Episode 4 - Beating Big Chains in a Small Town - John Brown - Red Rock Collision

Late 2025, a lot of shop owners are walking into 2026 with one question on their mind. How do I get more cars in the door? Well, today's episode is for the owner who's feeling the squeeze, because my guest is living in the squeeze. I'm talking with John Brown of Red Rock Collision in Cottonwood, Arizona. He's the only independent shop left in his market, surrounded by consolidators and competing against DRP fed volume and dealing with steering as a daily reality. And here's the hook. With the cards stacked against him, he's. He's not just surviving, he's winning and growing. He's even building a new, larger shop. In this conversation, John breaks down exactly how an independent stands out, earns trust fast, and keeps winning business when the big boxes are everywhere. I hope you enjoy this episode.

Welcome to Operational Intelligence. I'm Morgan Felchner, here with my co host, Tom Zoblin, a 15 year collision industry veteran and former marketing agency owner turned AI software builder. Each episode we dive into one shop owner's unique superpower and unpack the exact steps they took to master it so you can bring those ideas to life in your own business. Enjoy the episode. We hope you learn as much as we did.

Thanks for joining me here on my podcast. You are now guest number three. So still kind of working out the kinks of this, but yeah. So the way I like to start this is just, you know, like I said, have you just tell me a little bit who you are, your name of your shop, and, you know, kind of how, how you, how you came to get into the collision business.

Okay, that's easy. Well, my name is John Brown. I'm an Arizona body shop owner. 21 years now, the only independent shop left in our market. I got into the auto body industry by painting my first vehicle that I owned in my driveway and then kind of started painting other people's cars and went to work at body shops. And next thing you know, I decided to go out on my own. So here I am standing 21 years later.

So, so, so what year is that in? 21 years ago.

So that was 2005.

2005. Okay, so. And you're in, you're in Cottonwood, Arizona. I've been to your shop. So it's not a huge town. It's a very small town and it's kind of, would you say it's kind of remote? I mean, there's not a whole lot near you. You're like from Phoenix. You're. What about an Hour and a half, maybe two hours from Phoenix or something.

Yeah, depending on where you're at in Phoenix. Hour and a half. So we, we deal with, you know, anything we order part wise is next day. We can't have anything same day. And yeah, we're, we're remote. We're in the middle of Flagstaff and Phoenix. And so the two bigger communities in this Northern Arizona area were just in the middle.

Okay, so have you always been at that same location that you're at now?

Well, I had a second shop. My actual. My original shop was in Sedona, which is another small community but better known for tourism. Right. Everybody knows Sedona. So, yeah, my first shop I opened in 2005 was in Sedona. And then for a time I had both locations. It was my own little mso. And then I sold the Sedona store to a Car Star franchise.

Okay, I didn't realize that. Yeah. Okay, so and then in your market, who do you have as your competitors.

Now that they've all sold out? We have a Caliper. We have another Car Star franchise. We have a Kaizen. And then we had. Well, we don't have it anymore. We had a dealership here in town that they closed their body shop. So really, that's it in this community. Car Star also has one over in the Sedona market. So does Kaizen. So Kaizen's one of the smaller chains, but they're all pretty much bought out. Everybody here.

Yeah. Okay, so. And that kind of leads us to what we're going to talk about today, which is, you know, the kind of the theme of our podcast is I choose shop owners that kind of excel in an area that other shops might be looking to gain some ground in. And so for you, I want to talk about how you survive is the only independent in a heavily consolidated market. So tell us a little bit about the shop in terms of like, you know, your volume and how many people work there and stuff. So people kind of get an idea of the size of your organization there currently.

Tiny shop. We're in the throes of building a new building, but right now we're a small shop. We're 6,000 square feet of working space. We have 12 employees, including admin, which is about half of. Of our staff. But we, we're. We do well. We're very efficient. Last year we were pushing the two and a half million gross. And, you know, we average probably, I don't know, six or seven repairs a week kind of thing through the shop, which is very small in, in scam or in the, you know, the world of body shops. But I think we do pretty well for that small of a business as far as efficiency based on whatever criteria you use out there, you know, matrix or whatever. But we're the only non, not just the non MSO and non conglomerate, but we're also the only non DRP shop in the area. We have zero DRPs and haven't for 10 years.

Right? Yeah, so, so that's a, that's a great way to kind of start talking about that. So, you know, obviously it's not like, like you chose to, to be the only, you know, non consolidator shop or non DRP shop in your market. That just kind of happens around you. A lot of these questions that we, that I asked shop owners is, you know, why did you select this and why did you, you know, what, what does all that mean to you and all that stuff? This is a little bit different because it's sort of like it's something out of your control, but you have to manage it right. You know, so now, now you're, you're forced to, to, you know, hold your ground in this, in this world of, you know, heavy drp. You know, obviously all those consolidators are all drp, so they're all being fed all the work.

Right.

So let's talk about that. You know, obviously that's not an easy task to stay, you know, to stay busy and keep your guys Busy and keep 12 people, you know, going all the time when you know that, you know, is steering really a big problem for you and where you're at, I would imagine it's, it's probably more painful than even in some other areas where there's not a lot of consumer choice.

It's our number one problem, believe it or not. And, and you know, people think, I would think that we are kind of immune to it because we're in a small community. But yeah, reality is steering prior to we ever even know the vehicle was damaged. You know, when somebody calls in a claim, they're, they're going to steer them away. And then even though we've been in the community so long and we have a good reputation, you know, referrals, word of mouth. I get so many clients, I'd say 90% of my clients that come in with an insurance claim say that their insurance company tried to steer them away even when they told them that they were going to bring the vehicle here. So it's our, it's our number one Priority to battle at the beginning of a claim.

So how do you do that?

Well, inform the consumer. That sounds so generic. But you know, reality is our every advertisement we do, every, you know, anything we put out there is about you have the right to choose and make sure you're not just following whatever somebody tells you to do as somebody, you know, somebody who's had a repair, not your insurance company or their insurance company. And um, you know, just constant pushing out there that we're working for the client and not for the insurance company. That's really our big push all the time. That's what we talk about. But it's, it's hard, it's a struggle. I mean, I've lost jobs from family, friends. You know, people say, well yeah, my insurance told me I had to go. And I'm like, well, obviously I didn't explain that well, you don't have to go to them. But they believed it. They, they thought they did. And, and these are family and friends.

Yeah. So, yeah, so, so when you said you pushed out that. So you're. Is it advertising? Do tv, radio, advertising? How are you getting the message out there really?

We don't do any TV here. It's not really a marketing strategy in this small community. Nobody has a local television show. So you're, you know, you're advertising to the wrong people. But radio was a big one for many years before social media hit. And I still do it because there's still a couple of radio stations here in town that are. You hear it every, every story you're in or whatever, you know, people are playing it. We do a lot of stuff at local restaurants, things like that. We have little ads. But we've been pushing a lot of social media lately. I've been watching some of your stuff on Collision Hub and, and learning some tricks about that. So, you know, I'm green to it and I'm old, I'm 53. But social media is, it's where it's at. You're not going to be able to compete if you don't advertise on social media. So that's the name of the game right now.

Yeah. You feel that that's paying off you, that people are saying that they've saw your ads and yes, I really do.

And I, you know, I have a decent personal following. So of course everything gets strewn to that as well or copy to it, shared to it, whatever. But yeah, I think we get a lot of positive feedback from our social media pushes and our ads and we try to do Something out of the box. We don't just do before and after photos that nobody cares about until they're in an accident. You know, we try to promote our local. Everybody that's here is local. We live here. Our family's here, you know, so we push a lot of that family tie, and then the branding is there all the time. Just trying to keep that on everybody's radar, I guess.

Yeah. Okay, so is there anything that you've tried that didn't work, like, in terms of, you know, like, combating the steering or, know, getting people to understand that they have a choice? Like, are there, you know, are there things that I don't know that I know? It's kind of. It's a. Kind of a hard one to answer, I'm sure, because it's like, how do you know what. What somebody else decided, you know, if they didn't use you? But.

Yeah, you learn certain things when it comes to how you're going to approach that problem, knowing that that's a problem the minute, you know you can't do anything about it. When the customer got steered before you even knew it was a customer, right? If they called in a claim and they got told, go to the body shop, you didn't even know they existed, right? Until later they've had the car repaired, and you're like, wow, where'd you get that fixed? And you find out they were steered. But what we can control, right, is the car that came to our shop and asked us for an estimate or gave us a call, and we try to not do the generic, write an estimate and send them on their way. That seems to be the biggest combatant, to be honest. You know, the old, hey, I'll write you an estimate, and then I'll follow up with you in a couple of days. And by then, they've decided to turn in a claim, and the insurance company steered them away. Right. You lost that opportunity. So you got to make sure when they come in for an estimate that you are taking the time to walk them through the sales pitch for your shop and why they have a choice. Right. That's the number one thing I press with my guys and when I go out and talk to a customer is not just to do the old, let me write you an estimate, email it to you, get you on your way. You don't want to sit in my office. I talk through the whole claim process first. Even if they start with, I'm probably not going to file a claim, you know, a lot of people come in and say, that. Right. They're gun shy. They're scared. This is new to them. They feel like they're going to get scammed. And they feel like if they tell you they're paying out of their pocket, that you're going to take it easy on them and not, you know, gouge them. But as soon as you say there's an insurance claim, then they think they got you. So I make sure and explain the insurance process, even though they, they probably aren't going to go that way, according to them. I'll tell you some things that didn't work. And, you know, when I was first starting in the business, I went from a. When I went out on my own, I went from working at a heavy DRP shop. And so I had to compete against that same shop right down the street. Right. So what a lot of guys do when they start is they come up with, well, I'll. I'll waive your deductible or I'll help you with, you know, I can help you put some money in your pocket so that you don't have to, you know, bear the burden of this, plus you make some money. And I'll tell you that thing that, that'll ride with you for the rest of your life, even when you try to stop doing that. So, you know, you get known for being that. That guy, you know, oh, so. And so said you helped them with their deductible, so I came to you. Well, if that's why they're coming to you, that's a problem. Right? That's. That's not helpful for you. So I learned to not do that anymore.

Technically, it's not even legal, right. I think in some, in some, in.

Some places, it's not legal, you know, but there's, there's a lot of ways around that, and there's a lot of ways to do it where you can not replace a part that, you know, maybe had a scratch instead of, you know, yeah, they got paid for that part, but you don't replace it. And they can use that towards their deductible. There's so many. I don't call them scams, because there's ways to do it. But in reality, none of that is beneficial to you, and it's really not as beneficial to the customer as it sounds. So making them understand that is. It's part of the sales pitch, too. It's part of the negotiation up front. You know, we're going to do it all. We're going to do it right. And hopefully the only Thing you have to pay is your deductible. But to be honest, there's a chance you're going to have a copay in today's market, you know, where they just refuse to pay for something unless you're willing to go to battle in court. And who wants to do that? Nobody wants to do that. But that's, that's the world we live in. And there's a lot up front that you have to do. It's a. It's a challenge. It's a. It's probably the most difficult thing is facing being steered away from.

Do you talk to every prospect customer, or does your staff handle a lot of that?

Staff handles, I'd say more than 80% of it. I get involved if, if needed, or if somebody's missing, I'm the first guy down there doing it, but. Or if I'm just walking through the office, but I stick my nose and everything. But at the end of the day, I've got two guys. One's been with me for the full 20 years. So he's, you know, he understands how I do it and that's how he does it. And the other guy, we got a new one. And that's the training world that I'm working on, you know, making him understand. He came from the auto glass world and that's a whole different world. Even though he understands cars and, and some of the insurance stuff, it's a different world for him. So that's where the struggle rears its head. And I, I start to see that the problems that I hadn't really thought of creating a SOP for this, an SOP for that, you know, and you're going, man, I didn't even think this guy, how would he ever figure this out, you know?

Right. Yeah. So, because I've seen one of the things that I see happen at shops is human nature kind of sets in. So what I mean by that is, like, you can train somebody and like, you know, this is. This is this customer's first time they've been in an accident. Now, I think Mike Anderson's saying this is once every 18 years. It used to be one. It's every seven years somebody gets into an accident. So if it's really truly once every 18 years, you're talking about something that is really, really unfamiliar with the average person. For us in the collision business, it's not unfamiliar because you're doing it every single day. Dealing with, you know, how this story plays out every time somebody walks, it's hard to get people to stop becoming, you know, to not go into that robotic mode. And I've seen shops where, you know, a customer will come in, you know, that this customer is nervous about the situation. Like, you know, like I've shadowed front office people and watched how they, how they do, you know, that first contact with the customer. And I've seen them jump right into the. Oh, do you have a claim started yet? Well, we'll just come back when you, when you've done that. I can't really do anything until you've, you know, like, who's tracking that? What does that feel like to that customer? Like, hey, I can't be bothered with you right now. And it's not, it's not ill will or anything like that. It's just a robotic process. Like I, in my head, I can't, I can't help you yet because you haven't started this process. So it's, it's, you know, I, I would imagine that that's hard to kind of police that all the time. Unless you are just every once in a while popping in and maybe just monitoring or doing like a. And then of course, if you're standing next to that person, they're going to be on their best behavior and they're going to revert back to the sop or nervous.

Yeah. Or really nervous because you're there, you know.

Right, right.

Yeah.

Because your, your office is actually above the shop. So, you know, for the most, for the most part, it's easy for them to just kind of do their thing and then when you do come down, it's noticeable. It's not like you're just, you know, you know, being seen around.

So, no, I'm not ever present. But I would say, you know, to your point, that hiring a new guy here about a year and a half ago and having him shadow me so that I could train him, it opened up my eyes to what you're talking about. Myself and my other guy have been doing this for 20 plus years out front and you do get that robotic. I know how to handle this. Just give me your keys. Right. I mean, ironically, Carstar's logo here in town is we'll take it from here, you know, because that's what the customer, you think the customer wants and it's easier for you. I know how to do this. I can handle this with your insurance company and figure it out. I really don't need you involved. And reality is that's a poor mixture of, you know, it's, they're confused, they're not being communicated with. They don't know what you actually did to the car. And then when it comes time to ask them for more money because their insurance company didn't pay for everything, they're confused. That's between you and your. My insurance company? Well, no, it wasn't. You know, and so training the new guy, it opened up my eyes because he was new to every job when it, when it came in, he was treating that customer like it was his first time too, you know, so they had this great rapport, you know, of. He listened to the whole story. Oh, this guy turned the wrong way and you can't believe what you know. And I. You and I, or my other guy, anybody, were like, I don't need to hear all of that. I don't care. I just need to know where the damage is. And I'll start from there. But you have to back up, listen to the story. You have to talk to the customer and get on a personal level, because that's what I am competing against.

Yeah.

In the big boxes. Right. All of these guys. I've got a shop here in town now that people have come in and complained. Well, when I went there, they asked me just to get on their website and do an AI estimate to begin with. And then once that was done, they would take over from there. And I, you know, half these people are like, I don't even know how to get on their website. You know, they're still very green to technology and they don't want to do the photo app from their insurance company. They don't want to do all this stuff. They want me to handle it for them. So having that, I don't know, what you call empathy, you know, up front is, is a big icebreaker when you can start talking to them about, oh, yeah, I had the same thing happen one time. A deer ran in front of me too, and committed suicide. You know, that kind of stuff. And they think, oh, okay, so you're a human. You're not just a, you know, a robot.

Yeah. So. So when you are selling against a caliber and a car star, what, what is your pitch to why I choose you over the, over that shop? You know, is it because that, what you just mentioned, like you're not a, you know, big box corporate thing that you are on that personal level?

Absolutely. You know, if you're going to have, you know, I never badmouth the shop for quality because everybody's done a repair that you can point at and say, oh, God, look at that. And I don't Think that's a great sales. I never think negativity is never a good thing anyway. So it helps me because they use that a lot against me. So they try to be negative, and then I'm coming in all positive. Well, I'm not gonna say anything bad about them, but I will say, have you considered if you have a problem with the repair, are you going to be dealing with the owner of the shop or are you going to be dealing with somebody that says, I don't know, I have to push it up the ladder to somebody in another state, another place that you don't even ever meet to deal with? And do you want to spend your money locally? You know, you have to understand that certain of these boxes, their corporate offices are in a completely different state. So is that revenue really helping our local community? Like my business is, are you going to see them at a little league game tonight? You know, that kind of stuff. You know, when you have a problem with your car, who are you going to talk to? And I try to really push that personal thing. I personally am involved a lot in my community. And I mean, I was a coach at the high school for years. And I do a lot of car shows and stuff here for the city. Not just like Red Rock collisions car show. This is the city of cottonwoods car show. And I'm. I got my banner up there, you know, and people are. They put the name to the face. I know that guy. I've seen that guy. He coached my daughter, you know, that kind of stuff. And I think that goes a long ways.

How many of your prospects coming in have been to one of your competitor shops first?

I'd say a large percentage, 80, 90% of them. Very few come in here first because they're not told to come here. So they either had a bad experience over there or somebody else told them, no, no, no, go see us, because they had a good experience here. So, you know, it's really hard to get them to come here first.

Yeah, yeah, that's. That's an interesting. I thought too about the customer journey, you know, especially when you're building out SOPs and you're building out, you know, any marketing programs is to understand where that customer is. What's the frame of mind of that customer coming to you? Besides the accident stuff, which we, we talked about, what else have they experienced in this new journey? And it could very well be that they've been to one of your competitors first. And absolutely, the fact that they're at your door means something. Something didn't click over there. You know, for whatever reason, they felt like they were being in a robotic processor they got about because, I mean, you know, those guys have, have all the budget to like, you shouldn't be getting a bad experience at a big box store, you know. No, you would almost expect that out of mom and pop because they're typically kind of, can be overwhelmed. But you know, I got so many other things going on. You just don't have the, the reason, the resources. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And the, you know, all the layers of management that's constantly coming in and retraining everybody and all that stuff. So you would think wrong, maybe, you know, incorrectly that, that those big box stores have it down pat. But you really can, as you've proven for many, many years, you can win in this, this, you know, this game if you're, if you're kind of, you know, cognizant of that when that customer comes in.

So I, I wholeheartedly agree. I mean, we're dealing with the dynamic that they've probably been sold already on several things. So you don't know what they've been told, you don't know what they, the estimate they've been given is. You know, there's so many variables coming in. It's not just a raw customer. It's somebody who's been coached, who's been preached at, who's been sold at, and then also been pushed to, steered to another shop. And so you're, you're battling a lot of things, but it can be done right 20 years in and, and no major resources behind me. I started very small and I bought out another shop and I mean, he even carried me. I literally started with nothing. So, I mean, you can do it, it can be done and you can survive and Excel and I'm building a new building and life is getting better. So I don't. It can be done. It just, it's a constant, constant work. You're never going to coast because if you do, you're going to lose. Yeah.

So do your estimates typically vary much from what a typical DRP estimate would be, or are you kind of, is your pricing kind of in line with the, with because some of the shops I talked to, the Independence, they're way higher than what a, what a typical DRP that's just going to be as low as possible?

I would say when it comes to initial estimates, we are always higher. We try to catch more things, but we've also, we've had to understand the dynamics of what, what that customer is seeing and facing. And so we've kind of pivoted a little bit. So we used to be that shop that was always the higher estimate because we tried to catch everything we could on the original estimate. I don't want to if, especially if you're paying out of your pocket or something, I don't want you getting upset with me when you bring the car to me and you already knew it was going to be higher and then I give you another supplement on top of that. Right. But we've kind of learned that what they're facing out there now is either the, the DRP or the big MSO is going to write just a bare bones sheet, similar to what you'd get from a photo app on an insurance or an A estimate. That's what they're going to see from these competitors. Right. So what I try to do is not write an estimate at all and be high or low. I try to just explain to them, well, regardless of what they wrote, there's going to be more things that you find when you disassemble it. And really there's no point in writing an estimate. There's really nothing. You know, I try to push that direction. You know, you choose the shop based on who you want to fix your car, why you want them to fix your car, and then let them put the whole thing together as they're disassembling the car and avoid that where I am the highest in the, in the area, because there's somewhere you can't, you know, if you're dealing with the fleet management like a law enforcement or something like that, they're gonna still do the old three estimates and their, their board is gonna pick the cheapest one no matter what. And then they know they're gonna get a supplement down the road. So it's like, okay, so do I come in the lowest no matter what, and just leave a bunch of stuff off of this so I can get the job and then turn around and supplement them and deal with that? You have to choose whether you want to do that or not. But when it comes to real customers, life customers, I try to avoid writing the estimate altogether because I will be higher than anybody else. My rates are higher. I'm going to write some things that they won't oem things that I know are, you know, steering column going to have to be pulled. Customers will freak out if you start telling them you're going to peel a steering column out of their car. And they're like, there's nothing wrong with my Steering column. Why are you touching my steering column? You know, so you can oversell by putting too much on that estimate to begin with. So if you can avoid writing an estimate, you're going to have a much better chance of winning that job.

So you get, you're getting them in, they've come from a competitor, you get them to your shop. The goal is to get them leaving in a rental. Right? Is that the case? Absolutely. Yeah. Okay.

You know, like I think you used to say, capture the keys. Right. But I mean, the idea is at least have them booked in for us. A solid and signed repair order, signed contract. You know, we have a bunch of paperwork that's pretty daunting that I make you sign if I'm going to put you on the schedule, whether you're leaving it today or whether you're bringing it in in a week. I. I don't consider you a customer unless you've signed my repair contract. And you understand that that repair contract is a binding contract. We're going to fix your car because I'm going to from here, I'm going to start doing some work. I'm going to deal with your insurance company. I'm order parts, I'm going to prepare for your vehicle, and I'm not going to do that for free. So if you don't show up, we're going to have an issue. Right. And I make sure they understand that, because there's no reason for me to just hope that somebody's going to show up with their car, because as soon as they leave here, they're going to get sold to somebody else. Pushed another direction. So if you can't keep the car here the day they come in for the estimate, which is more than half the time, you can't do it either don't have the ability to take it in right away, or they need the car or whatever. So a repair contract is the next best thing. If you've got that signed, at least you've got their understanding that they're committed as well.

So, you know, one of the questions I like to ask is like, if you were teaching a masterclass on this, you know, what are some of the things that would. Would go into that? I'm curious, actually, to modify that question a little bit to, to talk about that. That contract, because that's the first time I've really heard someone really make sure that they had a very thorough contract. What are some tips for maybe a shop owner listening to this about what that contract should have in it?

Well, I mean, the Number one thing in my opinion is that the customer understands that it is a binding contract. That, okay, if you sign this, you're committing to have me repair your car, right? This is not just you're got a spot on my schedule. This is you and I are in a contract. I'm going to fix your car and if not, there are legal repercussions in here. It sounds evil and bad, but the reality is I'm going to commit some time and effort and money to your repair. And I don't want to do that unless you're really coming in. So don't sign it if you're not going to come in. If you're wasting my time, I'm wasting your time. I'm not going to write an estimate. But that, that binding contract part, you know, it's legal mumbo jumbo, but it basically says if for some reason you don't show up, I slotted that I have a loss and therefore any money I've collected I can keep and. Or you are responsible for whatever this amount of repair was that we agreed to. And I've only had to do it once. Um, quite frankly, I've done it a few times with people that try to bail. And then I explained to them what they remember. We talked about this. You signed this. So I'm going to keep this check and oh, how am I going to get my car fixed? Well, you can bring it to me. We talked about this. You know, you're, it's. I'm not trying to be a jerk, but I bought your parts. I did all this stuff, right? I've had it happen a couple of times and they brought the car and it ended well. But I've had one, one in maybe the last five years of doing contracts like this that bailed completely on me. The original insurance check came in. They tried to get their money back. The insurance company did. I showed them the contract and they, they didn't do anything about it. There's, there's nothing they could do about it. The customer had signed this contract. We had parts that we couldn't return anymore because it'd been too long and this kind of thing. So I'm like, guys, I can't just eat these parts. It's ugly when it does happen. But it's a lot better upfront to know the cars coming in before you do any of that stuff because they understand that they're in a contract and that' that's the thing I try to push the most. Yeah, you're, you, you want OEM parts. You want the. That's all great, and, and we can work on that. But the main, the main thing is we're in a contract here. I'm committed to fix your car. You're committed to bring it to me. Because I'm gonna be honest. You're gonna get pushed. You're gonna get steered. As soon as you call your insurance company, they're gonna try to convince you I'm the big bad wolf. And. And there's something else out there. And so don't sign it if you aren't sure of me. Why, why, why do that? You know? But usually when they leave here, they're. They're an advocate for Red Rock Collision. And when the insurance company calls, you know, they come back and say, oh, yeah, they tried to tell me I had to go down the street. I told them no. And I told them I'd already signed a contract with you. And that helped. And that does help them too. They. I've had a lot of feedback with that that they. When they tell the insurance company that they're already in a contract with Red Rock Collision, the steering diminishes substantially. So I warn them, just tell them you've already signed a contract with us and that they. They'll stop pushing it. And they do. So that helps, actually, in the steering world.

That's interesting. So, so the process then just to kind of top to bottom. So customer gets into an accident, they're calling their insurance company first because that's who's telling them to go to a Caliber or Kaizen or wherever they're going. They go there, they arrive, and those guys are taking a shortcut. Most of the time they're saying, yeah, just fill out something online. We'll get to yada yada, we're busy. Right? They kind of get the brush off, it seems like. So then they, I guess, are googling who else? I wonder how they're identifying you as an independent versus another one of the same. Like, how do they know Kaizen is the same as a caliber, at least in the eyes of a customer? We know they're all consolidators and they all operate similarly. But how do they know that they're not going to get the same treatment at Kaizen or where else versus you being a more independent. That's just language on your website and things like that, you know?

Yes, I think so. And, and again with my social media and that sort of thing. But the, the big feedback and I kind of track this, right. We ask a customer, why'd you come to us? You know, that's one of my first questions before I even want to know what's wrong with their cars. Why'd you come to us? You know, and well, I was told to go over here. I'll be honest, I didn't really like what they were saying and, and sometimes that's not nothing I can help. They're saying the truth and your car's a total or, you know, whatever, but, and then they start telling me they didn't have a good experience. So they asked a friend or they knew somebody that had a car repaired and, and they, everybody points to you. And then they always, we get a lot of good reviews. I push for reviews, I ask for reviews after the repair personally, I reach out to every client, you know, and I ask them to do these reviews and I hear, oh man, you, you've got like so many five star reviews. Everybody's raves about you, so I figured I better come check you. So they must have been searching it online and, and that popped up. Not to plug you again, but I, or your old business. Anyway, I, I, I would like to try to push some geofencing because I think that's very effective. But yeah, you know, that's another way to do it for a shop, especially in a big, you know, area, like a big metro area. Gosh, I don't know how you combat against some of this stuff because those people literally don't, they don't care about a mom and pop shop. They want whatever, you know, the Internet or their insurance company tells them to do. They want easy, fast, you know, less, less work on their part, at least locally here I, I tend to, I'm blessed that it's a small community and people will be like, oh God, you can't take it anywhere else. But you know, I notice that a lot, like I'll get on my social media posts, I will get, I've got like a small fan group, I guess, of old clients that pop in and make a comment, you know, I would never take it anywhere else, you know, and that's, that's helpful. I think the five star reviews seem to be the number one. People say, well, I looked online and you have all these great reviews.

Yeah, okay, so, so then they, they read your reviews, they come in and then you, you explain to them, hey, there is a, there is a difference in the kind of shop that fixes your car. You know, I'm not surprised to hear that you got treated that way. That's, you know, that seems fairly common. With shops like that, but here's why we're different. And then you kind of spell it out. You know, why, why you're different. You're the only independent in town and, and you know, kind of holding your own there. So is it something like that? Is that kind of like the.

That's exactly it. Yeah, that's exactly it. And, and then kind of push the. There's really no need to, to have an estimate. You really just need to figure out why you want the car repaired at a shop. And hopefully that shop is my shop and what do I need? You know what, what are your big concerns here? Because obviously my estimates can be different than their estimate than the insurance company's estimate. There's going to be three or four estimates rolling around here and you're going to look at them and go, man, I'm so confused. So what is it that you're most concerned about? Well, I want the paint to match or, you know, I'm really worried about all these sensors and you know, whatever they're. And then, then you go down that bunny trail and make sure that you, you're listening to them.

Yeah, yeah. And then, and then you get them into the contract and then, and then you either put them in a rental or you get, get the car in. So, so going back to the, the thing about the, the variance and estimates, this is an area too that I think body shops are missing opportunities. If you, to me, if you're going and you're comparing two estimates and one of them has 100 lines and one of them's got 250 lines, obviously the price tag is going to be more on the 250 line one. But I don't understand why shops don't point that out as like, this is what you want. You want, you want the most, you want the most thorough estimate because they're not missing anything, you know?

Yeah.

Like it's not dollars to everyone. Focus on the dollars. It's not about the dollars. It's about the complete completeness of.

Right.

Thoroughness of the estimate. If it's not on this other estimate, they're not, they're not doing it and not putting it on an estimate. They're not even realizing it needs to be done or, or considering that they should do it, you know.

So, yeah, I agree with that wholeheartedly, knowing what we know in the industry. But I also, there's a caveat to it where the, a, the client doesn't want to be burdened with a lot of information. I don't some of them do, some of them want to know everything. What are you going to do to my car and why? But most of them don't want to be bogged down. They want you to handle all this and deal with it. They want to know, okay, your price is different, your price is higher if you actually wrote an estimate, what a lot of times I like to do. If they do come to me with a competitor's estimate because they've gone to that steered shop, I, I tell them, well, rather than me write an estimate, why don't you just let me take a look at this and I'll tell you what they wrote. I'll walk around the car with you and explain to you what this estimate means. Because they probably didn't. And I can, I can put it in language you can understand and then we can, I can also take that opportunity to go, well, you know, like for instance here, they have to repair this. But in reality you can't repair this. This is ultra high strength steel. So, you know, I'm going to have to cut this off and replace it. And I'm gon to do it by an OEM procedure. It's going to probably be another 50 lines on my estimate compared to what they have here. But rather than burden you with all of that information, we can go down that bunny hole if you want. But this is why their estimate is going to be lower than mine. And they may figure this out once they get into the repair. I'm not saying they're not going to do this, but I'm telling you, they didn't estimate to do this. That seems to be a great plug because they're going to hear what they want to hear. They're either going to hear that shop didn't care enough to write all this stuff, or maybe that shop didn't know and they won't know and they won't repair my car. Right, but they're going to go down their own path with the information you gave them. Look, they wrote to repair this. This is not repairable. No matter how minor it looks. I can't repair this. I have to replace it. Or there's probably damage behind this and there's a structure behind there. There's a skeleton behind this, if you will, that. How am I going to know if that's damaged if I just put Bondo on the outside? You know, I need to explore that. And the only way to do that is to take the panel off. And now I got to replace the panel. So, you know, little things like that without actually writing a competitive estimate that has another hundred lines. Yeah, that's a great point. You know, my, my estimate has 200 lines. There's has a hundred. Obviously I'm more thorough than they are, but I'm just. My personal opinion is most customers are going to be like, I don't understand any of this. All I know is that your estimate is way higher than mine and my insurance company is telling me I'm going to have to pay the difference. And there's your problem. Okay, now we've got the problem. It's not 100 line versus 200 line thorough. And it's. My insurance company says I'm going to have to pay the difference. How are you going to deal with that? Yeah, so that's a whole nother. That's the big sales pitch from an insurance company now is if you do choose, you could choose your own shop, but you may have to pay anything that we don't agree to.

Yeah. So, so that's. Now I am going to make a little plug for Reclaimer here because this, this is a big epiphany that I got from you just the other day when we were talking is so, and you, you will be probably by next week you'll be able to start testing these features on Reclaimer, you know, you being in the beta tester of this product. But you said to me something that, so I had in my head, I was thinking these were sales pieces. But you know, Reclaimer will have a lead comes in. If it's an online lead, it'll send out just a proposal. Why choose Red Rock Collision, you know, and it's basically what we've, we've talked about how you're the only independent in town and blah, blah, blah. And we'll be able to put whatever we want in there that'll go to any, you know, automatically emailed to any prospect. So you're kind of pre selling, you know, what, what makes you special. But then, then you get, you write an initial. So you get that car, you get that customer. You, they're in the shop. You've, you've now you've written your estimate and you do need to send this to the customer and explain to them. What our system will do is take that estimate and turn it into a more layman's terms, like, like summary. They can read the whole estimate, which they're not going to understand anyway. But this will be just a, like an overview. We're going to take off the fender. We might put a new frame rail in we have to align the car like high level stuff. But what you told me is that, that what you do is you'll send that now to the customer and then CC the insurance company and our tool will have in there, that insurance company is likely to push back on some of these items like safety inspections and blah blah, blah. So now you are not chasing the insurance company, they're chasing you. You're basically saying these guys are going to tell you that you don't need this stuff and our system will have all that, oh, back to oem. You know, this is where it says in the manufacturer and all that stuff, all that done for you. But that, that really does turn the tables because now everything that they say is after you've already told them they're gonna say this and who looks like the jerk there? You know, now you've gone from being the bad guy to the hero and they're the bad guy and they're like, you're right that you know, then, or actually when they, when they do send you that short pay, then you're like, see as I explained, you know, they did, they did agree to these, but these things they didn't agree to. And here's how we're handling. So, so now with that, with just that subtle change of getting ahead of them and ceasing the insurance company, I also, I'm excited to see if just doing that then they become a little bit less aggressive on the things that they're cutting too, you know, so like because, because you basically are pointing out that I just gotta note that your recording is stopped, John. Okay, there you go. Yeah, I, I'm sorry.

Yeah, I think I should have put you in airplane mode or something. Somebody was trying to call me.

But yeah, I think, I think you're recording now.

Yeah, so yeah, it's back again.

Yeah, so, but yeah, that, that, that subtle thing. But I think it's going to be kind of huge because now you're leading the conversation, you're in charge of the conversation at that point. And that was a real, real epiphany because from then on everything that you're doing, you're ahead of them and. Absolutely.

And it's the way it should be done anyway. Right? I mean realistically that's your client is the customer, the vehicle owner, and yes, you're helping deal with their insurance company on their behalf. But every original conversation and explanation of what you're going to do to the car and why should go to the customer and then now they're an informed Customer. And there's, there's nothing better ammunition wise against an insurance pushback than an informed customer. They play off of ignorance and, and ignorance sounds like a bad word, but it's, it's the truth. They play off. Oh, your, your shop is, they're charging for so many things that nobody else charges for and that immediately puts the dark image on you. Right. So if you're going in ahead of time, this is what we need to do. Your car, this is why we need to do it. We verified that with the manufacturer, we've done all this research. And now bear in mind, your insurance company is probably going to push back on some of this stuff because they don't see it a lot. They should, but they don't, you know, not, not everybody does this, so there's a chance they're going to come back and, you know, make it sound terrible that you might have to pay the difference. And yeah, I want you to understand what we're doing to your car. And then, by the way, your insurance company is copied in this as you asked me to do. So expect that call, but I don't send it directly to the insurance. I send it to the client copying the insurance adjuster in it. There is some areas where you can't do that. Open shop assignments that a lot of shops take advantage of because it's easy. That, that's their, that's their fight back against that is that you're dealing directly with the insurance company. And then they can call Susie even before you know Susie's ever got a copy of it or they called you to tell you what they're not going to pay, they call the client and tell Susie, oh, your shop sent us their estimate and it's way overwritten and blah, blah, blah. If you'd like, we can pull it out of the shop and we can take it over to our open shop assignments are a great weapon that they have against what we're talking about, informing the customer ahead of time. So then you got to do that ahead of time. You got to call them. Your new software that you're working on, your AI stuff is going to help with that. Because even though we have an open shop assignment, we still send everything to the customer, first explanation in layman's terms and explain it to them. Come on down. If you want, we'll go over the car with you before I send this up to your insurance company. That way we're on the same page before they get it. That way when they do call, they can have that ammunition. But you got to play that a little differently with an open shop assignment.

Yeah, yeah, that's interesting. So just a couple more questions here, just see what else do we have here. So one of the things I'm gonna start asking shops about too, I, you know, so I've worked in the collision business. I had my agency for 15 years, but 20 years I've really been kind of helping shops out. And all along the way there's always some change, change, change. Like there's always some, like if you go to CIC four times a year, there's always some issue of the month, you know, that you have to deal with. But it seems to me that Covid is the real game changer in terms of what collision repair business was in the back in the past and where it is now. It seems like Covet just radically changed, changed it. What I, you know, what do you think are some of the big transformations that you've seen post Covid?

Well, a lot of the stuff we're talking about, right, the, the shops going to AI estimates or over the phone or like your website's set up to where they can send you photos and you can write them some kind of photo estimate. You know, the non personal touch was the COVID You know, everything revolved around that. I've, I've seen a big kick in that kind of technology and that helps me a little bit because there's not that personal approach or touch. And I, I tend to go back to that which is a comfort level, right. It's like comfort food your mom made you. When you go eat that again, you feel better than the stuff you've been eating for a while. But I, you know, parts were of a huge problem during COVID and there's still lingering problems with it when it comes to models that are five or 10 years old, you know, you'll get some parts are now obsolete because they just decided not to make them anymore after Covid. And it's like, man, it's only an eight year old car. I don't understand. So that, that's a hurdle that we deal with too. Parts from COVID But I would say the thing I saw the most in our industry is insurance companies went to more of a photo apps were already going on, but now it's like the thing, right? They won't even some of them try to convince the customer they can't help them unless they download their photo app and they can't help. Right. If you don't use our app, we can't help you. That's not true, but they tell them that, you know, so I, I see, I see that as, and then I see shops trying to counter that by doing their own version of that. Like I said, the website has a link where you, you know, send me some photos and I'll write you an estimate. Well, I never write that estimate. If they send me the photos, I, I just give them a call and say, you know, honestly, looking at the photos, I can't tell you what. Yeah, I'm gonna have to see it in person, you know, and we'll have to talk about it. But it's a great opportunity for somebody on the weekend who's trying to freak out and figure out how to deal with their car. At least they got to do something and move forward and then they got a response. But I would never send them that estimate. But I, that's, I think that's the thing I see the biggest from COVID is just that lack of personal touch. The desire to use technology to make everybody's life easier. But it also causes a lot of confusion. And I, I try to avoid the confusion up front, but, but then it.

Becomes a, an advantage to you though, because, you know, people are coming to you yearning to, to speak to somebody directly. I, I wonder though, in, in a generation or two if that's going to matter anymore. You know, the, the talks about these, these, you know, like the, the, the gen zers where they have that, that blank stare. You know, they just, they don't know how to communicate with humans. My, my wife works in the credit union. She's a marketing at credit unions and she said that they have bank tellers who have a manager right behind them. You know, when you go to the bank and you got the first person and then the managers are back here, they will text their manager. You know, they won't even turn their head and say, hey Sally, can you come here for a second? They got it. They, that's, that's how. But they're talking to a customer. So why are you in customer facing job? I don't know. But, but she said it's absolutely a generational thing that people, you know, they don't know how to communicate. Communicate. So I would imagine that the ones that are coming to you are probably trend older, right? Or, or do you still get younger people that are coming to you because they want to talk to you and you know that?

Well, I, no, not because they want to talk to me, but I'm starting to notice what you're talking about, where you're getting the younger people coming in, dealing with this first time accident. And like you said, they don't know how to communicate. There's another fallout from COVID Right. They, even though, you know, they're young and they have this technology, my kids don't realize that when I was a kid I didn't have a cell phone. They don't even understand. They can't comprehend. Right. So you know, but these kids come in and that's. You're right. They don't even want that personal touch. They just, look, dude, I'm gonna sit here. You go out and look at my car and can you just email it to me or you know, that kind of stuff.

Right.

So it's a change for me. I have to try and figure that out and play that game. But. And I think to your point, it's going to get more that way as those become more into the adult phases of their life. Right. My own kids are that way. But I also am seeing. And there's. There's probably some hope. There is. I'm seeing parents push their kid to come in and deal with the situation person to person because they realize that their kids are not capable of doing this because of what they've gone through either in Covid or just the technology that they're thrown. Even in schools, you know, they don't deal with their teachers a lot of times in person. They have to send their teacher an email to ask them a question about what's. What the assignment was. They can't deal with it in class. I don't have time to deal with that in class. You have to send me an email. That baffles me. I got a 14 year old that that's how they have to. All of their assignments are through online. Even though they're in class, they're doing it online in class and they can't ask the teacher the question unless they do it through the system. But I see parents now pushing them. No, you go in and deal with it and they may be sitting out in the car, they may stand behind them and let them talk and that kind of stuff. So I think there may be a shift where these kids also realize that they can't just go through life on their phone. Sometimes you're going to have to try and learn something and communicate with another human and, and to accomplish something.

Yeah.

So it can't always be that way. And I don't, I don't foresee it ever being a hundred percent that way. If somebody's got money involved.

Yeah.

Right. If somebody's got paid for something, then that changes everything. Right. If it's going to cost you more money than it should, you kind of got to understand that. Unless they have unlimited money, but I don't think anybody does that.

Yeah, right, right.

You know, I think that's the changer. Right. You can do a lot of things automated, and you can do a lot of things without physical communication with a person, but when it comes down to, am I going to spend too much money to have this done? You kind of have to get personal about it, and I think that'll help. But I don't know. I'm hoping to be out of the business before that gets to the robotic stage, where cars are just, you know, driving themselves to me like a whammo and I'm fixing them without ever talking to a human.

Yeah. Wow, that's. Yeah, I think that's a ways off, but who knows, right? I mean, you know, if.

If Tesla is going to start letting you use your car as a Uber and it can leave your garage and go pick somebody up and take them home and whatever they want and come back and park itself in your garage, why wouldn't you tell your Tesla to drive to the repair shop and call me when you're finished and come back home?

Right.

I don't know. I mean, it's. It's possible. So is it. Is it coming around? I hope I'm not in the industry anymore at that point.

Yeah. Yeah. Wow, that's. Yeah, that's. That's pretty. Then all. All those. This whole podcast and all these SOPs and everything that we're talking about, it's all null and void.

It's worthless. Yeah. It's got a time frame. It's got an. It's gonna go extinct. Yeah.

You'll have a robot greeter, and they'll send it to your robot body man, and the robot painter will paint it and.

Yeah. Or come to your house and do it for you. Who knows?

Right. Right. Well, that's all the questions I have, John. I. The last question I always ask now is, is there anybody that I should have on the podcast next that excels at something really cool in a body shop that you've seen that I should reach out to next.

You know, my. My personal experience with local guys, there's. There's not much. They're mostly big boxes now, so unfortunately, that's not really a direction you're going. I see quite a few guys on the Internet on the groups that you may have already talked to. I don't know them all by name, but there's a guy, Brian. I can't remember his last name now. Dang it. Anyway, he's on there a lot. He's on the Collision Club stuff. Yeah, yeah.

Brian Gerhardt. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, he seems to be extremely active and doing a lot of, you know, independent stuff, like I do. I tend to read his posts and listen to his stuff just a little bit more than I do anybody else's. I don't know if you have contact with. With him, but I don't. I'm always, yeah. Interested in what he has to say. So I would tell you if you're looking for. He's been in it a long time, it sounds like, and. And he fights a lot of battles and he's got a. He's got a pretty good. I don't know. I. I don't say attitude. He's just got a pretty good personality when it comes to talking about it. So I. I don't know him personally. I've only met him through social media, but he does seem to be a great guy to talk to about all kinds of stuff.

All right, well, Brian, I'm going to be reaching out to you next then.

So there you go.

All right, John, well, thank you for. Thanks for being with me on this podcast and for being guest number three. And, you know, thanks again for your time. I appreciate it. I learned a lot.

Thanks for what you're doing, man. I think this is cool. It's not just a sales pitch. This is cool stuff. So I appreciate you, man.

Yeah, I'm having a good time doing it, that's for sure. So.

Good. Well, you're getting pretty good at it. You don't have the big headphones in the fancy studio. I like that.

I have the headphones, actually. The. The first ones I've done, I. I have the headphones, but I got tired of looking at me with headphones on, you know, So I actually, I, you know, I had the fancy microphone for the good audio, but.

Yeah, yeah, I'm sure my audience.

Yeah, I figured out how to get the audio to come through the laptop on me, so.

Yeah, yeah, no, well, it's cool that you're doing this, man. I appreciate being on it and part of it.

Yeah. Thank you. I appreciate it. It's hard. It's hard to find guests when you got a podcast that nobody knows about, so. Yeah.

Hey, Joe Rogan had to start somewhere, buddy.

Yeah, right.

Right.