stuff like that. I have never found myself going to what I get in the mail. I do still do some advertising most of which is sponsoring the local kids soccer program my logo ends up on over 300 shirts. I also make sure I get in all of the High school sports programs. I like this advertising because I feel that I'm helping out in the community and that if I can get the parents in here someday when the kids are adults and on there own I will get them in here as well. Now all this being said I have only been a Manger for over a year now, and there are many more people that are smarter then me on here. I found this is what has helped turn this store around. In a different market it could be a completely different scenario.

I have tried newspaper and radio and none of it seems to work. The best and by far the cheapest is word of mouth. The best way to achieve word of mouth can be summed up in 3 words. SERVICE SERVICE SERVICE!!

No this would mainly be for Front wheel drives. YouTube best tires on rear and there should be a video from Michelin on there

I find that many of the smaller shops I wholesale tires to are not putting the best 2 tires on the rear. When they only install 2 tires. This also includes doing tire rotations the best tires need to stay on the rear as well. I'm curious to know how many of you are unaware of this? The reasoning for this is that you have the weight of the engine on the front 2 tires for traction, and hardly any weight on the rear therefore you want the tires with the best traction in the rear. The way I sell this to the customer is by telling them when you see a car in the ditch what way normally goes in first the rear. This is because of the lack of traction in the rear and the rear end is trying to pass you up in slippery or wet conditions. After I explain it that way. The customer normally gives up on insisting the new tires go on the front. And most of the time they will go with 4 new tires instead of 2. I do remember a video Michelin had on this. I think if you searched best tires on rear you could find it. In fact I remember Michelin and a tire dealership getting sued after a accident after the dealership put 2 new tires on the front.

None around I take it

I include the road hazard right in with the price of the tires and use it as a benefit of buying the tires from us. I would say about 95% of all the vehicles we put tires on leave here with our road hazard warranty.

Looking For a Steering and Suspension inspection form. Would anybody have one they could share?