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Car Guy Coffee & Fixed Ops Friday feat. Stephen Granger
Car Guy Coffee & Fixed Ops Friday feat. Stephen Granger
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About this episode
Stephen Granger joins the Car Guy Coffee team to discuss the importance of recalls in the automotive industry and how they can be leveraged to enhance customer relationships. With nearly 25 years of experience, Granger shares insights on how dealerships can effectively manage recalls to build trust and drive additional revenue. The conversation covers the challenges of consumer perception regarding recalls, the need for proactive communication, and strategies for engaging customers beyond just fixing their vehicles. This episode emphasizes the potential for recalls to serve as a gateway for deeper customer connections and increased service department profitability.
Topics:
recall management
customer engagement
fixed operations
dealer strategies
consumer trust
service department revenue
proactive communication
automotive industry trends
Car Guy Coffee & Fixed Ops Friday feat. Stephen Granger
This Fixed Ops Friday NADA Edition will feature CEO and Founder of Dealer Recall Solutions, Stephen Granger. Here to share how his technology helps dealers connect with owners of cars that have recalls and get those recalls fixed. Let’s Brew!
Don’t forget to share and subscribe!
Brew Brought By Our Proud Sponsors At:
www.fixedopsdigital.com
This Fixed Ops Friday NADA Edition will feature CEO and Founder of Dealer Recall Solutions, Stephen Granger. Here to share how his technology helps dealers connect with owners of cars that have recalls and get those recalls fixed. Let’s Brew!
Don’t forget to share and subscribe!
Brew Brought By Our Proud Sponsors At:
www.fixedopsdigital.com
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Technical
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Car
Honda Odyssey
"... car. So it was the infotainment system on behind Odyssey, and there was something where they had to reprog..."
Car
Skoda Felicia
"...le idea of everything that we do with my friends, Felicia, she says, Yes, this is what I've been preaching ..."
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Welcome to the Fixed Ops Friday Show, where we bring you high quality guests speaking about how to take your Fixed Ops department to the next level. This
Car Guy Coffee production is brought to you by Fixed Ops Digital powered by Trade Pending. Let's prove what's going on? Car guys in car gals. It's
lu Vermirez, the car Guy, It's Frime Hero and the one the Only Oh when mood? What's going on? Brother? What's up? Guys?
Welcome, Welcome, Welcome you and everybody to the very first of twenty twenty four Fixed Ops Friday. And we are so excited to have everybody jumping in.
Whether you're gonna watch this on the replay or you're gonna catch it live, We're telling you right now we need you involve. So wherever it is
that you are, we just happen to be in Miami and I know Owen's up there in the cold. I'll be out there tomorrow. Yeah. Coming
to Iowa. Yeah, coming to Iowa. Get to see my son.
I'm excited about that. But man, no matter where it is that you
are, go ahead and get ready for a hot pipe and cup of some of that Fixed Opps brew that is going to be super super special for you.
We got a subject that we haven't really participated here on the show before, and we're excited about it because, quite frankly, I get a whole lot of mail concerning it. When the more cars are owned over time,
the more notices you get. You even get the notices when you don't own
the car anymore. That's what I'm saying, right, But we are excited
to see everybody in here. Thomas Pingyon is already up in here saying Jordan
things going, Yes, that's right, we are over there over there, and we got a Facebook user saying, yo, yo, yeah, that's got to be Brian. So many great shows, folks. Fixed Offs Friday
has been running now for well over a year, and this show is almost two years now, and this shows really brought on a lot of amazing guests, and today is no less than that. It's it's another amazing guest that
we're excited to talk about what he does, what he's doing, and what's happening in today's market. I'm excited. I know Owen is Owen was really
excited when he sent me inform me saying, hey, this is what I got for the nineteenth, and I was like, fantastic, so excited.
There's been a shift in their company name. There's so many things that we
get to talk about today and the reasons behind it. So I'm pumped up,
lou there is a lot that's shaken up and we're excited about it.
But Owen, what is it that you went through when considering who it is that we get the chance to kick off twenty twenty four with? How did
we come to the special guests that we have to hear today. I think
what ends up happening a lot of times is fixed operations is such a massive, massive animal, right, There's so many different pieces of it. There's
so many different profit centers. There's a lot that you can just we can
go on this show and talk for twenty four hours and never hit the same subject twice. I've tried to be very specific with our guests, and this
one's no different. I think that this guy has a lot of knowledge in
this particular area. And I noticed that more and more OEMs are having these
problems and consumers obviously is something that they're having to deal with, and I just think, I think, at the end of the day, just to shed light to other areas of the fixed operation department is big, and so I think the topic today fits right into where we're at as we're moving into twenty twenty four, and not only from a consumer standpoint, but obviously while we're here today, and that's what opportunities do we have for dealers to get better, make more money, and to really give their consumers that great experience when they get to the service lane. And I think the more we can
shed light on what's actually happening in these different areas, we can definitely make a difference. And so yeah, let's bring them on. Let's let's get
started with this thing. Let's get them out here. So Facebook user was
our friend James Bernard. So hey, James, inside of the heart that
you have for this incredible industry, we got to go ahead and call the solutionary out here and just say solutionaries melt up. So let's walk in the
one the only Steven brangeres Wow that yeah, Yeah, the cups come in bigger sizes, is all right? Right, We're not done getting you pumped
up about really just you being you, you being bringing a solution to the market and helping out in a tremendous way, and we're just really here to make sure the whole world knows about it, or at least a little pocket of people that we can influence a little bit. But Steve, where are
you at? Tell us a little bit about and dealer recall solutions. Yeah.
So I have been in the auto industry for I hate to say it.
When I say it out loud, I feel really old, but almost twenty five years now, and I got into it and like most people, I think in our space where I wasn't planning on becoming a car salesperson, but I was a recruiter the dot com bubble burst. I needed a job.
I love cars, and specifically at that time, I was really being into audies. And my ex wife, she's looking in the paper. That's
how long ago it was. She was looking for job we need to say
person. And it's really a kind of a funny story because the guy that
I ended up going and working for we're very close friends. And he told
me later because I was telling him like, man, I was really worried when I pulled up. He was like, Bro, you pulled up in
a TT and you had a resume, Like you don't get that you were good. You were in Yeah. Yeah. I did the car sales for
about six eight months and realized it was the hardest job on the planet and I was not very good at it. But I still love the car business
and so try to figure out ways that I could be involved in the space and work for Auto Trader magazine. That's again Howlong Ago, this is cars
dot Com. And then I was one of the first dealer facing people at
car FATS, so handled large dealer groups for them, and then worked there for twelve years. And during that time, one of my roles was best
practice consultant. And that's where kind of the germ of the recall idea came
from for me, is when the Takata. Actually it was way before Takata.
It was some weird recall on Fords that they replaced a transaxle and a dealership made like four grand and I remember we were at Ford store in Ohio and the guy was like, can you help us figure out where we can find these? And I was like, oh, hey, maybe this was
an idea. And at the time, Carfax had this really very rudimentary listing
site that like nobody knew about. But if you ran a carfax report.
It would put a listing up and it was just the text listing, no pictures anything. And so we talked to him about what you could set up
an alarm, what kind of cars have the recall and it'll opinion when one's listed for sale. And initially that was the vision I had for a company
and it started the name of the company originally was called Recall Rabbit, and the idea came from that. Plus, I was the digital manager at a
seven store group here in Austin and it was right when Takata came out, and the guy who sat next to me was the service BDC director and he kept calling people every day. Hey, Bob, I know you've probably seen
the news about the airbag issue. We want to take care of you.
We don't have thousands of airbags sitting here, but now I talk to you, I'm gonna or do you one, and when it comes in, we'll get you taken care of them, get you in and get it and then fast forward the bat part would come in. He would call somebody and be
like, hey Bob, great news, we got the airbag. You want
to Oh okay, yeah, yeah, I'll big you. I'll give you
a call later. And I finally, after hearing this probably one hundred and
fifty times, I walked over and it's like, are you telling someone that we will fix their car for free and potentially save their life if they get an accent And they're telling you no, And he's like, yeah, it happens all the time. And I was like, Okay, there's something going
on here. And then I started doing some digging and realized how big an
issue recalls really are in our space, and that there is really a good way for dealers to connect with consumers and other dealers and try and connect those dots and get people in and get them fixed. Hey, dealers, Car
Guy, Coffee podcast, and Certified Solutionaries are honored to be part of team.
Thank you. The solutions They've been ruined for you to acquire more vehicles,
advertised merchandise, and manage those vehicles has made them one of the most sought after dealer parmers in the marketing. They are one hundred percent cgc IT
proved and when you visit them at NQ dot com you'll see a whole hill of beans worth of reasons why t bank let's brow and so fast forward built an initial MVP launched that in a minimum viable product. Sorry, I forget
them on the techy side and the auto side of the world back in before two thousand to twenty twenty. Sorry January twenty twenty, I decided to quit
my day job and start full time on the recall it trying to drive business to dealerships. Not on paper the best time to do your startup right at
the start of COVID. It worked indetic, but it was actually the cool
experience for us because what the tool originally did was connect dealers to help them solve recalls unused inventory. Right, So if I'm a Honda store, I
we would tell them all the Hondas that were sitting around them for sale that had recalls on them, and then they would connect, get them in, get them fixed. Nobody has to pay for it. It helps the dealer
who's selling the car, I have a better inventory piece to sell. It
was. It was a cool idea at the time, and we had some
dealers at the time. If we go in the wayback machine tell us that
they weren't able to be selling cars they could service. But people were afraid
they were going to die if they brought their car and to get their oil change, because nobody knew if I touched the car and you touched the car, am I going to get COVID? There were some dealers we had at
the time that are like, this is literally the only way we're making money right now is by getting these cars from other dealers. Recalls. Yeah.
Yeah, Like I said, I started digging and it it's a really big number. And I think a lot of people are surprised. It's depending on
the study. You find anywhere between one and four and one in five cars
at any time in the United States has a recall. So between y five
is sixty million cars. Why do you think so A quick question on that,
Why do you think it has I mean grown so much. Yeah,
here's the thing. It's like we heard about recalls, I mean growing up
early adulthood. You got a recall here, recall there. You know,
it was like, oh man, that what they do? They use a
bad part? Do they get? You know? It's like now I feel
like it's almost like the OEMs are like, it might not be as good of a part, but we're gonna just throw it in there and deal with the aftermath. What do you think changed in the philosophy to be where we're
at today, where you've got millions of vehicles that are on the road that yeah, every day, like I have Google alerts set up, and I'm blown away by the number. Every day I get an alert that says seven
hundred thousand cars. And I asked, I wandered the same thing. I
asked a lot of our customers, why do they think it right that people have been in the space for a long time? And kind of the common
answer I've gotten on And I don't know how good I feel about this as a consumer, But if you think about in the way gone days, it would take forever to get a car to market, right, it may be seven, eight, ten years from when the idea comes up and they start to work on it, and they've sped that process up. And part of
what has gone by the wayside in that speeding up is the testing, right, and so unfortunately what ends up happening this is again what I've been told.
I'm not this isn't the Bible, but is that work? The guinea
pigs they get the product out, not assuming they're going to be problems or knowing they're going to be problems, but that's what happens because they haven't had the rigorous testing that they may have had in the past, where almost overkill on testing of vehicles. And I think that's really the biggest piece that I've
heard, right. I think also there's so much more technology inside cars.
There's just a lot of other craft break and not work right. You know,
a big one there was a couple of years ago. We have grown
beyond that initial product from customer interaction. Customers come to us and asking us
for help. And one specific thing that kind of sparked where we are today
and the change in the name of the company is about three or four years ago, Honda had a big recall and this is just to give you an idea of that, right, And it was on the infotainment system and just the connectedness of the car. So it was the infotainment system on behind Odyssey,
and there was something where they had to reprogram it and it took a machine that's like the size of my Dea that they gave every hand a store one of these machines. And if you needed a second one, because you
have so many basics, like thirty grand or something like that, and what would happen, and the reason it was so scary to Honda and consumers is that if you did it improperly because the infotainment system was connected to the digital dashboard, it would fry the dashboard and then you would have a mileage issue on that car. All of a sudden, the mileage wouldn't be correct and
you so one thing to lead to other things other Yeah. Yeah, So
it just shows the connectedness of everything that's going on, and if something goes wrong, they have to fix it so that it gets fixed for the whole thing. Goodness so much. The Yeah, understanding of the exposure we do
get to have to our customer after the fact is a pretty important piece.
Yeah, inside of the recall process, I really would wonder what would the stats look like, what are the numbers or are there any studies? Does
anybody know how many first time visits to a franchise dealer or an oean dealer is because of Yeah, I don't know that numbers, but that's a great one number. And it's also one of the things I think that's it's a
great tool for dealers. I know a lot of times there's this kind of
negative perception of recalls. Inside the fixed ops world from the dealer space,
and it's understandable because some of them are worth not very much money. It's
a pain. Like you guys said, you've gotten mailers and flyers, which
on one side makes me sad, but also it makes me happy because hopefully we can find you and get you in. But if you take a step
back and think about most communication from a dealer to a consumer or what a when a consumer is dealing with the fixed ops side of the dealership right, it's a negative experience, not because of the engagement with the dealer, just because what's going on. Hey, dealers, franchise and independent, we have
some great news for you and your number one sales pro your website. Partner
with Team mxcess. We have the ability to pull you out of that cookie
cutter merry go round and help your website and body what it means to do business with you, from the highest quality production to the most strategic optimization.
We want to help you connect better to the ever changing market. To you
and your team to at least let us do a quick and free check up on your website, We can't wait to hear from you. Go to teammaccess
dot com. Back to the show. Your car. The most expensive,
second most expensive thing you own is broken, right, and so you're already like, oh man, it's not working. I got to go see the
dealer. You pull into the dealer, and dealers have done a great job
of trying to make their environments friendly and great for customers. But when you
take a step back and you think about it, there's the giant overhang, there's twenty people, forty cars. As a consumer, you're pulling in there,
Oh man, you're already worried. Cars checked up. I don't know
what they're going to say. I don't know if they tell me it's right
or wrong, or if the outreach you're sending is about a special or something like that. Like consumers aren't really excited about coming to a car dealership to
get their car face. If you think about the message that you send a
consumer, if you're messaging about recalls, it's not a message of come in and we want to take money from you. It's we're going to fix this
for free. We care about you and your family in your vehicle. We
want to help you. It's a great opportunity to get that customer in.
Like you said, maybe not the first time, but maybe it's a long time customer that hasn't come in for a while. Right there, It's a
great tool to engage your customer base, even if it may not be a lot of money. And there are a lot of recalls that are a lot
of money, but even if it's a small amount, if you're using that as a tool to generate engagement with the customer, you think about that feeling that they get when they come to the dealership. Right, I'm positive because
my service adviser reached out to me because they're concerned about my family and my minivan and the air bag, and I want to shure my kids are safe.
Right. And what we found across the board with our customers is that
typically when someone is messaging about recalls and that's why they come in, customer pay above and beyond that is typically from our customer base about seventy five percent above the warrant to work. Right, So somebody's the recalls one thousand bucks,
what we see is typically that consumers then spending an additional seven hundred and fifty dollars with that dealership before that ro It's a you build trust something to them that they didn't even realize they get the recall because you sent the letter out, you sent the message out, you reached out to them. They
didn't get it from the manufacturer. They didn't have to find out for themselves.
Yeah, you offered a free service to make sure that they're taking care of them and their family. Where else are the money with people they trust?
They should still be doing the MPI right, they should be still in the inspection. They're still going to be like going, hey, we got
you. Let's just go through that normal everyday process. And now that's when
you do make those recommendations, they actually believe them and they say, oh, okay, this is what I need. We're the The MPI is right.
It's whether or not the customer believes it's worth it to them to fix it today. And if they're not, if they're coming in and not getting
charged for that recall, maybe there's money in their pocket to take care of a couple of the things, and you're proving that with some of your data there. Yeah, it's a great opportunity. And I think even if worst
case scenario, you just fix the recall, right and it's one hundred and fifty bucks, Your point is exactly right. And this is what I harp
on with our customers. Should you get one hundred and fifty of those people
in, that's one hundred and fifty MPIs that now your BDC can reach out to those people. When you do talk to them, what they have in
their mind is, oh, the last time I went to the dealership, they helped me. So it's a yeah. It's a great tool for engaging
customer, especially because the majority all of these customers are not going to those third parties to go get a recall head because they can't. They can't where
most of them, whether they purchased it new or they purchased it US and never established the relationship with the franchise. They are taking care of their car
with the third parties up and down the block. When they get the chance
to. If it's presented right, receive great news. We haven't a fixed
for your vehicle. We have it almost as upgrade for your vehicle to be
optimized to work more to factory specifications, just like us on our iPhone.
How often do you upset and when we say, hey, there's going to be an update, Yeah, there's an update, but it's because they're fixing you know what I mean. That's where we were going, and I think
we need to change it and call it an update. Recall like that language.
I do agree, said a good prove have used proactive communication instead of react. That's the whole idea of everything that we do with my friends,
Felicia, she says, Yes, this is what I've been preaching to the service BBC and the advisors amen to that. Just as earlier, the customer
already has pain. You're one hundred percent right, so before they even show
up. So what do we do? We build trust by taking away as
much of that pain as possible and know us up. Thank you so much
for joining us. And this is some really good stuff my friends, and
I think that everybody who's on the show watching it right now live, they all agree they get this is to me, it should be a no brainer.
It's why it's so crazy that a business like yours, a company like yours, is like breaking ground. This is something that should have been done
a long time ago. So I'm so glad that you guys are out there
making this happen right now for so many dealers and for the industry and for clients. More importantly, for the people who are owning these vehicles, which
are the deal with employees in a lot of cases, which are their family right. So it's important that we have all these types of things put in
place to build more trust and makes it so simple. It's just data.
It's data that we use to send out information to be able to get them to come in and share and help. And let's be honest, we've had
another We've had some data come out recently that from twenty one to twenty three we've actually lost market share to the independence. So we're still fighting that game
of convenience of price. And so if really one of the few things that
we still have in our bag that they don't is recalls. So why are
dealerships not embracing it? Is it a pain in the ass to get paid?
Is there there might be few things that it's a different process than customer pay. There's probably some things there that are they're relevant. But at the
end of the day, if I really want to grow market share, to Steven's point, if I get one hundred and fifty people in to fix something that I know the OEM's going to reimburse me for, I think what ends up happening in a lot of cases that I mean, maybe not so much as we move forward here, but in the past it was like, Okay, we got that fixed, let's just get on to the next appointment where it needs to be part of a bigger strategy. Hey, let's reach out
to that person. Let's give them a coupon to come in now and get
an oil change done at ABE at a cheaper price, and say, hey, this is a second touch point, and there's a third touch point, and before you know it, that customer only thinks of you when it comes to that solution. But if you just let them come in and get the
recall, shake their hand, wave at them, and they're off, you've done yourself no good in the thing. We literally have done nothing with it.
Activity breeds activity, right, and that's the whole point is activity keeps everyone busy, keeps everybody happy, keep clients coming inside your place of business.
We lost the market share between twenty one and twenty three, is no doubt. We were selling cars for twice the price that they were. We
were not caring about any service at all. And that's such a game because
that was such an opportunity there in that time to do the compute opposite.
There's a lot more trust by that and gain more market spare in service departments, which our service departments are above beyond any to me. Most of those
independence out there, they have better, better service texts, they have everything that you can imagine. It's just the problem is that majority of them don't
know how to market that. They don't know how to do those things.
That's why companies fix off digital and deal with recall solutions that are out there to help you guys, do that, fix up digital trade pending, you know what I mean. Like, it's so important that people go out understand
and I think that dealers, if you're watching this right now, I'm telling you start looking at those recalls, start finding solutions for that it. Reach
out to Steven, have a conversation with them. I promise you they'll be
happy to give you as much information that he can to be able to help you get Yeah, even if you don't work with somebody like us or recall asters or the other players in space like on set a great thing. Like
it's a process. I can't tell you how many stores we've worked with where
we send them because we can see which customers went in by their VN and we see it at the end of the month that like we set them in for the recall and they didn't even fix it. We know you were joying
the show so far. We just wanted to quickly remind you about our partners
at Fixedops Digital and how they are automotives premier service marketing and technology company not only proud sponsors of the Car Guy Coffee podcast, but they also served as your dedicated point of contact for all your online service marketing related needs servicing dealerships throughout the US and Canada. The mission is to create a better online experience
for your service customers while using data intelligence to drive more fixed operations revenue.
If you want to take your service marketing efforts to the next level, go to fixed ops Digital dot com. Back to the show, let's go,
what are you like that? Because of their own internal process when they get
there, they don't have a way to look up the recalls or whatever that is. It's just it's a piece of the puzzle I mentioned. I was
a recruiter and I worked for an agency in the San Francisco Bay area and we were one of a giant company that at forty eight locations, and we made more money at our one place than all forty eight other combined. That
boss was brilliant and he's it's something to me one time because I worked on something that was it wasn't software related, so it was a smaller dollar amount for the branch, and I always had a chip on my shoulder, and one day he pulls me said this, even when you go to the liquor store, they don't just sell champagne. They sell chick lits. You know
why they sell chick lits because they make money on the chick lits. Right
you are the chick lits of our company, and I'm so glad we have them because when somebody walks out with the champagne, they grab a chick lit right like. And the recalls is that same piece. Maybe it isn't a
huge home run on the recall itself, but the periphery stuff, the NPI, the great experience. The now you see what a dealership is really instead
of what you think in your brain. Dealing with the dealership is like versus
Jiffy Loeue or mine Key or Firestone, whoever you pass to come to the dealership because they can't work on the recall you can. This is a great
chance for you to take that and run with that customer. The other thing
that we see too is it's a great way to engage older customers and bring them back in. Because you've got a five year old card, you're probably
not going to the dealership to get your old change, even though to your point the tax is probably better than the other place. I just changed my
oil somewhere because I had to, and they screwed it up. I ended
up taking it back to the dealership because they didn't do it right right.
You never have to have that worry because they don't have CSI Sports and Independence don't have to worry about what their customers think. They just they just do
it the manager right. And that's we have different level so much. We
had one Honda store that after seven eight months of running with us, he reached out to me and he's like, I gotta thank you. I won
an award and I didn't know how I want it for his region and I was like, what are you talking about? And it was they get I
guess there's some sort of review that they have for age of customer brands right two to three years, but whatever, it was, and he had more than anybody else in the region in this older band, and he could not figure out where they were companies, like how many game means eight year old customers. And when he started doing the digging, he was like, it's
because we're messaging about recalls, they're re engaging. We're doing a great job.
We'd get their trade right. There's so many periphery things that can happen
with this. Just again, it's a positive message. We want to help
you. Come on into the dealership. How many times are you looking for
you good used CPO cards? Right? And I think of it as sales
man conversation creates car deals and every bit like the trust the build them coming back to the store. That makes them even more confident in the front side
of the house, right where the certain people, so all that stuff works together. This is a team effort. And when you can have this running
as an owner, and this is why the owners need to think of it as more. This isn't just service. This is your business. This is
your business. This is your great stories like we have too that I can
just think of on the top of my head. So we work with a
great store in the Chicago area and we help them message. It was not
technically a recall. It was something with a transmission on a Honda that if
there was something wrong with it, Honda would replace it. And so we
messaged all the customers that had this, and it was during the Thanksgiving holiday and a woman came in and it was an older I think CRB or something, and they ended up replacing it. And she was blown away because she
was like, I could have been driving. She had a big trip,
she was going away out Thanksgiving to her family a couple hundred miles away.
She's like, if it would have gone out, I would have gone to somebody, a transmission shop. They would have probably fixed it. I would
have never known that it was going to be replaced at no charge to me.
And the same thing happened with the same kind of recall here. I
live in Austin. We have a great customer here hand a store. We
sent the message. The guy called the dealership and told him to stop sending
him the message. And the guy, he's, I've gotten this message two
or three times. I've taken it to a local transmission shop. They're about
repair it and replace it. And our customer said, whoa whoa, whoa
stop. I will send a tow truck to that place, pick your car
up, and we will place the transmission at no charge. And the guy
was like, what what are you talking about? And that's what this recall
is. Your transmission needs to your replace. We will replace that, notre
and he did. And the guys, I can only imagine that's the thing
you think about that I think about the next time that guy talks to somebody who says, you're looking for her car. He is loyal for life.
Yeah, life, Yeah. But he started from a perspective this is you
guys are trying to trick me. You're trying to get me in, which
essentially what it is that we're trying to break down is a giant wall of mistrust that the customer has with the big bad car dealer that's inside of our community and trying to get us for every dollar for their big beautiful buildings or their big beautiful displays. The customer doesn't recognize that all of that awesomeness is
for them and it is them, and that they get that with the product that they purchased from the dealership. And if it's approached properly, then the
customers should recognize this as great news and, like we were saying earlier, as the update, because to your chick lit point, the product placement inside of your local convenience store isn't by happenstance. It's designed to make you grab
and pull and pay for products that were never on your initial list of I need to get And just them being placed there, just them being you being aware of them there makes it possible that you could take a bite of the apple another time. And yes, inside of the sales department. Goodness,
what if we took it that seriously that a person is potentially becoming another client of our organization. Let's get some of the people that can best discribe what
it's like doing business with us to say hello on one of those appointments, to take a core tour. Let's do the service walk and the sales walk.
Let's reverse how it is that we present on you. If the first
glance we have from the store isn't them kicking a tire, but them saying, hey, something's broken. You guys said you're going to fix it for
free? Is that for real? And somebody says, yes, absolutely,
that's awesome. You're getting such and such upgraded people have been so happy with
this upgrade. Let me show you around a little bit while they take care
of that. Let me get your coffee. Let me show you what it
is that you get with being here with us. If we were alerted to
them coming to our magnificence for the first time, Let's give them the experience.
Let's show them what we have. And to your point, Ohen,
yes you're coming in. While you're coming in for this recall, here's your
coupon for your oil change, because you're gonna have to do that, and even if you don't come get it during the time that you're here, you got the coupon. We want to see you again. We want to be
givers. And that's the shift that has to happen inside of our industry,
is that the consumer has to recognize they get more with us, They get more because in golf, inside of our actual flow, rather than being another transaction that might be a little bit cheaper, but is cheaper, it's cheaper in relationship those show me your richest person, We'll show you the ones with the most rich relationships. Quick question, do you know what smart pixel two
point zero, Location IQ and audience IQ have in common, you know I do. They are solutions that our friends and proud sponsors and One Data and
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dot com. Let's brew Come on now, back to the show. And
those are that really is what a customer does want. We all want it.
We're all still customers first. Right. It's a fine line too,
because you have to take them off the recall because into other areas of the business, because the challenge is if it's already not a great situation for the customer, and honestly, I think it is. Also we're looking at this
as an opportunity and how much dealerships can additionally make additional revenue and things like that. But it is a fine line because you don't want to be known.
I hate to throw Kia out there, but what is Keia known for?
Right now? You start becoming that kind of a company where it's like,
oh, every time I think of that brand. All I think about
is that issue that's gone global. I think a couple of things have to
happen there. You have to be forthright with the customer. You have to
be up front. You got to make sure they understand that this is something
that is going to once we get this done, this vehicle is still going to be the reason why you bought it. And then ultimately, to your
point, dealerships look at that ABC or mister Jones on the name of the business as that brand. So let's take their mind off of the recall that's
being done, and let's get them involved with other areas of the store.
And so that way, it's a positioning I think opportunity for you as well while you're still doing that recall, because the last thing you wanted to do is sit there and watch them with your car up on the lift and watch them pulling that thing out and working on it. You know what I mean,
Like, it's just constant reinforcement on God to hate this vehicle. It
just always has problems. And I got a recall, and let's move them
away from that and let's by the end of it, the heye, we took care of that. Look at that's that beautiful, brand new vehicle that
you bought six months ago, that you fell in love with, and now you've gotten a whole other aspect of what our dealership can bring you, not only from a service standpoint, but someone said there, someone brought up there what happens when it becomes another opportunity to sell a car? Right now,
you want to be that answer for them. That's exactly the cycle that we're
looking for. And that's what these recalls can do for you, all dealers,
and if you seales pros and for you service reps, everybody, this is a great, great opportunity to build more relationships. When you're putting the
relationships above your revenue, your own going to do way better than everyone around you. If you put people over your over your profits. I'm telling you
the profits will come. They just do if you it's but it's everybody doing
it together, right, So everybody making sure that they don't just come in for a recall, we fix it, that we're giving them service while they're there, that we're going to that next level showing them mind we believe our service department is the best in the area, or whatever we want to say that it is right. Be that and just be that, Be that dealer,
be that person who's out there giving people what they need, and that's help. And when you can help people, they're gonna come to you when
it's time for them to when they need the help, and they don't need to ask, they just want to ask for it, so they're just being told to them. Get it. So I love this conversation, friends and
family and everyone out there, solutionaries. This has been a great one today,
Steve, and you've crushed it today with this recall student. Obviously you
know what you're talking about, and we appreciate you sharing that with our network.
I know Owen was super excited to have you on a show, and I see why now and I can't wait to see what else happens. You're
going to be at any da. I'm still planning. The plan is,
yes, no booth, but I'll be there. It's easiest way for everybody
to get a hold of you. I got your website running at the bottom
of yea yeah time. Yeah, either that or you pin me on my
mobile. It's five one two six six three four five four four, So
yeah, pick up the phone, folks, reach out to him. He's
happy to help. He has solutions for you and your recalls. I'm telling
you it'll make all the difference. It'll build better relationships inside your story,
and it'll keep your people busy and opportunities for them. So all big giant
life cycle. I love it. Owen you have anything else for Steven before
we get ready to forgive focused fly out of here. Yeah. Nothing,
really is just a great conversation today. Obviously, get into the trenches.
Talked prior to jumping on here that we could sit in and talk about a lot of these different profit centers and different areas of the fixed operations apartments for hours, right, And unfortunately you have to, thanks Jason, you have to look at recalls as just that an opportunity to now only gain revenue today, which obviously is good because the OEM is covering that, But how do you use it to advance your mission with your customers through regular maintenance, through that next vehicle purchase, things like that. And I think that's the part
that's tough for some, especially on the service side. We're so busy,
we don't think like that, right. Service marketers are not our service department.
Service directors are not necessarily marketers and that type of thing. So bring
in your your digital team, bring in your agency, bring in your marketing team, and say, hey, I've got this little niche thing going on right now. It's not positive. I'm gonna spin it, turn it so
it's positive. But what else can I do off it. Let's get everybody
in the room talking and let's come up some really solid strategies that are going to help like compound on top of each other. And I think that's the
thing I like to really think of outside the box on when I'm working on stuff like this. And Steven has been a great partner of ours. We
really love that he brings us a lot of great data when it comes to which vehicles out there have recalls and things like that. And I know he's
a growing company, so I wanted to make sure that we gave him a little little highlight today and I knew Steve would come with some great info and I think he did so with that. Steven, thank you so much.
Ay last thought, when you're in yeah, no, I would say, like I said earlier, if you don't use us, start thinking about it and come up with a process at the store of how you help customers get recalls fixed. Well, Stephen, there's not too often on the Fixed Ops
Friday have we had some announcement of our validity to what it is that you're bringing to the industry. But we're gonna have to go ahead and drop out
there that Dealer Recall Solutions is CGC approved. Everybody, go ahead and give
him a shout, let him know that you need not back. But Stephen,
it is a conversation that can continue to go on. The concept behind
why it is so important that we do this is critical. Thank you so
much. What's going on everything? See you brother, see you, Jason,
happy that has been joining us in here. This has been the first
Fixed Ops Friday for the year twenty twenty four, and we are excited to bring you a whole lot more. We are pumped up to be part of
the solution here in the industry, especially inside of this fixed obstinate folks.
There is so much to learn, so much growthing to do inside of that.
We got to drop those F bombs so we can keep doing it too.
Hey, real quick, guys, real quick special edition next week.
Right. Yeah, the NADA all my new friends that trade penning is going
to be joining us. So I'm super excited to the show twenty six,
be looking forward. I'll be having a promo come out on in the next
couple of days. It's going to be an amazing show. We're gonna be
talking about what to see and what's happening at NABA, what's happening with trade penning right now, because there's a lot of stuff going on. I'm excited
to have them on the show too, because I'm telling you that the buzz about what's happening with the with all of the companies just combining to Foreorn Voltron, I'm telling you I love it. So it's gonna be a lot of
fun to talk about. Can't wait. Yeah, to be on lookout for
that. I think everybody on this show next week has not been on the
show, on the show before, so boo excited for that. Yes,
I thought, I give ourselves a shameless plug there, shame on our slug plug city. We got all kinds of outlets to keep plugging. We are
excited to do what it is that we do, but let's get ready to forgive focused by everybody. Thank you Brian o' taking. We see you out
there, brother, Thank you for jumping in and everybody else that is brewing solutions with us. Let's forgive Focused Fly, so Steven go ahead and help
us out. Hands on the shoulders on the field. One two three,
Focus Fly. That's right. Everybody here is the car Guy and I'm thrilling.
I'm here, and you've been brewing solutions on the four Guy Coffee podcast for Fixed Ops Friday, No. One, the Only the Ohen Move and
our special guests Steve Rider. That's right, everybody see you, so we're out h
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