mtnmods

I admire your tenacity, wanting to go big and think out of the box. Have a great team of lawyers to go through a non-compete clause, have lots of interviews with insurance companies that have insured that sort of venture, and make sure you can swing getting your guys bonded as well. Have you thought about how you might market to qualified techs…[Read more]

All great replies so far. Listen to them for sure! My two cents after 18 years in business starting from scratch, unless you’ve a chunk of change to live on personally, pay your bills, cover some payrolls, and take care of your vendors on time, start small and grow slowly. It doesn’t take long to build distrust with your suppliers if you’re late…[Read more]

The story is critical. Sometimes however, the story isn’t about the parts, its about their family, experiences, vacation, history, people, or interests you have in common. The story connects and builds long-standing relationships. If a customer wants the back story on a part or why you do something some way, you can tell if you’re listening to…[Read more]

I agree our pricing/profit model is a mess. To profit (as required) using a combination of labor and parts will likely need to change. So far, customer’s that come in insisting that they can get the part down the street at AZ or online through Amazon get the normal “steak in a restaurant” explanation. If they don’t come over, we send them away and…[Read more]

We have been with RO Writer since 2008. It’s got a ton of features, unfortunately rarely does everything work properly. I’ve spent so much money on hardware, software, tech support, tech support for every third party application, hardware tech support to fix what the tech support screwed up, and countless hours each month on phone calls. They take…[Read more]

I’ve gotten my crew to all within 5 minutes of the hour over many years and tears. I don’t want to bust anyone’s chops for an occasional 5 minutes. However, I had the same two of my four guys consistently slightly late 1-2x per week and then 3-5 minutes late three days in a row and I was done. It shows an utter lack of respect for everyone’s time…[Read more]

No to rehash what Tom said, but maybe a bit more info.  I use a CRM company (I have used them all and personally prefer Kukui) to integrate our numbers, appointments, web presence and reviews. They send automatic appointment reminders, text and email followups per my preset criteria, i.e. new customers and not zero dollar RO’s. I know I could…[Read more]

Yes, we require an inspection of every car, with a regular form. I pay .3/hr toward this free inspection. (I am generous) but I am a stickler on giving every customer his own ability to make an educated decision on his service based on a full knowledge of his/her cars condition regardless of my opinion of his/her ability or willingness to pay.I…[Read more]

One thing I think needs to be mentioned is that Mitchell can be learned in a week, and I still have not learned all there is to learn in RO Writer. Mitchell also has good training videos. I use ROW because of the Smarte Cat feature, nobody else has that. But I also used to have Mitchell in a small Honda shop and it worked great because we set up…

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We have used several POS/Shop management systems over the years. Currently we operate with RO Writer. Huge investment, sort of a bait-and-switch approach to sales with no personal demo available. You pretty much have to pull the trigger to get to use it yourself. Customer service is better now than it has been over the last 8 years but still 5 or…[Read more]