weighit

My cabinets were 48X60 pressure cabinets. One shot plastic media and walnut shell, the other shot flower size glass bead. Trick to having a cabinet for any kind of production is air pressure volumn, not the high pressure. I had a 800cfm compressor that ran the shop booths and the two cabinets. So all four guys could be working a the same time. A pressure cabinet will out produce a siphon cabinet about 4 to one in time on a job. But for a small use system, a siphon using higher pressure and a course media will work fine. The dust collectors are OK and normally will collect all the air born dust, where a pressure production system will really capture all the dust, but the costs really go up. Find a good used pressure cabinet and have a blast...

When I was running a shop I needed a replacment tech and found a fellow working at another shop I knew of. In the interview he said he had been at that shop for 5 years and made X per year. I said working here for me you should make at least 15% maybe 20% more the first year, so he came to work with us. At the end of that first year he was well over 30% more than he had been earning, I asked what he felt was the reason he made more with us? He said I'm actually getting paid for what I do. The estimates are much more accurate and even though you expect more from me than the last shop management did, I feel I'm able to give you my best, and make much more money for my family. It was how we estimated and priced the work that we did, trying to make each job pay what it should. Giving away labor or time was not how we advanced. 

When I had employees I paid them $2.00 more per hour than any of the competition paid their guys. One, I knew they all worked hard for me and deserved what I was able to pay. Two, I didn't want the the competition to try to steal them away from me. I knew what I made every year working for a dealership, and when I opened my shop I knew what I needed to do to attract good help, pay them well and say thanks often.  While I made more, they made more. I suppose by now with the way things have changed they would all be in the mid 30's to low 40's per hour. By the same token, I would be earning mre too.

One of my guys when I owned a body shop did side work for cash doing roofing for a friend of his. I get a call on a Saturday from him in the hospital, he fell off the roof. Wanted to have me tell the workmans comp and insurance that he was working for me in the shop and tripped and fell. He broke bones in his neck, and was going to be out of work for a while. Are you kidding? No way, working for cash has drawbacks and this is just one of them. Some folks can get away with under the table, but when it crashes, it can hurt in more ways than one. 

All that can so is come back and bite you hard. If that guy was to ever need to collect workmans comp for an injury, guess who he tosses under the bus trying to get his full money.  I gave cash bonus money for Christmas but all paychecks and hours worked was by the book, and checks. issued.

That is a good point, one I didn't need to worry about. I suppose if our season was say just summer and we were slow the rest of the year I probably would have had to change my vacation times. Shutting down and paying the guys worked for us. It will be interesting to hear what others do.

I had my shop in a smaller town outside of Detroit, and had 5 guys. I shut the shop for my vacation the last two weeks of Aug and first week of Sept. I paid the guys by check in the mail 40 hours pay every Friday while we shut. That was my vacation, they got 2 weeks vacation on their anniversary and could take it when they wanted. Or, just not take that time and get the pay. Since we shut for those 3 weeks in the summer most never took any other time off and collected the money. We were very busy all the time and if I didn't take the time I wanted we would be working all year. Thats how we worked time off.

A body shop near my old shop was hit with lightning and burnt to the ground. The owner was sure he carried enough insurance, he didn't. Plus all the employees tools were not covered either. As I had a stripping blasting business, I had each employee bring the tools that were still identifiable for me to clean and make servicable again at no cost. A lot of shops started asking their insurance providers what was covered and what wasn't., Me included.

I don't think the service side sees as much control the insurance companys do to the body shop side. Owning my own shop and then running them for various dealers it was a constant battle with them as to who actually was running the shop. Them saying this is what your hourly rate is, and us saying no, this is the rate we work with. Always a fight. Then they come through and have surveys to all the shops in a given area to get the average labor rates and then they say well, your not conforming to the rates others charge. or forcing the car owner to only go to one shop that is the 'Prefered" shop they work with. Wanting to supply the parts to the shop as to cut out our profit, or demanding LKQ parts, or off shore parts when the shop never used those, only correct factory parts. Sometimes making the customer feel like we the shop was trying to rip them or someone off. By not doing the insurance companies requests. All we wanted was the proper repairs to the damage and get paid a fair rate. Like I said, always a battle. I'm sure now, all these years later, it has to be worst.

Wow, reading about the retirement life you have, nothing like what I did. Sold the business, bought a large truck and 5th wheel a few months before the sale and once the money was in the bank, hit the road. Lived 8 years traveling around the USA exploring what this country has out there. While traveling found another business I started weighing rv's by wheel position, tire safety was the reason. What air pressure was needed to be safe, so that not only kept us busy, but brought in a bit of money to further the life style. I was 53 and my wife was 51 when we hit the road. We found a foreclosed home in 2010 we just  could not pass up and ended up stopping our full time travel adventure. Still travel about 5 months a year in a motorhome now. Life it all you want it to be, but sometimes you actually have to go look for the fun.

When I was a service writer, we used to have a China marker in our pocket, when first talking with the owner, we would invite the owner to walk around the car with us,pointing out any chips, dings or issues in the body, as we used the marker on the paint. Did two things, allowed us to make sure it was going to leave with the same amount of damage it came in with, gave us a bit of time to discuss the car, look at the tires, check the mileage and lights on the dash and overall condition, before it ever got into the repair shop. Once the car was finsihed being written up, then the camera came out and photos taken. Since each writter was making a commission on total ticket sales, we were tuned in on really looking at the car.   

Why would a EV owner ever want to go to a auto repair shop to have the EV charger bought and installed? Many places either on line or through the vehicle manufacturer sell wall charger units, and can either be plugged into the dryer plug or contact any local electrician to hard wire. I got mine through Tesla and found a electician to install in my garage. I paid $500 for the wall unit and $350 to install. So my electric rate at home is .11 cents per KW, and I spend roughly $35 a  month to drive my car in electric charges. I have so far 23,000 trouble free miles driven, except one trip to the tire store to remove a nail. I expect to buy tires sometime later in the year and do not miss one bit the gas stations nor service shops with my old ICE cars. The small shops making a killing are the vehicle wrap places that are changing colors or adding window tints. Unless you are a trained EV guy and can open a EV only shop, where you would be able to get out of warranty vehicles, I don't see any other way to break into that market.

I don't know now if that pay structure could/would work for the employee and the owner any more. But with some constructive discussion it might? 

7 hours ago, Joe Marconi said:

A great strategy, based on culture!

Would you say that the technicians consistently produced the hours that were needed to maintain sales and profits? 

Oh yes, very few ever actually collected the guaranteed hours, but it was there as a security for the guys that really took the time to ensure quality work and not be penalized for the hard job or that one that kicks your butt. It made that whole service department seem to click like a well oiled machine. I liked working there. 

I was a service writer at a Mercedes dealer years ago, the pay plan there was the light line techs were given a 40 hour pay, even if they failed to flag that amount of hours, the next tier was set a 45 and the heavy techs were set at 50 hours pay. The owner was a nice fellow and wanted each employee to want to come to work, but also wanted zero, none, no comebacks. His thoughts were if your sure your going to at least flag 40 hours there was no reason for any short cuts, rushed jobs and the possiblily to cause a comeback. that just ticked off the customer and made the dealer look bad. I have to say the entire service department worked extremely well and everyone seemed interested in doing a good job. And that was back when labor rates were in the mid $60 per hour range. None of the other dealers in the "Motor Mall" did that and seemed a lot of the techs in those other dealers were always coming in applying for a job. We rarely had any turnover in our techs.

When I ran a Ford body shop and the paint reps wanted to put on a new paint product show they would offfer any shop in the given area to send their painters to my shop for the show. It was always held after hours during the week. They got to see first hand how that new product would help the shops make money. Problem was my shop was equipt with the best of equipment, supplies well run and clean. The other smaller shops didn't or would not upgrade to our level, so sending one of their painters into our shop was the kiss of death. They were really afraid I was going to take one or more to work with us, or the employee would go back to where they worked and complain that they didn't have the best of equipment to do the job. Attendance to the seminars was spotty, even though the paint company put out a really nice meal and gave all kinds of free items to the folks who came.

Had a customer that was a private OSHA inspector, traded some of what she owed me for the job I did for a inspection. Oh My, glad she was not there in her official capacity. Stuff she found or pointed out was astounding. Have to say after she left, I did start to try to correct some of the obvious things and worked on the harder to spot things over the year. Never did get to all the items, some I felt were pretty petty but I guess if it have been an official inspection I would have been in some real trouble. Believe me they can sniff out things you never ever think about.

Had a customer that was a private OSHA inspector, traded some of what she owed me for the job I did for a inspection. Oh My, glad she was not there in her official capacity. Stuff she found or pointed out was astounding. Have to say after she left, I did start to try to correct some of the obvious things and worked on the harder to spot things over the year. Never did get to all the items, some I felt were pretty petty but I guess if it have been an official inspection I would have been in some real trouble. Believe me they can sniff out things you never ever think about.

That is exactly why the charging stations are plentyful in larger cities. Apartment dwellers are not able to have their own charging point like a home owner or renter would. It goes back to the having a charging point where the person charging the car while having to sit in that spot for 20 or 30 minutes, or less would be able to go into a close by place to buy some food or drink. A auto service center would not be the best place for such a charging point. When i made my drive back with my Tesla I made a point to go into each local store where the charge station was and buy something, as a Thank You to them for allowing the space in their parking lots for the charge point. Many folks do the same thing when using those charge points.

I own a Tesla and other than the 2,300 mile cross country trip to buy it I have ony used a charging station twice, otherwise charge at home in my own garage. The places I have charged on the trips, the charging stations mostly were either where I could walk away from the car and eat, rest room break or buy something while waiting. Having a charging station in a auto repair faculity would not benefit the shop owner nor the car owner.  Just my thoughts.

Years ago I learned how expensive it was to hire a new emp;oyee without any experiance in the field of our business. With the maistakes and costly errors in learning it didn't take very long to realize it was much cheaper to keep the guys I had without having a big turnover. Making them feel wanted, thanked them for their work and desire to do a good job. Then came pay, I paid the fellows I had dollars more than any of the competition paid. That ensured that my guys would not be leaving to go to the other guys and lose money. I made sure the benifits were way above the competition too. In the 10 years i owned that business, one fellow was there 3 week short of 10 years, the newest employee had 6 years seniority. the other guys fell in between 6 years and 10.  Turn over was nil and over the years I felt paying them more made me more, Not all business owners feel the same way, But I had a very comfortable living and actually enjoyed going into work with a crew that also liked being there. Worked for me.

In my 10 years of ownership in my little business, I told a few different people to leave and never return. One guy started crying, begged and pleaded to please not ban him from the shop...I relented and said you give me one ounce of problem and your gone. He returned many times and was a perfect customer, I guess he really needed my services. A couple of guys I didn't chagre them for what I had done, and said your all done here, find another shop to take your money. I worked hard to give everyone the best possible workmanship for what I was charging and didn't I need a jerk to make the job any harder that it was. 

The local auto mechanical repair shop I use now advertises on the local am & fm radio program. He rarely talks about his shop himself, but he does have his customers that are other business owners talk about who they are and why they found and use this shop. They say they are looking for quality, fair pricing and on time repairs, and hearing the actual owners talk about why this shop got theior business is a two fold winner. They both get positive review advertising and since this is not that big a community, between the 4 actual cities maybe 120,000 people chances are you either have been to the person talking or have heard about them.. This little shop is very busy and I have found the same positive response to the shop owner when we go in for service. He told me his thoughts were to let the happy folks tell others why they found him, not him telling you.  Seems to work well here.  

When I had my little business, for the first three years all we did was pay off loans, but at the end of those three years we were debt free. Then we started putting anywhere from 3 to 5% of the gross sales each month into that side account savings for what if expenses. It would grow and grow and if we needed some surprise un accounted for purchase, we had the money. No sweat, no more loans for us. When we decided to sell the business, that extra money was moved in to the bonus for the owners account!  Worked out well and have suggested that approach to a relative that has a small business and so far they are doing it too. They want to buy a bigger building and are planning on using that money for expansion. Also they do not want loans.

Well congratulations on your kind of retirement. Have enjoyed all your input and thoughts over the years I have been here as a reader. I sold my stripping business and "quit" at 53 and got into a RV and full time traveled for 8 years till we bought another home after we sold everything to travel. All my friends and other business owners I worked with said your too young to retire when I let them know I was going to sell everything and travel., I said I never said retire, I QUIT....have a whole different attitude. That quit lasted a total of about 5 months and I started another business while still traveling. So I do understand you selling and "retiring' Kind of.... have a Blast and hope you enjoy the new life being "retired"!!