We always hear from owners that mechanics say that they're better than what they truly are.
And so that is what I can guarantee you some owners are listening to this right now.
They're like, oh, well, he wasn't getting paid much because he wasn't as good as he thought he was.
Good evening ladies and gentlemen and welcome back to another exciting thought-provoking episode of the Jada Mechanic Podcast.
My name's Jeff and I'd like to thank you for joining me on this journey of reflection and insight into the toils and triumphs of a career in automotive repair.
After more than 20 years of skin, knuckles and tool debt, I want to share my perspectives and hear other people's thoughts about our industry.
So pour yourself a strong coffee or grab a cold Canadian beer and get ready for some great conversation.
You know, we want to see what you take from this place and be able to implement it in your business because we want to see everybody succeed.
For sure.
Yeah.
So here we are back again, another episode of the Jade Mechanic Podcast.
I'm sitting here with two really cool guys and I'm sitting here with Marissa as well.
Don't want to leave her out.
But my two guests today, Chris Enright, who's now an old, old friend of the show.
I'm sitting here with Parker from Parker's Moldable Mechanics.
So Parker, say hello.
Hey guys, my name is Matt Parker.
I'm the owner of Parker's Mobile Mechanics.
I've been the owner for about two years now, close to two years.
And a new friend for you, a relatively, a little older friend.
I met Chris Enright last year here at AST and he is now one of my most favorite people in the industry.
Chris.
What's up everybody?
So happy to be back.
Good to have you back.
So I'll call you Matt.
Yeah.
This is your first time at any kind of event like ESTV, right?
Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah.
And how did you get here?
All thanks to Chris.
So I posted a video on TikTok.
He had seen it and reached out to me as really a wonderful human being and was just like, hey, I see you're doing wonderful work, but you need some training.
Not in any type of negative way, but fully respected what I did and was willing to help.
And then, yeah, reached out from that.
So give us the context of what was in the video.
Okay, so like I know yeah, you know, all right So I worked for this gentleman who initially called me for it was just a cooling fan replacement And I quoted him on the phone.
I used car salesman.
So, you know, he knew exactly what he wanted and that was it And so I was like, okay, you know, i'll be buying about an hour to do that for you So when I got there though, he had different things in mind.
He had a valve cover He wanted me to do an alternator.
He wanted me to do he had a bumper waiting for me with the with the paint the matching paint
So, you know, I'm already there.
I got all my tools out.
I get the cooling fan replaced.
It took me, I don't know, it took me like five minutes or ten minutes or something.
It was extremely easy.
There was no bolts.
It was literally just unclip and pull out.
They're not all like that.
No, they're not.
Not at all.
But this one was pretty easy.
But we already had a set and we already had a set agreement on the pay and it wasn't
Just because it took me a little bit less time than what he hadn't, you know, seen other mechanics do he had thought that that what I was charging was Was ridiculous, right?
I was I was only charging $70 Yeah, okay for and I mean realistically that's way low and to begin with a super cheap.
That's ridiculous It's ridiculous super cheap because I want to interject you shared the video with with our little chat group Yeah, and I was like
know just yeah it was in my mind because I'm like why is he letting the customer of A watch him and B tell him how much it should cost yeah yeah so you shared that with B and you know there's a lot of you know it's a it's a not a big group but it's pretty active group of people that are like oh well yeah this is we've seen how this goes before oh yeah right and we've seen how you know we don't always support this way of doing business right in our industry because it can
I think we probably use the word cheap in the industry, right?
It devalues the industry.
Yeah, for sure.
So, carry on.
So, well, and then, you know, I got it done.
As soon as I was done, he was like, hey, I got a second vehicle with an alternator that needs to be replaced.
I already ordered it.
Here it is.
I was like, I have a pretty, you know, set payment already on component replacements like alternators.
And so, you know, I was like, well, it's going to be this much.
He was like, OK, that's fine.
I start working on it.
And then he just interjects, you know, after the agreement, after the second agreement is made, he interjects and says, you know, hey, this took you five minutes and you charge me 70 and that's taken you like 10 minutes and you're charging me 100 or 120.
And he's like, so.
Can you not cut me a break here?
Because this only took you five minutes."
He's like, this only took you five minutes.
Then after that, in those situations, I want to be like, absolutely not.
No.
Being a new business owner though, realistically, I was a bit nervous.
Negative review reviews impact especially an individual owner like that impacts them pretty well And so I was like, you know just trying to keep everybody happy, but I walked away they're defeated You know what?
I mean?
I ended up doing like six different replacements and made less money than I would have just doing one You know what?
I mean?
You helped his profit on those absolutely and then he turned around and sold those vehicles and made quadruple the amount of money He paid me so it was like and without me he wouldn't been able to sell the vehicle.
So right and
It's hard to get people to realize that.
Well, I mean, obviously he called you for a reason, right?
Right.
Yeah.
So how did you wind up
And I don't want to say in that situation of that guy's crash, but give us some of your background on how you went from being, how did you get to being a Matt Parker's mobile mechanic?
You got a background as obviously a tech working somewhere else.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I worked out.
So it all started, I worked for this mom-pa shop called Frank's Automotive.
It was only tires.
They only did tires there.
And then we had one lady that pulled in with a lug nut.
broken, broken stud.
She was like, you know, I need this replaced.
They were willing to put a tire on it and send her on her way without replacing that stud.
And I was like, well, I've seen my brother do a bunch of work.
Studs aren't, I've seen him knock studs out easily.
So let me just try it.
So I tried it.
And then from that, they let me do like,
For the first time ever wheel bearing work hub work and stuff like that And this is all things that i'm like teaching myself, you know what I mean?
And because i've never done them before and once I got confident in that after about like a year I went to a big shop robertson tire had like 10 bays I actually didn't have a driver's license So they didn't want me to be a mechanic because I couldn't test drive vehicles and pull them in and out.
Mm-hmm
Well, let me start.
Let me do something.
Let me be a tire.
I was like, I did tires for like a year.
Let me do tires.
And then I progressed from that.
Eventually I got my license six months later or so and was a mechanic there.
I was really, really mistreated.
You know what I mean?
I was really mistreated.
Almost like we've heard that before.
Yeah.
It's a recurring theme, isn't it?
It's like a really bad rerun that you can't shut off.
Oh, yeah.
Groundhog Day, you know.
It's so wild.
So when you say mistreated, what do you mean by that?
You didn't feel like you were, do you feel like you're overworked, underpaid, not appreciated in terms of nobody ever said thank you, Matt?
Like, what do you mean by mistreated?
Because it's a big, big, big gamut of what you can... Absolutely, absolutely.
So as the company itself, they tried to have a good company overall, but
You know, there's always that one or two bad boss or whatever.
So I just got I had at first initially I had a boss that I did way cheaper work as a mechanic than our other mechanics because I was happy to be in that position.
I mean, I was happy to have the opportunity to be the mechanic I wanted to be.
So doing cheaper work, you mean you were working for him for significantly less money?
Well, I was still getting paid as a tire tech, being a mechanic.
And that lasted a year and a half.
The mechanic I worked with was getting quadruple the amount of... And I didn't even like kind of put two and two together until we had like a dinner.
We all had like a dinner and then his wife was like talking about what they were going to purchase.
And he's like, well, I just got this Mustang.
And then I was just like, dude, I freaking just had to ask my dad to help me pay with my electric bill.
You know what I mean?
So I was like,
Just yeah, I mean it's a better deal.
It was a better deal, but the people I worked with were awesome You know what I mean the mechanics that I worked with were incredible mechanics It was the I mean it was literally it was my bosses that were just dicking me around you know what I mean, and they completely took my work for granted and
You ever get the feeling that sometimes the owners wish that we never had a Christmas dinner or any kind of gathering because sometimes a few beer gets consumed and people start to talk about what they get paid and then all of a sudden you build distention within that, right?
I mean, it's always mind-blowing to me too.
As an owner like your job is to create that culture and make sure people are happy and paid well like why is this guy like Obviously not super experienced at that time right but still doing a good job as an employee having to borrow money
from his dad to pay his bills while this guy over here, like, yes, maybe he's way more experienced in producing more, obviously, but he's on his way there.
And I want him to do better.
And guess what?
Be like this guy because he's making me more money.
And so I want to encourage him, pay him more, train him and do these things.
But instead it's like, oh, well, let's just keep this hush hush because I'm paying him next to nothing and still making good money.
Goose, right?
Look at the profit margin on him.
If I pay him $14 an hour and I pay my whatever experience tech 24 and they do the same job where you turn 10 hours for the shop every day and he turns 10 hours for the shop every day, your profit is through the roof.
Roof.
Yeah, you are the golden my news compared margins are a lot different.
Yeah well and and I realized that because I I told that boss that I was gonna go to a different shop for a different Roberts entire and he called my bluff, you know and was like we'll do it and so I went to the owner guy or whatever one of he was one of the owners of Roberts entire and I went up to him and Went to his office and I literally just told him I didn't you know say I was getting paid bullcrap But I told him I was getting I wasn't treated right felt like you're worth more
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, and I just elaborated that to him, you know And he's seen my and honestly he's seen my worth and I had at that time I had four different good reviews and the past I was like eight or nine months at Robertson tires me saying my name and so, you know, he like Okay, we'll send you out to this place and then I actually loved that shop and I really liked it but that it closed down and we all had to move to another shop and where they had already had their mechanics and they had already so I
I was again at the bottom, you know what I mean?
So I worked my way up there and then we all went to another shop.
So a multi-store owner who has a store shut down by the sounds of because of bad management, right?
Displaces then a bunch of employees, right?
And it's a multi-store owner yet they can't afford to have a mentorship program in place or a laid out plan for what somebody like Matt here, where they want to see him go.
Well, it's like a lot, you know, you see those disconnected owners and such, obviously you had to go around or over the other guy.
To make sure that you were taken care of because then he obviously you went to the person that eventually made the decision to get you the more money in the training or whatever.
But, you know, they're so disconnected.
They don't even know that they have a bad manager in there.
I think they might be like, um, um, what's, what's the, what's the word we're using?
Um, absentee.
Oh, absentee.
Um, it's very possible.
Right.
I mean, and I'm not, I'm not trying to throw shade at absentee owners, but I think sometimes the owner of the business, Robertson Tire, how often did you actually see that owner?
I never met him.
Not once.
Yeah.
So, and that's hard, you know, they're disconnected.
They have no idea.
They're just looking at numbers.
Usually at the end of the day, they're just looking at the P and L's and the balance sheets and talking to the managers every now and again.
Yeah.
Well, and then the, the boss gentleman that I talked to, he was a co-owner of Robertson tire, one of the co-owners of Robertson tire.
And I literally had to like walk past like three people,
Cause I was in, at that point I was enraged.
You know, I'd done work for three years and got paid.
I wasn't getting paid a 14, I was getting paid $12 an hour.
Working, I wasn't getting off work until night.
And you're, are you in Oklahoma?
Yeah.
Yeah, I was in Oklahoma.
Yeah, I wasn't worried.
I wasn't getting home until nighttime, man.
And I, you know, I have children and stuff and it just, I felt defeated.
I was like, you know, I'm working, I'm literally working my butt off, dude.
And I'm like getting paid nothing, you know, and I, I'm seeing our mechanics leave at like two o'clock and you know, they're done with their jobs.
And I, I have like, and that's another thing and picking up work for other mechanics and not getting that, not even getting that appreciation from it.
You know what I mean?
It's just, it's, it sucked, you know?
I have a question actually so there's always the in our world So if people at home don't know I don't know Matt at all Like I literally saw his tick tocks and yeah, so we're just now getting to know each other So this is all new to me as well but we here in the world that we're in because we're you know involved in a lot of this and wanting to better the industry and we always hear a
From owners that mechanics say that they're better than what they truly are And so that is what I can guarantee you some owners are listening to this right now They're like, oh, well, he he wasn't getting paid much because he wasn't as good as he thought he was.
Oh, yeah What would you say like that?
I that's what that's a good great question I mean there are tax out there that I do think a lot of cases text think that they're better than what they are I mean, I thought I was way better until I opened my shop and then but
was still not I mean I was a I was a machine at the dealership and I turned hours like crazy so I was really good at producing but I mean that as far as like my technical skills and stuff were good and my mechanical skills but
In our world, like it's always, you know, oh, well, you know, I deserve $30 an hour, but they're only producing, you know, 20 hours a week.
Well, yeah.
Well, absolutely.
And that's a good question.
And I didn't, I didn't ask to get paid like, you know, crazy.
I just wanted the mechanic salary is all.
Yeah.
And I already knew.
And there was no way and no chance that I would even try to go above another mechanic that's been there for years because that's taken value from another mechanic and I would never do that.
So essentially they were still just paying you as a tire as a tire You just wanted to be paid the same amount as the mechanic as a mechanic because you were doing mechanical work.
Absolutely Yeah, let me ask you so you you talked about you, you know, you were doing hubs and you were doing brakes then Yeah, it was well as a lot of didn't realize but you know, Oklahoma has terrible roads So I there's a lot of wheel bearings and studs that I replaced Yeah way more than brakes and way more than you know, like front-end suspension.
It was always wheel bearings.
So I
So this shop today if if a car came in towed in because it wouldn't start would they take that on or were they?
No, no, no.
Yeah.
Yeah, not at all.
So suspension brakes tires.
Yeah Yeah, nothing like that.
Um, we did so I did the first timing chain I had ever done was on our was on my own vehicle.
So and that was what kind of vehicle is that?
That was a Ford Edge.
Yeah, and that was at Robertson tire and You know, I got
Man, dude, none of the other mechanics did none of that stuff and I, you know, I did it and they were like, man, that is incredible.
So I got a lot of credibility from them from that.
But again, I, that was still in the time I was getting paid as a tire tech.
So I mean, I, I built that credibility.
I built that value for myself.
I showed my worth.
It just, I was just taken for granted.
Right.
You know what I mean?
Yeah.
Obviously you had a willingness to learn.
Yeah.
I was just going to say he had, he, he went and found himself a skillset that they weren't even interested in marketing or utilizing or attracting that kind of customer, that kind of work.
And I can,
understand from a tire standpoint because the tires is about moving volume right right it is about the it is about buying tires because I worked in a tire shop it's about buying a lot of tires cheap moving them really fast in and out real quick right minimal labor build to the ticket
Get that warranty onto the tire package.
Get the car looked at for things that we want to sell.
If we see an oil leak, we cover our eyes.
If it's check-ins, we cover our eyes.
If we have to boost it to bring it in, we cover our eyes.
We just want four tires on that thing, and we want it to be able to go down the road straight and not wear the tires off.
Absolutely.
So we don't want liability, and we want to be able to warranty them tires.
Go ahead.
So you do something on your own car that's a pretty involved repair.
Yeah.
And the people, your senior people that are working around you are like, wow.
Yeah.
Did any of them at that point then go to bat for you and say, hey, Matt's worth a little bit more than what they're getting paid?
Two, actually, of them did.
Well, one, his name was Zach, and he's still a good buddy of mine.
And he, ever since I started, the first thing they had me do was a radiator.
And they just sprung that on me.
They're like, hey, we're backed up.
We've got a lady that needs a radiator replacement.
Can you go do it?
And I was like, let's do it.
So I went and did it.
And that very day, that very same day, Zach went to our boss and was like, hey, make him a mechanic.
Let's make him a mechanic.
He's like, you know, we've got tire techs.
I was fast with tires, but I had fun because I had good employees, but I didn't like it.
You know what I mean?
And I wanted to be a mechanic.
And so he kind of like, you know, he was like edging me towards it.
And I secretively did stuff.
You know, I did shocks for him, you know, back, rear struts, stuff like that.
So you're, at this point, and I'm not trying to pry into your personal, what's your financial situation?
Do you have a place of your own?
Are you living at home?
No, here's the deal.
When I moved up to Oklahoma, I lived with my wife's parents.
And at that time, I was living with my wife's parents, and we were trying to get our own house.
It was just literally impossible.
Like it was not gonna, and especially, you know, at that time I had two daughters, so especially it was,
you know I have children I have mouths to feed and uh and you know I was 20 some odd years old I'm not trying to live with my girlfriend's my wife's parents.
So he's he's a dad with two mouths to feed and a wife living in the in-laws basement.
I lived like that I lived at my in-laws place for quite a while at $14 an hour trying to
Yeah.
I mean, but it's really cool.
Like the best part of that story is your friends act like going to bat for you.
Like how many times do we have to say it?
Like rising tides raise all ships.
And normally like in the previous experiences I've had, the cultures have been extremely toxic and no one's going to bat for anybody.
You're my competition.
Like you like, you know, oh I found a shortcut to this you don't get to know what it is I figured it out like that's that's not what we need right like you need someone like a Zack to help You know, you guys can work together and not only work together But it it's better for the shop because productivity goes up culture is better.
People are happier.
Yeah
Want to come riding each other.
Yeah, everybody's everybody's, you know, like friends you spend more time with the people you work with in your family So yeah, and that's and that goes to when we got sent to that second shop where there was already mechanics It was man.
It was literally war like and I didn't understand I was like we can yeah if we all work together We there's plenty of vehicles to work on guys.
It's like if we all work together, you know we can all be happy in this but it was always about like
or it was all about at that location, you know, I'm better than you, you're better than me, even though I don't even know your freaking name, you know what I mean?
It's just like, and yeah.
How were they paid?
Were you guys paid on just everybody got an hourly wage or was there some kind of production bonus?
Was there...
Flat rate I think probably wasn't so I got told for three years that we were gonna get Christmas checks dude three years I've heard that before yeah, I heard that before and it wasn't just from an employee You know some some odd guy saying hey, man.
We're getting Christmas bonuses This is literally like talk to you from our boss.
You know like And so and then you expect that stuff wouldn't be told that you expect if you keep it up guys You're gonna get a Christmas boom.
That's exactly what it is and then it's like no bonus in that
Guess we didn't keep it up.
Yeah, you know, which nobody told you what it was the goal that you had to hit to get this No, no, we just got to keep the productivity going and yeah.
Yeah, keep it keep it running smooth So everybody's hourly
Yeah, well our mechanic, we had Zach, he was a really good mechanic.
He got paid a little bit different because he actually got taken from another shop to get there.
So I understood, you know, and again, if I, I can see, you know, any mechanic can watch a mechanic and see, you know,
not really what he's worth, but how he works.
And you can kind of feel out a sense if he's serious about it or if he's just trying to get through the day.
And I took it extremely serious in Zach's scene.
I mean, I went to college for this, you know what I mean?
And this is all out of my own money.
I would work all day long and without seeing my kids for like six months, basically.
I would work all day and then I'd go straight to school.
And I would get out of school at freaking 11 o'clock, go right back to work at 6, and it was just a repetitive process.
And again, the company I worked for knew that I was going to school.
And I was trying to show in any which way I could, like, here I am.
This is my value.
And I had no intentions to leave.
It was kind of just one thing after another.
And then I was like, you know, let's just
I realized, you know, if I wanted to be treated the way I wanted to be treated, I was gonna have to do it myself.
So, because you had a manager come to you and he called your bluff, you said.
Yeah, oh yeah.
You came to him and said, I'm gonna, you know, you leave and he said, go ahead then.
Yeah, well I talked to a different, he was a tire tech, but I talked to a different guy at another shop and he was like, man, we're hurting for mechanics.
We've got one mechanic, he's just lousy, you know, he's just, he's lazy with his work.
And so, that just stewed that idea.
Like, I was like, hey, what if I go to another shop?
Would I get paid like a mechanic because they need a mechanic?
And I mean, we needed a mechanic at the shop I was at.
We just didn't, I wasn't getting paid like I should.
And again, I wouldn't make a big fuss about it, but when I'm having to ask my dad for money, you know what I mean, and stuff like that, it's.
Well, I mean, like, how long ago was this, do you know?
Like, time-wise?
That's probably about,
Six years ago.
Okay, so even six years ago shops are you know, obviously looking for tax and yeah, but they're paying $14 and yeah, I wonder why they're looking for 10 absolutely and then you see and then you see your manager, you know, I mean just the thing is is like
the mass majority of shops would kill for a tech like you, someone that is willing to learn, is willing to learn, is going to college to learn, you know, to advance your skillset.
Like that's what I did as well.
I mean, I went to a tech school and I wanted to learn and better myself.
I went to tech community college as well in addition to going to UTI.
So I'm constantly wanting to learn as well as you.
Now that we've talked, I've learned a lot more about you in the last day and a half.
and shops are desperate for someone like that, desperate.
And like Rick White said yesterday, just like you were saying, the other tech was talking about them needing a mechanic.
If you think that other shops aren't marketing to your current techs, you're lying to yourself.
Even if it's not the shop, it's techs from the other shop, which is still the other shop.
And so if you think that someone's not marketing for your current techs,
You are absolutely lying to yourself.
I know that for a fact.
I don't even have any texts.
Because guess what?
Those shops are marketing to me trying to bring me back to their shops and close my shop down.
It's 100%.
It's a situation of, you know, it's one thing to have a resume sitting out there on Indeed or something like that.
But I mean, we all start to, especially in a small town, you start to get to know either through the parts vendors, the tool vendors, or you just start to get to know.
If you happen to go to a training event, you just meet some techs around here and you're like, if they come in and they're happy and they're bragging about where they're working and they're bragging about how they're being treated, that's not even marketing.
That's just like, the best cultures obviously come about.
We know who they are, right?
So when we talk about, you know, poaching,
Some people are really easy to poach if you let it.
If you let your place get to a point where it is, that's not poaching anymore.
That is somebody getting an opportunity that you're not giving them.
And when we start to say- A better opportunity.
That's right.
You know, this shop's poaching, they're not poaching.
We don't own, we don't belong to anybody.
We're not hired help, right?
You are a free-willed person to work wherever you want to work, whenever you want to work, and it's always the right thing to do is to be vocal and communicate with your current employer about this is how I feel, right?
I feel like you're not giving me an opportunity.
I feel like you're not, you know, I feel like I'm not compensated.
I feel like I'm not valued.
If you go to them and you say that, Super Mario, you ain't all that special.
they're telling you, you've maxed out here.
You are at the pinnacle of what we see you.
And it won't matter how many timing chains you do in a forward edge, we have you fit this role, and that's where we're gonna keep you.
So if somebody's telling you that,
Absolutely.
Yeah, absolutely.
And I mean and and I was like completely I was more upset than anything, but I was I was extremely open and vulnerable and I was talking to him about it You know I was like this is a lot of time and I didn't even bother until after I felt that credibility After it until after I had a diploma and everything And reached out and got a negative response.
I it was mind-blowing because I was like dude, I
Do you realize the hours that I had put into this?
Do you realize and it's not about it's not like At that point it wasn't even really about the money anymore.
It was like do you not see what I'm doing?
Do you not like what what's going on at the front counter where you can't visualize what we're doing back here?
And what especially what I'm like going through to be where I'm at right now, right?
So you left that place and
Well, it was funny that you mentioned poaching.
Because when I got to that second shop, I worked there for like three months, man.
And I talked to another person who was a diesel mechanic at a construction company that my wife's cousin owned.
And so I was like,
Oh, you know, wonder what this is like.
I was like, I wonder what this is like.
And so I messaged him and I was like, hey, you know, see you're looking for a mechanic.
I've seen it on Facebook.
I was like, I've seen you're looking for a mechanic.
And I was like, I've never worked on a diesel in my life.
See, we didn't take diesels at Robertson or nothing.
I was like, I've never worked on a diesel, but I'd be more than happy to learn.
And so he came to Robertson Tire and interviewed me in the back.
And I was just open, fully open.
And he, out of, and this guy, and I owe him praise too, his name was Dustin, Dustin Smith.
And he seen that I wanted to learn and knew that
At that moment.
I was naive about it diesels about 24 volt systems and stuff like that and Hughes prepared for that, you know what I mean?
So when he hired me, he walked me through everything and trained me He taught me how to weld I mean he taught me how to do heat up metal and you know, pull cylinders out stuff like that I did my first full engine.
It was on a tractor actually, but a full engine swap cool with him and you know, he taught me a lot and
It was only him and I, you know what I mean, as mechanics, and it was a construction company, so their majority was the concrete that they did and what they laid.
You know, we worked on their fleet trucks and all the equipment and stuff like that, but we were kind of not really a necessity, you know what I mean, to them, and him and I both seen that, but I didn't get paid terrible at that place, but
I just grew from there.
And I did a lot of service calls at that job.
I'd go put on freaking whole belts on a freaking skid-steer that fall off, tracks on a skid-steer, and cylinders that are just busted with hydraulic fluid.
Here's the deal, I was like, I'm gonna go to, I'm gonna go to diesel.
Okay, I'm gonna go to community college for diesel now.
And this is what I thought.
And so I did, you know, and I got my diploma from that.
But this is the kicker.
When I was at, when I was taking classes at OTC, they were like, hey, we'll help pay for some of your tuition if you want to teach some of these classes at Napa.
It's these better car care classes on just how to take care of your vehicle, how to check oil, your fluids and stuff like that.
And I was like, dude, let's do it.
Sure.
And I'm not going to lie, I was nervous.
I mean, I looked young, you know what I mean?
I'm talking to people that are older than me.
Who's going to literally listen to me?
They did.
You know what I mean?
They liked the information.
They weren't belittling me because of my age.
I spoke how I should speak, and I was being proper and professional, and they appreciated that.
And then from a couple of people, hey, well, my vehicle's actually messing up.
Do you think you can run out and check on it?
And I was like, you know, being a pal, sure, absolutely.
You reached out to me.
I'll do it.
And then that came from,
I started doing side jobs like that and I found myself like calling to work and Because I was getting more side job business than you know, and like I said, I wasn't really a necessity there So they they would let me just call in, you know what I mean?
And you're like, I'll see you tomorrow and that's the thing We see that a lot to like if someone's not making enough money and they're making more doing side work Well, what are they gonna do?
Absolutely
So like that's we constantly say that like my goal is to pay my mechanics when I get to that point So much money.
They don't want to do side work Yeah, I do is just go home and spend time with their families or whatever they want to do But so so you is that kind of how you started building your?
clientele for yeah mobile thing yeah, and then I
Well, and then I was doing a turbo on one of our fleet trucks.
One of our drivers, he's well known for being a numbskull, is the best way I can put it.
Well, he's a driver.
Yeah.
Well, he's in a 2500, and he's got a backhoe on the back with two buckets.
And I think he had like 20 gallons of water in the bed of the truck and was about to go power wash all this stuff.
And he's on the highway, puts his stuff on cruise control, pulling all that crap, blows a turbo.
So I'm on the side of the road doing a turbo now.
And our concrete foreman knows nothing about mechanics.
Whips in, slams on his brakes in front of me.
And he was like, hey, this truck got serviced last month, and now it's got a blown turbo.
What's the deal?
And I was like, well, it's got a blown turbo because your driver doesn't know how to drive.
And he was like, oh, are you sure?
And I was like, are you kidding me right now?
I was like, what's going on?
And so actually, I was like, you know what, my good man?
I was like, I'm not going to work for you anymore.
I was like, because this just isn't for me.
But I didn't want to leave because Dustin was so good to me, but he had his own plans and he was already on his way out the door.
So I did talk to him.
I was like, hey, I'm so sorry.
I love you to death, man.
But I got to move on.
And that wasn't just an everyday thing.
That wasn't the first argument I got in with that guy.
We've gotten in a few arguments.
It's just the unappreciation.
I was like, dude, I get you're a foreman and you drive a fancy truck that has the company's logo on it.
And I get that you got a nice little coffee mug you walk around with, but you ain't got to talk to me like that.
You know what I mean?
I'm surprised.
I was going to ask you because you seem like a really laid back person.
Because like we had talked about like I made that video and I got several hate comments from people Like saying that, you know, I was trying to be I don't know belittling to you or something That's why I messaged you right away and I was like hey because if people don't know like on tick-tock if you're not friends trying to send messages can be
Yeah, quite annoying.
So to people that I messaged like months ago on TikTok finally responded to me because they're after your you pushing my platform.
They actually answer me back.
Yeah.
Look, there's been an inbox in that from that guy.
Yeah, the jaded idiot for two months now.
And that's what happens because if they don't follow you and you don't follow them, it's a pain to get through.
So as soon as I saw you follow me, I was like, I messaged you right away and I was like, Hey, like I'm at absolutely zero disrespect and you took it.
Nothing like that.
But like we had talked about and you even got, you said you got messages too, right?
Yeah.
I got some.
Yeah.
They're just but I didn't I seen the video and I didn't see I could see how people Because you just said you need training.
I could see how people would stop it there Yeah, and be like what a meanie but I when I seen the video I got so excited and I was like I already knew I needed training every every owner that Has problems and like runs through issues and troubles knows that they need to critique those and get better at them training I would I would say
They don't know that, but they do.
We all need training.
I mean, I still constantly need training, and I had recorded that video, like, multiple times, trying to change my wording.
They have all heard that they need training, but I'm going to interject and say most don't know they need training.
Most people are not as open as you have been to it, right?
I can tell you that 100%.
Like,
Um, just trying to help people.
Most of the time they want help, but they don't take it.
Ego is an obstacle.
Yeah.
Okay.
And you want to be a receptive vessel, which means that I want to be able to easily pour into you the things that I want to offer to you.
If you cannot take that because you pride, uh, emotions,
Nobody's saying you shouldn't be offended.
Nobody's saying you shouldn't be hurt.
That's a human thing.
But you got to put that to the side for a minute and take the knowledge and the gifts that he's giving to you, anyone's giving to us.
Because if I hadn't, oh man, I wouldn't be sitting here.
I would not be sitting here.
If the people that have put me on this point hadn't said to me, shut up, listen for a minute, and keep your emotions in check, I wouldn't be sitting here with you now.
Right?
So it's, I've been bragging about Chris for three weeks now to everybody.
Oh yeah.
Because it's such a, it's such a cool thing, you know, what he did.
And it really is mind-blowing.
He is better than me at it because like I, still the way I can be to him often is that I would be like, this guy is a write-off.
There is no point in giving him any kind of training because he is, he's,
will he even get it you know because when you put yourself out there on social media sometimes people look at it and the confidence that you have to have is there's no way he's ever going to hear what I'm trying to say because he's already like no I have a platform I'm doing this look at what are you doing from social my social following is way higher than it's got nothing to do with that right right he's trying to teach you that it's not about follows and likes
It's about how to make your business better.
Absolutely, man.
This has been, honestly, this entire event's just been life-changing.
Like, it's literally been life-changing.
From not even before the class, man, just sitting in lunch the first day and listening to the seminars, I was like, it was almost something that you, like, you couldn't draw away from.
You had to, like, listen to it.
And it was like, and it puts everything into a whole new perspective.
You know, I always had the problem with like having a customer that gives me some sort of story You know and all mechanics get those stories, but me working straightforward with an individual I get them a lot and I you know, I have a huge heart and I feel sympathy but at the end of the day I you know, I have three I have three daughters, you know, and they're all expecting, you know me to bring home food and so it's I
I got to put a roof over their head and stuff.
And as much as I help, as much as I want to, I physically wouldn't be able to perform and keep going on at that rate.
I would have to change it up.
And that's where you got some crap mechanics that pay $75 for a tune-up or something.
And they're like, well, this guy's paying $75.
But they're not knowing that this guy's going to slap on one of the, like,
break some stuff, slap on the old coils, not gonna clean nothing up, stuff's probably gonna be unplugged.
And that's why we get so, sometimes when we say to you, because you gotta remember, like you just mentioned, that one mechanic is gonna do things one way, and then the better mechanic is gonna do things the right way.
We're trying, it's too often when we see somebody in a situation from social media, and that's the devil of it, is that we make too many snap judgments, right?
And we think, and it's like,
Oftentimes, unfortunately, the guy that you're trying to be not is who often is the one that's out there pushing their platform so hard.
You know what I mean?
So it's like, so when we see that, and then we say to them, they need training.
It isn't just about, because the fact that you're doing it for so cheap is what's devaluing the people that you are trying to be.
You understand what I mean?
The technician level that you want to become, if we keep enabling the cheap,
You never, we don't get the most of us to that level.
Right.
There's too many options for the customers out there to find the cheap.
Right.
So we're trying to eliminate the cheap, whatever that may be.
And you know, that's a whole other thing.
We can go on.
What's cheap for you is cheap for them.
And you know, your customer, my customer, not your customer.
Right.
What I said to you last night is, you know, the number one priority is to go home at the end of the day and be able to provide for the family.
Right.
You know, I, everybody that knows me,
Too many years of being the way I am, I don't have a whole lot of sympathy for that customer.
Their story and their problem is their story and their problem.
You've walked the path that you've walked.
You've got the scars to prove it.
It's just business.
You need to charge what you need to charge.
He needs to charge what he needs to charge because he wants to provide a lifestyle for himself and his family.
That person that you're servicing makes their own choices on the lifestyle they want to have.
We're not here to discuss lifestyles.
You need something done.
I'm your person to do it.
This is what it costs.
That's as far as it has to go.
Absolutely.
And I'm the best option you have.
But oftentimes, like we talked about, we devalue ourselves and we undervalue what we offer.
And we are, as I will continue to say, one of the most giving and generous industries out there.
And we want to fix everything, but we can't fix everything and we cannot be the hero all the time.
And so what I think I mentioned this yesterday is we end up discounting everything and continually discounting and help out our clients.
but then in putting ourselves in a worse situation because we do have huge hearts and we do want to help people.
And I tell other shop owners and techs all the time, I'm like, absolutely help people, but help them from your profits.
Stop discounting your work because you're worth it.
All the time, all the knowledge, all of the schooling you took, all of your experience, all of that took time, took effort.
Now you have equipment and overhead and
your cost of everything of doing business, that costs money.
And then you have a wife at home, three kids.
So, you know, when you have all of those caught, that is a certain amount that you need to make so you can be home.
Cause nobody wants to work 24 seven.
I've been there.
We've had that conversation too.
We've had a lot of conversations that you got here, but you know, that's, was me in the beginning of the business working 12, 14 hour days working Saturdays, you know, uh, neglecting my family.
That's nobody wants that.
Like in our minds, we're like, we're just on the grind.
We're trying to provide for our families.
And we don't realize every time that we discount a service to a client, um, you know, we're taking money out of basically our children's mouths, uh, that food out of their mouths.
And that's why I made that video because I knew exactly what that situation was because guess what?
I've been in that situation time and time and time again.
And I did the same exact thing.
Yeah.
And I didn't know what I didn't know and that's why this event changed my life and changed the trajectory of my business and my family.
And so that's why like we had talked about and I was like, you know, I literally thought about it for days and I'm like, okay, what am I going to do?
Like I can make another video.
And he didn't, he didn't fill us in that that's what he was going to do.
He just, he just went and did it.
Right?
Like you didn't need us to push and say, you didn't come to us and say, I'm thinking about doing this.
It was just one minute he said it.
And then the next minute he's reaching out to you saying, I'm going to send you the ASDE.
And we're all looking at it going, wow.
Because we talk with some people that are involved in some pretty big operations, some pretty big shops.
And they see the video.
And they don't do anything.
And Chris is not a big operation.
Chris is relatively new in his business.
They're not struggling, but they have aspirations of what they want to do.
And it's all going to take money.
But him, out of his heart and his faith, sees you and said, I need to grab this person and bring them along with me.
I need to do for them what somebody did for me.
Man, so I'll never stop bragging about that because there are so many people that had more means to be able to do what he did and they don't.
They just continue to complain and bitch and say the industry needs to change, people need to do more, you need more training.
Training's friggin' expensive.
It's not cheap.
Shout out to David Hall.
We can't forget about David.
I put that video out there and that's what I told him.
I put that video out there.
Think that specific video got a hundred thousand views at least if not more now I haven't checked plus the other channels plus you posted it Yeah, and I put the invitation out there.
I said any other owners that are interested in helping I'm you know, I will yeah
pay for this guy's entire trip.
And, uh, which I wanted some skin in the game.
Like I wanted, because I feel like if you have some skin in the game, you take it more seriously.
So, but I wanted to be able to cover the mass majority of your costs.
And David was the only one who reached out to me.
And I'm not saying like those other people that didn't reach out to me are bad people,
But again, we have to put our money where our mouth is.
That's what I said in the video.
Absolutely.
Because I can say that you need training because I needed training.
My point of that video was I needed the training.
I was in your spot.
And so I literally pictured myself
in that position, knowing how I handled the situation very similarly to you did, that you did, I needed to know how to handle a situation like that.
Because unless you get taught by somebody that can train you in like, what do I do?
If they don't show you a different way and if you're never willing to learn it, then you're gonna continue to do the same thing and the same thing and the same thing.
And so that's what helped it for me.
So I'm like, well,
Well, and you touched all that in the video, and then, and that's why, like, there was none of it that I felt, like, as disrespect or anything.
I literally, when I, when I personally watched it, I was like,
Like it was like, I almost like lost my breath, you know what I mean?
Because it's like, okay, here's a guy who literally see me in that video, in that clip, I was struggling because I was like, dude, I'm doing all this work and you're trying to pay me less money, man?
I was like, are you serious?
you know, instead of saying all the things I wanted to say, uh, I was just like, yeah, sure.
You know?
And, and I was like, you know, and I did, I was like, you know, but I do warranty on my work and stuff.
So I'm, I, I value what I do and I'm not just going to leave here and be like, sorry, Nara, sayonara.
And, uh, and you touched base on all of that.
And so any person that like messaged me or comment and I was like, did you know, you can literally look at the comments.
I was like, do you literally not watch the full video?
Cause they don't.
Yeah, I was like cuz he says this was him.
This is me.
I needed training and now I'm doing better, you know Yeah, and you and David are both shop owners.
So it's not like you know, you're
You got thousands of dollars in the bank and you're just willing to throw money left and right.
This is money that you could, I'm sure, use for stuff and you've seen value in me.
Man, I've been trying to produce that value to show, which is why I started social media.
I wanted people to see this is me, I'm genuine.
This is how I do work.
I won't screw you over.
I'm a good guy.
But I'm also human, so mistakes will be made.
But I will correct them.
I'll fix them for you.
And that's why it's important, like I was saying to you last night, we need to build a little more profit into every job that you do now.
So that you can build the profit into each job that you do.
So however you decide your pricing is going to be, add whatever you want to it.
To understand that I want you, like I said last night,
If a customer calls you up and you get there and they immediately start to haggle, I want you to have that cushion and that buffer to be able to say, I'm going to get back in my truck then and I'm going to go on to the next appointment.
Or I'm going to go home early and I'm going to play with my daughters.
And that way when that person calls you the next day, because you made the drive, yes, are you down some money by making your travel time?
Yes you are unfortunately.
But when that person calls you that next day you say, I can't come right now.
Right?
Well when can you come?
I'm not really sure.
I said, and then you say, I spent X amount of dollars to travel out there for you to try and haggle with me.
I have a no haggle policy.
Which means unfortunately I can't come back now until I get that money covered plus the initial price that we quoted.
And I guarantee you more people will say,
Okay, when can you come?
Then the people that continue to argue.
And the people continue to argue say, I'm not about arguing.
I have to do what I have to do and charge what I have to charge to provide for my business and for my family.
And I'm sorry that you don't see the value in that.
And I wish you all the best in whoever you find to service your vehicle.
Because they will.
They will find the value, right?
Like we talked about, they're gonna call other people and they're not gonna show up.
Because when you even mention that, a lot of those people that... You're the only one that actually showed up, or the guy that you went back and fixed the car because you actually came back and showed him your true character.
Like, hey, I made a mistake, I'm
I'm gonna fix this and take care of it and he was happy to give you that extra money yeah, those are the type of people you're looking for the people that They talked about in the class is like the the person that complains at 500 bucks is gonna complain at 300 bucks That's right.
The person that complained at 300 bucks is gonna complain at 200.
They're gonna complain at 100.
They're gonna point at a thousand they're gonna complain at every price because that's all they care about and
I don't know how many times I can say this, but you're worth more and that's to everybody.
It's you, me, we're worth more.
And that's a big issue we have.
It's hard for us to realize that.
And I don't understand why, but we are, we're worth more.
figure out how to build that buffer in.
Yeah.
Right.
So and it's not about having cash in the bank.
I'm talking about figure out how to build that buffer in so that you because you already have the confidence.
So now but I want you to really have the confidence because it's like I don't need every car.
That needs to be emblazed on every shop owner.
Not every customer is your customer, right?
And I don't need every car and profits not a dirty word Yeah, and and I some I've noticed from being a shop owner is like, oh, you know if I take on a job that in my mind I'm like, you know, I'm getting haggled with on prices.
Anyway, I'm like, man I probably shouldn't take this job and then I'm missing calls from potential people that Genuinely want their car fixed.
Yeah, and it's like you know, I know everybody knows that car issues are they suck when you have problems, but
There's like a right way and a wrong way.
I've posted 17 videos in total going back after somebody else.
In one particular situation, one lady had her whole wheel fly off.
That was from another mechanic and you know that did a way cheaper price on some front brakes and so Then that's the that's the stuff you run into like and you could see I posted a video about torquing lug nuts, you know I I put a just a ratchet on there and was tightening it and I did a little no-no finger and then I Put a torque wrench on it just to show everybody and I had dozens of people.
Well, I just zip it up I just zip it up.
Yeah, I get that a lot
yeah you think in your mind do you ever that hate on the tools that you have what are you doing with that red tool what a piece of junk well then there's these vehicles and I mean everybody's seen it you're driving 70 down the road and then zoom zoom zoom people are just flying past you what's gonna happen one of those wheels fly off dude now you're gonna have fatalities I mean so you you bring up a very good point because that's why sometimes it's people need to be operating with insurance
Yeah.
Insurance.
And the one thing most people look past because they think it's never going to happen to them is the liability of something of that nature.
Like I post the process of torquing down wheels on my social media.
Every time I post that, someone tells me that's way unnecessary because it's a long process.
But when you're the owner and all the liability falls onto you, it's different and you start to realize why and why it's important.
Well, then the moment you start cutting corners like that anyways, that's the time you start becoming a crap mechanic.
When you think there's an easier way of doing it.
So here's a lesson to take from this.
We're going to give a shout out to another creator.
Royalty Auto Service.
Did you happen to see their process when wheels go on?
Yes.
So Royalty Auto Service is a channel that's on YouTube, TikTok, Instagram.
But their process is, and Royal is in Florida and it's got a very established, well-known shop.
Their process is when somebody comes over and puts wheels on a car, the wheels go down.
So he went through a long video.
It was on YouTube about two weeks ago.
But what's the process with a torque wrench versus an impact gun versus a torque stick versus not.
But the key thing to take away from how royalty does it is once the wheels are on the ground and torqued, somebody says, torque.
and somebody comes over with another torque wrench and then proceeds to torque all the wheels again and then the car gets quality control test drive and then it gets torqued again by a different person so that three different people have torqued the wheels on that vehicle you want to talk about liability and protection yourself and royalty royals royalty
It's called royalty because his first name is Royal.
Royal said, I can't remember the last time we've ever had a wheel come off or come back loose.
Well, that's what I, like I was discussing this with a follower not too long ago and he was just asking me about the process and I explained to him and he was like, well, that just takes a lot of time.
I said, yeah, but a wheel falling off the car takes even longer.
And I said, that customer is going to be ticked.
And I said, guess what?
They're not just going to be ticked at me, but they're going to start telling everybody else online.
Oh yeah.
Are we perfect?
No, no, like we're going to make mistakes But I made them the most amount of mistakes you can alleviate the better and so that's why that kind of stuff matters.
Yeah, and That's great.
Like that's the kind of stuff that I love seeing on social media It's like people need to see the professional side.
Yeah of the industry they need to see that we are professional
And the title of that video that I posted it was 33,000 accidents per year are happening for just tire related issues and so that was the title and so It was like I wanted everybody to realize you know what I mean?
because I've seen it like five or six times at Robertson tire and that's you know, that's a place where it's supposed to get torqued twice and You know, they don't you know what I mean?
And so unless you're like unless you're really a genuine good mechanic
If they don't, you know what I mean?
Because there's going to be no micromanaged shop that's going to be able to watch all the mechanics and do that stuff and all the tire techs.
So that's another reason why when somebody asks you, why do you cost more?
Because it's not just why do you cost what you cost, but if you're constantly getting hit with why do you cost more, you have to think about more.
I want you to think about more because I want you to start charging more.
Not just about more than what you already charge.
Think about the end goal, like him, his door rate is higher, he's a Honda specialist, than his local Honda dealer.
I want you to think about more.
That is the goal for you, Matt, is to think, how do I charge more?
Because then it's a situation of
I have the justification and the reasons when somebody asks me why I charge more for that very reason.
Absolutely.
I'm trying to avoid being one of the statistics of 330,000 tire-related accidents that happen every year.
I'm doing it because your life is worth, you know, even if I don't like the customer, I don't want that car to crash into something that could have your daughter in it.
Absolutely.
So think about more.
It's not about doing more hours or more jobs, it's about ELR, Effective Labor Rate.
It's about ARO, Average Repair Order.
That's what you've got to think about.
Even though you're mobile, you've got to think about the time that I've got to travel to that
worth something.
Absolutely.
I'm gonna get paid for it.
Absolutely.
The wear and tear of my vehicle.
You posted a video, I remember you were saying, I saw it, your own truck the starter went out on it.
Yeah.
Right?
Did you go, nobody haggled with you?
No.
You just went down to the parts, you just went down to the parts store?
Yeah, I walked like four miles, man.
Walked four miles because no other way to get there, right?
No.
So walks down four miles, you go in and you buy your starter at, you didn't haggle the price, right?
You have an account, you just pay the amount that you need to pay to get it, walk back,
Put the starter in.
At no point did you think about haggling because of your situation.
So don't allow people to come into your situation
and dictate what their situation should be, your cost, your value.
There's no room for that.
There's no place for it.
Why it keeps coming into conversations is irrelevant.
I don't care why your starter failed, right?
I don't care.
This is now me talking to your customer.
It's just business.
It's just a situation of I have to charge you this amount to put your starter in.
Absolutely, you know, it's not that I don't feel for you in the fact that I'm sympathetic to maybe you missed a shift, right?
But let's be real sometimes starters.
Give us some warning and if we just turn the radio Well, I mentioned in that video she was giving me some signs and I was just like, oh
There's a very you know, I always wonder I wonder if Apple Cares that their iPhone the new one is $1,500 They're making profit off of that.
All right, you don't ever see people going online like that
Oh, I just had to pay $1,500 for this phone.
No, they're posting it.
Oh, I got this new sweet.
Absolutely.
Blah, blah, blah.
Now granted, granted, obviously it is a different idea because people don't like spending money on their vehicle, but that's where the training comes in and you start to understand and better to show your value of why you're worth what you're worth.
And be able to elaborate it even a little bit, you know, so a customer can understand.
A hundred percent.
But you also have to know your numbers.
I'll preach that till the day I die.
You got to know your numbers in the business.
Cause if you don't know your numbers, you don't know what to charge.
You don't know what you need to make.
You don't know what you need to bring home.
And you as the owner need to make profit and more, more than four to 5% owners, more than four to 5% because that's the average.
Yeah.
Chris and I were talking before you got here and I was asking him, I said, what kind of courses have you taken?
Because what we hoped for you is that you got at least a good mix of both the business and the technical courses.
So when you're here at AST, can you kind of give us a rundown on what you took?
Okay, so the first class I took was the Trust and Currency, and that was, man, that was an extremely eye-opening class, so.
That's Cecil?
Yeah.
No, it was Rick White.
Rick White.
Trust is your real currency.
It was a good class.
Yes, I listened to Cecil when I first got here in the seminar, and he touched base on some really, really, like the doctor topic.
You wouldn't, you know, if you go into a doctor and then you pay because you're having a problem,
You pay the doctor fee you pay the prescription fee doesn't work You go back to the doctor pay the doctor pay another prescription fee, you know And that's and he said that's why it's called practicing medicine because they're allowed to do that with mechanics You know you make you you're not allowed to practice.
Yeah, I mean that they come unglued if you make a mistake You to be perfect, but they don't expect the doctor that they're paying thousands and thousands.
Absolutely.
It's quite interesting
And then you become so stupid if you make a mistake.
You know what I mean?
All of a sudden, all your credibility is just like.
And so you took that class.
What's your next class?
OK.
And then so this morning I took a CEO and recruiting class.
And so that class.
So that class was really beneficial to me because I didn't know.
So when I started my business, I obviously had a website, a domain.
I started my Google page.
Through Facebook and Instagram, I was doing all my marketing and I just like,
fell off the burner with Google.
And I did notice a trend in my customers that I was getting.
All the customers I was getting now was just from the reels that I was making and stuff like that, instead of people that genuinely needed car work done, you know what I mean?
And Googled repair shops.
And so someone
went onto my Google page and put their number as the shop owner.
So whenever someone would call off of my page, it would go to there.
And as ingenious as that is, I had no idea that that was happening until that class.
He was like, well, let me see what you got.
And I was like, well, it says I'm not an owner of it anymore.
Them dirty buggers.
Yeah, right?
Well, and I told him like that alone like my goal for him like we talked about I said I hope that you just take two or three things home with you.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's hard It's a lot of information to come to this and if you can at least take two or three things home like that's a lot in itself, but I was like that alone right there like somebody else is getting your freaking calls from Google because some
Worthless loser at home has nothing better to do and what would happen man?
They go like let's say, you know, they do a crap job Yeah, and I'm getting the review on a job.
I didn't even do So but the good news is I did call that number and it was inactive So I was like at least now looks like I'm a lazy owner instead of a terrible one You know what?
I mean?
So now people's not like him.
He's got a bright side.
He does.
So any technical training you took while you're here?
So I'm actually going to do a boot camp training class after this.
I forgot the entire word for it, but it's it's a business zoning and boot camp training learning process.
Anything on technical car repair?
There wasn't no classes that I took this year on technical car repair, but I do plan to make it to Vision, in which I do plan on making.
Yeah, that's close to him.
It's only four hours.
It's only four hours from me.
I didn't realize it was so close.
Yeah, so I plan on going there, and I wanted to, I didn't only want to take, you know, technical classes, but I also wanted to take some diagnostic classes as well.
So that was going to segue into my, I want you to think about this, okay?
You're in Oklahoma.
Yeah.
Keith Perkins with L1 Automotive, or L1 Diagnostics.
Yeah.
He's in Oklahoma.
Oh, is he?
He probably have run in some similar channels and, you know, Keith is one of the top brains in our industry right now in terms of DIAG, programming, troubleshooting, whatever you want to call it.
He's got a lot of free content out there, you can see.
And then I introduced you to some people last night, fellow YouTubers and stuff like that.
I want you, and this is not me lecturing and telling you what to do, I just want you to think about when you've got some free time, whatever that might be,
We, none of us ever stop learning, right?
And it's not just a podcast, but we're all a bunch of nerds where it's like when there's a new Scanner Danner video out or there's something we're sharing all the time.
Look at this case study that somebody posted on YouTube.
So think from that standpoint of, you know, how do I get to that level of being able to diagnose a car?
Because the reality is, is eventually what we want to see for you is that you don't have to necessarily go and pull an engine out of a car as a job.
Right.
I want to see you, I want to see all techs, if you're going to be mobile, you roll up with a van, you do some programming, you do some diag, and somebody else that is cheaper than yourself ends up doing the grunt work of putting the component in.
And you just might get called back to program it, calibrate it, whatever you want to call it, right?
Diagnose why the car doesn't start.
Think about from that because... Well, he has aspirations to own a brick and mortar too.
Yes, but I want you to think about the way
What you're doing a lot of it right now, as you age out, your body only has so many times that you can bend down and kneel down and roll around in the dirt to do those kind of jobs.
So I want you to think about always developing the brain as much as you're developing your repetition skills that are physical in nature.
Because as that starts to peter out for you, if you grow your skill set to a level where I don't have to swing a hammer, or I don't have to crawl around to get the job done, then you get yourself into a different type of job.
And I'm not trying to say you need to do more work.
That's not what I'm trying to say.
You understand what I'm saying?
Absolutely.
But the people that we've introduced you to and what we've tried to show you, learn their platforms, right?
Follow them.
get involved with their social programming, their medias, that kind of stuff, and take from it the technical stuff that they're trying to teach you.
We're not trying to go out there and say compete with them, or go out there and start to all of a sudden sell yourself to customers that you're not.
If you're not strong at DIAG, don't go out there and start to try and do a bunch of it.
But if you can do it, continue to work on that.
Because that's where you truly invest in your ability going forward.
And you and I have had this conversation, right?
He's awesome at what he does, but he talks to us all the time, sometimes he gets something in him that he's not familiar with, and it makes him nervous, right?
And I don't wanna say he's struggling with it, that's not the word I'm trying to use.
But it's not... The confidence isn't there.
So the way we build confidence is not in, I did that job this fast.
The confidence comes from being able to say, five other mechanics looked at it and couldn't figure it out, I figured it out.
And then we get into making some serious money because then it doesn't even matter what those five charged.
You are the last stop maybe in your community or your area to solve that car.
Right.
Whatever five other charged did that didn't work, it doesn't matter because it didn't work.
It wasn't the repair it needed.
Your repair is then going to be the repair that is a successful repair.
It doesn't matter if they spent three grand and it didn't, it doesn't matter.
Right.
Does not matter.
You're the guy.
It was your repair that's what they needed.
Right.
And then don't ever undervalue that.
We talk all the time about, like, just in one this afternoon.
Well, I went and fixed a wire and changed a fuse.
There's an example of an oxygen sensor issue on a truck that I fixed way years ago.
Four oxygen sensors that went in plus labor is like $600 back then.
It didn't fix the car, right?
If I go in, Jimmy Purdy said the same thing this morning, if I go in and change the fuse that was blown and fix the wire that was shorted, can I not charge $600 for that?
Right?
This is not a trick question.
You're darn right I can.
Right.
Because $600 for a repair that didn't work, in my brain has always been the repair that does then is at least as much as that.
Right.
Yeah, because they didn't spend money on something they didn't need.
Like how many times do we see that?
We talk about that all the time with Paul.
And on his channel like he that's essentially what the mass majority of his cars are is it's been to how many other places and he's the last-ditch effort and they've replaced a bunch of parts and like he said he Nowadays, he doesn't He said it it's he doesn't always know the situation like in the past He's talked down but he's like my perspective has changed like they've not gotten the training
That they deserve and you don't know the situation and it's easy.
I've done it I'm very guilty of it of trashing another shop and we we have to stop we got to stop and not Like I said, I'm just as guilty of it as anybody else when you're out there and you're and you're doing your social medias and stuff like that remember that
more times than not when you're talking to the customer and it's you and them yeah the reason the car didn't get fixed is who you're talking to yeah not what you're talking about yeah because they probably chose cheap oh yeah right and choosing cheap is they're allowed to i'm not trying to say that every
the best repair is always the most expensive.
I'm not trying to say that.
You know, if they find somebody and it's cheaper and they get a successful repair, it's a successful repair.
Right.
But, you know, oftentimes, too many times we want to blame the tech in a lot of this industry for a car that doesn't get fixed.
And it's just a natural thing.
The customer always thinks the tech is what screwed up.
The reality is sometimes if that customer went to AutoZone or someplace that has free die egg,
you think about in the back if you could be that tech.
It's not getting paid to try and figure out, so what are you forced to do?
You're forced to guess.
Okay?
So when you have a customer in front of you and you say, they say, well they just threw a part at my car.
The next question I always ask them is, well what was the dying fee?
And they go, there was no dying fee.
My next answer to them is, well madam, you get what you paid for.
Right.
You essentially forced the hand of them to make the guess.
They made a guess.
Absolutely.
Right.
You're mad now.
But who are you really should be mad at.
Right.
Should be mad at yourself.
OK.
Absolutely.
It's like Cecil said in a class this morning, the cheapest way to fix your car is pay for a diagnosis.
Like we oftentimes trick ourselves in thinking like, oh, we don't need.
I can't charge for that.
I can't charge.
That was 100 percent me.
Like I was better than I was when I was at the dealership when I started my own shop.
But it's still all the time like I don't know if I can charge for that.
Now, it's a charge.
I'm not giving it away because, again, like he said, it is the most important part of the process, and I don't want to guess.
Test, not guess.
Like that, again.
Such a great saying.
And that's why it was important for me to introduce you to the people that I introduced you to.
Absolutely.
And yes, and here, and scanner Dan is a cool guy.
He, I was outside man and he was going home and he stops and he, I'll make a video about this later too.
Cause I got, dude, I got stoked.
It's hard to like, when you see someone like that and you like, you're like, you feel like a little girl and you can't speak.
You try to talk like yeah, but he gave me he signed his book and gave it to me Diagnostics book man Incredible.
He's he's one of the most down-to-earth cool people and like what he's done for this industry as and has been incredible and I guess that leads me into a question I had like so far obviously you still have an afternoon class here soon and
What do you think so far?
Because you, like me, before I came to AST, I knew nothing about any of this training.
We talked about my story, how I found out about all of it.
You obviously didn't know anything.
You told me you didn't know anything about it either.
So I'm curious, so far, what are your thoughts?
And let the people know.
Well, like I said in the beginning, this has been a life-changing event for sure.
I was a bit nervous walking in here because there's a lot of people.
But what's mind-blowing is listening to all the different people and they're all on the same page.
Everybody has the same goals and the same dreams and the same aspirations and they realize and everybody gets it.
You know what I mean?
And hearing it from one story to another, and they're pretty similar, so they understand.
And that's incredible.
And just you taking me out here.
And Dave's sending me, he's Venmo'd me money.
And I could have done anything with that money.
But you know what I mean?
You can't find people like that.
And this place literally has been not just an eye-opener, but it's not just a lesson learner.
I've already learned.
Like you've seen yesterday, man, I've got like freaking five pages of notes just for one class.
Good for you, man.
And so it's like all of that, all that takeaway is like I have, now I have even more confidence in like in the future of what I can do.
And I like look forward to the next time I can come do another class and another event.
And I already shot out to a Check Engine Chuck, like I told you, said I was doing a podcast with
Yeah, let's call him.
He needs to get on the he is Hearing from me.
Well, I told him I was doing a podcast with both y'all and I was like, you know, it's it's it's sucks you can't be here and everybody thinks you know the best of you and You know, he was like, you know, I'm sad that I can't be there and I was like, well, dude There's always next year.
Yeah, we're always there's doing it and this is my this is my first time hearing about this and
And realistically, if you just would have reached out to me and told me about it, I probably wouldn't have came.
No, I guarantee you wouldn't have came.
Yeah, I probably wouldn't have came, man, because this is a long way away.
But when I seen your video, I showed my wife, and she called her boss for some reason and was like, guess what?
And, uh, you know, and I was like, I do that for a moment.
I was like, is this really happening?
I was like, well, you said this is also a lot of firsts for you too, right?
It was my first airplane.
First time I went on an Uber.
It's the first time I'm in a hotel by myself.
First time at training like first time at training.
Yeah, like so that can even a normal like Under normal circumstances.
That's a lot to yeah, right and then you don't know anybody.
Absolutely So the kudos to you for one accepting it and to like going through all the adversity to actually make it here because it's not an easy trip even if
if it is all paid for, right?
Absolutely.
And you still paid for your hotel, you still paid for your Ubers, you're still paying for stuff.
It's not like it's all free, so you still invested in yourself as well.
So again, that just says a lot about you as well.
And like I said, just the decision to come out here was huge.
Because I didn't know, like I said in the video, I'm like,
Yeah.
You know, you may or may not want to go, but if you decide to like, yeah.
So I'm glad you did.
I mean, it's, it's huge.
And so that's what the plan that you need to put in place, Matt, is that you want to decide that I want to go to more training and I want to attend more than this, which means you have to now build it into your price of what you're charging.
Absolutely, and I want to reach out to you know, any anybody that I can about AST because I worked with so many different mechanics.
I had no idea.
Yes, and no idea what that were Jeff and I are on a personal I don't know journey and it's a rampage whatever you want to call it to to get as many people to know about this kind of stuff for this particular reason because if you've never been here and
you don't know about it, and then you just hear people talk about it.
It's hard because it's an investment.
If you're a shop owner and I close down for three days, so I have my lost revenue, I pay for my ticket and my wife's ticket, I pay for the hotel ticket, I pay for the rental car, it's expensive, but the value I take home is so much more, not only the training,
But the networking and the people, like you said, all the like-minded people, and now you have connections with all those people, I guarantee you, without a shadow of a doubt in my mind, if you reach out to any single one of the people that you met this weekend and ask them a question or need help with something, every last one of them will help you.
I got like three personal numbers from people.
So yeah, absolutely.
Like I said, man, it's mind-blowing.
And then when you meet people that you've watched for years, you know what I mean?
And they're doing
They're they're obviously up there and now you're doing what they're doing, you know going to the same things and it's all the better the quality of yourself and the vast and what you do and And not only is this this whole training event, but like make you better as a shop owner But it like it really makes you better for like your customers, you know what I mean?
Yes 100%
that's that's what we raise the industry up we want to bring a better level of quality to the most people's repairs and a quality of repair and then we want to sell the value of what we're giving you a service right you already save people the headache of having to get in their car and driving down to the shop yeah right somebody picks up the phone and calls you and says I need an alternator put in my whatever and you immediately okay I'll call you back and give you a price that doesn't mean that
because you're going to them, then it has to be less than what a shop would charge.
It should be more.
Right?
So think about that, because it's not just about, you are worth it, Matt.
I said to you last night, you are worth it.
And this is how you continue to build into your evolution, is by realizing that I am worth it.
And that's why I have to charge what I have to charge, because I want to come back to AST.
Chris and I on this plight of trying to get more people aware of it, at the end of the day, I want as many people here as possible.
I want to lift up everyone.
Now, if they don't want to come, they don't want to take what we feed them, right?
That's fine.
But at some point, we're all going to hit a point where people can't say, oh, I didn't know about it, or I didn't hear about it.
They have to stand up and say, I chose not to.
And then that way, when they're struggling with whatever it is, people can go,
Why didn't you just get some training, dude?
Right.
You know?
Yeah.
And so as a mobile mechanic, it was hard when I first started because I had a lot of people.
Obviously, there's other mobile mechanics.
And I have a lot of people like, well, I just got the phone with this mobile mechanic, and he's going to do it for this much.
And so like literally as an industry,
Everybody has to you know be able to charge more like I get that you'll you know Do some breaks and put three lug nuts on and miss two, but you'll charge half the price.
I get it, but You know, just don't do that.
Just pay that you know, there's always somebody cheaper There's always somebody my like mantra that I share all the time on social media There's always somebody willing to do it cheaper if somebody is not always better actually something is rarely better But if somebody was cheaper, why are you now talking to me?
I better get off the phone with you.
I
so that you can call that person back and book that appointment.
And this is not a rub on mobile mechanics, but what we want to see within the industry and the people, and it's not because we're snobby if we work in a shop, but what I want to see is the reality is there's mobile mechanics and then there's guys with some tools in a vehicle.
For sure.
And so there's a difference, right?
Absolutely.
So what we want to see is you to be able to distinguish yourself
from those guys with just another guy with a vehicle and tools.
And you're going to have to be able to do that with the kind of work and the kind of value that you perform and give to the customer.
And that's accuracy of repair, which I don't think is a problem with you.
And quality repair, which I don't think is a problem with you.
But if you want to get to the next level, you've got to develop this.
Because people are going to continue to call you.
If you go in and say, hey,
Like I saw you doing a fuel pump in the caravan.
I saw that video a little while ago, right?
Now, that's all good if somebody calls you up and says, hey, I need a fuel pump put in my caravan.
Right.
But if you, if, and they have a pump, you put it in and it still doesn't start, where you really become, separate yourself from the other person is to be able to go in and say,
okay whatever like you want a fuel pump put in I put it in it still doesn't work now I can diagnose that for you if you want.
Absolutely.
Right and that's what we want to see you get to that level.
Absolutely.
Because that's what separates 90% of the guys with a vehicle and tools is that 10% have the ability to diagnose.
Right.
Do you understand what I mean?
Absolutely, man.
Absolutely.
That's what I'm hoping for you.
And you know, if I tend to sometimes disregard somebody in your shoes, it's because I don't, with the social media sometimes, you're just showing a basic repair.
Right.
And the real people, the real superstars are the people that will put themselves out there like he does.
on a diag, on a repair, and say, this is why I do it this way.
Right?
Right.
So when we're looking at, like, I don't watch a video just to see how somebody does a water pump or a fuel pump.
I want to see the real, I nerd out on the stuff, he nerds out on the stuff.
And you don't have to, because it's going to come with detractors.
You're going to put something out there and people said, that wasn't the most efficient way to troubleshoot that.
Oh yeah.
Or that's too long, or I just jam my power probe into it and I hit the button.
Oh yeah.
But what I want you to understand is it's the 10%
that can't do what a lot of the greats do, is what's going to make you have no ceiling on where you can go with this business.
For sure, yeah.
You understand what I mean?
Absolutely.
So, you know, I want to thank you for coming on.
Chris, dude, I can't thank you enough for what you've done.
You and Marissa is just rock stars.
And I'm happy to see you here at ASDE and I'm happy to hear your enthusiasm for the other events like this.
Oh, for sure.
I mean, I want to see you here next year and the year after that.
Absolutely.
I want you to check in with all of us and let us know how it's going.
I mean, we're going to follow you, obviously.
Absolutely, I mean like he said reach out to any of us if you know you want to you want to how would you do this?
How would you do that?
What do you think about this, you know, and sometimes if you post something?
Here's your warning.
We may call you out Chris Chris or I may say dude, you know remember what you were taught right and
Yeah, cause it is easy after these like, uh, you know, people come home from an event.
Yeah.
You get off your, you got this high, right?
And you're, you get home and you're like, yeah, yeah, yeah.
And then like, then you get back into the grind and it's like a month, two months, three months.
And you're like, it's easy to, that's why it's good to surround yourself with great people.
You see that?
Let me know for sure.
Shout out to me.
So, I mean, so I can do a little bit better.
All right, I want to thank you everybody for being here.
It's Matt, it's cool man to meet you finally.
It's great to meet you man, I'm really excited.
You guys, I adore the heck out of both of you.
Thanks for having us again.
Yeah, we'll have you all on soon at some point.
I want to thank everybody for being here and we'll roll on to the next one.
Hey, if you could do me a favor real quick and like comment on and share this episode, I'd really appreciate it.
And please, most importantly, set the podcast to automatically download every Tuesday morning.
As always, I'd like to thank our amazing guests for their perspectives and expertise.
And I hope that you'll please join us again next week on this journey of change.
Thank you to my partners in the ASA group and to the Changing the Industry podcast.
Remember what I always say, in this industry, you get what you pay for.
Here's hoping everyone finds their missing 10 millimeter and we'll see you all again next time.