Sure, trying new things can be fun and adventurous, but deep down human beings are creatures of habit. Predictability and consistency make things easier for us because we know what to expect and how to react to the situation at hand. Replicating consistent expectations can be much more difficult for an Auto Repair Shop than a McDonald’s or a Starbucks, but it is just as critical.
On this week’s episode of Digital Shop Talk Radio, we welcome Greg Masewic and Marc Arnold (owners of three Meineke locations in the Concord, NH area) who are making a concerted effort to create the most consistent and replicable customer experience possible by focusing on consistent processes on the back end. What are their results? You will have to tune in to find out!
Episode Transcript
*This transcript was generated using Artificial Intelligence. Errors may occur. If you notice an error, please contact [email protected].
– Good morning and good afternoon! Welcome to this week’s edition of the Digital Shop Talk Radio. I’m Tom Dorsey. It’s episode 59, and we’re gonna be talking about process, consistency, and how to implement the digital shop technology and do it the right way. And so I’ve got no better guests to come on than the king of consistency, the prince of process, I’ve got two great multicenter owners from New Hampshire. Meineke multicenter owners from New Hampshire, you know, the live free or die state, right? The great state of New Hampshire. Greg Masewic and Marc Arnold. Welcome, gentlemen.
– Thank you.
– Thanks, Tom. Nice to be here.
– So you guys have been with us, probably, I think, the reason or at least a big part of the reason why we’re even with Meineke and rolling out this digital technology to the organization is ’cause of you guys, right? You’ve been around with us since the very first day.
– Yeah, we were patient zero, yep.x
– You were patient zero, and man, it’s been nothing but success for you. I gotta tell ya. I mean, I know in the beginning, we had some growing pains and stuff, and also we learned probably as much from you as you learned from us, as it relates to developing a process, the best practices, how to apply those best practices in a consistent fashion. And then what do we need to be looking at from a metrics perspective to know that we’re doing it right and we’re not headed to the cliff, right?
– Yeah.
– You know, I don’t know. Tell us a little bit about your operation, and because when I look at your numbers, when we’re talking consistency, the three locations I’m looking at right here are, it doesn’t matter the metric. I look at inspection rate. I look at motorist research time. They’re within a couple of points of each other across those locations, and that’s a pretty incredible feat, gentlemen.
– Yeah, no, no, I’ll tell you that the BCP has made a huge difference for us, right? We live on that now. You know, the old you can’t manage what you can’t measure type stuff. For us, that’s really, you know. Prior to that, you were getting information in late off of whatever reports you were running and constantly scrambling to try to get a number propped back up to where you wanted it, right? And there was a lot of stuff that we really couldn’t even see. You know, inspection rate, prior to this, you really had no idea, right? You hoped everybody was doing a good inspection, and they all told you they were, right?
– They sure did!
– But you couldn’t measure it.
– Yes!
– Yeah, oh yeah. And this has been just, we know. The technician effectiveness report and the BCP, those are our two go-to things consistently, just working those and working those and working those, right? And then what were we saying? The name of this was what, consistent process, and we were just talking earlier, saying the only thing consistent about our process is that we’re consistently trying to improve our consistency and our process, right?
– Right.
– That’s consistent!
– Yeah, yes.
– That’s the name of the game, right?
– Yep.
– You’d better be. I mean, that’s what everybody’s doing. You know, even the ones that are masters of it, that have made the billions, like McDonald’s as an example, right? They’re constantly trying to improve their process. It’s never good enough. There’s always some efficiency gains that you can get and some improvements that you can make, and then of course, you adapt to new technology that comes out, that allows you to do more with less or do it in a different fashion that’s gonna make more business sense for you. And so you guys, I gotta tell you, though, you took to it like fish to water. I don’t know if it was just, you got a really thick bullwhip back there and a chair, and you’re out there just, you know, giving it to them every day. Or what’s that, what’s that saying? The beatings will continue until morale improves.
– That’s kind of our approach sometimes.
– Right? And, I mean, not for nothing, but being also you had to develop that process and build those habits in, how do I say this in a way that’s not gonna get a bunch of emails and get people offended? Is that , you know, a lot of the times you have more entry-level technicians that you have to get to… Some of them haven’t even had a job ever before, right? So you gotta get how to tie your shoes and get to work on time, and then adopt this change. And they probably didn’t learn that in tech school. They probably didn’t do it at their last job, and then it just becomes, oh my gosh, this is, you know, what a nightmare, what an obstacle it is, or a distraction it is for me. I know how to do my job. How do you overcome that attitude initially when you get that system in place?
– Well, you know, it’s funny. It’s actually easier with those new guys than it was for the guys that were working for us prior to AutoVitals.
– Sure.
– To untrain and retrain those guys was really tougher. Guys who come in, especially if they’re young and green, when they work for us, this is the only thing they’ve ever known, right? So they just, hey, that’s the way we do it here. They don’t know that it was ever done a different way. Those guys tend to be actually easier to get into completely adopting. The green guys, the really green techs, tend to be the ones that do our best inspections, ’cause–
– They just follow the rules.
– Yeah, they just follow the rules, right? The better the tech, they’re too good to do this or too good to do that, and then it’s a little more of a challenge getting them on board. But over time, they see the improvement to their sold hours, to their paychecks, right? Finally, the light bulb goes on. That’s where, from in the bays, that’s really where we had more resistant, was with the older guys, the guys that have been with us longer, as opposed to new guys we brought in.
– The tech, be pretty easy to the buy in with the techs, I think anyways. It’s more the advisors that, you know, they–
– Really?
– It’s more work to get them to follow the process and do it the way we want. I don’t know if that’s the way it is for everybody, but I feel that the service advisors are definitely a little harder going along.
– Yeah, and it’s funny, because, now that’s a great point, Marc, because from a tech’s perspective, it’s hey, I can see the value in this. The more information I can put, the more pictures, the more likely somebody is to buy something, right? Pretty straightforward. From a service writer’s perspective, hey, I’ve been doing this for 20 years, and I know. And I don’t need a picture to help me to sell the need for a timing belt tensioner, because I got all the lingo, and I have all the knowledge. And it’s one of those things, right? It’s like a fire hose, like drinking from a fire hose. When you stand on the other side of that counter and you don’t know anything about what a timing belt is, let alone what a timing belt tensioner might possibly be, other than it provides tension to a timing belt.
– Right.
– I don’t know if it’s $1.50 or if it’s $1,000, if I need it to get home or not, right? And so then you’re gonna start to tell me all of the important stuff about it, and the more confused or the more complex it becomes, the less confident and assured I am that I understand if I should approve it or how much it should cost. And then I start to have doubts, and then I want more info. And then it’s just this– Right.
– Exactly, yeah.
– Yup, yup.
– And it’s one of the hardest things to do, to let go of that, because a service writer feels like they’re the point man up there. They gotta be in control. I’m the conductor here. I’m not gonna take the backseat. I’m the leader, right? And it’s hard to let that go, but what you really have to do is get them to understand the value of that third-party educational experience. That YouTube video, that piece of video, because we’re so conditioned to go look at that stuff online now, the psychological effect of learning, not being sold to, in that motorist’s mind, is really one of the critical success factors to get that conversion right. How do you guys approach that? So are you using the educational videos in there? Do you wait the time and let them consume the information before you try to call them and sell them?
– We do, yes.
– Yeah, we do. That’s a big part of our process, right? Is, yeah. And this is one of the things we’ve been really working on as of recent, is looking at those numbers of workflow step moves and making sure that it goes to waiting for approval. That email or text goes off to the customer, and then everybody, every service advisor does what everything in their training and being says they shouldn’t do, is they just sit on their hands and wait and watch that counter go and give that customer time to do all that research. Again, these guys, that estimate’s ready. They just wanna hop on the phone and get that–
– Go go go.
– Right, that’s it. That’s hard for them to do.
– And so especially when you’ve got high volume, right? Because there’s always somebody else coming up, and then you’re starting to feel like you gotta accomplish things so you can move on. And really, the frame of mind that you need is to understand that you’ve cloned yourself almost, right? Now I can do this sales process that’s happening without me involved in it. It’s happening on the customer’s cell phone right now.
– Right.
– Exactly.
– I could do that with 20 people by going click, click, click, click, click, right?
– Yeah.
– And I could shoot that out, and it’s working for me in the background. It’s like investing in the stock market, except for days like today and yesterday, right?
– Right, yeah.
– You know, you’re supposed to just let your money do the work for you, and then you cash out. That’s what they tell you. You know, that’s the story I’ve been sold.
– Yeah.
– But it’s hard to do that. So Marc, from a process perspective, how were you able to get them to heel? How did you get them to actually, A, trust it and do it, and then B, do it consistently?
– Yeah, so the research time, we want them to, it’s gotta be 250 seconds, right? And if they haven’t hit that number, 250, in a reasonable amount of time, maybe call the customer. Ask them, “Hey, have you looked “at that inspection report I sent you?” If the customer says yes, you know they haven’t, but you see they haven’t. Say, “Well, hey, why don’t we open that thing up “and take a look at it together “and go over it, if you have any questions, you know.” And if they haven’t, then ask them to open it and give you a call back a little bit later.
– Yeah.
– When they have looked at it for a bit. In a perfect world, that’s the way it would work every day. It doesn’t always.
– But–
– But.
– That’s how we try to get them to do it anyways.
– But one of the, to all this is now, it really helps you find root causes for issues, right?
– Yeah, yes.
– Research time is low, then we know we’ve got an issue with the drop off script, and that’s actually what we’ve gotta work on, right?
– Yes.
– Is getting, off script better, and once we fix that, research time takes care of itself, right?
– Yes.
– That’s one of the most powerful things with everything involved with Autovitals for us, that it’s really let us, you know. Again, every problem we had was a bit of a mystery prior to that. Things were not happening right, and you spent a lot of time trying to identify what the cause was. With this, you can get to that cause pretty quickly and get to work on fixing it, right?
– Yep, yep, yep. Yeah, and you have the ability to pre-educate them before they even get into the shop, right? And so a lot of that stuff, what might have took, you know. So here’s always the dilemma, is do I spend the extra five minutes, and this turns into a 10 minute time standing up at the counter. And I got a line, and there’s people on the phone. And I might be missing business, right? To maybe get that fluid flush up sell. Or do I just give up, write them for what they came in for. We’ll catch it on the back end, maybe.
– Yep, yep.
– And move them along, right? And what I’m saying is, you don’t have to make that sacrifice, because you can do both. You can educate.
– Exactly.
– Get them all prepped up before they get there, and then you can spend a real short amount of time talking about important stuff, and move them through. And the next person, you know what? Here’s one of the greatest things, too, is if you get a line, and they’re feeling that experience, and here’s where that consistency and that process is so important. ‘Cause you do it each and every time. Well, guess what? Other people in line are listening, and then they know what to expect. And then it’s almost like they get up there and go, “Well, that guy approved those other things, “and maybe I–”
– Yeah!
– “I don’t wanna be the cheapo standing around here. “Maybe I approve it, too!”
– That’s exactly how it goes. That’s exactly how it works, too.
– It also works the other way. If they didn’t do a good job and they didn’t approve, then the other customers are like, “Well.”
– Yeah, oh! Well, I get outta here with just the coupon, right? It’s two of them, in case you want both!
– That’s right. You’re gonna have to hand them out in line. Here’s a coupon for you. You get a coupon! You get a coupon!
– No, that’s, yeah, that’s exactly how it goes.
– Yep, you’re right.
– And so yeah, and so with that process in place, that’s why it becomes so much more critical. Because, A, you condition the folks. You condition your customer or educate your customer on what the experience is. They expect it. They’re ready for it. Then it’s really pretty simple, right? You don’t have to sell anything. You remind them, right? Or if it’s the first time, it’s a new recommendation or finding, you educate them. And now they know, and then you just give them the options of here’s what you gotta do today. Here’s what you can do next paycheck, or whatever. And let’s get you on the book right now.
– Yep.
– Peace of mind, you’re all taken care of, buddy. Right?
– Greg’s famous for telling our guys, “When you go to McDonald’s,” or not McDonald’s, “You go to your favorite burger place, “and one day you get the burger with the bacon “and the pickles and the cheese. “Next time you go in, they forget to put the pickles in, “but you got everything else. “And then the next time you go in, “you got the pickles, but you didn’t get the bacon.” So then, you know, it’s not consistent. So eventually what you’re gonna do is like wow, this place kinda sucks. I’m gonna–
– Yeah.
– the next place and get my burger the way I want it every time, right? That’s kind of the idea with the consistent process and giving them the same experience every time they’re here.
– Yep, because that’s it. You know, some of them will leave you reviews. Most don’t, and they just go away. And you just don’t know why. You just–
– That’s right.
– They don’t tell you. They just aren’t around any more, and maybe you don’t even realize it ’til the end of quarter or, you know, you’re balancing the books there. And you’re like, “Huh, my car count’s way down.” Maybe I do a customer audit and see, well, I haven’t seen Sam in a while. He’s been coming to me for 10 years.
– Exactly.
– Exactly, yup, no.
– And where is Sam? Where were you at, Sam? “Well, I didn’t get pickles.” Okay.
– Exactly, right.
– This darn glove box for you, buddy. Come on back.
– God, we just think that that’s so important, and that, we hammer that into our guys constantly, right? Is that, you know, be consistently great, or be consistently mediocre, but you gotta pick one and stay with it, right? Because it’s when people don’t know what to expect when they come into your shop. That’s when they really start to get nervous and untrusting. They want that same experience every time, right? So that’s what process allows you to give him.
– Yeah.
– That’s the key, we think.
– Yeah.
– If you tell them six months ago that they needed struts and CV axles and tranny flush, and then they don’t get any of that done. And then they come in six months later, and all of a sudden, you don’t tell them they need it again. They’re gonna be like, “Well, did I need it then? “Why didn’t they tell me–”
– Were you lying to me then, or are you lying to me now? Yeah, which one? Yeah.
– I got a funny picture–
– You know what?
– Yeah, I got this funny picture of one of our shops sent in, and it was from their security camera. And it’s a picture of a lady. She’s probably 65 years old. She’s got her smart phone out, and she’s giving him the what to to the service writer over something that was recommended in the past, but he wasn’t recommending it to her in this visit. And she called him out on it–
– Oh, yeah!
– on her cell phone, you know? And like I said, she’s 75, or 65, 70-year-old lady. I just thought it was classic. I mean, it hits all the points. If I could just put that on a sign and send it out to anybody who says that, “Oh, my customers don’t need that stuff “or don’t want that stuff.” It’s just like, yeah, the worlds have changed.
– Oh yeah, no, you can’t hide your sins anymore.
– That’s for sure!
– It’s all right there. There’s no place to hide.
– Only in church!
– Yeah, not in the Meineke, you sure can’t.
– No, no, but that’s the power in it, right? That’s what helps be better, right?
– So let’s talk about that. So because there’s probably some new process things that you introduced. I mean, you guys were already pretty structured, from a here’s how we run our drop off. Here’s how we run our approval stats. Here’s how we do the work. Here’s how we do the pick up and follow up and all of that. What changes have you made, that you implemented since you went digital? And what has been the payoff to make those changes?
– Yeah, so we could use our Concord store as an example, and that was the first store to do it. You’ve met Paul, Paul our manager–
– Yep!
– who is amazing, right?
– What’s up, Paul?
– Yeah.
– I know you’re watching this. You should have been on here.
– He should be on here.
– I know. He should have been on here. But you know, for the first year, Paul fought us tooth and nail on this thing. You know, he was up there running a highly successful six-bay shop, was pretty convinced there was no way we could put another car or another dollar through this place. It was maxed out. And now, we’ve brought this thing in, and we were just asking him to do all these different things. And, “I’m winning every day. “Why are you asking me to change? “Why are we changing anything here?” And fought us hard for a year.
– Us too, I remember.
– Oh, yeah, yeah.
– We had meetings talking about Paul, so. I remember those days, porter sharing.
– Oh yeah, one day he had the epiphany, probably just because he finally figured out there wasn’t another choice, and we weren’t letting it go, right?
– Exactly.
– One thing was, nobody was, this thing wasn’t going, so he was either gonna stay with this, or– And embraced it. And within six months, sales were up over 50%. Car count was rock solid, and everybody was making a lot more money. And since then has, between all of our stores, he’s now our greatest advocate. And he’s the guy that goes in and tells everybody else, “Look, this thing worked here. “This is how we do it. “This is what you’re gonna do.” So he’s our disciple now, right?
– Yeah, exactly. Yeah, it’s funny. That’s usually what happens, right? It’s the toughest nut to crack, has the most tender fruit inside.
– Yeah, yeah.
– And so that’s what happens, is, I mean, you fight it, fight it, fight it, but you can’t argue with a 50% increase, you know. And Paul’s a great operator, but just like anything else, you might be a great cook, but you still need pots and pans. You know what you need.
– Yeah.
– Yeah, you’re right.
– Well, and you know, the Rams. When you had the Ramseys on, Ben and Nate, or ogres, as we call them basically.
– Oh, that’s good stuff.
– But it really, you know, one of the things is, this whole thing, it really shows you all the things you suck at, right?
– Yeah.
– You’re doing, you know. As great as you’re doing, you stop looking at things, and, okay, cabin filters. Yeah, yeah, we do these great numbers. Why the heck don’t we sell cabin filters? And then you pull out your tech effectiveness report, and you go, “Oh, ’cause nobody’s looking at them.” And you get to work on that. And that’s how you stay good, right? The day you think you’re the greatest shop in town is the day you start going out of business, I think, right? You gotta just, there’s always something that we suck at, right?
– Yeah, and that’s the mindset you have to have, because you can say, oh. Especially, you know, what happens? So if somebody were to tell you, you suck at that, well then you’re gonna get defensive. And then you’re gonna defend yourself, and you’re gonna do more of what you do. And you know what I mean? Because of pride, right? But if you can accept what you see with your own eyeballs, and go, “Yeah, this isn’t working. “I need to make a change.” And I’m honest with myself about that. And I implement, and I commit to it. You’re gonna move the needle. Are you gonna double overnight? Probably not, but if you increase 10% a week for a year, that’s a lot of money.
– Yeah.
– Yes, it is.
– Exactly, yep.
– And it’s the incremental steps, and it’s exactly like you said before. And this is important for folks that are in the middle of implementation or thinking about implementation. You heard what Greg said about Paul, right? Is that in the beginning, it’s very resistive, and I’m gonna come up with all the excuses under the sun as to why this isn’t gonna work. But I have to at least commit to some measurable period. And I usually challenge them for a pay period. Challenge them for a pay period. And I’ll even take, you can even take a young, green tech who’s always on his cell phone. And you always gotta tell him, “Hey! “Quit texting your girlfriend! “Get back to work!” That guy, put him on the tablet, ’cause he loves pushing them buttons. He grew up with that stuff. And have him go up against the most bragging, best tech, against the digital inspections. We never need this thing. Let him run a pay period, and see who makes the most billed hours, right?
– Yeah, exactly.
– Whoa!
– Yeah.
– Yeah.
– Yeah, no, that’s it. It’s just like you said. It’s an all-in, proposition, right? And you can’t be half doing this, half into not doing it. And you just have to let your guys know. Look, this is it, right? We would have guys threaten to quit, and I’d say, “Where you gonna go? “‘Cause wherever you go, in six months, “they’re gonna have this same thing.” This isn’t–
– Yeah.
– Keep going, right?
– Yeah, right. Matter of fact, I just called that guy up and told him not to hire you. Oh wait, no, Don’t do that.
– But no, so yeah, no. We could, Our guys who hated it the worst in the beginning, couldn’t even imagine going a day without it now. It’s incredible.
– Yep.
– Yeah. So let me ask you this. Did you, because once, here’s the sweet spot, is once you get the team on board, and that’s the process. And they’re doing it consistently. Well, then it’s real simple when you bring in new people, because that’s the way we do it here. And they self-police, right?
– Yes.
– Yep.
– The rest of the team will hold that new team member accountable and show them how it’s done. They’re working in your , and it’s an awesome experience, an awesome feeling. But to get there is a little of an uphill climb.
– Oh yeah, yep.
– Mm hm.
– So I’m sure you implement some regular shop meetings. Did you document? Do you have it posted? How do you handle the full picture of what is expected through that process at the counter and in the bays? You don’t have to go into the details, but how do you get those habits built that they do it the same way each and every time, and then reinforce that, so that they stay consistent?
– Yes, so we just have super frequent meetings. Went through, we’ve got our multishop KPIs on the BCP all set up, right? And once a week, everybody. We go through with everybody. Okay, here’s where you are. You fell off on this a little last week. Let’s get that back up, and just keep the focus on it, right? You know, we joke about beating them over the head with a two-by-four. We do do that, but the why. We try and make sure they get the why, why we’re doing this, ’cause that’s, if you want them to buy in, that’s really what they’ve gotta understand. It’s not just do it ’cause I said so, right? And so we just try to have a culture where everybody gets why we’re doing this, and it’s all about the customer, right? ‘Cause if we take care of all this stuff, then customers will just keep coming back and spending money. And all those, the sales number takes care of itself if we’re doing all of these things down below correctly, right?
– No, and you hit the nail on the head. Do they come back and give you money?
– Right, yeah.
– They’re ready. They already have the money in their hand. Just don’t mess it up, so they put it back in their pocket and take it–
– Exactly!
– Right? They literally have the money in their hand when they show up. That’s how easy, if you do the process.
– Oh, yeah, yeah.
– Hey Marc, what would you say, though? What would you say? So you were talking earlier about you kinda, the hardest challenge or the most challenging was at the counter. What would you say was the, other than the pride factor, what was the most difficult thing that you had to overcome to get consistency across all your writers?
– I think we’re still overcoming it, right? We’ll concentrate on motorist research time, for example, or inspection sent, right? We’ll concentrate on that, and we’ll get them concentrating on it, and then they’ll be looking over here. So they forget about this. So our job is, by monitoring that BCP, goes all right. So we’re doing great here now, and now we gotta look over here. So we gotta start looking at that, but the biggest thing with the service advisors that I see, is getting them to follow the process, like the workflow step, for example. To me, that would be very simple. You just, you’re moving the tiles. But it’s not apparently, because we just were having conversations just this morning with one of the service advisors in the store. He told the guy to do the brake job. He didn’t put it to waiting for work complete, right? And I’m like, what’s the problem here? Why is this so hard to do? It’s just move the tile, right? That’s the hardest part, is getting them to–
– Break their own habits.
– Break their own habits, and just consistently follow the process. You know, getting a smart, using a smart phone add ons, getting all those jobs on the ticket. They do it 90% of the time, and then they forget. They don’t put in waiting for approval, so the customer doesn’t even get the good inspection that our tech did. The customer doesn’t even get it, right?
– Wow, yeah.
– I think the hardest is at the counter, is getting those guys to follow that process.
– And of course, I mean, when they get busy, you’re more likely to fall back. And the trick is, is how do you get the fall back to be the digital process–
– Right, right.
– Right, exactly.
– instead of grab a piece of paper and a pencil or whatever it might be. You know, and it’s funny, too. ‘Cause we’re constantly, it’s like what you said earlier, where our consistency at AutoVitals is, we’re consistently working to improve our product based off of the feedback and the results that you guys, that we see from you, right? And so without letting too much of that cat out of the bag, we’ve got a new release coming out here in a couple weeks, and it’s going to be, it’s gonna have tools in there that allow you to do exactly that. Especially from an onboarding, if you’re new or you got a new hire in, to where we really give them step-by-step best practice guidance both on the tablet and on the today’s vehicle page. And with the ability to do that, then it becomes, because the big question that I’m gonna have once it’s released is, how many actually turn it off? Because it’s consistency in a jar, is really what it is, right? You just pop the lid off, and you do it this way. And really, it’s gonna boil down to, people are gonna feel like it takes longer, and I wanna see, A, does it actually take longer, and B, if you do take longer, let’s say it takes five more minutes, but your ARO is up 50 bucks. Or you’re able to, with the same amount of staff and the same amount of hours, get two or three extra billed hours of day done, because you’re more efficient. Well then, that extra amount of time is a great trade off, and so it’s really gonna be interesting to see how that comes out. And I’d like to get feedback from you guys once we get it out for Meineke. Is to say, because like you said, Greg, you’ve been, you know. And I know, Marc, you guys have been from day one. You’ve seen the whole we didn’t really have a clue. This is all new. To very bulletproof existing best practices and process. And then get the feedback on how that guided tool is gonna help not just your operation, but other Meinekes that are coming in or anybody who’s looking to adopt that– Yeah, we’re real excited to see that. We’re real excited for that to come out.
– Yeah.
– Yeah, are you guys in the turbo group? I thought you guys were in turbo.
– No.
– No, not right now. We jumped out for a little bit, ’cause…
– Business, yeah, I hear you.
– There’s a window that you test. There’s a window you can withstand being a test pilot. Then you gotta go take a little break, right?
– We tend to get the most time out of you.
– Exactly.
– No, and we’re Pacific, so you know. Greg’ll be catching, I’m sure, 11:00 p.m. phone calls from Uwe or something, 11 o’clock or whatever.
– Yeah, yeah.
– All right, buddy, I only have to be up in three hours, but thanks. I like blue as a button color, sure.
– That’s most calls.
– No, it’s all right. But yeah, really excited about that stuff coming out, because especially for getting that consistency and the process.
– Yeah.
– Critical. But you know, it goes without saying, but congratulations on your success. Thank you for everything that you’ve done, working with us and being patient with us and giving us the feedback we need to improve. I’m just really happy that it’s been a great partnership, right?
– Yeah, it has.
– Definitely, yeah.
– It’s been profitable for both of us.
– Yeah, it absolutely has.
– You guys crush it. I mean, when you look at the numbers, and I see a Meineke center that comes in new. And I compare them. If I compare them to you guys, it’s just . I mean, it stuns me that they’re resistive to adopt the change, right?
– Yeah, it stuns us, too.
– It’s stunning! It’s like, you guys are making literally four times more than you were doing, the same amount of vehicles, and–
– Yeah.
– It’s your call.
– I mean, it’s change. It’s scary. I get that part, right? And a lot of times, there’s ego involved, right? If you’re telling me I need to do thing different, then you’re kind of telling me I sucked at what I was doing.
– Exactly.
– Look at it. We knew we sucked at what we were doing, certain areas, right?
– We still do. We still suck at a lot of things.
– Well, I’ll tell you what you don’t suck at, and that is karaoke cab.
– I get it, we’re back to ogre, yes.
– Yeah.
– Ogre’s the one.
– I love it. He came on here and called you leprechaun. You’re calling him ogre. I feel like I’m watching a “Lord of the Rings” movie or something.
– I’ll be Legolas. I’m Legolas.
– Watch the pineapple drinks. He’s a big pineapple fan.
– Yes, he is.
– Yeah, just buy him some pineapple.
– Yeah, he loves pineapple.
– Oh man, that is good stuff. Good, I miss you guys. I wanna come out. I gotta come out this year, and I gotta find some excuse to get out on the East Coast and do something and come by and see you.
– Yeah, we’ll put a training thing, or.
– Yeah, exactly.
– Frost is .
– Exactly.
– It’s all a committee!
– [Dustin] I mean, no official word on that, but maybe look for a workshop announcement on that coming up here in the coming weeks or months.
– Nice!
– That would be awesome.
– [Dustin] Yep, yep, up in that area.
– Our Boston Market could really benefit from that, so that’s definitely a good idea.
– [Dustin] We’ll go to the Boston Market, and then we’ll cater it with Boston Market. And it’ll be great.
– What is that? Workshop to the second power or something? Maybe cause some type of time–
– Formula.
– Facetime continuum disruption.
– Oh.
– All right, guys. So hey man, I really appreciate you guys coming on. It was awesome. I’m sure a lot of people are getting to that next step and are gonna take away a lot from here. Continue that conversation on the Facebook forum. You can reach out to these guys directly, to Meineke 1332, 1331. Pretty soon it’ll be whole northeast coast. It’ll just be these two guys right here. If you wanna be successful, do what successful people do, and you’re looking at two of them right now. So reach out, say hi. Good guys to know. Really good guys to know, you know. And we hate them here at AutoVitals. Oh! I wanna give a shout out to Mr. Fred Gestwicki. Happy birthday, buddy.
– [Marc And Greg] Happy birthday!
– Meat on a stick! Miss you too, man! We gotta get out to Ohio for a workshop, too. I gotta get on the road, buddy.
– [Dustin] Maybe look out for some news for that in the coming weeks and months, too.
– There you go! See, Dustin’s got a plan for everything.
– Nice.
– He’s got a plan for everything. He holds it close to the vest. See you next week, next Wednesday. Same time, same place, 10:00 a.m.–
– [Dustin] Hey, actually, yeah. Can I talk about this episode a little bit, Tom? We got a really special episode, ’cause I am gonna be live on location with Adam Bendzick.
– Oh, that’s right, buddy.
– [Dustin] Yeah, yeah, so, and Adam, he really got up and running a really successful operation. And he’s gonna tell us how he got here, but he’s also gonna tell us what he might change if he had the chance to do it all over again. Maybe some words to the wise for people who are gonna be starting this process or are brand new to it. So how to be really successful, and how to do it quicker than Adam did, basically is gonna be the, yeah. Is gonna be the– Yeah, and we have a really incredible case study with Adam. You might remember him from the show we did with John Long from Schertz and Christopher Peterson and those guys were on. And they were talking about specialization and roles at the counter, right? Put a production manager, and how they could have a dedicated estimater and dedicated sales folks. And now we’re gonna get to see some of the results, and you are gonna knock your socks right off your feet. I’ll tell you what.
– Oh, nice.
– Yeah! We’re gonna get a shop tour. We’re gonna get some really good information out of Adam. It’s gonna be a really great episode, and then it’s gonna tee up a round table discussion. Adam’s gonna lead for us in about a month from now. So yeah. It’s gonna be really great.
– Yeah, I’m actually gonna base some of my break outs, ATI Superconference and some other things around this case study, so get in. Take a listen. Dustin, the intrepid road warrior that he is, will be out there on site, so it’s gonna be good to see your face, buddy, other than the blurry thing that you show us in the background sometimes. It scares most small children. Better be careful with that. But yeah, tune in for that. You don’t wanna miss. We’re gonna have Uwe on, too, telling us from the technical perspective what are all the critical success factors to get that done and get those results like Adam has achieved. Next Wednesday, don’t miss it. Be there or be square. ‘Til then, go out and make some more money in 2020. Thank you, gentlemen.
– Tom.
– Thanks, Tom.