The Shop Owner Comparison Trap | Anders Gustafson - Ep 29

0:00And I think the people like just started or 2 to 3 years in, they have to sit there and look at the social media too. And they're looking at all the wins. Oh yeah, I did $1.17 million last week. Like, okay. And then you're like, well, all I did was $10,000. Like, no, but the week before you did $8,000. Yeah. And this time last year you were not doing anything.

0:19So you have to look at your own growth and be your own, you know, race against yourself. And I don't think people know to do that. Welcome. To Downshift with Tanika Haynes, the automotive auntie. The thing about Tanika, she gets to know you. She'll laugh and cut up with you, but then she'll hit you with some knowledge that you may not want, but that you need.

0:39Let's downshift. Anders. Andy? You're like a little bit too old to be called Andy. Yeah, I'm a little too old to be called Andy. We won't call you that. Yeah, but that was— it was Andy until like 9th grade. Andy Pandy to my mom. You know, I made a decision. Andy Pandy? Andy Pandy. That was like my mom's thing. Andy Pandy. Andy Pandy.

1:06So you're just Andy. My grandmother calls me Nika Poo. See? Okay. You're making me feel self-conscious. Andy Pandy. I think I call my Santana and Jordan— Jordan Stinkaman. And Santana's like 300 and 800 pounds kid. And I call him my little bun bun. He's like 6'6 and huge. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So welcome, Downshift with Tanika, and let's get started. Tell me about yourself.

1:33Where in the heck are you from? Where the heck am I from? So born and raised, I consider myself an East Coast guy, born and raised in and around New York City. Yeah. Folks still live out there. Been up and down the East Coast, went to school in North Carolina and lived in Alabama for a while. That was where I first got introduced to automotive.

1:52Working for a big chain out of Birmingham, Alabama. Okay. Yeah. Like in the office, under the car, under the hood? In the office. Yeah. In the office originally. It's this company called Express Oil Change. At the time they were called Express Oil Change and Service Center. Right. There might be some near you. I feel like I've heard it or seen that before.

2:10Anyway, it's a chain. It was a franchise chain. They do a decent job. They're not like, they're not as bad as some of the big chains out there. I mean, they're more, I don't know, like, do you like Christian Brothers? I mean, we don't have those. We do have a couple in North Carolina. It's like, not a lot like here. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

2:28I mean, it's like the point is like, I mean, some chains are really bad, but they did an okay job. Like they weren't trying to like rip people off and this sort of stuff. And yeah, I started in an office gig with them and just, I don't know, wasn't super satisfying. Didn't really love my office gig. Learned a lot about how they were running their shops.

2:49Got essentially a free education on what it means to, you know, run a decent shop. 'Cause I go to all their managers meetings, I go into the stores, you know, I saw the numbers and all this sorts of bit. And I was really, really eager to get out of Alabama. Just wasn't home. Not where, you know. You didn't wanna be there with Forrest Gump?

3:06No, no. I mean, it's underrated place, Birmingham. Like good food, great people, you know, but just, I don't know. Yeah, yeah. Okay, next. Yeah, yeah, exactly. So, and said, okay, well, you know, I think I've learned a lot about this. I was really young. I was, you know, in my 26 or something. And I was like, I think I've learned enough about this.

3:30I think I can open a shop. Pretty naive, pretty stupid. And my wife and I had some family, she was my girlfriend at the time, but we both had family in Southern Virginia, like Hampton Roads area, Norfolk, Suffolk kind of stuff. And I was like, we should, you know, we both have family there. You know, things are going good in the relationship.

3:50Like, let's move to Virginia and we'll open a shop. I like the Clampetts. What's that? We like, we loaded up the truck and we moved to Virginia. I mean, I remember towing my Honda Civic behind the U-Haul and like, and I didn't fix it to the U-Haul properly. And I remember one, like one guy honking at me 'cause I had like one, yeah, like one wheel.

4:13Yeah. Like falling off behind, sleeping in the rest stop in my U-Haul. So yeah, this stuff. You can do that stuff when you're young. You can't sleep in a U-Haul at 45, 46. No, no. Yeah. But it was, yeah. Yeah, exactly. Uh, so yeah, not far off. Uh, loaded up my truck, moved to Southern Virginia. We opened our first shop in Suffolk.

4:32Um, that was early 2000, like '10, '12. Um, and it went better. I, I guess it was okay. I don't know. I mean, we'll get, we'll get into this. I mean, like, how old were you at the time though? I was in my late 20s. Okay, that's not— I mean, yeah, okay, that's pretty Ambitious. Yeah, yeah, I was, I mean, naive, ambitious, I don't know.

4:56You can do that when you don't have children and stuff and you can make those kind of decisions. That's exactly right. Yeah. You know, and I mean, I like the, the only thing I remember thinking at the time, I remember being scared. So can I curse? Don't curse. Yeah. Yeah, you can curse. You can curse. I remember being scared shitless 'cause I had never like led anybody.

5:16Like I had never been responsible for like somebody else's performance. Or their paycheck or their groceries. Yeah, anything. All of that, right? Nothing. Like nothing. Forget it. Like, yeah, like, I mean, not even like in a little boring corporate job where I have like one little underling for me. Like, I, you know, and so it was— that was the moment, like the week beforehand, where I was like, all the, like, I figured out how to get the, you know, the store open and figure out where to get the money and, and all that.

5:43Like, that didn't really stress me out until when I was like, oh my God, like I got to keep doing this every day. I got to keep doing this every day. Or like someone's going to like, like they're going to like work for me. You know, I don't know how to like describe it. No, exactly like that. Yeah. And like they're going to have to listen to me kind of thing.

6:01Like I had, you know, that was, I mean, remember just having a total, total breakdown. Running a great auto repair shop isn't about working harder. It's about being intentional with your time, team and how your business runs. That's where TechMetric comes in. Shop management, payments, and marketing all in one platform. Your team works from the same information. Your customers get a better experience.

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6:53That's not the problem. The problem is consistency, because some days it only works when the right person is working, and when they're not, it's a whole different shop. So now you're stuck in that cycle. You need a strong team to run a great shop, but you need a great shop to attract a strong team. Make it make sense. That's why I rock with Detect Auto.

7:11Detect Auto streamlines your service processes with automations that save time, increase maintenance sales, and improve productivity without changing your whole system. It plugs in, guides your team through inspections, recommendations, and even customer communication. Now that's not just based on memory or mood. That's how a shop runs. And let me tell you, I've been using it for over a year now. My ARO is up 63%.

7:38That's not new knowledge, that's just consistency. If you're tired of your shop depending on who showed up today, go check out Detect Auto. Book a demo. Um, because I had a, um, I had met some guys, um, and, you know, other shop owners, and they're like, well, you know, you've come and see how we do it, and, you know, you can bring I had, you know, a master tech kind of level guy that I totally fell into, like, backwards.

8:08Yeah. How I found him, it just so happened that, like, he had just moved across the street from where we were gonna put the shop. Okay. And he was currently commuting, like, his new commute was gonna be, like, an hour and a half away. Wow. So when he saw that, like, we were opening a shop, he just stumbled in there one day.

8:25He's like, hey, are you, are you gonna open a shop? Because I now have a, I just moved here and I have a really long commute. So it worked out. Yeah, it worked out. Um, but we went to, you know, a friend's shop to like learn and see and, and these sorts of things, like how guys were doing it or, or whatever.

8:39Um, and oh God, I just like, I remember the night before that, like I was gonna be bringing Richie with me and I, I mean, I, I, you were scared. I was so scared. I was so scared. I was so, so, so scared. Uh, it ended up, I mean, obviously it ended up being fine or Good enough. Like that first year was not super fun, but it wasn't like a total failure.

9:06We did okay. We had a decent location. Like that was the one thing that I took from like the big chain that they're like, you wanna be someplace where people can see you and like people can find you. Location, location, location. Location, location, location. So that was like the main thing that I took away from. So that helped, right? 'Cause I didn't know how to market.

9:24I didn't know like, you know, a whole lot. Most people don't, they don't realize until like you have a dream and then you're like, wait, whoa. Gotta do what? Yeah. So you were like every department, your HR, your marketing, your accounting, you're all the things. And you just didn't even know all the things that really went into running a business. No, I had no idea.

9:42I mean, I was the manager, right? I mean, I was essentially learning, not even the manager, I was the advisor. Like, I mean, I didn't, was not good at working on cars at that point. Right. You know, knew almost nothing. But yeah, so yeah, the accounting didn't get done for the first year. Oh, okay. You know, even if it's— but like, it'll come up.

10:04Like, that's stuff I know about. I'm very comfortable with it. You just didn't have time for it? I just didn't have time for it. You know, that was it. It was just like all day, every day, just like, you know, I don't know, just felt like I couldn't leave the counter in case somebody called or like whatever. I was like afraid to do anything that felt like it wasn't running the shop.

10:26Customer-facing stuff. Yeah, like customer-facing stuff. Like people forget about all the back office stuff. Yeah, yeah. So I just felt like it was like being dishonest if I like went to, you know, disappeared from that or whatever, you know? So yeah, it just got ignored. You try to do it at night or whatever when you get home and it's— Yeah, bring your work home and then— Well, coaches call it now scheduling your hats.

10:49Sure. So you just didn't do a good job with scheduling your hats. No. I mean, that's a learned thing because I guess I don't know, I'm not a technician, but technicians that go from technician to shop owners, they don't think about that part the same way that you didn't think about that part. So it is what it is. And you ended up with how many stores though?

11:04Just 2. Just 2. Just 2. Just 2. Yeah, we ended up opening another one that was like 45 minutes away down in Virginia Beach. And it was fine. It was an okay store. Definitely did not— I got cocky. The first store ended up doing pretty well after a couple years. And so I was like, oh great, just rinse and repeat. Kind of thing.

11:28And the, and the other one was gonna be in a fancy neighborhood, you know, lots of money. Like I was like, you know, this, this'll be— Well, what didn't translate? I mean, if you did good at that one store, I, I think honestly it might've just been the location again. Yeah. Right. You, you, you know, like the other one was just like, like people couldn't ignore us.

11:46It was, you know, right next to the brand new Kroger that just went in. Mm-hmm. And like, you know, they'd put in Ulta and all the other like nice shops and we were just like right there. Yep. And I was just like, people couldn't ignore us. Like they were just like bumping into us. And the other one, I thought it was gonna be good 'cause it was near like a Home Depot and same thing, like shopping center.

12:05But it was just like, it was like tucked behind and like not as visible from like the street and these sorts of things. And again, I wasn't like, what we were really good at was service and taking care of people. Like that was our marketing, you know? I was not gifted at like, Figure out how to— How to get the new people into the new store.

12:25Yeah, how to get people there. Like when they were there, everyone was always super happy. Yeah. You know, these sorts of things. And the shop didn't do poorly, but it just, I don't know, maybe I had too high expectations and— I don't know if I ever do that. Yeah. People say, oh, don't you wanna be a multi-shop owner? I was like, I don't think I wanna do that.

12:44Yeah, I get it. I don't wanna have to do it again. I get it. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. It's just, it sounds scary. Like you said, you go in there and this shop is working really good. And you've got all your hats, you know when to wear them. You've got the team, you've got the counter, you've got your customer base, and then you want to go do it again.

13:00Maybe I'm just a sucker and I'm just like too scared to do it. Maybe if I did it, it would be fun. And you're supposed to challenge yourself, right? Right. I don't want to. I'm too old for that. Yeah. I mean, again, like starting all over, like having another kid right now, almost 50 years old. The first 2 came out fine and then the last one would just be an asshole.

13:17Like, I don't even know if like, I was a mom, I was a good mom. I had 2 kids and what is with this? What happened? Little Jimmy, what is wrong with you? It's because, yeah, Mom, you're a mama. You're old. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, stuff's changed. Yeah. Things change. Yeah. It's gone by and you just got different priorities or whatever. And so I don't know.

13:36Again, I was definitely stuck a little bit in— this was a different path than like any of my other friends were taking. Like, you know, most of them stayed in office jobs or, you know, were working in finance and and these sorts of things. I don't think any of my friends really respected what I was doing. Right, yeah. I think, well, I was at UNC Greensboro, so I was about 45 minutes from the shop and I would work every other day with Dad.

14:04And they were still in school and they had careers in buildings that had AC and they were clean and they could get dressed up to go to work. So up until now, I really don't think they were like, oh, that's gonna be so cool. You're gonna work in the shop with your dad. I don't think anybody ever said that. I mean, they adore my dad, but no.

14:21Yeah, no, but there was, There was definitely some of that. It's a different path. Yeah, where I felt like, I don't know, I think some of that, like, second shop just felt like you got to, right? Yeah, I gotta show them. Yeah, yeah, or, you know, that this is what it's about. It's about getting bigger and, you know, and growth and these sorts of things.

14:38And yeah, that was not the case. That was not the case. Yeah, that was not the case. It was not, it's, yeah, I went from feeling pretty good about stuff to going back to that place of just like— Right, scared. Yeah, like, I don't, I don't know, you know, you— first shot was going well. I'm starting to grow into the role, you know, I feel good and confident and, and these sorts of things.

15:04And then, you know, when that second store is not, I'm like, I don't— I have these moments where I don't, I don't know what to do. Like, did you try coaching or anything like that, or was that even a thing that you ever heard of before? No, I like— truth, you know, one of the biggest mistakes I made is I was not a good participant of the industry.

15:23Like, I lived like in my little island of like, just, I don't know. I just, I don't know. I guess I wasn't looking. I don't know why. No, it's a lot. I mean, I don't know the statistics. I'm not gonna sit here and say X percent of these people do not go up and get coaching, but there's a lot. Yeah. I wanna say it's like only 10% of shop owners go to conferences and do the things that support us.

15:46I had never been to conferences. Like, you know, I didn't know anything about, again, I wasn't, I definitely had that mindset of like, Like, I, you know, I was competitor, you know, to like other shop owners. Oh yeah. In the area. Even though there was like 1.8 million cars. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah. You know, I definitely had a little bit of that.

16:03Like, they don't want to talk to me, I don't want to talk to them. Yeah. You know, sort of, sort of stuff. Um, so yeah, a lot of, a lot of the bad habits. Well, I think people still feel like that, so it's not, it's not uncommon. Yeah. Do you think if you had coaching or uh, a partner with another shop that you can bounce ideas off of that it would've been different?

16:24I think, I mean, there was, yeah, of course. Like it definitely could have done better because in the end, like the first shop may be doing well despite me. Uh, you know, if I'm being totally honest, like there was some, I made, okay, I made some good decisions, but you know, I, I certainly wasn't the best possible leader that I could have been.

16:45You know, I, I wasn't like, I was still learning and, and these sorts of things. Um, so like when it came to the second location and it was just, you know, not hitting, like I, I could have used, um, just, yeah, some more rah-rah, some more, you know, some support, some emotional support and stuff. We were having kids at the same time.

17:06Like it was not, I couldn't be putting this on my wife, you know, to like come home and, uh, bring all the negativity home. Yeah. You know, she didn't wanna hear this shit. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Nothing. And so like, I wish I had like some guys that I could kind of talk to, but I mean, I even remember, you know, with my friends, the same guys I was like trying to impress is, oh yes, it's doing good.

17:31It's doing good. You're lying. Yeah, yeah, you're lying. You know, you're lying. And that was definitely one of my biggest weaknesses. Like, it was just always feeling like I had to, like, I made the decision to do this. Like, it has to be successful. I have to present this image of like, you know, it's all working out, it's all going, going great.

17:50Um, and like, yeah, we were just talking about that, you know, and I think that happens a lot on the social media now. Everybody's talking about all the happy stuff and all the, oh yeah, we did this and we did that and we did this, and then actually in the back corner of their shop crying because, oh shit, oh my God, I can't pay this, I can't do this, this is not happening, can't find a tech.

18:09And there's real situations happening. And then, but, um, I don't know if it's ego, I don't know if it's testosterone, because I'm pretty sure women do it too. Yeah, yeah. But I don't know. I mean, so like one thing I loved about the shops is like they did keep me busy and kept me off of social media. Yeah. You know, and like off of my phone.

18:30I noticed after we sold the shops and again, now you have a little bit of free time and like I'm back on social media a little bit more. And obviously social media had changed. So, you know, it keeps getting, you know, comparing 10 years ago versus, you know, right now. We're not talking about MySpace anymore. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. But like, I didn't realize it, how much it was messing with me when I started spending a bunch of— like, I, I don't know, I, I guess I felt like I should have been more excited after we did sell the shops and like things worked out okay.

19:04And but then I was spending all this time on social media and I'm reading things and it— I was feeling way, way, way worse. Really? Oh my God. Because you were comparing yourself to people's stories and their highlight reels, right? People's stories. Stories constantly, constantly. And, and, but, and it doesn't come naturally to me to be like, you know, like, I worked really hard, I, you know, did okay with my business, I sold them, like, you know, look, you know, it was just kind of like, oh man, he's got 3 shops and he's still running.

19:32Oh, you were comparing yourself. What do they call that? I, yeah, I mean, the— I don't, I don't know. I just like, I just remember analysis paralysis. Yeah, is that what that is? I don't know if that's what that is. I don't think— yeah, it was more like I mean, it's, it's, yeah, I just remember having that moment where I was like, oh my God, like, I feel like shit when I spend a bunch of time on social media.

19:53Like, you know, I'm, and I, but I'm, but I'm proud of myself, you know? So it's like weird. Yeah. It was just, it was really hard to, to— You couldn't toot your own horn? No, no, it doesn't like— We need a class on horn tooting. I can horn toot. I can horn toot. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, toot your own horn, right? And it doesn't have to be in a way that like so many people do it now, which is like, right, you know, you don't think pretending like there's no problem.

20:20Oh no, there's problems. Yeah, yeah, there are problems. I like— it's perfectly fine to share your thoughts and be open and toot your own horn about like, you know, but be honest. Be honest about it. Yeah, like, yeah, the shop's doing good. I don't have to be there all the time right now. It is a blessing. I have a wonderful team, right?

20:34Yeah, yeah. Um, I've learned after— I mean, I've been doing it for 10 years on my own now. It's not like I started. Yeah. And I think the people like just started, right, or 2 to 3 years in, they have to sit there and look at the social media too. And they're looking at all the wins. Oh yeah, I did $1.17 million last week.

20:50Like, okay. And then you're like, well, all I did was $10,000. Like, no, but the week before you did $8,000. Yeah. And this time last year you were not doing anything. So you have to look at your own growth and be your own, you know, race against yourself. Yeah. And I don't think people know to do that. But I think that's kind of in your personality.

21:10Like, I— Yeah, it's a little bit of my personality for sure. Like, you saw my stuff yesterday. The most boring. That was funny to me. Yeah. But now that you're saying it, I'm like, that was sad. No, but I mean, it did. But you did it on purpose. It got attention. I did do it to be funny. Like, humor is like sarcasm is definitely my, you know, that's your go-to.

21:30Yeah, that's my go-to. I feel much more comfortable. Give me some more of that stuff. Yeah. Well, as opposed to like the, I mean, all these freaking booths with, you know, life-changing, you know, world revolutionary kind of like, I don't believe any of that, you know, so. But like, exactly, you gotta tell people exactly what it said. It said most boring booth at Techtonic.

21:53At Techtonic. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. It was the most boring booth at Techtonic. And in that perfect, I was really trying to go for like the '90s infomercial style, like, you know, but turned it on its head a little bit. But yeah, you know, wanted, Boom, boom, boom, boom. Uh, there's no flashing lights over here. No, no, no. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sorry, I meant like the, you know, those like— what was the guy?

22:13Ron with the rotisserie? The— you're weird. Do you remember? You remember that? I know you're talking about Ron with the rotisserie. Yes. And I can't remember what his like go-to like tagline was, but he would like make the audience, you know, yell it every time he took the chicken out or whatever. Um, oh my God, was it an air fryer? It was like one of the first air fryers.

22:35Yeah, it was literally just like a little rotisserie kind of thing. And then I had all the attachments. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. For the low, low price of— yeah. So you go from selling your shop. Yeah. And sell both of them. Yeah. Um, and then, then what do we do? Uh, took a little time off. Um, you know, got to, yeah, yeah, be a little bit more helpful dad, husband, uh, kind of stuff.

22:56Also, so you sold it for some money money so you can sit down for a little bit? You can sit down for a little bit. Okay, cool. Yeah, yeah. I mean, like, again, the first One ended up being, um, a pretty big shop, you know, and, and, and was successful. Um, the second one was meh. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Um, but like had the foresight to invest in the real estate and, you know, and so like a couple things came together that made it— yeah, made it like, okay.

23:24Yeah. Gave me, gave me some comfort. But, um, I have very young children still, you know, it's a long journey. Yeah. You went to cleaning boogers and, uh, yeah. Yeah. But it's a long journey like that. That set us up, but it was like, you know, it wasn't the, the end. Um, and so, I mean, I know I was making a joke that I was ignoring all the accounting when it first got started.

23:43Yeah, but you're an accountant. I'm not an accountant. I am not an accountant. Okay, okay, okay, okay. Because yeah, there'll be some accountant like, you know, you know, like certifications. You're supposed to technically have like certifications for— you're a money dude. I'm, I'm a num— he's a numbers guy. I'm okay, I'm comfortable, I like numbers. I do remember when I realized that I liked accounting, the little— you're gonna hate this story, but like the little accounting software that I first started using, it would be like it had— it was like a game.

24:14Like if you're like what your accounting software said your bank account balance was and like what your bank account balance were, that it like matched, it gave you like this nice big green check. Mm-hmm. And that was like That brought me so much satisfaction. The green check? Going for that. That's everything. You can find every penny in the reconciliation. Going for the green check.

24:34Like, working through it until I got the green check. You don't understand how much I add that 2 or 3 cents to just like, mm-mm, I'm done reconciling. You're the person that would go find that 2 cents. I love it. It doesn't drive me insane. But I would also make sure that there would never be a 2 or 3 cents. Like, I was doing it at all times.

24:50So weird. Yeah, it's weird, you know? But I'm comfortable with it. And in the end, like, it was part of what helped us succeed. You know, it was like just being comfortable with that component of it. I was way more comfortable with the numbers and the— I had to work really hard at the shop stuff. Okay. You know, like, I— like, for me, it was totally like the business side of it.

25:14I wasn't necessarily paying as much attention to it as I could have. Like, I wasn't a natural-born marketer or anything like that. But in the end, like it didn't, like it didn't emotionally drain me. Okay. You know, to like have to work on that stuff. What was emotionally draining for me was like being on the counter and like, and like dealing with— Mine's backwards.

25:33I can be on the counter all day. Oh my God. No. But when I have to go and do the numbers, my eyes start twitching. I mean, until the day that we sold the shops, I still had, you know, a little bit of jitters when you pick up the phone to call a customer. Really? How many, how many years did you have the shop?

25:4710-ish years. What? I mean, thousands. I love being on the front counter. Thousands. Thousands. I feel so out of place when I'm not on the front counter. When I have to go back there and do ownership and management type work, that's stupid. Thousands of calls to customers, still nervous. Well, if that's who you are, then that's who you are. You can't change it.

26:04Yeah. It wasn't your thing. It wasn't my thing. I mean, but I, you know, I tried to, you know, push myself, push myself to do it. But I mean, it comes like now I do believe like I can help shop owners is what I do. But yeah, because you taught a class. Yeah. But I'm naturally inclined to say it's the most boring, you know, thing I do.

26:20Stop saying that. Yeah, it was just— 'Cause I think in that class the other day, like I was sitting back there, I had questions and then I know Enrique had questions. We were like, damn, it's only 45 minutes. Yeah. Oh, oh, you came to our class. That's right. Yeah. Yeah. I saw you in the back. Yeah. That, that was, that was wild.

26:34Um, uh, like, you know, that was an insight into shop owners. Like we give the title, like, you know, why you need to sell tires. And then they were like, we already sell tires. Like, what are you doing here? Like, did you read the title of the class? Like, why are you here? The only people that came were like the biggest tire sellers.

26:51Well, I don't think I sell enough tires. Right, right, right. Like, I'm a little afraid of it for the reasons that you put up there. Yeah, yeah. Because, well, I didn't understand that because I just like, oh, we don't get the 55%, 65% mark. We don't get to do this. But yeah, but the profit off of it is so much greater than, like you said, the water pump job.

27:11Sure. So once people see it and break it down, and I think that's probably even though they're selling tires, I don't think they can see it. They don't. Yeah. Yeah. That's part of like the big picture. So you need to do like a, you need to do a tutorial. I will. I mean, you know Dan, right? Yeah. Yeah. You and Dan need to put something together.

27:27Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, I did that class the first time like a year ago at Vision and Dan came up to me and he's like, I want to, you know, be a part of this. And I said, great. Because like, you know, it always helps to have somebody. Well, yeah. Like, you know, proof, right? You know, like I can point to, you know, a guy who's got a great shop.

27:44You know, and does a lot of tires. Yeah. But yeah, that was funny to me. So you're teaching tire sales and then the software that you have. Yeah. Yeah. I didn't know nothing about it. That's fine. That's fine. We are, we are on what we would call the back office side of how you run your shops. Okay. So it's everything from moving your data from TechMetric QuickBooks, you know, so some people use the back office like that.

28:13So we have something similar to that. Okay. We have parts reconciliation, and we also just help people with straight bookkeeping and accounting. So don't, don't get me wrong, like, um, it's not a straight software product. It's a combination. We use software and technology to make sure that you're actually getting an ROI on the money that you spend on accounting. Okay. Um, because that, that's what we think a lot of, like, a lot of guys just look at it as.

28:39It's just a sunk cost. I got to do it. I got to spend the money. Necessary evil. Okay. A necessary evil. And we take the, the alternative approach, which is like the people that you're paying to do it spend so much time on what I call brain damage tasks of just like, you know, data and typing numbers and these sorts of things that like they— like even if they were able to, you know, contribute to your company on a higher level, at a strategic level, they have zero time.

29:05They have zero time. And do they really know what it means? Yeah. So chances are you can't probably hire somebody who would know what it means. Right. And also get them to like do the really, really low-level tasks that need to be done to get good numbers out of it. Parts reconciliation. Yeah. So you end up picking one or the other. Like, you know, you, you, you like, you just pay the really low-level doer kind of bookkeeper type and they don't contribute to your organization strategically 'cause that's not like how their brain works.

29:37They don't know what it is anyway. Yeah. But you know, like if you go and try to invest in somebody who could help you you make sense of like what those numbers would mean. I mean, kind of like a coach, but not, you know, coaches obviously talk about many, many different areas, not just the finances. Like you're going to pay a lot to that person and you don't have the low level.

29:57Yeah. They're not going to reconcile that invoice against what came from Toyota to what you had at the shop. So that's why everyone just thinks like, it's just, it's a sunk cost. You know, it's like, it's not going to help me grow. And, you know, again, as someone who could sit there and do that sort of stuff, you know, for hours and like it and like it, but also am very comfortable with what the numbers are trying to tell me and like and how to turn that into strategy, like how you use tires.

30:25Yeah. You know, I— that's cool. I'm gonna have to get a demonstration because I hate them. I can't. And I can't stand it. The only thing I do like about the new QuickBooks books online is that it's so much easier to reconcile. Yeah. Other than that, yeah, no, no, it's fine. I mean, you want to see an eye twitch? You know, normally you can't see somebody's eye twitch.

30:43I'm sure you can see my eye twitching when it's that time. I mean, it is hilarious. I'll come out the back office and I'm— they're like, you're doing— I'm doing the books. And they're not that bad. It's just like, yeah, it's just like, it's not my thing. What fills your cup? Like, what makes you feel, you know, good? What makes you feel, uh, empowered?

31:02Like, I don't know, that's So the numbers fill your cup? Oh, for sure. And this— how long did it take for you to develop this? Is it software? Yeah, I would say I would call this a very, you know, tech-enabled service. So we still have like human component to what we do, but we use our own custom-developed software to make us so much more efficient that like the money that you spend on this can go towards— again, like I work as a fractional CFO for, you know, a couple of MSOs and this sort of stuff where I'm able to contribute for them strategically and, and talk to them about things, you know, big questions that

31:39they have, help them understand, you know, cash flow, help them, you know, figure out buy a store, sell a store. I, I don't know, you know, talk to them about their PEO situation, like actually help them like make decisions on their business. But like all of the little stuff that needs to get done so that I have that good information is, done very easily via our software.

32:00So does that make sense? That does make sense. It's very smart. Like, are you the brainchild of this? Is this your baby? You made up your system? Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I mean, I have business partners, you know, and I have mentors in this. As I said, like, I wasn't the best about being a participant in the industry, you know, as a shop owner.

32:20So I've— this process of like coming to trade shows and meeting people and talking to people, I've been fortunate to run into some, yeah, some really smart folks and they're willing to help me. And yeah, so it's been very, very, very, very rewarding. Like it's been nice to, yeah, stay, you know, actually do, like I felt I learned a lot and, you know, and be able to keep using that knowledge.

32:51And then you could say, yeah, I had the shop for 10 years, so it's not like, He's like, you don't know anything about me. I do. No, that's— I do. And I was winning. And then— and you were winning at some— I guess at some point you never really lost. You just got out while you're on top. I got— I mean, it's— it was the wholesale story is there was an offer and I had a 50/50 business partner.

33:14So we got approached by somebody and they made an offer. And I had a business partner who said, I want to take it. And I was like, you know, I was like, okay. Oh, you had a business partner? I had a business partner. I've heard nightmares about that stuff. I know that comes up a lot. Yeah. On, on this stuff. Um, and I have to keep my mouth shut.

33:34Okay. Um, because like, that wasn't my— that wasn't your experience. That wasn't my experience. Um, and I understand, like, I do understand people's logic, like how it, how it can go bad. Yep. You know, fast. Um, but, and I guess we did do the things that people say, like, if you're gonna have a partner, like, have everything laid out. Don't just get a case of beer.

33:56Yeah, yeah, like, make, make it all so, like, um, really official. Official. And he had no, like, he, I mean, he was the money guy. Okay. You know, he was the guy, like, uh, uh, and had no interest, didn't even live near us, you know, lived a few hours away, like, so So there was some of that that like, I guess made it— It's probably easier not to have both people.

34:20Right. There all the time. Yeah, 2 chiefs there in the shop all the time. But you know, like that was part of my motivation too. I mean, not just 'cause like obviously I felt like I had to like reward the investor in any way, but like that was a motivator for me. Like when I like, you know, being scared was definitely a motivator and like being like scared of disappointing him was a motivator.

34:44But it was also like, I guess I would turn it a little bit around, which is like, I really wanted to do right by him, you know? Like it was a positive side of having a business partner. Like I like wanted to do well for myself or whatever, but like I was driving some, you know, it's a little bit of ego, like some ego and from feeling like I could make his money grow, you know?

35:09Like, yeah, he got his return on investment. Yeah. Like I, like, Uh, like there was a little bit of ego. So you can go back to him and say, hey, got another part for you. Yeah, yeah, look at this. Yeah, you know, so that's good. I mean, the fact that he, he still won. Buzzy won. Yeah, yeah. But it wasn't— yeah, it was very unexpected, I guess I would say.

35:25Like, I was— I thought I was going to be running those. I thought maybe, I don't know, at the time, even though the second— yeah, I was starting to look at the third one like right as the second one opened, and then that got nixed. Okay. Uh, because 'Cause the second one wasn't, you know, like I told you, didn't do so hot, did fine.

35:45And, but yeah, at every stage I was like, this is what I'm gonna keep doing forever. You know what I mean? Like I didn't expect to be out of it after 10 years. That's still a long time. Yeah, yeah. What do they say it takes how long before business is profitable? Is it 3 years? I don't know. I don't know statistics. Yeah, a lot of them never are, right?

36:06A lot of them never are. And I don't even think they know. They don't know that they are. Yeah, they just— as long as money's in the bank. Yeah, then I'm good. Yeah, that's fine. But yeah, but yes, it's not software. Say, what do you call it again? Shop Lovers. No, what do you call it? It's not software. Oh, I don't know.

36:24Tech-enabled service. Your tech-enabled service. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Could show them where they stand financially. Yeah, yeah. Open some eyes. Yeah. Make you some small changes or give yourself a pat on the back. Yeah. And it's, you know, it's for all sorts of people. I mean, if you want to grow, if you don't want to grow, like, you know, like we're talking about, it doesn't— like, growth doesn't have to be the, you know, the reason that, you know, you do any of this.

36:48Like, but we do want to make sure that, like, people feel that the money that they spend in this area is contributing to the company. We do think it's something that, like, bigger companies do. Like, they use marketing, they use finance, they use HR as like functions to help you grow a little bit. They're not just like necessary evils. Um, so yeah, for me, account— no, I love my accountant.

37:14She's not evil. She's necessary. Yeah, yeah. But she's not evil, but it's necessary. And yeah, yeah, I'm lucky because I have one that I really respect. Yeah. And that's what it is. I mean, that's so much of it is like the one— the ones that are really doing well. It's great people. But I just wish she did know more for the automotive side of it to help me make other decisions.

37:34And like, she's going to make sure I don't go to jail. Yeah. And the IRS doesn't show up. Yeah. Yeah. And my books are reconciled and all that good stuff. But there's like, I'm pretty sure there's some factors that are missing and that's where people like you come in. And that's what I said. We're not, we're not really accountants. Like, again, I'm sure, you know, someone will get mad at us.

37:52They'll be mad. Don't get mad at me. He's not an accountant. Yeah, I'm not an accountant. We try. You know, it's, we call it operations or financial operations. Like I'm a good bridge between those two. Like, you know, being able to understand like why we need to do it a certain way in the shop, you know, and how that links to what happens with this number in the back office kind of, you know, stuff like, and try to make it painless for people, you know, like painless for your manager, painless for your service advisor to like— painless for me.

38:22Yeah, painless for you. For whomever. Um, and yeah, it's, it's, it's a lot of fun. I mean, the best part is like, uh, again, born and raised on the East Coast, I like going like different places now. I like meeting shop owners. Like, no, you just said you just got back from Spain. Are you going to Spain? So we're on a boondoggle.

38:41Uh, we're a bit of a boondoggle. He's on a boondoggle. I'm on a boondoggle. My wife was very supportive, you know, of us, um, or me When we were getting the shops, that was a lot of my ego. Like, I wanted to do that. She's raising the kids, this sort of stuff. So she had an opportunity now for her career now that she's back to working where they let her live in Spain or asked her to move to Spain.

39:09And I said, sure, let's do it. Oh, cool. So yeah, we're on a boondoggle. We're out there. Please tell everybody what a boondoggle is. You know what a boondoggle is. No, I don't. Come on. From North Carolina, you never been on a boondoggle? A boondoggle just means like a, like a, like a, just a, you just wandering out, not really sure like what, what's going on, but it's not permanent, right?

39:29You know, it's like, it's, um, you know, an adventure. I'm on an adventure. I'm on an adventure. Okay. Yeah, yeah. It's, it's an adventure that like, uh, it's been fun. Kids are young, like it's cool. Um, they're, you know, figuring stuff out. Um, but yeah, I mean, I'm only would come back Um, spend a lot of time, uh, in the US, obviously.

39:50Um, get to go all around the country, like get to go places like I'd never been before. Right. Um, like it's more, it's more fun for me now. Like I get to go, I don't know, go got a guy that we work with in Iowa and it's like, like that, I don't know, something about like going to Iowa right now feels a lot more exciting than it did when I was living in Virginia.

40:08Yeah. Does that make sense? Yeah. Go get some potatoes. Yeah. I don't know. You know, but it's like I've never had a reason to go to Iowa before and I like, I don't know. Because they didn't have But now you're just like, oh, I want to go see it. Yeah, I want to go see it. I want to see what's going on.

40:20Um, and check. Yeah, been there. Yeah. And like, the part about the boondoggle is it definitely— like, I love America, you know? Like, it's been a good, you know, uh, that's been one of the side effects is like, America's awesome. America's beautiful. Like, you come back home and you're just like, yeah, yeah, I like it here. Yeah, I like it here. Because I'm just thinking, oh wow, he lives in Spain.

40:39But I'm just like, which is fun too. It's cool. Yeah, it's cool. But it's not home. It's not home. It's not home. And like, and it's like that classic, like, you know, You don't have— you don't know what you got until, you know, until it's gone. Yeah, kind of thing. Like there's no KFC, there's no Bojangles. But just like, like, yeah, America's massive.

40:55It's beautiful. And it's so many— there's so many places right here in America that I've never been to. Right. You know, and like, yeah, you know, it's— yeah, it's the girl that you've been with forever and you're underappreciating her a little bit. So you can boondoggle together. Been boondoggling. Boondoggle. Yeah. I mean, there's boondoggle. So my other favorite word is jabroni. You know jabroni?

41:17No. You never heard? Well, come on, like someone said jabroni. Uh, how about a jalopy? No, you have to tell me what a jabroni is. A jabroni is like, I mean, anyone who's ever watched— you never watched any wrestling? The Rock? Anything? Um, yeah, The Rock was when I was like 20, so I was over with wrestling. Yeah, yeah, I'm really— I mean, that's what— that was what he would call— yeah, that's what he would call the people that he's about to wrestle.

41:39You jabroni. So it's still like a, you know, yeah, the only reason I looked at The Rock is because he was fine. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, he still looks good. Yeah. Um, no, it just means like you're a dumbass or an idiot, or it's kind of like, yeah, he's a jabroni. He's a, he's a, he's a, he's a jabroni. He's a fool.

41:55You can't just say you're a dumbass. Yeah, he's a fool. He's a fool. Uh, and jalopy, that's an old raggedy car. Yeah, yeah. So, okay, we would say we'd have a lot of jabronis bringing in jalopies, you know, to the shop. Uh, and they're out here boondoggling. Yeah, this jabroni's been on a boondoggle. Now I gotta is jalopy. And it's— this is going left.

42:19Makes perfect sense. I understand exactly what I'm saying. Oh my goodness. I know exactly what I'm saying. I have no idea what you're saying. Like I said something at Vision and what did I say? Oh my goodness. That's what's up. That's what's up. That's what's up. And it ran her crazy. And so every now and again I'll text her and say, that's what's up.

42:38That's what's up. Yeah, that's what's up. We're going on a boondoggle in our jalopy with some Some jabronis in it. No, but I mean, you know, like, so life is good. Yeah, life's good. Business is good. You're teaching and coaching. Teaching, coaching, working with guys. Um, but yeah, and, uh, I thought, you know, this event's been really nice. Uh, oh, they did a great job here.

42:58They did a great job here. And this is the first time. Yeah. And I told Sunil, I'm pretty sure this cost $1.8 billion, right, to put this on. It was fancy, man. It's fancy. It's fancy. You know, somebody complained about the lemonade. You hear about that? Somebody went on social media complaining about the lemonade as if there were not sugar packets right inside it.

43:17Oh, that it wasn't sweet enough? That it wasn't sweet enough. Come on. That was like, I mean, so I remember, grew up in New York, went to college in North Carolina. You had sweet tea and you died. I had never heard of it. There's 2 things like, yeah, talk about people using weird, you know, So, yeah, the guy, he was on my hall in college and he's like, first night, dude from, I don't know, somewhere deep in Georgia.

43:44So he had that really strong accent. Yeah. So we go out to the restaurant and he ordered sweet tea. Some sweet tea. Some sweet tea. I was like, what the hell is that? And no, that's way too sweet. Yeah, but I love them both. I can drink unsweetened tea, but sweet tea, it will take you out sometimes. You just need some water with it because no.

44:02Yeah. And then the other, the other thing that drove me insane about the way he would order drinks was he doesn't order soda. He orders a Coke. He's like, I want a Coke. Yeah. He's like, I want a Coke. And they'd be like, what kind of Coke? He'd say Sprite. I was like, no, no, no, no. You wanted a pop, didn't you?

44:19Yeah. I say soda. Okay. You do say soda. I say soda. I say soda. Soda is a Sprite. Yeah. Yeah. Coke. Pepsi is not soda. Yeah. Well, it's just syrup like they use. And again, I mean, he's from Georgia. Like Coke is based there or whatever, but like Coke was the word for pop, was the word for soda. Like when people say khakis and khaki is actually a color, not a pair of pants.

44:36Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah. So he would joke with me and say, can I get a Coke? What kind of Coke do you want? A Sprite. Yeah, I haven't been that— I mean, I didn't grow up that deep in the South, but I understand. Yeah, yeah. Okay. I can relate. You can relate. You can relate. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So you boondoggling, building, teaching.

44:53What's next? What's next for you? No, we keep going with this. I mean, it's been, you know, Keep working on Shop Levers. Really excited about it. Like, I've been really fortunate to work with some awesome, awesome people and companies, you know. We were talking a little bit, like, anybody who pretends that the average small business in America is not like a complete shit show is lying.

45:20I got the best shit show in the world. Yeah, yeah. But yeah, I mean, it goes back to what we were talking about, like social media. Yeah, social media will mess you up. Yeah, like, you know, everything. But like, there's a, there's a lot of work, uh, to be done to like help, uh, to try and make it a little less shit showy.

45:35Um, and that's, yeah, that's where, that's where we'll be, you know. Yeah, if people show up for training and know that it's available and it doesn't, it, it doesn't cost as much as you think it costs. No, not training costs you a lot of money. Like, could you imagine where you would be if you knew and were open to training in that first couple years of having your shop?

45:58I mean, God, yeah. A lot, lot different places. Right. So it's so important. And I know I preach it about every podcast, but it made such a big difference in my life. And when did you start? I started, well, you know, I was on my own when my father retired and that was 10 years ago. Okay. But I grew up in the shop.

46:16Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I watched him like, Daddy didn't do a lot of training. It wasn't a lot of this for the collision industry. Right, right. And I mean, and, uh, so he does say, he's like, I wish we had all the stuff that you guys had. Well, so we've got the internet. The internet can be a mean place, but it also can be a source of so much information.

46:34For sure. Even Facebook can be a source of information if you find the right connections. Yeah, yeah. But you know, you can get in there and then there are people just being idiots because they can. Yeah. Um, and they can get away with it because you can't reach them through the phone. Right, right, right. And so there's a lot of negativity, but then there's a lot of little bright lights in there also.

46:48There are. Yeah. So I try to be a bright light. Yeah. With humor. Yeah. And like you said, it's not— being a business owner is not— you do not get to clock out. No. Eventually. I mean, like where I am versus where I was 10 years ago, 2 different places. Right. Before, I probably worked 18 hours a day. Yeah. You know, I brought the kids to school.

47:06I mean, to work with me. I did 7 days a week. I was telling all the customers yes. I had an ARO that was sucky. I didn't know my value, didn't know how to price. I didn't believe in marking up parts because I was just scared. Yeah. So I was just running around owning a shop with fear. Yeah, I didn't have any numbers to back it up.

47:22I didn't know where I was at. I had to check my checking accounts, like, okay, yeah, okay, okay. Um, but as I was more open to coaching, right, um, actually didn't start with coaching. It started with Facebook. It started with the ASOC group with Lucas Underwood, just being there and being a mouse. I didn't say anything, didn't say much. Yeah, yeah, yeah, just looking, looking, reading other people's questions, looking at the answers, like, oh, oh, So other people have these problems.

47:45Yeah, see, hearing someone else ask that question is like— Yeah, you're like, okay, I'm not crazy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right. So like other people have these problems and I'm not alone and I could— there's a different way. Right. Is there? Yeah. I'm interested. I'm interested. And then being open to it. Right. Being open to different ways to run the shop. And like being, learning that people will actually help you.

48:05Yeah. What? People will actually help you and they're just not going to run over you? Yeah, they did. Yeah. And I'm just thinking and I can laugh about this now, but I just thought Lucas Underwood was like so cool. He's not. He's not that damn cool. I don't know. Lucas, you're very cool. I've never met you. But it just brought me into the coaching arena.

48:25Right. And then I got to sample different classes and then say, oh, and like they say, if you can just take one thing back to your company and implement that, Yep, your coaching is going to pay, your conference is going to pay for itself, right? But if you implement 2, 3, 4, right, it's definitely going to pay for itself. For sure. And then it'll give you the peace of mind knowing that you're not alone.

48:49Yeah. Um, you're not crazy, as crazy as you thought. Yeah. And, um, you can get past it. Yeah. Like we're talking, I know what it feels like to run into your office and, um, feel like you have to be at the front desk, but you got to go check in this part. But then this is happening and that's happening. And then I have a kid with a cold in the background.

49:10And when the shop closes at 5:30 and he's got practice at 6. Yeah, but I still got work to do. Yeah. And I'm a mommy doing all of that. You had your wife at home. She's probably like, if he don't bring his ass home and come get this snotty-nosed kid, I am tired. Yeah. So I get it. And I do still. And I'm glad that I still remember that and I never want want that to— that memory to be lost because I always want to respect where I've come from, right, and how I got out of that.

49:38Yeah. But I just have a new level of devils now. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So yeah, I got a new level of problems, but that's going to be anything you do, right? What, business ownership? Being self-employed? Yeah, that is for crazy people. That's for crazy people. You know, there's no other way to do it. And I like being crazy. I like being crazy.

49:55So it's fun. There's nothing like it. Yeah. And there's also nothing like it. Yeah. But yeah, I hate when people act otherwise. Yeah. That's, that's the worst part. Because again, I love, it's part of the game. It's part of the fun for me. Yeah. Like it, it is like, that's the thing. Um, if I'm not learning something, right? I mean, for me in the shops, honestly, like, like learning about cars.

50:16Yeah. Uh, was like one of the things that I most enjoyed. Yeah. I, I will creep up on a tech and he's like, what are you doing? I just wanna see. Yeah. I just, you know, like that kept me like really, really engaged. Like, Like, you know, I probably should have been more time learning how to like sell. Yeah. You know, and like how to do— I wanna see what this is.

50:33Yeah. How to do the counter stuff. Yeah. But yeah, any, any kind of learning, you know? So like that's where it never stops. Like there's always like the next thing. And it never stops. Yeah. And even with the business owners, you know, everybody say roller coaster ride. So if everybody's always winning and they're lying, 'cause they're not always winning. Yeah. They're always winning.

50:50And you think about the roller coaster, that means you're going up the whole time. Right. That's just boring. I mean, like, you're just going up. Yeah, yeah. The fun part is when you go up. Yeah, yeah. You go down and you go. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You like. I lived. Oh my God. I lived. Oh my God. Let's ride it again. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

51:07Yeah, cause you're like when you go up and then you go down that dip, you you're gonna piss on yourself sometime if you're not strong enough. But then when you get down, you're just like ah, just like oh, and then you go up again. Right. And then it's a twist, and then you go up, and this and whatever. And you get addicted to it.

51:20You get addicted to it. Yeah, people get addicted. Yeah, and so that's what business ownership is. Yeah, yeah, for sure. That's beautiful. I've never actually— roller coaster. I just made that up. Did you? I'm gonna copyright that. Yeah, write that down. Do not use that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You should. It's recorded. Yeah. But yeah, that's what it is. It's fun.

51:36It's a roller coaster. Um, I still cry. Maybe I just still sit there. I do have to find the happy songs. I'm like, okay, I'm gonna go find my happy song because I almost killed 2.3 people today. Right, right. Um, and then I get ready for the next day full of fun. Yeah. Adventures and blessings and curses. And it, yeah, it's tough.

51:56Like, I mean, the biggest thing that happened for me, like, that I'm not proud of is just becoming like so jaded about customers. Mm-hmm. Um, you, you know, like, they're not that bad. They're, they're not. But I became like, they became a little like, you see 'em, you, yeah. Like when, when it started, like that was part of the premise is I was like, yeah, we know what the, like we all know what the reputation of automotive of is.

52:16So like, it's not rocket science. Go in there and take care of the people, and like, you should be— people are peopley, man. Yeah. Oh my God, you know. And so that was the part that I wasn't proud of. Like, oh, you know, so that's the thing that I love. I like, like, self-correcting. I like correcting people, and I'm really good at it.

52:32Okay. But the numbers, you know, like, you customer can tell me something and I can just— you get down. No, I struggle. Let's, um, let's talk about this. I I do understand why you think this as a consumer, but, um, no, no. But I can do this for you. Will this work for you? Oh my God, I love it. I love it.

52:51The people that ran our body shop were our former tenants. She would say, could you come help me? I was like, yeah, I'd love to. Yes, ma'am. Mad? I know you're mad. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. That was amazing. Yeah, you know, I'm so sorry, but you're safe. You didn't get hurt in the accident. Yeah, God has blessed you. And I know the commercial has you thinking your car is going to be done in 3 days.

53:10It's not. You're going to be done here in 30 days. And you hollering at us is not going to make it get done any faster. Actually, we move slower when people are mean to us. And that makes a joke. I'll tell people, I'm going to charge you more if you keep asking me the same question. So the answer is no. And humor always.

53:26Like, I got to charge you. But I get scared to use humor in those sorts of— But that's part of my personality. I'm not sarcastic, but I wouldn't do it with a customer. Customer. Oh, I will. Yeah, because I can do it. I can smile and they're just like, okay, she cussing me out. Yes, I am. Yes, I am. Yeah, this lady, she's like, oh, I keep calling the dealership to buy this car.

53:42I was like, because you keep asking them the same question, right? I don't want to talk to you anymore. No. She said she won't answer the phone. I was like, because you've been saying the same thing for a year. She said, I didn't think about it that way. I was like, yeah, the car's not gonna get any better. You know, fix it, yes or no?

53:55Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh no, this is good. Yeah, it's, it's nice. Life is good. Yeah, yeah, it's, it's good. It is like you got to keep perspective that you are not your business. But that was like, you know, that was, um, not something I was so good at. Well, for, for sure. But you're getting better at that. You get better at that.

54:14You definitely get better at that every day. Yeah, 1% better. Yeah. Um, but like those early Google reviews and stuff. Yeah, yeah. Google reviews, I love to answer them, especially a bad one. No, I'm so sick of Google reviews. I love them. Oh my God. Yeah, I had a lady went on Nextdoor and she just threw us under the bus because our oil change was too high.

54:30And I was like, no, it's too high for you. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But we're not the cheapest, but we're def— we're not the most expensive, we're definitely not the cheapest. And if we're not the place for you, that's okay. That's okay. That just kind of makes her feel small because she can't afford it. Right. But it also values my employees and what we have.

54:46And I'm not going to— just because you went to the internet to attack me, to attack you, we're not going to do that. You've never been in my doors before. And for you to come and do this on the internet, what do you— how does that make you correct? Right. And she did. And she said, well, I did my research. You do seem to be a good shop and blah, blah, blah.

55:04She apologized in the thread. Yeah, she apologized. And I And I was like, love you, bye. Yeah. And I canceled her appointment. Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because you're gonna need me because you're gonna go to take 5 and they're gonna take 10 and they're gonna take 15 and then they're gonna take off your, um, drain plug and they're not gonna be able to put it back on because I put it on at an angle and you're gonna have to come see me.

55:21And I'm gonna remember your name, baby. Yeah, take off your panties. And then you're gonna wish you paid me for your oil change. No, I, uh, totally. Yeah, um, it's, uh, you It's amazing to watch you work, you know, in that regard. Like, I mean, that's like really, really— But you're gonna be able to work like that in this, in short clips.

55:41Yeah, yeah, you get there, you know, for sure. Like, this is, um, uh, some— I mean, it's questions of confidence and these sorts of things. But, um, I mean, I'm just the sort of like, like, I feel at all times a need to like prove my value. I don't know. Like, well, I don't see it. Yeah. So that's the story you're telling yourself.

56:03Okay. Because when you're in front of the class the other day, you control the chaos because people were asking questions and they got you off subject. But I did not. I did not think that this would be the subject of our conversation. So that is your— that's how you see yourself in the mirror, but that's not how I'll see you. Okay. And we don't see ourselves— think about, okay, old school answering machine, right?

56:23Sure. Um, when you leave a voicemail and you listen to yourself on the voicemail, I hate my own voice. Oh my God, I don't— there's no way listen to this podcast, right? I haven't. I really— I listened to the one with my dad, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I hate my own voice, right? But that's me being hard on me. Sure. So you're being hard on yourself because you want to be better.

56:43Yeah, yeah. But I don't see you that way, if that makes a difference. Well, it does. I appreciate that. So tell the people how we can, um, get in touch with you if they're interested in Shop Levers. Yep. It's not Leavers, Lever. I say Levers, Leavers, whatever, you know, people, you know, Anders, Anders, whatever, you know, it doesn't matter. Yeah. shoplevers.com, anders@shoplevers.com.

57:03You know, call my cell phone, whatever. Like, you know, it's— we're— call me on my cell phone. Yeah. You know, don't— operators are standing by. And what is that number? 914-610-9982. I love it. Yeah. And yeah, you get a rotisserie. You get a rotisserie. Yeah. And then— or a sham one. A ShamWow and a George Foreman grill. And a George Foreman grill.

57:31Yeah, yeah, yeah. RIP George. Oh man, this is fun. This is fun. All right, well, we'll talk again. Thank you. Downshift with Tanika is where we slow down long enough to have real conversations, hosted by myself, second-generation shop owner Tanika Haynes. This goes beyond your car count, your KPIs. We want to talk about leadership, legacy, mindset, and the messy, beautiful journey of building something that lasts.

57:58You will hear stories from shop owners, technicians, and other industry leaders who are figuring it all out by themselves in real time. This is a space for growth, tough love, laughter, and leveling up.