Dealer Maintenance Fails

Bringing in some hair: meet Bryan Shaw 0:00

Steve Shaw: Welcome, everybody. Welcome back. What's going on, everybody? Dave Rogers, how you doing today, sir?

Dave Rogers: Again, I'm always doing fan-damn-tastic there, Steve Shaw. How are you?

Steve Shaw: I am doing spectacular. I brought my brother, Bryan Shaw. You guys like to gang up on me. You're the guys with no hair. So I brought my brother Bryan, because I needed some hair to back me up on this episode.

Dave Rogers: I think it's about time we got somebody with some hair. Perfect.

Steve Shaw: And just so everybody knows, my brother Bryan Shaw has a podcast called "I'm Leaving Right After This Drink." I'll let him tell you about his podcast. But the funny thing is, we got to talking, and Dave, you and I talked about it too. He was telling me about his experience with his Dodge Charger. We're not going to name any names or any dealerships, because quite frankly it was not a good experience. But what I believe in my heart is that this is the typical experience at a new car dealership. Dodge dealers, if you want to refute this, come on and talk to me. What do you think, should we go down that path, Dave?

Dave Rogers: Absolutely, man. Let's roll.

Steve Shaw: So, Bryan's background: he's got a huge rock and roll background. He does drink a lot. And full disclosure, he is the editor-in-chief of the Fixed Ops Focus podcast. Bryan is our digital media director. He runs things in the background and keeps Dave and me straight. Bryan was telling me about his experience as a dealership customer and how much money it cost him to take his car to the Chrysler store. So Bryan, take it away and share your horror story. What happened, and how much money did it cost you?

Four years and never offered a rotation 1:59

Bryan Shaw: Well, quite frankly, we can start with the first Charger. I had that car for four to five years, and not one time did they ever offer me a tire rotation, which I thought was shocking. I didn't even realize it until I bought my second Charger and took it in for the first time, and the guy said, "Would you like a tire rotation with that?" And I'm like, "Are you serious? Nobody's offered me a tire rotation in the last four years. So yeah, I'll take a tire rotation."

So every time I went in with my Dodge Charger after that, I'd go in for my oil change and tire rotation.

Steve Shaw: You had a free maintenance package too, didn't you?

Bryan Shaw: Yeah, I had the free maintenance package for the first however many oil changes and all that stuff. Then one day I go in for my oil change and get my little report back, and it says my tires are at three, four, five and six, or whatever. They're all at a different tread. And I'm like, how is this possible? The car didn't have that many miles on it at the time. So I take it to Mavis Tires. They'd done my tires the last couple of times.

Two Mavis stores, two different experiences 3:23

Bryan Shaw: And that's a whole other experience in itself. I went to the one that treated me really well the first time, and I went back there the second time, back in December. And the guy just didn't really care that I was even in the store. It's like a quarter to five or whatever. I'm like, "Look, I know you probably want to go home. I'm just asking you to go outside and make sure my tire tread is what the dealership says." I don't want to just take their word for it and go spend a bunch of money on tires for no reason. And the guy just looks in his computer: "Yeah, you got these last time, blah, blah, blah. There's your price, a thousand bucks." And I'm like, "OK, could you at least go outside and act like you're going to look at my tires?" He never did. So I just left.

And by the way, that guy was not busy at all. There was no one in the waiting area. It was just me standing there. Luckily for me, there's another store right down the street from my house, and I went into that Mavis on a Saturday. It's slammed. There were probably eight people in the waiting area getting their tires done or whatever. And this guy was the most helpful guy on the planet.

I told him my story: "This is the report I got back from the dealership. I just want to make sure. Do I need two tires or four tires? What do I need? If you could at least go out and check them." And he goes, "Yeah, man, no problem. Give me a second." He gets his tire gauge thing, whatever that is, and goes out and measures all four of them. I'd told him my back tire was the lowest, but he did all four, and he goes, "You know what? You actually need four tires. They're all at a different tread. I'd just get all four." I said, "OK, no problem. What's the damage?" He pulls me up on the computer: "Well, you did these last time. I've got a better tire this time," and does the whole thing.

And the whole time I'm thinking, how did all of my tires have a different tread? And come to find out, it's because I'd never had an alignment on my Charger in all the times I brought it to the dealership. How could I never have been offered an alignment? For me personally, that's the cheapest thing you're going to sell me when I go in for an oil change. "OK, yeah, do the alignment, do the tire rotation, whatever you need to do."

But this guy was super helpful. "Here's the price. Here's this. I'll even throw in a free alignment when we put the tires on." Amazing customer service. And I thought, wow, if the other guy had been half of that, I probably still would have gone to that store. I found it pretty shocking that the first guy was so "I don't really care," and the second guy was so incredibly helpful, as busy as his store was. At the end of the day, I went back and actually wrote a review for the guy, which I never do.

75,000 miles and never offered an alignment 6:50

Steve Shaw: So approximately how many miles were on your car when they told you that you needed tires?

Bryan Shaw: Probably the mid-70s at that time.

Steve Shaw: So you'd been going to the same dealership with your second Charger for upwards of 70,000 miles. They rotate your tires, and no one, one time, ever asked you to buy an alignment. That's what I find absolutely criminal. That's why he drinks a lot.

Bryan Shaw: Never. Never one time did anybody offer me that.

Steve Shaw: What do you think about that, Dave?

Dave Rogers: I don't believe it. What year is the Charger?

Bryan Shaw: 2020.

Dave Rogers: So you should be getting one a year. You're doing about the right mileage, 12, 15,000 miles a year, so you're right in the range. It's not like you're crazy. But not one time did the dealership offer it to you. In this case the dealership not offering you stuff caused you to wear out the tires, and then you go to Mavis and get two totally different experiences. Everyone always thinks the outside shops give you better service, but that's not always the case.

Bryan Shaw: No, it definitely wasn't.

A tire scanner nobody follows up on 7:54

Steve Shaw: Well, what's interesting to me, just to dovetail on this: I just had my Wagoneer in for service, 18,000 miles, my third service. I drove into the dealership local to my house, and I'm not going to say their name either. I drove in two times, and they use TreadSpec, the world-famous tire machine. Great. They send the traction report to my email or text, and I get it before I get home. Great.

I took it in and had some electrical problems taken care of, and on that first visit I had my 15,000-mile service done. So I'm at 15K, I get a traction report, and guess what the traction report said? Two tires are out of alignment. Did anybody mention that to me at all? Nobody. The senior service advisor did not mention that I need an alignment at 15,000 miles. Great. I'm glad you spent, what does that machine cost, $100,000? Nobody offers me an alignment.

So I go back for my special order parts, and I could go into a lot more detail about why the guy never called me for four weeks to tell me my parts were in. I drive back over the TreadSpec machine, and I get another email that says the same two tires need an alignment. You think he offered me an alignment? F no. And that's the whole point today: how can you spend a hundred thousand on a machine and still miss the opportunity? There are two Shaw boys right here who would have bought an alignment from you, and you couldn't be bothered to ask us the question.

Dave Rogers: Well, that's why you and I always talk about the machines. It's a crutch. I have guys who use the Hunter machine where you slap the clamps on the car, roll it real quick and get an alignment reading. The technicians do it every single time they bring a car into the shop. It's not done customer-facing. It's done when we bring the car into the shop. And those stores are consistently over 30% alignments as a unit to repair orders. On 30% of the customer-pay ROs that come through the shop, they do an alignment.

Those two shops are always consistently high. The rest of the stores, without the machine, fluctuate between 5% and 15%. The stores with the tire-scan machine are getting a little bit of traction, because it does email the customer. But the missing part is that the advisor never mentions it. You've got to mention it. I don't understand this. You have the machine. And it goes with everything we've talked about before: if you don't have a good process in place, technology does not make you better. It really doesn't. It's amazing.

Steve Shaw: That's the key.

Bryan Shaw: Hey, I'll even take part of the blame. My brothers are in the car business, and I should have known better. But as Steve says, I drink a lot and I'm a rock and roll guy. What the hell do I know about a car? Again, it's the easiest sell to me: "Hey dude, you need an alignment." "OK, cool, do it."

Steve Shaw: Like we always say, would you like fries with that? "Would you like an alignment on your car today?" It takes almost no time and no effort to ask for fries. It's an impulse item. People will buy it if you ask them. But if the senior advisor in your store isn't asking the question... I'm the biggest laydown on the planet, and I know Bryan would buy if they asked him. But if you're not going to ask me, why would I do it?

And think about everything else that gets missed. They didn't even tell me I had the Jeep Wave program, that I had free oil changes. Nobody ever mentioned that. I had to find it on my own. If I hadn't asked, I wouldn't have gotten the Jeep Wave oil change. I didn't ask for the alignment, so I didn't get one. You've got to think about what's being missed. And to me, thank you, I'll go to another store and get my alignment taken care of. But what does a Grand Wagoneer tire cost?

Dave Rogers: Yeah, probably expensive.

Steve Shaw: Four, five, 600 bucks apiece. It's got to be expensive. I don't want to be driving around on tires that are going to wear prematurely. It's an easy sell. I would get it done. I want to take care of my Wagoneer. And I'm not just picking on Chrysler stores, and I'm not on my high horse like we're great or anything. It's like Dave said: just because we have AI, just because we have this tool, doesn't mean you're going to get the job. I love tire scanners. I love tire profilers. That's my beg for a sponsorship from those guys. I think they're great tools. But if your advisor isn't going to ask the question, it's a waste of money.

Yellow tires at 4/32nds 12:46

Dave Rogers: I was talking to one of my service managers the last couple of days about what we should be tracking, and I noticed their closing ratio on the multi-points and ASRs is less than desirable. So I'm looking through repair orders at random. I pull up the screen, and I look at my favorite subject: yellow on the multi-point.

Steve Shaw: The number one most marketed item on a multi-point.

Dave Rogers: Right, yellow. It happened to be tires and brakes, which are the two I would allow as yellow. And it's a Mercedes, so of course, if you drink the factory Kool-Aid, maintenance is once a year. I say twice a year. I don't care what kind of car you have, get the oil change every six months. These tires say 4/32nds. Now, in Pennsylvania, 2/32nds means you fail inspection. At 2/32nds your tires are basically bald.

At 4/32nds, I'd dare you to do 80 miles an hour on the parkway or turnpike in the rain, because you're not going to survive. So 4/32nds is not good tread depth to begin with. It really should be red, but OK, technically it's yellow. But I ask, no matter what you subscribe to, six months from now or 12 months from now is the next maintenance, and they're not making it to either one. So shouldn't the tires have been red? If you can't make it to the next oil change or the next interval, it should be red.

Steve Shaw: I'd go along with that 100%.

Dave Rogers: And I'm looking at the service manager, and I'm like, "Let's pretend you don't believe anything I say, and the guy's going to go 12 months between maintenance. How far is he going down the road on 4/32nds in the summer? He's not going to make it past June. You lost that tire sale. I don't care what anybody says." That guy's going to slip on the road in the rain and pull into Mavis, and hopefully he gets the good guy you talked to, Bryan, not the bad one. But he's going to buy tires somewhere else. He's not coming to your store. And I don't understand how we just allow it.

Bryan Shaw: Listen, that guy at Mavis had me so scared about my one tire that was at a 3 that I was afraid to drive on it for two days. And I had to drive literally a mile and a half between Mavis and my house and back, twice. I thought, I don't think that tire's going to make it.

Dave Rogers: I watch it. I see this stuff, and it brings me back to my Jersey City days, Steve. Jesus. Wiping my head, wiping the hair off my head. That's why I'm bald. I used to have hair like yours, I tell you. I'll show you pictures of me when my daughter was born.

Steve Shaw: You used to have hair like Bryan's. I've seen it.

What a customer wants from a dealer 15:42

Steve Shaw: Here's what I want to do. This is a short episode. People always criticize me in training: "Well, we have the TreadSpec machine, we have this." I told the story about getting thrown out of a booth at a convention one time, because I was telling my buddy not to buy the Hunter machines, because it's about behavior. Now, I don't have a problem with the machines whatsoever. I think they're wonderful, if the advisors will follow through on the next step. I've seen stores put in four or five of them across lanes and never see improvement, because they never do the training. Shameless plug for Steve's training, but if you're going to spend the money, I want you to get your money's worth.

But Bryan, you're a layperson outside the industry. Dave always gives the GM tip of the day. What would you say to a car dealer from the consumer perspective? You're the customer. You're the guy going in there and trusting the dealer to take care of your vehicle. Same dealer, two cars. What would you say to that dealer about not maintaining your vehicle, or how you want your car maintained? That's really why I asked you on. We can rant forever, but what would you, as a consumer, say to a GM about their store?

Bryan Shaw: To me, it's all about the customer service at that point. It's about the advisor saying, "Hey, this is what you need." At the end of the day, I have to decide whether I want it done or can afford to get it done. But at least tell me, "Hey, these are the things you have to have in order for your car to maintain its life." For me, it's just about the customer service, and nobody ever mentioned it.

It shouldn't be my responsibility as the customer to say, "Hey, should I get an alignment while I'm here? Should I get some tires?" That's your job. Your job is to tell me what my car needs, because I'm not a car guy. That's the important thing to me. The advisor should know exactly what I need, based on all the reports and all the machines: "Hey dude, you need this, this and this." And I'll go, "OK, I'll do this and this, and I'll wait until next time for the other one, if I can."

Dave Rogers: And that's the way it should be. That's the way it used to be in the old days. You'd tell them what they need now and what can maybe wait. That's the kind of advice we used to give customers: this is a red item, it's got to be done today. This is a yellow item, it can be done in the next three months. It was a lot easier when we saw people three or four times a year. Now, at six months, eight months, a year, I feel like there are people in the stores who feel they've got to get you every time you come in. "I'm only going to see Bryan once a year, so let me pluck his brains out and take everything he's got." And there are other people who just aren't used to selling, and for some reason they don't close the deal. I just don't understand it. We're here to do exactly what you said, Bryan: tell me what my car needs, and let me decide whether I can do it today or not. That's all.

Bryan Shaw: Look, you're going to sell me a $50 air filter that I can go to the store and buy for 10, and I'll go, "Yeah, just fix it." I'm here. I don't want to spend $50 on that, that's insane, but I'm not going to go do it myself. So just do it. And yet you can't sell me an alignment that costs, I'd assume, more than that.

Steve Shaw: 150. And especially with 10,000-mile intervals, though on a Chrysler it's 5,000, those tires are expensive. I paid a premium for my car, and we're only talking about alignments, tires and basic maintenance right now, so I won't go into all the other aspects. But those are expensive tires, and I will never say no to a service advisor. Bryan has asked me in the past whether he should buy something or not, and generally the answer is, "Yeah, get it, it's your car." But with extended intervals, we have an even bigger obligation to our customers to help them, as Bryan says, maintain their vehicle and make it last as long as humanly possible.

"I'm Leaving Right After This Drink," and the GM tip 20:33

Steve Shaw: Bryan, tell everybody about your podcast and where they can find you.

Bryan Shaw: My podcast is "I'm Leaving Right After This Drink: Rock and Roll, Whiskey and Other Stories." I talk about my time in radio and the entertainment business, the people I've met, or just stories that happened over the past weekend. Just hanging out and telling a story. They're no longer than 20 minutes. I keep them short, because nobody needs to hear me talk that long. A fun story or a couple of fun stories, and move on.

Steve Shaw: If anybody wants to learn about the guy who drove the KISS bus, or the stuntman for the General Lee, and actually some of those guys worked in the car business, tune into "I'm Leaving Right After This Drink" and see my brother. He's a character. He's always got a good rant for you. His rants are as good as Dave Rogers'. So Dave, why don't you wrap us up with the tip of the day? We'll actually have a short one this time.

Dave Rogers: Tip of the day for general managers: I'd challenge you to get into whatever service tool you have and take a peek, like I said earlier, at the declined maintenance. Maybe look at those yellow items, which drive me nuts. Take a look at it, then have the conversation with your people and just ask the question. Just like if you had a salesman bro-ing it up on the lot, or an F&I person running to the bathroom every time there's a cash deal, or any of the nefarious stuff you notice in sales, start looking into service and start inquiring. Just ask the question. If anyone takes offense, they're probably in the wrong business. Why didn't you recommend these tires? Why didn't you tell the customer they need an alignment? Those are the typical questions. Bring it to the forefront, let people know you're watching, and see what happens. I guarantee you'll have more sales.

Steve Shaw: Awesome. Everybody, it's been great to speak with you, and we'll get out of here. Only 22 minutes this time. We'll see you next week. All right. Thanks, bro.

Bryan Shaw: Sweet, thanks, brother. Making it nice and short for me.

Dave Rogers: Thanks for joining us. Back to your drink.

Bryan Shaw: Thanks.