SDR 320: From Quick Lube Tech to Master Tech: The Blueprint for Fixed Ops Success

Today we're going to talk about how to take a quick lube tech to a master tech. It's a fascinating conversation that Christian and I have about it. You'll. I guarantee you're going to take away at least three or four ideas that are going to inspire you. Then we, we talk about the fact that it's the summer of fixed stops for all kinds of reasons and much, much more. Coming up on this edition of Service Drive Rev. We are in the dawn of a fixed ops revolution. It is time for fixed ops. Never before has fixed ops been more important.

Vital.

Vital. And what's funny is, so car sales are down, but people driving is up.

Isn't that confusing?

People are driving everywhere this summer.

Yeah, that's what I heard.

It's an all time record. And I don't know if that has to do with gas prices or just because flying is up too. It's not like people flying is down because sometimes that happens in the economy where they. People are like, I can't. We can't afford to fly. But we'll just drive. They're both up. Like people are just moving around. People want to go.

Yeah. It's been a while since I've been on an empty plane. Like where there was a bunch of seats. Almost everyone I get on is. It says this is a completely full flight kind of thing. Are you seeing that same thing when you're traveling?

Yeah. And knock on wood, all my flights have been on time. I haven't been on a delayed flight in the last like six flights.

Who you fly in? Alaska?

Delta.

Delta's really done you right.

Alaska. Unless I have to.

Okay. Too close to American.

Well, in. Nobody cares about this, but in Washington, the Delta. Not only is Delta just better, but the gates are next to the door. Alaska has so many gates in Seattle that you could end up on one of those islands where you have to catch the airport.

Yeah. The subway system thing or whatever it is.

Yeah. Which I hate. So Delta, you're just right there and it's right by the subway. Sub pop shop.

Yeah. Which is a cool little place.

Yeah. Inside of the Seattle airport they have a sub pop record store where you can buy vinyl and merch and all kinds of stuff.

I was gonna say their vinyl collection's pretty good, but yeah. You know, you say that nobody cares about this, but you know what? The first thing somebody will. When I see someone in public, they're gonna be like, hey, so I've been to that Delta terminal. It is really nice. Like, we'll talk about to transform your service department. The things you think they don't care about, they care about.

Well, I care about it. I. I always try to go in there and buy a vinyl or something. It's interesting. Yeah. So in. You know the thing that's funny too about the driving thing is you were doing a thing every summer where you would rent an rv.

Yep.

And then drive around. You went. Did you go to Wyoming?

Yep. So I did Yellowstone.

So you. Your son. You and your. And your now wife but at the time Fiona. Girlfriend.

Girlfriend.

Yeah. Would do it. And so where'd you go? Wyoming.

So we did Yellowstone before we did the Grand Canyon and we did Sequoia.

And then one of those trips you came up to Washington to the lake.

And then last summer we came up that way to. That was the fourth trip was coming up to see you.

So that one didn't count.

No, it counts.

But you.

Well, you said Wyoming. Yeah. Also went to Washington through Oregon.

We have to. Yeah. Unless you're on. You have to go through Oregon.

I have geographically anyway challenged.

So I was always really impressed that you would do that. But also like that to me is a nightmare.

I don't know that when it comes to like the travel and that kind of stuff that we could be further polar opposites. I feel like everything. A lot of the things that I like are like they're big no no's for you. I've learned that throughout the years in.

Me asking you about this. It isn't just that you're also doing an influence on what you're doing is you're parenting.

Yes.

So that does play a role in. It is you're trying to create experiences for him. It's not just about you because let's just say you didn't have a kid. You might not do it or you might not do it as consistently for that for sure.

And I would be more apt to fly.

But I got to say if I kid I wouldn't do it.

I know you would.

I wouldn't have anything to do with it. I wouldn't want my kids to want to do it.

Yeah.

I. Well, the worst scenario would be if I did that in the My kid was like can we do that again?

No, no, we can't.

I created a monster.

But I really do like the. And I don't know how to. I'm sure there's other ways to do this without the pain of the road trip travel. Like I like the no electronics time. I like the kind of having the conversations and doing I'M probably just reliving my youth a little bit. Like doing the thing where no air conditioning. You just know we do, we do air conditioning, but, but like the license plate game where you try to see if you can find license plates from all 50 states and then trying to guess the capitals and like, we're. It's like a little education, but with a little bit of bonding and all that stuff. And I do kind of go into that thing is, when he's 30, what is he going to look back on? So I'm trying to like, create those moments for him now. So if it's a little bit of a pain of me driving 5,000 miles in 10 days, I'm willing to do that.

Yeah. So my, my idea of travel or the way that my mind works is like, I'm like, okay, I'm going to Wyoming. I don't think, like, okay, how can I take the longest path to get there? And also, so there's that, like, I think, like, I, I think Wyoming is like, what, an hour and a half, two hour flight? It's pretty quick.

Yeah. Maybe two or three.

How many days does it take to drive there?

It'll take me. It takes me two or three days to get there. Yeah.

I don't think like, hey, I want to go to Wyoming. Let's see if I could take two or three days to get there. I just want to get there. So that's the first part of this. The second part of that is when I'm there, I don't want to stay in an rv. I want to stay in a hotel. Like, so the, the accommodations and the travel both are just polar opposite. I don't know. With the one I'm thinking efficiency and then the other one I'm thinking comfort.

Yeah.

Yeah. It's not my thing at all.

Yeah.

I'm not a camper.

Your logic, your logic is noted. Like, it's not wrong. That, that why take three days to get somewhere you can get in two hours? Doesn't make any sense. Is. Is I voice it to you. So. Yeah, you're not wrong.

Yeah. And then also, if I was gonna go on a road trip, I like the kind of road trips where you don't have to be anywhere. Like, you can, you know, like, you roll into a town, you're like, oh, hey, I'd like to stay here a couple days and just see what it's like here instead of like bombing through all these cool places. And you, like, you never get to experience them because there's so many Cool towns in America that, like, have their own story and their own history. And, like, I'd rather kind of stay in one place and learn about it versus just bombing through.

Yeah. Whereas I have actually planned out my gas stops. Like, it's that bad.

So we're. Yeah, we're a little different when it comes to.

We're a little different. It's okay.

But I do think the parent thing plays into that. Like, that's a great experience for him to have.

Yeah, that's what I keep thinking of. And he's got a pretty bad memory, but he always remembers these trips, so. And I don't know if that's the thing is I've just got to make it so shockingly terrible for him also, like.

Because. Have you been to all 50 states yet?

I'm missing, like, four.

What are the four I'm missing?

Alaska, Maine, Rhode island, and, like, a random one. Arkansas. I've never been to Arkansas.

Clinton. I always think Clinton when you think Arkansas.

But isn't that a weird spot for me not to have been?

Yeah, because it's kind of right there.

Yeah.

But that is one thing that most. Most people don't travel anymore. Especially kids. They don't travel. And, like, in doing what we do, like, you get to see. Oh, I'm so grateful for that part of it here. And Canada. Like, I've seen some of the most incredible parts of Canada. Like, Canada is such a great place.

Didn't you rate Calgary as one of your favorite cities in the world?

It's up there. It's my favorite city in Canada. Yeah, it's. I don't know in the world if it would rake.

I don't know either, because I know. I know that there's a lot of cities in Europe that you like, but you always have talked really highly of.

What'S the greatest city in. In America? It's not even close.

Oh, gosh. New York.

Yeah. Manhattan. There's not there. It's nothing. And then London. Calgary would be Canada. Yeah. But what's your.

Past? London. What's second for you over in Europe?

Barcelona. Yeah, I've been to Barcelona a bunch of times.

And then Rome. You liked or didn't like?

I don't know. Italy's a little. I don't know.

I would say that other than London, by far the next closest city is Barcelona, where you've talked about, like, your experience at Barcelona. There's something rich about the culture and the museums and all the stuff that's.

There that I've never been to. Tokyo. That's on the list.

Didn't that sound fun when Michael was talking about his trip?

Yeah.

Yeah. That's cool. More stuff that we think people don't care about, but yet they might.

You can't drive to Barcelona, though.

Not yet. Not yet. You got to fly amphibious.

It's a long flight, too. Yeah. So we're a little different there. But the good news is more people are thinking like you than me, and people are driving. And when people drive more cars and trucks break more or need more maintenance. But the service and parts departments become very popular in people's lives.

They are going to have captive audiences is what I like to say.

So, you know, any sort of marketing stuff, I'd be like, you know, get ready for your road trip in my marketing and, you know, I would. I would scale up to be ready for drive inside, you know, out of towners, all that.

You know what my favorite thing about that the road trip marketing is that it is applicable to everyone.

Like when it makes them think about the thing that they're looking forward to too.

So it's a stranger and that the vehicle is.

Yeah, you're tying the two together psychologically. It is.

That's my favorite marketing campaign, I think, that we've ever worked with was the vacation one. Do you remember that? It was. Gosh, it must have been 2016 or something like that where we did that thing where we came up with the story in the three sections.

Oh. @ one of our coaching meetings, we had the managers write a three stage email sequence.

Yeah.

Because all they were. Everybody was doing the buy three tires, get one free. And we're like, no, you got to tell a story.

Yep.

And the one that won was a manager from a Nissan store that did a thing on his son's baseball and going to the.

Oh, like a travel thing or something like that. Or that they were going to League.

World Series or whatever.

Okay.

It was great.

I wrote mine on forgetting to pack underwear.

What's in the news.

Okay. So as you kind of foreshadowed earlier, car sales are slowing as that early tariff binge trails off. I don't know if you remember that happening, like, back in March and April. People were kind of like panic buying when the tariffs first got announced. So that is all kind of cooled off and it's affecting, well, you know, a lot of the manufacturers.

I was thinking about this, like, I have friends that are affluent that could afford to buy anything they wanted that aren't buying cars. Like, they're driving their car and keeping it And I don't know what that is because usually they would just get a new one. They wouldn't even think about it. And people are driving their cars longer.

Like, you know what, I even fell into that category too, because I've been leasing for as long as I can remember and I bought this thing. So I'm.

People are changing.

Yeah.

Behaviors are changing.

Well, I thought that mine was also kind of price driven too, that the lease wasn't any cheaper than buying it anyways. So I think that that might be driving the market to change because it used to be that a lease was a wonderful deal like they were. It almost didn't make mathematical sense where you could lease a, you know, $70,000 car for 600 bucks a month or whatever it is. And now it's like you can lease a $70,000 car for $2,000 a month.

There's any correlation between a midlife crisis and leasing a sports car and to now buying an old person car.

It's a lot of stages in a very short amount of time, isn't it?

There's any correlation between the midlife crisis and the sports car.

There might be.

And then leasing. Now you're buying. Marriage is buying, isn't it?

Right. I'm old now.

It's a long term commitment.

Yeah. So. So maybe that's it. Maybe it's me personally in the midlife thingy going on. I didn't feel any different turning 50. Remember you tried to skip 50?

I felt different turning 50.

Did you?

Yeah, I feel 30 and 50, I think were the hardest.

Yeah, I do remember 30. Like 30 felt like in the end of an era for sure.

Feels like 60s on the horizon.

It doesn't. Doesn't feel so old anymore. 50 doesn't feel old. 60 doesn't feel old to me. But I don't know. There's a lot of. There's a lot of things going on that I think that this generation of people is going to live way, way longer than some of the predecessors. Just the way that people look at 50 versus what they looked like at 50, you know, a couple of decades ago.

I'm in these circles with these doctors that are always like, if you can live another five years, you can live forever. And they say that every five years. Yeah. When are you gu to figure it out?

Just hold out a little bit longer. But yeah, so the. So there's definitely a slowdown. Like there was for a while in March, April, we were headed for like kind of almost a record pace in sales that is cooled off significantly in May.

And I think that it's just aren't spending money.

Yeah. From what I heard, you know, just with talking with prospects and clients, that this month feels like a pretty significant slowdown. Then there's definitely like, all things. There's winners and losers. But even in a market that's cooling down, Toyota, Ford, Honda, Hyundai, Kia going up. The rest of the market's going down. Huge cuts from EVs, like a 25% decrease in EVs, and. And hybrid sales are going up. So people are shifting from the electric to the hybrid. So that's happening, which is why you're seeing, like, Toyota, Honda, Ford, because they've all got Hyundai, Kia, all have hybrids.

So that probably has a lot to do with Trump too.

Oh, I think he's affecting the car market in a crazy way, unlike any president I've ever seen.

Drill, baby, drill, drill.

We're gonna drill, baby, drill, he says. So funny. But. But yeah, so. So markets cooling sales, not as much, which will mean people hold on to their cars for a longer period of time, which is just great news for you folks in service and parts. And then the last thing, speaking of.

Service and parts and proof that Fixtops is the star of the show.

Yeah. So I have never seen this before. Maybe if I'm wrong, put it in the chat. If you remember a year that this happening. Automotive News ranked the top 100 dealership groups by service and parts. Have you ever seen this before?

I've seen that. They do the numbers, but I don't remember it being a standalone.

Yeah. So it's its own. It's its own list. And essentially the whole article talks about how this is the. This is the fixed ops. Time to shine. The golden era for fixed ops. The list is kind of interesting to me too, in terms of who's number one. So you know that there's one dealer group in the country that is like 200 dealers ahead of everybody else in terms of dealership count.

Are you talking about autonation?

No, the one above them in dealer count.

Who's that?

Alithia.

Oh.

So it's very interesting to me. They're number one in dealership count. They're number three on this list. But then it started to make sense because I don't know if you remember this from a while back. The Brian DeBoer, I think, is the CEO, and he kind of did a stern message to all the fixed ops managers in the Lithia group that you got to get yourself.

You're gonna get it together. You're gonna get out.

Yeah. There was really shortened to the point.

I thought that was interesting.

Yeah. So. So he shifted his.

It's an interesting thing to do that, too. Like, remember when Bill Parcells would do that in his press conferences where he would call out his players in the press conference? It's a. It's a style.

Well, for him, I feel like it worked for Parcel.

I feel like their problem is they grew too fast.

Oh, yeah.

It's hard to grow that fast and keep everything. Oh.

If you look at, like, their dealer count from 2000 to 2025, it's like a.

Like a.

This.

Yeah. You make compromises when you're growing that fast.

Yeah. So that probably it's. You know, take it for what it's worth. Probably is the right answer to this. But I do like that he's kind of changing his focus to a. To a fix kind of thing. But there was. You know, there's a lot of stores on here in the top 10 that don't have, like, the number eight group is Morgan Automotive, and they have 70 stores, and they're ahead of stores that have, like, where's Van Tile on there? Man, do I wish I had my glasses. What's Van Tile also called. Do they have a different name?

Is it Sonic or Buffett? Bottom. Oh, Berkshire Hathaway.

And that's different than Asbury. Like, I'm so sorry. I don't know the groups, but.

Yeah, so it might not be on there.

Might not be those.

Those lists are only of the people that report.

That's true.

So everybody doesn't report.

So that. Yeah, so they're missing, but you got autonation is the number one in service and parts revenue. Penske is right behind him. Lithia, Hendrick, Asbury, Group 1, Sonic, Morgan. It's a pretty big list, but, yeah, it's fixed ops. Fixed ops. And it's billions and billions of dollars.

Drill, baby, drill.

Drill, baby, drill. Let's do that. So that is. That's the news for today.

So how to get lube techs to become master techs in. The thinking behind this was that we kind of hear that a lot, Right.

Yeah. That there's. There's this gap between, like, the people that have been there 25 years. They're master tax. They're great. Everything like that. And then there's, like, this. Whatever you want to call it, Purgatory. A purgatory area where, like, there should be a lot more B and, like, C + text, but it's like master tech, loop tech, and then there's the, the ravine that's in between. And the, the thing that I keep getting asked, like, how do I fill that gap? Because I think people are feeling that pressure and then they're trying to recruit and all they're getting is people that are. What they would call it, you know, they would say are lube techs, but they're looking for that B, which I think. I don't know what you think, but in today's like, the climate that we're in, I think B and C techs are super valuable.

Yeah.

Just because the way that the cars are built and everything like that, there's not as much brain surgery going on as there used to be. And B and C techs are worth their weight.

And I would say that it should take a year for quick lube tech to become a C tech and not that, you know, two years for them to become a B.

Don't you think that even in that, like, that one statement is that you're better off than 70% of the other stores out there just coming up with, what's the time frame supposed to be like?

Yeah. And I, I would also say that, you know, when, when we come into a store to help turn it around, we're kind of forced to hire techs. We're really good at hiring techs. But that's a, that's a band aid in a sense. If I was running a store, I would probably rarely hire techs. I would be growing my own. And so the real fix long term is to grow your own. Like, you know, we can go in and hire a bunch of techs because nobody's done it for a while. But the truth is, really, you should be growing your own. And so by growing your own, it means that, you know, young kids are coming in and you're holding on to them. They're not leaving. And, you know, a lot of stats in our industry would say that 60% of those kids leave in the first two years because there isn't a plan in place. And nobody quite understands how to move them from a quick loop tech to a master tech. And so we have some ideas here. The, the first one is to have a real career path.

This is something you made fun of me for at one point in time. Do you remember?

Well, yeah. And, you know, credit to the way I think is I would rather win.

Than be right 100 because. Yes.

And so the, the thing that, you know, we learned out in the field is that giving these, these kids a career path. And so one of the Things that would happen with, with them is they would see a shop foreman that had been there a long time. They would say, like, oh, this Guy's been here 25 years. It's. He's not going anywhere. There's no path for me. And so you have to, from day one, you have to show them a path and you have to paint a picture that they, they can grow. And then you have to develop a system that you're touching them along the way. And then you manufacture bumps in the road that are the wins. Right. So it's like every in. In the system that was devised that I made fun of, it's like every three months they're getting a raise and a promotion. And so like you're a quick lube. It's like karate and like you're a yellow belt with three stripes kind of a thing. Like you're. But it keeps them on a path and it gives them something to achieve and they're always seeing progress and it on the other side. And the thing that's lacking more than anything else is it forces the manager to be having these conversations. It forces the manager to pay attention and be involved with them where in most situations, like there's, you know, there's the stall, get to work, and there isn't this personal attention or involvement or focus on their career. And so more than anything is it's showing the younger, you know, quick lube tech a career path. But it's creating a system where the manager has to be involved and be active and intentional in that. And that's a win win. Right. When the, when the manager and the employee both share a common goal and a common interest. And so this kind of forces that. Right.

I love that.

What was it? I don't know. Last time I looked, was it 17 different stages we have in that?

Yeah, there might be more than that, but I want to say that there was. There was nine or ten just within like that express level, like that Lube tech level, there was nine or ten. It might be 17. And it works.

Yeah, no, it work. It. It's a complete 180 as far as turnover, as far as, you know, loyalty. And the other thing too is they want to learn then like they want to get better because they're vested in a career path. And when you're vested in a career path, you want to, you know, buy more tools, learn more stuff. It's, you know, it, it's a win win on all sides. Do you.

Or would you. When you have like that focus on the grow your own. And like that this person, when you're kind of bringing them in, they're going to be someone in eight to 10 years that's still on your team. How would you interview for that? Like, is there anything that. Because I would guess you would ask questions different than our listeners. Like when you're thinking about bringing that person onto your team, that not just to change oil and do tires, but you're thinking that big, long career thing. Would you interview any differently?

Yeah, well, I would say that the thing that you do different there is you're selling them on a career path from day one and seeing how they respond. But as the, as the leader you have, you have to implant the future. Like, you have to talk to their future self, right?

Yeah.

And so, you know, things that we've learned over the years in that too, and I think that's a great question is like, if you hire somebody from out of town, most of the time they'll end up moving back home. So you want to hire local. You want to be involved locally. Right. Because they usually end up going home. Boys usually end up going home to mom. In a sense, we had that so.

Much in Chicago because we had that big UTI school right by where I worked. And we interviewed a lot of those kids. And I kind of. You are so right. They went back to Montana, they went back to Wisconsin, and it felt really good when they came in. But the homesickness is real. It's. That's a really good point. So hire the local talent. And then, man, hiring for the future self, that's such a big thing. That's really about you kind of seeing their full potential. Right. Even if they don't.

Well, you want to tell some sort of story in there. And you know, we've kind of talked about this before, but in just a good example of this, and I, I think anymore, there's great examples of this, and we have clients that do a great job with this. But Enterprise Rent a Car, like when, when they used to do job fairs is they would have these young kids come in and they would, they would say, like, hey, you know, this is, this is how we work. And just so you know, the CEO of the company started where you're going to start. And so anybody that comes in there is thinking, well, if I work hard, maybe I don't make CEO, but I could be a branch manager. I could be like, it's already embedded in their head because of the story that they've been told about the company at the very Beginning. And so you got to have a story about somebody who started it, you know, the ground level and moved up. And then along with that story, when you're interviewing them, you want to talk about the stuff that matters. Like they, you know, they got married, they bought a house, they have kids. Like, whatever it is, like, that represents progress and freedom. You want to tell that as a part of that story, too, but you want to implant that as the road map, because people follow maps. Like, if you, if you implant a map, they will follow that map. And I don't mean to get too deep into psychology, but it's just a part of it. And then the. But a map that is a story is twice as effective because we think in stories. So. And it's just what enterprise did. Right. They just talked about.

I thought it was so brilliant when you told that story that was good. I also think that, like, there's a huge lesson here is that, like, the story starts at the interview. We think about, like, the, you know, bringing people into our family. Like, it starts on the hiring. It doesn't. It starts on the interview from that moment forward. That was a.

When you can tell in the interview, right. If you're telling that story and then you qualify, you're like, you know, tell me about your parents. And, you know, if they're relating to the story, then that's a. That's a person that falls into the. The overall story you're trying to create for the business. And if they're like, you know, I just want to play video games and smoke weed. Probably not. Probably not. The kid. Yeah.

They might not have the ambition, but.

If they get excited and, you know, they, they sit up a little straighter or they become more active in the conversation when you're telling those stories, that. That's something. I mean, it's not everything, but it's something.

It's a. I feel like there's a bunch of kids out there that are responsive to that stuff.

Oh, yeah, it's for sure.

Yeah.

But we're just not good at telling the story.

We're leaving it to them.

And then we sit around and we're like, well, these kids nowadays, and it's like, well, we're the ones in charge. Like, why don't. Why don't we create a scenario where it's a win. Win.

Yeah, I agree with you. All we're doing is making it better for them.

Then the, the next one just goes along with form equals function, in a sense, is if you, if you want to grow technicians the environment and the system that they're functioning in has to breed to that. Right. And so, you know, in most dealerships, you hire a quick lube tech, they go to the quick lube and they're surrounded by quick lube techs. That is not an environment or a form that's going to progress function. It is almost, in a sense, you know, a dead end, really.

The worst is when it's the quick loop building.

Yeah. It's like, let them all fight it out and we'll see who makes it.

Yeah.

But meanwhile, they create their own culture, their own mindset, and none of it is about progress. And none of it has the influence of older, more qualified veteran techs. They're rarely interacting. And so, you know, the, the system that we put in place breeds this in a sense, that we put the quick lube techs in the shop. Not isolated. They're next to and report to a team leader who's a veteran tech who helps them with their inspections. The, that lateral support group gets the work. And so you're teaching them, you know, that, hey, inspection sheets matter. And when you fill out an inspection sheet and the. The work gets okayed, our group benefits from that. You're just teaching them business. Like, this is how capitalism and business works, in a sense is like the system has to be built or designed for the outcome that we want. And if the outcome that we want is, we want, you know, we want to capture whatever opportunity is there on the vehicles that we're working on and we want to grow our own technicians, then the, the system needs to do that. In the quick lube system, the way that most consultants or manufacturers do it is exactly the opposite of that. It doesn't. You don't grow your own. And it, you know, and then the other thing that will happen that, that I've seen and you know, frankly, we've been guilty of this in environments that we have difficult customers that don't, you know, that are just locked into a way of doing things is then it's like, oh, well, we'll hire a tech to oversee the quick loop. But the efficiency drop. It's. You're.

It's just an expense.

Yeah. It's not, it's not a straight line. And they still don't see the benefit of the work in a sense, too, it's, it's. It's more. When you design a quick lube the way that they're designed, it's all about speed and not about quality. And the thing that's rewarded is speed. Not quality.

Yeah. Which. The faster you are, the worse you. Word. The worse it is at the end of the day. I was just talking to somebody today about that and I was like I said the manufacturers, like, at the end of the day, I think that they had intent, they had good intentions. They thought they're listening to the customer. And I explained to him, he's like, well, I can get two people on the car. And I started to talk to him about, like that in itself, like, it's just a. It's a fallacy that two dudes do it faster than one guy. And then the end of the day, what we're missing is that the faster we do the oil change, the more it becomes a commodity. It's just something you're walking into Walmart and buying off a shelf. And like, the further we can get away from that, the better off we are.

Yeah. I would say too, is the faster we do it, the quicker we. We become the constraint. Because you get so busy doing this loss leader that you can't keep up with the volume anyways.

Yeah. And it's almost like. It's almost a punishment if you sell something because you're.

Yeah.

You're. You're missing the dopamine hit of getting harder.

Like the, the form is designed around speed and not around quality and relationships. Yeah.

I never thought about lateral support as a life lesson, but is.

Yeah.

In the environment that you create and that, like you would have people, you aspire. Yeah. That's. It's way more than just turning wrenches.

I mean it too. Just for us as a company, like we were running that system on our back end as far as growing our own coaches and all that, like, it just works like, it works to throw people in the mix, to have them a part of the mix, not to have them isolated and specialized. When they specialize, they become specialized in that. So if you just specialize, then you're just a quick lube tech. And then you don't think there's a career path.

That's right.

And you don't get the influence from the guys that are making really good money, that are making time, you know, because also the other part of it is a quick lube, really most of the time isn't your. Your. Your margins are so thin, even if they're. Most quick lubes run at like 50 efficiency, but even at that, even if you got a quick lube to run at 100 efficiency, it still isn't profitable.

You're not collecting enough per hour for it to make Sense.

Yeah. It has to be about Max, maximizing the opportunity.

Yeah, I agree.

So form equals function. The system is what helps you get the, the quick lube text to masters. Maybe more important than anything, I think. And then the, the other one that we came up with is just having a mentor. Like if you weren't doing lateral support and like there, you know, just say in like a highline dealership or quick lube isn't a thing like BMW, Mercedes, that sort of thing. Having a mentor. And the, you know, the way to do it or the way we do it is you pair a younger tech up with a veteran and you give a veteran an override for the hours that the younger tech flags for 90 days or something like that. But what happens is then the veterans vested in that, that technician and mentoring them and the kid is learning because what the veteran is vested in is their performance.

Yeah.

And what happens is if you give those kids as assistance and you're not keeping track of what they're flagging and the other tech flags all the hours, the kid isn't learning anything. Because we wanted, what we want to condition them to understand is how to make, how to make flat rate. Yeah.

I would say attach their identity to it. Right?

Yeah.

And then I think the thing that you hit that's the most important for this to be successful is the timer. So there's so many times we'll go into a store and I've heard him not just apprentice and I feel like this is almost degrading. They'll be called helpers.

Yeah.

Like talk about not attaching their identity to what they do. Like you just help to make sure this person's doing it.

And a helper also insinuates like, maybe I'll do this or maybe I won't. But it's not a career. A helper is not a career.

Right. So I think that that's a big thing. We have to kind of change the focus. But man, if you put a timer on it and then, and like, like you said, it's a, it's an override. Not like you get everything that this person is because what that person does matters.

Yeah. You know too, I was, I was thinking about this when, when we were recording an episode of Books that changed my life the other day and Rita was on, you know, Rita the photographer?

I think so. Yeah.

Really good looking Swedish kid. He's been in here a couple times taking pictures.

I'm sure, I'm sure.

So he, he came on and he was talking about how growing up in. In Europe, the way that their education system works is that you only go to 9th grade, then in. In basically in 10th grade, you're going to vocational school.

Oh, you got to make a choice.

And so he picked architecture. And then you go to school for a little while. But the, you know, year two, three and four and half of year one, I think the way I understood it is you're working, being mentored, and so you're an apprentice, and then you're being taught by actual people in the field. You're working in an architecture firm. That's your schooling, is you're working in the business. You're not sitting in a classroom from four years. Like, I don't know how many times I. I've sat with a doctor or a lawyer or people that have these degrees that went to college for, you know, six years, and they're sitting there and they're like, nobody taught me how to run a business. I learned how to be a doctor, but I don't know how to run a business or a dentist. Right. And we don't, you know, it's. It's an odd thing that we make kids go to school until 12th grade. The education that we're giving kids ranks us like, I don't know, really low.

In the world, not even close to the top.

And we're spending all this money on schools that isn't getting us any results. And we don't have kids going into vocations because they don't want to be techs. They don't want to be all these different things. I really think an overhaul of our education system and having kids, you know, being apprentice and mentored in different lines of work is a way better use of their education than sitting in a classroom with somebody teaching them about a subject because that's the thing they needed to teach, not because it's the subject you're an expert at.

Yes. Someone came up with a curriculum that had to be done that nothing.

So asked backwards the way we do it. And, you know, what brought us into that conversation was like, they, like Sweden, and those countries are always ranked the happiest. Like, people are the happiest. And so I was asking him about that, like, why living in America, why are we always, you know, ranked as one of the unhappiest countries, even though we're one of the most, maybe the most powerful country in the world, but we can't educate our kids anymore. At one time, we were really good at education.

Yeah.

Like, we. And we valued it. We valued schoolteachers we valued police. Like that's all, you know, been flipped upside down and hence our, you know, anxiety and how miserable we are for the most part. But I thought that was really interesting and I think that just goes to what we're talking about with this is like, you know, thinking about it in a different way to get an outcome or even what I said earlier is I'd rather win than be right. Right. Like I thought it was goofy to have all these different promotions for quick lube text. I'm like, I'm a quick lube plus plus. I just thought that was goofy. But it works. And so if it works now, I don't think it's goofy anymore. Now I think it's cool.

And what else could we do to it? Because I feel like that was another thing is when you, when you saw that it was working, then you gave us a couple of suggestions that made that even better. Like I. You might have added a couple of rungs to the ladder yourself just to do that.

Well, I just embraced it once it was working.

Yeah, that's what I'm saying is. Is. Is it.

Just try to understand if it works.

Then try to make the best of it. Right. So I was just thinking about as you're talking about the Europe thing, like, I bet the statistics on take rate for career choice from 15 year olds is better than 18 year olds coming out of our system and then going to college and trying to choose a major. I bet it's infinite.

Let me say another thing about Rito too. Is he an architect?

No, no.

But he talks about that education in that time is like incredible. Like he was working in a business, learning. And at the end, once he got his degree and he graduated, he, he's like, yeah, I don't want to be an architect. But he saw it through and ends up like architecture applies to everything. And it applies to photography, design, like all kinds of stuff. It's all connected in a sense. And like even like with the. My sister in law who's in college, she didn't know what she wanted to do. So I was like, just get your business degree. Like you can apply that to anything. And you can flip too if you decide you want to be a doctor, you decide you want to do something else. But you'll never regret learning about business because it applies to everything, anything you want in life. And so, you know, imagine you go and you know, in ninth grade you decide you're going to be a technician and you work for four years and then you decide you Want to do something else. You still have this experience and this knowledge that applies to everything because you've mastered something.

Yeah.

It raises your self esteem.

Yes. It's the self esteem of mastery of something. Right. Like, so we, we get these kids out of high school and they're, they're masters of none. Right now I do like, I'm a huge, I feel like we've gone way off the reservation here, but it's okay. So I feel like, like STEM is headed the right direction. Right. Like where it's like a science, technology, math, like a really strong focus and you come out of that thing where those are like your main, your main like competencies. But I do, I agree with whether it's with technicians, advisors, kids, like let's get them a mastery of something and let's see where we can go.

Yeah. So number one is having a career path and selling it from the very, very beginning. Having an outline, show it to them. Having lots of little wins along the way. So they, they're progressing. Number two is the system has to drive it. Form equals function. And then the third one is having a, having a mentor. But if it, you know, if, if it was me, I would grow my own. I would never be hiring techs. And I, you know, I say that from a perspective of we're really good at hiring techs. And the first thing we do when we go into a service department is hire techs because you need, you know, you need additional production to increase sales no matter what. But it's a, it's a fix. It's a band aid. A short term band aid, not a long term solution. Yep. And it's the summer of fixed stops. Gas prices are low, people are frisky and traveling. Christian's going on some crazy road trip.

5,000 miles of beauty.

Isn't it more fun to put miles on a leased car than a car you're gonna own?

Yeah, probably, but I don't drive a lot the other, you know, 11 and a half months out of the year. So I'll be okay.

Yeah, it's great. Well, thanks everybody. We'll see you next time on Service Drive Revolution. Thanks so much for watching this episode of Service Job Revolution. We're uploading new stuff every day, so make sure you subscribe and click the bell icon so you don't miss out. If you have a question you'd like us to answer on the show, call 8333 Ask SDR and we'll answer your question on the show. That's 8333 Ask SDR for special deals on our books and training, head over to offers.chriscallinc.com now that's offers.chris collins inc.com I'm Chris Collins and I'll see you in the next video. Number two is the system has to drive it. Form equals function. And then the third one is having a, having a mentor. But if it, you know, if, if it was me, I would grow my own. I would never be hiring techs. And I, you know, I say that from a perspective of we're really good at hiring techs and the first thing we do when we go into a service department is hire techs because you need, you know, you need additional production to increase sales no matter what. But it's, it's a fix. It's a band aid, a short term band aid, not a long term solution. Yep. And it's the summer of fixed stops. Gas prices are low, people are frisky and traveling. Christian's going on some crazy road trip.

5,000 miles of beauty.

Isn't it more fun to put miles on a leased car than a car you're going to own?

Probably, but I don't drive a lot the other 11 and a half months out of the year, so I'll be okay.

Yeah, it's great. Well, thanks, everybody. We'll see you next time on Service Drive Revolution. Thanks so much for watching this episode of Service Drive Revolution. We're uploading new stuff every day, so make sure you subscribe.