Kind of stayed low and quiet for a while, took it all in, learned the business even better and just quietly moved on every year and grew and grew.
I changed the name, rebranded, got my life back five days a week, not seven, you know, normal hours.
And I quickly learned that wherever I was is the place that made money.
So if I spent more time at the Shell, the show made money.
Welcome to the Gain Traction Podcast, the official podcast for tire business.
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Hey folks.
Welcome to the Gain Traction podcast, the official podcast for tire business.
My guest today is Eric Svedberg, president and owner at European Auto Works in Virginia Beach, Virginia.
It's a one store operation doing 3.7 million per year and he's been in the automotive sector since he was 16, so he never left.
Eric, welcome to the Gain Traction podcast.
Thanks, Mike.
Thanks for having me.
Yeah, I'm glad you're here, man.
You got a pretty cool story.
I'm glad we got to know each other the other day.
So if you don't mind, for audience sake, you were 16 when you got started and it wasn't a family business, correct?
It was not.
Yeah.
So you're just getting a job basically, and then you.
And then kind of fell in love with it, I guess.
Unnecessary evil, I guess.
The paycheck, right?
Yeah, you need some gas money and date money and that's how that started.
All right, well, tell us a little bit about when did you know that you were going to stay in it?
Really?
When I was in my early 20s, 21, 22.
That's when I knew.
Were you still working at the same shop at the time?
Yeah, I was in Amoco station.
Okay.
And tell the audience a little bit about Amoco because, I mean, we may be a little bit older than some in the audience, but it was full service, right?
Yeah, Amoco was an oil company all the way from the early 1900s.
Part standard, you know, Standard had everything.
Exxon, you know, Amaco, Everything.
So we had a full service.
I had a full service station or I worked at a full service station.
So you either had a pumper where you only pump gas usually, you know, you probably had a car wash or you had a food shop where you sold convenience stuff and.
Or full service is what I had.
So I had a three bay, full service location.
So we had gas and three automotive service base.
That's awesome.
Their logo, if I remember, didn't it.
It was red, white and blue, right?
Yeah.
Torch and oval.
This torch.
That's it.
The torch and oval.
Yeah.
Very cool.
Just to go down a little rabbit hole here.
Have you ever seen the series on the History Channel called the Men who Made America?
Oh, is that about the old oil tycoons?
Well, yeah, it did.
It's Rockefeller and.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And then you get to the.
It starts out with Vanderbil because he was in shipping and railroads.
And then they get to Rockefeller and their paths overlap a little bit.
Rockefeller was quite a bit younger, but he needed Vanderbilt's trains.
And then.
Then you go through the whole process of when, you know, he is.
Built a refining empire and I think he touched 95% of the oil that was refined in the United States at one time, which is just insane.
And that was the whole monopoly thing.
Oh, and then.
And then they broke up Standard Oil.
That's right.
And the irony was he.
He didn't want to break it up, but he became even like 10 times wealthier after they broke it up because he got stock and whatever.
However many companies what they break it up to.
Almost like 10 companies or something.
Yeah.
And Amaco was one of them, if I'm not mistaken.
Yeah, Amico was one.
Utoko, which was like Utah oil company.
All these off brands.
Yeah, Exxon.
So it was almost like, if I.
Remember correctly, I think it was the divisions of Standard is the way they broke them up, if I'm not mistaken.
Something like that.
But cool story.
But it's kind of cool that you were part of it in Virginia beach and you had this experience and so tell us a little bit about it, because you got in it and then the guy that owned the operation eventually sold to you.
Is that right?
Yeah, I became like a lead technician.
I know this sounds weird, you know, like at age 19, I was always mechanically gifted and so.
That's awesome.
State inspector, we have safety inspections in Virginia, so state inspector, lead technician.
Did that for a few years.
I was still going to college.
And, you know, around the age of 21, he's the owner, who I work for ever since I was 16, talked about going to sell that location because he had three other locations that were only pumpers.
So he kind of liked that better and wanted to get out of the full service business.
So, you know, I started thinking about, okay, well, I could probably do this or, you know, get some money.
So I started trying to figure out where I was going to get money from.
So I, you know, beg, borrow and steal.
And then I felt like I should probably have a backup plan just in case it didn't work out and he sold it to somebody else.
And maybe I didn't like that somebody else, and so on and so forth.
So my backup plan was, I've always loved boating.
Been in it my entire life, still am.
So I had arranged to work charter business in the Mediterranean.
So I figured, okay, I'll go over there, work the charter business, I'll be crew, work my way up to captain by age 30 or something like that.
That's the backup plan.
Every so often I wonder if that backup plan would have been more fun or better or where my life would be.
But, you know, currently I am not a charter boat captain in the Mediterranean.
And the sale of the Amoco station went through to me and I became the youngest Amoca dealer in the country at age 22.
Yeah, and you told me when you would go to the national meetings, people would ask where your dad is.
Oh, yeah, national beings.
And every customer that ever got gas that had a problem with the pump.
Yeah, right up to me and hey, is your dad here?
I need to talk to him about this issue out here.
My.
My answer was the same every single time.
Well, I mean, he's over there at the shipyard working on submarines.
I'm not sure if he can help you, but I'm here, so that's great.
Well, you.
But you did say, I think you admitted that you always looked young when you were young.
So you were.
Yeah.
So that was.
That's so funny though.
But you what it feel like to be the youngest in the country.
Was it intimidating?
I mean, when you go to these meetings or anything?
Or did you look at the fact that you just had a lot of mentors in front of you that maybe helped you out?
I stayed very quiet.
I. I kind of have always been a sponge.
So, you know, I absorb information from anyone and everyone.
So when I'm at meetings, I'm just taking it all in.
If they are asking for opinions and I actually have an opinion of maybe what could better out, I would express the opinion.
But other than that I just kind of stayed low and quiet for a while, took it all in, learned the business even better and just quietly moved on every year and grew and grew.
That's a lot of wisdom at an early age.
So how did it get, how did you go from Amaco to European Auto Works?
So BP bought Amaco probably seven or eight years after I became a dealer.
And bp, obviously, as if you've driven around, they don't have any full service shops for the most part.
So that was not their idea of what the future business looked like.
So I knew they didn't want me eventually and I at that point didn't want them since I'd been working 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
As far as the shop being not the shop but the gas station side.
Being open for our audience sake, Amaco was a full service, 24 hour server, wasn't it?
24 hour service, yeah.
So you had to be available.
Basically you didn't have to be, but.
You got 20 off your rent.
So really everyone did it.
So yes, I got you a little financial motivation there.
Correct.
Yeah.
Back then the rent was this 1991, I guess I started off at 3200amonth.
Was the rent.
Oh wow.
Yeah, you pay Amaco and, or, and then Amoco paid the landowner because Amoco did not own the land.
So I gotcha.
So they negotiated it for you though.
And that lease was negotiated all the way back into the 60s.
That's how long that shop had been there.
That's very cool.
And rebuilt a couple times.
Yeah, yeah, I got you.
But still in the same spot.
Well, I didn't mean to cut you off but.
So you, how'd you transition to European Auto Works then?
Yeah, so bp, well, BP bought Amaco.
I decided that they were probably not going to renew the land lease.
The land lease was coming up in about a year or two.
So I talked to landowners, said hey, they're not going to renew this thing, but I'll renew with you.
So sure enough, land lease was coming up, BP didn't want to renew, I jumped in.
We worked out land lease five years with three five year options.
Okay.
I'm good for 20 years at this location.
So I'll, I changed the name, rebranded to automotive specialist.
So not quite European Auto Works yet.
So I still kept doing my thing.
Automotive specialist.
Got my life back five days a week, not seven, you know, normal hours.
Yeah.
Enjoyed the weekends and that rolled for approximately 14 years.
That's awesome.
So after 14 years, I said, you know, I, I got this last five year lease coming up, I probably should do something, you know, to protect my investment.
And the landowner would never sell.
I had asked multiple times.
So I started looking and there was a business owner that owned a European shop.
He owned the building, he owned the land.
It's called European Auto Works.
And he was ready to retire.
So I went to him, we negotiated contracts on the contract and boom, I was out after the 15 years and then into the new place, which I currently own, much bigger.
You know, going from 20, I guess maybe 2600 square feet or something like that with the ultimate specialist in Amaco to 10,000 square feet.
Wow.
Yeah, that's big.
So how big a change was that for you from just going to, I guess, the general practitioning to what?
European makes and models primarily?
Or did he take care of everything else too?
He was, he was 100% Mercedes.
Oh, wow.
That's all I did.
And I, Automotive specialists only did Asian domestic.
So I was going from Asian domestic to a shop that only did Mercedes for the previous 30 years.
So obviously there was an entire marketing plan that was put together to be able to make this successful.
Wow.
That.
I didn't realize that's a major.
I mean, that's like a dog leg left or right on the golf course.
I mean, you really took a big turn there.
How'd that work out?
Like first year and your existing customer base or were you able to get your customer base from American specialist over to.
Yeah, automotive specialists?
We, yeah, we let everybody know.
We, we sent out postcards, we sent out letters.
You know, we talked to people as they came in.
You know, they have something.
Every so many miles you move, X number of customers drop off.
Right.
So if you only moved a mile, you'd probably keep 95% of your customers.
You move 100 miles, you'll keep 0 of your customers.
So were moving up probably five miles away.
I think approximately 25% of the customers followed.
There was obviously some confusion with the name going from automobile specialists and say they owned a Honda or Ford or whatever, and then European Auto Works.
But, you know, a lot of my core clientele followed me and to this day I still work on quite a few of their cars because no way am I going to be, you know, 20 plus years, you know, helping their family and then go to a new shop and just, you know, turn my nose up to them.
No, absolutely.
So, so you do, man.
I mean, you do work on all makes and models, even though you're called European or.
We.
We are probably 90 to 95% European, but we do more than Mercedes, so we're doing Mercedes, BMW, Porsche, Land Rover, Jaguar.
You know how to evil.
Just curious.
What do you see in.
In the lineup of makes and models in your space?
What do you see the most of and the least of?
We see the most Audi, Volkswagen, BMW, Mercedes.
So we see the least Land Rover, Jaguar, Porsche.
Yeah, that's interesting.
So how big a competition do you have with dealers or the, you know, the car dealers service shops near you for those makes and models?
We obviously have competition when it comes to the vehicles that are 10 years and newer because they still work on those.
But all the dealerships in our area, they hit 10 years they don't work on.
So we almost have no competition.
That's really interesting.
Very interesting.
Yeah, that.
So they almost build a market for you with.
Without you even trying for it, in a sense.
But I'm just, I feel very blessed.
That's awesome.
So what did you.
Where do you see European Auto Works in a year or two, have you ever thought about more than one store or location?
When I was in the gas business, I did have more than one location.
So I had Namco.
I also had a shell station.
Also I had a towing company.
I quickly learned keep.
This was in my late, well, mid to late 20s when I had a shell in an AMCO.
And I quickly learned that wherever I was is the place that made money.
So if I spent more time at the shell made money.
And at that point in my career, I didn't have a lot of systems.
I didn't have a lot of processes.
People are even talking about that, really.
I mean, this was the 90s.
Yeah.
You know, now you hear it every day.
So I, I then said, okay, let me get rid of this towing company first because it was really dragging me down.
And I'll tell you one thing, there's nothing worse than getting up at two in the morning when it's raining to go change a tire for aaa.
I mean, that is the worst.
And I had to do that sometimes.
Yeah.
So, yeah, that's not fun.
So I'm like, I'm getting rid of this.
Well, especially if you were the AAA guy in your area.
For sure.
Yeah, they paid $12, I think, to do it.
I mean, I certainly would rather stay in bet Gail for 12 bucks in the rain, you know, in January.
I'm not coming tonight.
Oh, I'M sorry.
You guys know it's rated outside.
I'm sorry.
The tow truck doesn't start.
Oh gosh, that's brutal.
The only reason tow truck or the towing business was actually semi fun as we're in the on the police list.
So that was always exciting.
So I bet you know those are the ones you know at the 2 in the morning or 2:30 in the morning when you get called out it's because it's a police call, it's a drunk.
He ran into something and who knows.
I remember picking up a Nissan pickup truck one time and he had twisted that bed so bad, you know and I didn't have a rollback with me.
I only had a wheel lift picked up from the front and only one tire was touching on the back.
Just brought back to the shop at 2:3 in the morning with nobody on the road.
So I bet you have some very interesting stories.
Anything come to mind, funny or.
Yeah.
That you may have encountered.
I have one fundy.
This was when I think when I was 21.
I don't think I had bought the shop yet but I had a regular customer.
He, he worked at church up the street but he loved tinkering with cars.
He liked buying cars, selling cars.
This had the other.
We had a great relationship.
Anything he couldn't do, you know, I took of it for him.
But you know, for the people that remember a Meor XR4TI, do you remember that car?
I remember the name.
I'm trying to picture it right now.
It was like a German car that was built with Ford.
So I think they had a Ford engine but you know, Germany was involved and whatever.
So AmeriCorps XR4Ti was the car but I mean you could drive for a year, never see one but this guy had one.
So he had a drivability issue.
He dropped off with me, you know I looked at for the first day, worked on other cars where but I couldn't figure out his problem.
So the next day he came up and I, you know, he's getting gas and he, I saw him out there.
I told him, you know, I walked out to him on I told him where I was at with it, but I was still looking at and he said he was heavily involved with his church and he said here, do you mind if I pray for you?
I'm like yeah, I don't mind if you pray.
I thought he's going to go home and pray for me and you know, we'll go about our business.
Yeah, no, he was praying for me right there in the parking lot.
So he put his arm around me, he reached up to the Lord, he, dear Lord, please let Eric find out what the issue is with my AmeriCorps XR4TI.
And, you know, then we bowed our heads and Amen.
And he drove off.
And I guess it worked because about two hours later, I figured out what was wrong with that car.
So there it is.
Man, that's a great testimony.
That's so interesting.
I appreciate that.
Hey, and I was also going to point out the fact that I. I went online and, you know, you.
You do a really good job of promoting yourself on Google because you.
You've got a lot of pictures out there, and I noticed your reviews are great.
You got 4.5 stars for 538 reviews.
That's awesome.
That's tough.
It is.
People are tough.
Oh, I know.
But I mean, that says a lot of.
And then you had one little ad, and I was going to ask you how you used it.
I mean, I saw it on your Google business profile page, but it's a kid jumping into a pool.
And then you've got a couple taglines in there.
One says, go ahead, take a chance.
Which I thought was really cool when he's jumping in the pool to give you guys a try.
And then the other one was, you will love our service.
And then at the very end, it says, more than cars, people, exclamation point.
I. I think I thought that was such a great ad.
And it was only 15 seconds.
What did.
Where did you apply that ad?
Was it social media, or did you do it?
Actually, I was going through this phase where I was making a bunch of videos, playful videos like that, and uploading them to Google, our business page.
Because Google likes pictures, Google likes videos.
Google likes when you interact with them.
When you.
Google's always changing.
So if you're.
You're buying into those changes as a business, whatever algorithm they use, you will.
You'll end up showing up higher on the list.
You know, I under.
I understand SEO and AdWords and all that, but for instance, you know, local service ads, right?
Yes.
So that's their latest.
So if you can apply and you have to do a background check and all that, you apply for local service ads, and you're part of it, you're going to be showing up higher on the list because you're playing nice with Google.
So that was kind of part of that whole strategy.
That's cool.
So how.
How old is that ad?
Just curious.
Probably six years oh, okay.
All right.
Yeah.
So have LSAs been involved with in the Virginia beach area that long or is that.
No, that's that.
I think I was the very first person to grab onto it.
That's awesome.
Yeah.
So for those listening, do your research.
But those are important.
And then I was going to also ask you, was there any particular software that you like that you found?
You know, there's tons of softwares out there for our industry, but did anything stand out to you that you felt like, man, that was a game changer for me and I'm glad I incorporated it.
There's quite a few.
I've always been pretty techie.
So I used Mitchell forever.
For over 20, probably 28 years, I use Mitchell.
And so Mitchell had a lot of gaps.
And so there was someone that worked for Mitchell that then left and he started bolt on and bolt on, filled all the gaps.
So the first gap they filled was DBIs, digital video inspections.
So therefore were the first in the area to have DBIS and to be able to show that to our customers way back.
So we went along with Mitchell and Bolton for many years and you know, added things way.
It became more and more clunky, you know, as you're having two different companies just, you know, driving in parallel.
But you gotta go in and out, in and out.
And so I Finally, approximately three years ago, four years ago, I switched to TechMetric and Tech metric is.
I should have done it earlier, but you know, they changed some stuff and made it even better every year.
And they're doing it.
They make their product every better every single month.
But it's a game changer.
You can, I thought I could train someone fast on Mitchell.
I can train someone 10 times faster on Tech Metric.
That's, that's an awesome testimony.
That's great.
Anything.
Is there a, is there a business book or let's just say personal book that you like that give a nugget to the audience?
Sure.
I read 10 pages of nonfiction every single day.
So I like books.
Now when you say nonfiction, what type of nonfiction?
Any.
I obviously do a lot of business books.
I do a lot of leadership books, but I also like history, so I read historical and I also do audible.
So if I'm at the gym or something like that, I'm doing audible.
So yeah, at this point in my life, I consider that reading still because I'm absorbing information.
Yeah.
But as far as a book, a business book, that's really good is, let's see, Making money is killing your business, I think by Chuck Blakeman.
And have you read that one?
No.
Okay.
So in my opinion, that is the modern day business plan.
So, you know, if somebody's starting a business, what's everybody tell them to do?
You know, okay, go write a business plan so you know what you're doing.
So you have a roadmap and they write the business plan, they get the loan, they start the business, and you know where that business plan goes, right into the drawer, never to be seen again.
So making money is killing your business is so much better.
It is.
It gives clear goals, gives a way for an owner to systemize their business so they get out of the business faster.
As far as the day to day become the visionary versus in the weeds.
So that's a really good one.
As far as a historical book, I think, which applies to your audience and me and you obviously is Freedom's Forge.
Freedom's Forge, that one's by Herman, I believe.
And that was how the US government brought in a guy that was an expert in automotive.
Right.
Automotive building, construction.
Right.
Getting cars outputted and brought in someone that was an expert in construction.
And during World War II.
And so how they could, you know, get the assembly line going faster and faster, build more tanks and planes and such like that, ships.
And then how, you know, the construction guy could, you know, build roads when we took over territories and stuff like that.
And the names that they use in the automotive space in this book go all the way back to all the names you've heard of all the parts on cars like Saginaw and you know, when I hadn't read this book in probably eight or nine years, but I still remember just smiling every time I saw the names of all the people from way back in the 40s, you know, 30s and 40s, and those names are still applied to cars today.
That's so cool, isn't it?
Yeah.
And being a history guy, I bet you really like that.
Yeah.
Did you.
Have you ever heard of the book Acres of diamonds?
No.
Dr.
He's actually the founder of Temple University.
Okay.
I'm trying to get my young sons to read it now.
I mean, they're in the college age, ones in their 20s, but it's very short.
It's actually a speech he gave over 6,000 times.
He was a captain in the Civil War for the Union.
He.
Just a cool life story, but he, he.
It's basically 40 pages, so it's More like a pamphlet.
But I think they taught it at Wharton School of Business for years.
And a trainer that I knew, he's in his 80s now, really good friend's dad that was the one that told me that he said, oh, yeah, they said that book is.
He said as far as he knew, it was still taught at Wharton School of Business.
But basically it was being aware as an entrepreneur what's underneath your feet.
You don't have to look far.
A lot of our resources, a lot of the magic that can happen that you want to create in life is literally right under you.
And basically take the opportunity to look below you first before you look too far away, because there's diamonds underneath you and you're not recognizing them.
And I think in a unique sense today it comes in the form of maybe connections as well, your network of people.
You've got resources that you don't realize that you have.
And it was just.
It's such a great book.
It's 150 years old and yet you still, I guess maybe even 175 now, but you just really.
It just, it resonated with me tremendously.
And then I can look back in certain family members I've had that are very entrepreneurial and looked at, you know, they just.
They may not gone far in school, but they recognized, you know, what was in front of them or the need that was in front of them, and they.
And they filled that need in their market.
That's amazing.
I know.
I'm looking up when we're done here.
I think you'll like it.
I can't wait for you to get back in touch with me and tell me if you like it.
Yeah, but it's literally probably.
I think it's probably my favorite business book of all time because the practical application of it is just so interesting.
But the.
They said Dr. Conwell, I mean, he toured a lot for some reason, and he gave these speeches and that was a speech he gave.
And then they put it in a pamphlet or a book later, but he had given that speech like 6,000 times.
But basically it's a storybook too.
I mean, like in the sense that he gives these stories, he tells his point by telling these stories.
And.
Well, if they're still teaching it today, then it's a game changer.
Yeah, it's got a lot of application to it and I think you can apply it in unique ways today.
But before we check out of here, I want to make a point because you got into Coaching a little bit, right?
You help other people.
I did, yeah.
Yeah.
Tell us a little bit about that.
So I've always given back to the industry wherever I could.
So I've helped other shop owners, I've helped entrepreneurs get started into the business.
You know, not only auto repair, but, you know, I've helped into the, you know, aftermarket space, you know, lifts and wheels and tires and all that stuff.
And then I started getting coached by Dan Martell, and I just had this, you know, passion of helping more.
But I had so much knowledge, I felt like I could give, that I should monetize it.
So I started a coaching business, Fuel Coaching.
And it's just me, myself, and I.
And it's a lot of fun.
I coach only so many people at a time, give them a lot of tools and all my systems and processes and playbooks and all that to help them grow, be able to see what they might be missing, you know, if they're too in it.
You know, sometimes the guy.
The guy on the sidelines can see it a little better.
Well, and I think.
I think what's really cool from, you know, me hearing you and thinking if I owned a single store and needed some coaching or whatever, you've been doing this since you were 16, so you've seen every aspect of business.
I mean, like, I mean, you had a fueling station.
I mean, you know what I'm saying?
You had every.
Every part of the business.
And then you.
You've been involved in the corporate space as well.
So I. I think that's really cool that you get back that way and then obviously got to limit your.
Your exposure.
I mean, can only take on so many clients at a time.
But I did want to point that out for the audience that.
That you.
That's the way you give back to the industry.
I think that's awesome.
So thanks, Eric.
I can't say enough, but I'm glad you reached out.
I'm glad that we had you on the podcast.
And please let me know what you think about that book.
I just thought.
His name is Russell Conwell.
I'm writing that down.
Russell Conwell, Acres of Diamond.
But please come back and.
And stay in touch.
I certainly will.
Thanks for having me.
Absolutely.
All right.
To our audience out there.
Thank you.
As usual.
You know, we love you.
Come back and see us.
Thank you to all our listeners.
Thank you for being part of the Game Traction podcast.
We are grateful for you.
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