Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
Confessions of a Shop Owner is hosted by Mike Allen, a third-generation shop owner, perpetual pot-stirrer, and brutally honest opinion sharer. In this weekly podcast, Mike shares his missteps so you don’t have to repeat them. Along the way, he chats with other industry personalities who’ve messed up, too, pulling back the curtain on the realities of running an independent auto repair shop. But this podcast isn’t just about Mike’s journey. It’s about confronting the divisive and questionable tactics many shop owners and managers use. Mike is here to stir the pot and address the painful truths while offering a way forward. Together, we’ll tackle the frustrations, shake things up, and help create a better future for the auto repair industry.
Mike Allen [00:00:00]:
They should let you do hidden fences with shock collars for kids, for small kids.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:00:04]:
Oh, it's a brilliant idea.
Mike Allen [00:00:06]:
I think so. It gives them a warning buzz first.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:00:07]:
Yeah.
Mike Allen [00:00:08]:
New business.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:00:08]:
Yeah, I was about to say, what are we doing here? That's where we need to go, yeah.
Mike Allen [00:00:11]:
I mean, lots of branding opportunities for funny names.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:00:15]:
Confessions of a shop owner. Confessions of a parent in prison.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:00:21]:
The following program features a bunch of doofuses talking about the automotive aftermarket. The stuff we or our guests may say do not necessarily reflect the beliefs of our our sponsors, or any other associations we may have. There may be some spicy language in this show, so if you get your feelings hurt easily, you should probably just move along. So without further ado, here's your host, Mike Allen, with Confessions of a Shop Owner, presented by TechMetric, the best software in the history of ever.
Mike Allen [00:00:58]:
Turbo Confessions of a Shop Owner brought to you by Techmetric. I'm here with another of our great podcast partners, Carolyn Redenburg of Turnkey Marketing. Carolyn, you were just telling me that you've embraced the, uh, I am like— we know that the, the shtick is that I'm an evil shop owner, right? You've embraced being the evil corporate mastermind. Big Brother is watching all of us, yeah, whether we like it or not. I mean, how often have you been having a conversation with your spouse about something and you get ads for that on your phone the next minute, right? Um, you've found a tool and a methodology that checks all the right boxes as far as legality and everything else to allow us to kind of tap into that type of marketing where we know what people are looking for. We identify where they live and we feed them the ads. Somebody's looking for auto repair, talking about brakes or whatever it might be.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:01:57]:
Yeah.
Mike Allen [00:01:58]:
The device is gonna feed them ads for your clients.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:02:02]:
Yep.
Mike Allen [00:02:03]:
It's gonna geo-target their home and start feeding ads to other devices in their home for your client services. And that it's just like this bonkers, crazy, super high effectiveness because—
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:02:16]:
'Cause they need it.
Mike Allen [00:02:16]:
They're pre-qualified. They're hunting for it actively.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:02:18]:
Right.
Mike Allen [00:02:20]:
First, how did you find this? Second, reassure everyone that that's legal. And I've got more from there, but let's start with, is it legal and how did you find it?
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:02:33]:
Yeah, it's totally legal. And we found it just from being, you know, so into marketing and always just staying on top of trends. And I remember someone on my team brought it to me like, I don't know, a year and a half, 2 years ago. And I said no, 'cause I was like, I don't think this is legal. And he was like, no, this is legal. I've been researching it. And I was like, I don't think this is legal. Like, I just, I can't believe it.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:02:57]:
And then I started researching it more and more too and looking into it and realized that it is really legal if you do all the right things. And basically we can send an email to someone who has said that they need auto repair. They've opted into something saying, please send me information. Yeah. And then send them an email. As soon as they open it up, boom, we get their physical address. And then from there they start getting streaming service ads, which is so funny. Like you watch YouTube or you watch Hulu, right? And you see an ad.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:03:33]:
And I don't know about you, but I just think like these are the ads. I'm still in the old school cable vision mode. You know, I'm thinking that everyone is seeing the same thing.
Mike Allen [00:03:42]:
To be fair, I thought the same way. Yeah. Until people all over my life started sending me screenshots or walking up to me and be like, dude, you were on my TV last night. I'm like, what are you talking about? I was watching YouTube TV and there you were in one of your commercials. And the funny thing is you guys manage my marketing for me and I don't ask questions. And I'm like, here's my budget, here's my desired number of phone calls and my desired number of cars. Handle it. Yeah.
Mike Allen [00:04:12]:
And I was like, no shit, I guess I'm on YouTube TV now.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:04:16]:
That's hilarious. I didn't know that. That's amazing.
Mike Allen [00:04:19]:
I don't ask questions, man. The phones keep ringing and we're busy and I just, I just let it rock.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:04:25]:
So you're doing direct track, it sounds like. That's hilarious. Yeah. We've heard that from other people though, too. They're like, how am I on this thing? You know? And I'm like, well, we're managing your marketing. Like, this is what you've asked us to do, right?
Mike Allen [00:04:39]:
And then I feel bad for my rep. She's a wonderful human being. I don't know, is it okay if I say Rachel's my rep? And she's so politely persistent trying to get me to respond to messages and attend our meetings. We have a monthly call and I make it to about a third of them. And my website developer and host and SEO guy is on all of them. And I think that they've just developed this nice little friendship talking about my business and making decisions on, you know, shit to do for my business. And it's— sometimes I'm there. Sometimes they even text me.
Mike Allen [00:05:14]:
They're like, hey, bro, you're going to show up? Like, oh, I'm sorry. No.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:05:19]:
But that's the beauty of it. Like, I remember when you had a crazy magazine person and she would text me at like 2 in the morning.
Mike Allen [00:05:26]:
I still have that same crazy magazine person.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:05:28]:
Oh, you do? I thought she was in prison.
Mike Allen [00:05:31]:
Oh, no. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Oh, that one. Yeah. Okay. So that's different. So I had 2 magazines that were on.
Mike Allen [00:05:36]:
Yeah, I remember her. She was batshit crazy.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:05:38]:
Yeah, I think she's in prison.
Mike Allen [00:05:41]:
I think there was like some bipolar disorder action going on there.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:05:44]:
There's a lot. Alcohol.
Mike Allen [00:05:46]:
Yeah, it was awesome. It was awesome. She was fun at Chamber of Commerce events, though. Yeah, she was life of the party.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:05:53]:
I believe it. But we would have— she was really persistent. She like really, really— whenever she couldn't fill a spot, she really, really wanted you to fill it. And she would text at all different times and like try to push. We'd have to be like, I wouldn't even, I wouldn't call you at 2, you know, and say like, Mike, what do you want me to do? I was like, no, this isn't in his budget. It's not getting the results that we want. We're not going to do it.
Mike Allen [00:06:19]:
I remember that now. That's a great memory. So I just blocked that shit out.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:06:22]:
Right.
Mike Allen [00:06:22]:
But, and that's the great part again, too, about having someone that handles that part of the business is that I don't have to stress over that stuff.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:06:30]:
So thank you for that.
Mike Allen [00:06:32]:
Thank you for being awesome. You're welcome. I do remember when you broke up with me. When your business grew so much that you had to pass me off to someone else.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:06:38]:
Oh, yeah.
Mike Allen [00:06:39]:
I was very heartbroken over that.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:06:43]:
Are you still?
Mike Allen [00:06:44]:
I mean, Rachel's very nice.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:06:46]:
She is.
Mike Allen [00:06:46]:
Yeah.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:06:47]:
And she is on it like white on rice. Like when you and I text each other or email each other, it's like, oh, sorry, I forgot to respond. It's okay, because I forgot to respond to your text.
Mike Allen [00:06:57]:
Yeah.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:06:58]:
Yeah. So she is better than both of us in all of their efforts.
Mike Allen [00:07:01]:
Well, that's what you pay her to do, right?
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:07:03]:
Yeah.
Mike Allen [00:07:03]:
So how many reps do you have now?
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:07:06]:
Well, we don't call them reps, we call them account managers. But we have a team of almost 40 people.
Mike Allen [00:07:11]:
Holy mackerel.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:07:12]:
Yeah, like 38 people. So pretty much 40.
Mike Allen [00:07:15]:
You're kind of a big deal.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:07:16]:
I mean, my team's kind of a big deal. They're awesome.
Mike Allen [00:07:21]:
So it won't be long until you cross that 50-employee threshold and that changes a lot of things.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:07:25]:
FMLA and all that stuff, yeah.
Mike Allen [00:07:28]:
Shucks.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:07:28]:
I know.
Mike Allen [00:07:29]:
It's gonna be so miserable having to deal with that.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:07:30]:
Yeah, I know, it's like paying taxes. You're like, this sucks. Wait, I made money this year.
Mike Allen [00:07:35]:
I'd way rather have to pay, well, I'm thankful that I made enough to have to pay this.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:07:41]:
Right.
Mike Allen [00:07:41]:
So, well, it's been an exciting year for you also outside of the office.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:07:48]:
Had a baby.
Mike Allen [00:07:49]:
Congratulations.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:07:50]:
Thank you.
Mike Allen [00:07:51]:
Are you done now?
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:07:52]:
Done.
Mike Allen [00:07:53]:
This is 3, right?
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:07:53]:
This is 3, yeah. I just wanted to be like you, Mike.
Mike Allen [00:07:58]:
Dare to dream. That's what I say. Dare to dream. How far apart are they?
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:08:03]:
So first one is 4. So he was 3 when Madeline was born.
Mike Allen [00:08:07]:
Okay.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:08:08]:
So all, I had 3 in less than 4 years. So the first one is, they're 21 months apart. And then the second, number 2 and number 3 are 26 months apart.
Mike Allen [00:08:19]:
We did 2 years apart for each one. And I think that was about right.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:08:23]:
Yeah.
Mike Allen [00:08:25]:
But no, it's a game changer when you go from 2 to 3.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:08:28]:
It is. So, I mean, she's still so little. She's only 4 months old.
Mike Allen [00:08:32]:
She's not mobile yet.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:08:33]:
She's not mobile yet. She's just like the happiest little baby, you know? So it's been, it's been pretty good.
Mike Allen [00:08:39]:
How are the big kids doing with Helen and Newen?
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:08:42]:
They're great with her. They're so good. I mean, they're kids, so they're like punching her and they're like, look at this, mom. And I'm like, oh my gosh, don't touch her.
Mike Allen [00:08:49]:
Stop throwing your—
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:08:50]:
like I was actually just FaceTiming with them right before this. And my son takes all his foam blocks and he's like, these are soft and poured them on her face. She's like typical number 3. She didn't cry. She was just like blinking a lot.
Mike Allen [00:09:05]:
Making her tough. Yeah.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:09:07]:
I'm like, son, no.
Mike Allen [00:09:08]:
Did you have the, like, I remember with our oldest going to the grocery store and we had this thing that we would take out and like put in the shopping cart that was cloth and covered all of the surfaces that he might touch.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:09:20]:
Yeah.
Mike Allen [00:09:21]:
And, you know, like we'd take like 3 or 4 pacifiers with us. Cuz if he dropped one, that one's gotta go in the bag and get out of clean one.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:09:27]:
Yeah.
Mike Allen [00:09:27]:
By the third one, it was just like, let 'em roll around in the parking lot for an hour. I'll be back.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:09:32]:
Yeah.
Mike Allen [00:09:33]:
You know?
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:09:33]:
Totally. Totally. No, we actually never even got that for, for my son. Like I intended to, and then I remember I had, I remember going to the grocery store the first time for my oldest and I didn't have it. And I was like, oh my gosh, I don't have the thing that covers the shopping cart. And then I was like, well, buckle up, kid. Like, I don't know what to tell you.
Mike Allen [00:09:52]:
You know what, we survived.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:09:53]:
Yeah, exactly.
Mike Allen [00:09:55]:
I mean, we drank from the hose, right? You didn't have to go inside and get filtered bottled water.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:09:59]:
We had well water that had pieces of rust in it. And my mom—
Mike Allen [00:10:04]:
It's flavor crystals.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:10:05]:
My mom would tell us like, it's good because, you know, lots of people are low on iron and rust has a lot of iron. So it's actually good.
Mike Allen [00:10:11]:
No one needs to have an iron deficiency.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:10:13]:
No one, yeah, that's true.
Mike Allen [00:10:15]:
So funny, um, I grew up, um, the first 7 or 8 years I was in a— we called it the single wobbly— it was a single wide trailer about a quarter mile from my grandfather's service station. Cuz my grandfather opened his station in 1937 and was there. So while Mom and Dad were building by hand on nights and weekends the house that they still live in now.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:10:38]:
Wow.
Mike Allen [00:10:40]:
Um, but he had in-ground fuel tanks that were 50 years old, right? And they just leaked. That's just what they did. And you knew it, right?
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:10:49]:
Yeah.
Mike Allen [00:10:50]:
And I remember that you could see the kind of mirror sheen on the water coming out of the garden hose that we would drink from. So the like colors, carcinogens for health and longevity.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:11:06]:
Oh, yeah.
Mike Allen [00:11:07]:
But after that store closed, thankfully we did not own the fuel tanks. And so the company that did own the fuel tanks was found liable for the ground contamination and went bankrupt. And then it became a government Superfund site. So we had a drill and a centrifuge burning off the gas out of the groundwater for like 15 years.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:11:32]:
Oh my gosh.
Mike Allen [00:11:33]:
So it pumped, pump the water out of the ground, they put it in centrifuge and spin it to get the gas to separate, and they burn the gas off and you see a little smokestack. But it's just crazy. Wow. We just got our clean water certification a couple of years ago, so.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:11:47]:
Oh, cool.
Mike Allen [00:11:48]:
So now my kids can drink from the hose and it not be colorful.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:11:52]:
Yeah.
Mike Allen [00:11:53]:
Nice.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:11:54]:
Nice. Is that like a reverse osmosis thing or?
Mike Allen [00:11:57]:
I don't know. Yeah, I don't know. It's a stupid thing that we used to do when we were kids, right?
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:12:03]:
Yeah.
Mike Allen [00:12:03]:
So it was the same time when you could spend the entire weekend outside and it not be a big deal.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:12:09]:
Yeah.
Mike Allen [00:12:09]:
And be out of sight of your parents and it not be a big deal.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:12:12]:
I, you know, so I have a nanny because I work, obviously. And I was home for some reason recently. It was in the fall. My kids were playing in the yard and they're playing in all the leaves. And she had to run inside. And I was like, oh, it's no problem. And she's like, you're gonna leave your kids out front? Out front, like people could take them. And I'm like, I think they're fine.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:12:35]:
I think they're fine.
Mike Allen [00:12:36]:
You're a terrible mother. You're a terrible mother.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:12:38]:
She's like, they're 2 and 4. And I was like, they know not to run in the street, I think. Like they never run in the street usually.
Mike Allen [00:12:45]:
They should let you do hidden fences with shock collars for kids, for small kids.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:12:49]:
Oh, it's a brilliant idea.
Mike Allen [00:12:51]:
I think so. It gives them a warning buzz first.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:12:52]:
Yeah.
Mike Allen [00:12:53]:
New business.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:12:53]:
Yeah, I was about to say, what are we doing here? That's what we need to go. Yeah.
Mike Allen [00:12:56]:
I mean, Lots of branding opportunities for funny names.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:13:00]:
Confessions of a Shop Owner. Confessions of a Parent in Prison.
Mike Allen [00:13:05]:
So, but I digress. So what has it been like these last few years as you've had, maybe this is not a fair assumption, but it feels like you've had explosive growth in the last several years.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:13:19]:
Yeah.
Mike Allen [00:13:20]:
What have been the biggest challenges that you've had to deal with in that timeframe?
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:13:23]:
Yeah, I would say at first, you know, when you go from being a super, super small company to a small company, there's a point where you need more manpower, but you don't have the money. And so you're doing everything yourself, but you really need more people. And so you're just in this like wobbly point where you're investing so much time. Um, and we've all been there, you know, but I was, I think that was the hardest point. That was probably like 9, 8, 9 years ago. Um, and then as I started to grow people and get a bigger team and get more clients and be able to feed my team, I think the hardest thing is just, I don't know, that's, there's so many great things.
Mike Allen [00:14:13]:
It's been so easy for you because you're so awesome.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:14:16]:
No, it's not been easy. I think it's just the transition of like redefining yourself at every moment. And for me personally, it's like who I am today probably isn't the leader that I need to be at the beginning of next year. The beginning of next year, I need to be a different version of myself that can lead a bigger team, that can help more people. You know, you were talking about longevity with like drinking out of the hose with all these carcinogens. So I read this book called called "Outlive" by Peter Attia. Have you read it? Mm-hmm. So it's about longevity.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:14:51]:
It's like a really popular thing right now. It's about being healthy and having more life in the years that you have. And so now I just had a third baby. I have this really big team and I was like, you know what, I need to do a better job of taking care of myself so that I can be here for my kids and so I can be here for my team. And so I signed up for this kind of like personal training thing with my husband. And the guy was taking this intake form the very first time I was there. And he said, why are you doing this? Like, why do you wanna do this? And I kind of told him what I just told you. And he's writing things down and he stopped and he looked at me and he goes, wow.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:15:33]:
'Cause I tell him, you know, I have 3 kids now, I have a team of almost 40 people. And we work with hundreds of auto repair shops.
Mike Allen [00:15:41]:
You feel the weight of responsibility.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:15:42]:
Yeah, and they rely on, like they truly rely on us. Like if we crap the bed and we just don't perform, like all your technicians at 3 shops are depending on us to make the phones ring and they need to go feed their families, right? It's not just about you and me and our families, it's the people that we support. So I'm telling this guy this and he's like, probably 24, you know, like he's like, oh cool, yeah. But he actually stopped writing and he was like, wow, it sounds like you're the lottery ticket for a lot of people. And I was like, oh, you know, like—
Mike Allen [00:16:17]:
Don't fuck this up, Caroline.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:16:18]:
Yeah, seriously. But I think just that, just realizing like, okay, it's not just me. Like the beauty of my company is really in my team. But at the same time, I have to continue to evolve as a human, as a leader,, all the different things in order to lead my team to the next step so that they can have success in their lives and they can feed their families. And so you can have success in your life and you could feed not only your family, but all the families you employ. So I think the weight of success is not talked about a lot. You know, like the weight of success, like you, you do have a lot of responsibility. You have a lot of things that you have to steward.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:17:01]:
You have a lot of mouths to feed. And, um, it's a big responsibility. You gotta keep your eye on the ball. And so I think that there's, there's definitely the entrepreneurial dream that we all have of like freedom of time of, and freedom of money. And, um, we have that, but we also still have this responsibility to our people. And that is not really talked about when you're thinking about the American dream. So yeah, I think that, I think just evolving and becoming better and better internally is the biggest thing that I've had to continue to learn and step into and challenge myself to be better.
Mike Allen [00:17:44]:
Do you take intentional time to sit back and think about what you need to be for your team and your family next year? And how am I gonna take the steps to evolve to be that person next year?
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:18:00]:
I do, but not as much as I should. This is a confession. Yeah, yeah, I get it. So I totally do, but I think you're probably like me where you sit down and you're like, "Great, I have these top 3 things," and then squirrel, it's like the next big thing. Is on your plate and you like, you're like, oh my gosh, it's January 29th and I never finished my resolutions or I never finished this thing. So I'm kind of someone who has big goals, but I don't map out like every single point because my friends that are business owners who are so adamant about having like every single thing mapped out, like where they're gonna go and where they'll be at this month 3 and where they'll be at month 4, it's like, yeah, that might happen, but it might not. Like, you need to have a map for where you're going and a plan. But if you're like, at 3 months, we will have, you know, $500,000 in revenue at 3 months, and that will allow me to do X, Y, and Z, especially when we're thinking like 10 years out.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:19:04]:
Like, for the year, it's easier to map out, like, this is where I need to be at this point. But if you're thinking like 10 years down the road, I mean, so much life happens in 10 years.
Mike Allen [00:19:12]:
Have you ever gone back and One, are you a person who writes down your goals, like 1, 3, 5-year goals? Yeah. And if so, have you ever gone back and looked at your long-term goals from a decade ago?
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:19:24]:
From a decade ago? Oh my. No, not from a decade ago, but from like 5 years ago, yeah.
Mike Allen [00:19:28]:
I was so wrong.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:19:30]:
Oh my God. Like, how so?
Mike Allen [00:19:32]:
So naive.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:19:33]:
Were you thinking too grandiose? Like, I'm gonna have 500 shops.
Mike Allen [00:19:37]:
Oh no, it was never like that, but it was like, I was going to have paid off the main house and I was going to own a beach house free and clear. And, you know, all these, yeah, things that I didn't take into account the cost of having 3 kids in private school and the cost of, you know, all of the creative and interesting and new ways I find to screw up my business and then have to go back and recoup the mistakes. Yeah. Right.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:20:05]:
So has this podcast I don't know if I can ask this, but has this podcast like taken away from you as a shop owner? Or—
Mike Allen [00:20:14]:
Yeah, it's been bad for my business. I've really enjoyed it. I've had a lot of fun doing it. I've enjoyed the human interaction and the friends I've gotten to make and the people that I've met that I never would have met before. But it's taken my eye off the ball. My business has suffered as a result. And there will be, frankly, there will be a fair amount of further conversation about that in 2026 as I recuperate and recover from some of those aftereffects of that taking the eye off the ball. You know, frankly, I'm not comfortable discussing them and sharing them on the show yet because I'm not out of the woods yet on some of it.
Mike Allen [00:20:52]:
So I 100% have shiny object syndrome. And this was a fun shiny object. And I still enjoy it. And I'm still going to keep doing it. But I've got to learn to prioritize time. And because look, like everyone, I waste an inordinate amount of time on distractions. I don't watch a bunch of TV shows or anything like that, but I'll burn an hour or two a day doom scrolling easy. And that's so bad for you in so many ways.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:21:25]:
So sad too.
Mike Allen [00:21:26]:
Yeah. Well, it makes you compare yourself to fake versions of other people who are only sharing the best, right? Yeah. So, no, in '26, I've got to be much more intentional about prioritization of what gets my time and my attention. Yeah. You know, like in the— as the podcast has grown, we're very, very lucky that, you know, we're going to pass over 20,000 followers this week. That's huge. Congratulations. Thank you.
Mike Allen [00:21:56]:
And with that comes an enormous amount of inbound messaging. And I was really intentional about responding to everyone for a long time when there was 5,000 and 10,000, 15,000. And now it would take hours every day to respond to all the messages if I did that. And I realized, wait a minute, that's probably not super healthy.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:22:23]:
So— And scrolling, like, Yes, people compare, but the thing that makes me sad when I find myself scrolling, doom scrolling, is just that life is so short. I don't know, my dad died 5 years ago and it just makes me think about we're going to die. I'm going to die, you're going to die. And life is the sum of the moments that we live, right? And you hear that and you see that, but it truly is. It is the sum of the moments that you live. And so, How many hours are you awake? How many hours are you spending doing something that's pointless? Stupid. Pointless. You know, and we all do it.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:23:06]:
But when you kind of like wake up from it, it's like, that is the, if I play back my week as if it were a movie.
Mike Allen [00:23:14]:
If you've listened to this podcast for more than 5 minutes, you already know my favorite way to learn is to watch someone else screw it up first. That's the whole point of Tectonic 2026. It's not a conference where everybody pretends everything is perfect. It's owners, advisors, and techs getting in the same room to talk about what worked, what didn't, and what they'd do differently if they could rewind the tape. Because the painful truth is most of the stuff holding a shop back isn't some secret trick. It's the basics we avoid: training, consistency, communication, accountability, inspections, workflow, hiring, all the boring stuff that actually makes you the money. Presented by TechMetric, Tectonic is happening April 9th through 11th in Houston. Tickets are on sale and our listeners get $500 off standard pricing with code Confessions500.
Mike Allen [00:24:03]:
Go to techmetric.com/tectonic. That's T-E-C-T-O-N-I-C or tap the link in the show notes.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:24:11]:
Is this what I want the movie to be about?
Mike Allen [00:24:12]:
Look at your screen time. Yeah.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:24:15]:
Yeah. Yeah. And when you, when I get that report, I don't know if your phone gives you the report and you're, I'm like, I turned it off. There's no way.
Mike Allen [00:24:21]:
I turned it off.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:24:22]:
Yeah, because it's too hard.
Mike Allen [00:24:23]:
Do you want to see the number of pickups a day? How many times you pick up your phone or activated the screen a day? Yeah. It's bonkers. Yeah. And I am addicted to my devices. I mean, like my wife is an amazing woman and she is not at all. She deleted all social media a couple of years ago. She reads paper books, right? She is intentional about developing hobbies. She's intentional about keeping in touch with friends.
Mike Allen [00:24:49]:
Wow.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:24:50]:
She's like— She's a superhero.
Mike Allen [00:24:52]:
Yeah, yeah. And I'm convinced that most of it's just 'cause she doesn't have fucking Facebook.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:24:57]:
Yeah, she has like all this time. Yeah, all of us are like, we have no time, and we're scrolling. And she's like, I don't have Facebook, I have so much time.
Mike Allen [00:25:06]:
Yeah. I was asking her what she, like, there was a charity that she heard about that makes, crochets blankets for children in the NICU. And she was like, I'm gonna learn how to crochet this week so that I can make blankets for children in the NICU. Oh my gosh. And then 3 days later, there were blankets in the house. And I'm like, that's, that's amazing. Crazy, right? But at the same time, I saw a lot of funny memes. So, you know, there's that.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:25:31]:
So how do you really compare those? I mean, that's pretty priceless too.
Mike Allen [00:25:37]:
But well, I know that this is a short— this is a short little bonus clip that we're going to release. I know that you're super in high demand. And how did your class go today, by the way?
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:25:47]:
It didn't. I have it tomorrow.
Mike Allen [00:25:48]:
Oh, I thought it was—
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:25:50]:
okay, it's tomorrow. Yeah, we're talking about like the customer life cycle, like customer journey and how AI plays into that. Okay.
Mike Allen [00:25:57]:
Yeah, super.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:25:58]:
It's going to be cool.
Mike Allen [00:25:59]:
What's the customer life cycle for a turnkey client?
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:26:04]:
Um, so like the customer journey, basically. So lots of times I meet people through conferences, um, or people just like see me online or hear me on the podcast. And then reach out, whether it's on Facebook or our website, and we follow up with them and talk to them, and then they become clients and we'll onboard them. We'll have like a really intense onboarding time where we're like really getting to know their shop. And it's like we're our own versions of AI. Like we really, every person needs to like really, really know because we're making judgment calls.
Mike Allen [00:26:38]:
I remember the onboarding visit. It was awesome.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:26:40]:
Yeah, we don't do the onboarding in person anymore.
Mike Allen [00:26:42]:
Yeah, you can't. It's just too bad.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:26:43]:
It's just too much. And what happened was it would take, it's like someone would reach out and they're like, I need cars right now. And we're like, cool, we'll be at your shop in 3 weeks. And then it will take 2 weeks to onboard you. And then, so in 5 weeks, we'll actually start working on your like monthly marketing. And so we realized it wasn't actually in the best interest of our clients. It was kind of in our best interest because it helped us really get to know our clients well and just like made that relationship even more, um, intense, you know, like I've been to your shop. I've seen, I saw the garage door that was missing that caused you to sleep there with a gun the night before.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:27:26]:
I saw the sleeping bag.
Mike Allen [00:27:28]:
Yeah, that's another story for another day.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:27:33]:
So I mean, there were really good benefits, but yeah, we're able to do a lot of, we're able to do all of it online and really get to know a shop. And then we get to say like, all right, The first couple of months, we're going to be more back and forth with you because we just want to make sure that we're doing it, you know, how you want it done. At the same time, we're not going to be just yes people. If you're like, I have this, because this happens all the time, I have this amazing idea. Here's what we're going to do. We're going to write our name on Frisbees and we're going to throw them out on stage and it's going to cost us $10,000.
Mike Allen [00:28:04]:
And we're like, that sounds like an idea you've actually heard someone say. Maybe. You gonna drop a name?
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:28:09]:
Nope. And it could have been more money actually. We're like, oh my gosh, no, don't do that. Nope, uh-uh, nope, no, we're gonna do this. Nope, we're not.
Mike Allen [00:28:19]:
Okay. So you're saying I shouldn't put my business ad on the back of the grocery store receipts?
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:28:24]:
No, don't do it.
Mike Allen [00:28:25]:
Don't do it.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:28:25]:
It never works. It does not work. And the same with like the shopping carts.
Mike Allen [00:28:29]:
Yeah, the shopping cart and the bus stop benches, terrible. Terrible. They don't drive cars, people. The people on the bus stop bench don't drive cars.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:28:37]:
I do believe in having a really good brand. Like you do want people to feel like they're seeing you everywhere, but do it smartly.
Mike Allen [00:28:46]:
But do it with Big Brother and direct track.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:28:48]:
Yeah, just do it with Big Brother. Just do it in a creepy way.
Mike Allen [00:28:52]:
Yeah. Perfect. I know that you've got to go, so I'll let you go, but thank you so much for coming in.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:28:56]:
Thank you, Mike. Yeah, appreciate it.
Mike Allen [00:28:58]:
Thanks for listening to Confessions of a Shop Owner, where we lay it all out, the good, the bad, and sometimes the super messed up. I'm your host, Mike Allen, here to remind you that even even the pros screw it up sometimes. So why not laugh a little bit, learn a little bit, and maybe have another drink? You got a confession of your own or a topic you'd like me to cover, or do you just want to let me know what an idiot I am? Email mike@confessionsofashopowner.com or call and leave a message. The number is 704-CONFESS. That's 704-266-3377. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to like, subscribe, or follow. Join us on this crazy journey that is shop ownership. I'll see you on the next episode.
Carrie-Lynn Rodenberg [00:30:04]:
Um, you know what I said, Jeff?