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Life As A Mechanic | Paul Danner, Check Engine Chuck, and Keith Perkins
Life As A Mechanic | Paul Danner, Check Engine Chuck, and Keith Perkins
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About this episode
A candid conversation unfolds among automotive experts Paul Danner, Check Engine Chuck, and Keith Perkins at Tools 2025, touching on the fragility of ego in the mechanic world and the importance of recognition. They discuss the challenges of running a shop, the responsibility of online creators, and the need for higher labor rates to attract new talent. The episode also highlights charity efforts within the automotive community, personal growth journeys, and the significance of collaboration to elevate the industry. Listeners gain insights into the evolving landscape of automotive repair and the camaraderie among mechanics.
Topics:
mechanic ego
shop management
labor rates
charity initiatives
online creator responsibility
collaboration
personal growth
diagnostic challenges
community support
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Today, Jeff sits down at Tools 2025 with Paul Danner (ScannerDanner), Keith Perkins, and Check Engine Chuck. Paul shares updates on the SD Charities initiative and highlights the importance of giving back to the community, including a tool auction supporting an auto tech school in Senegal. Keith and Chuck discuss the challenges and rewards of growing their businesses, from shop expansion to personal journeys in technical skill development. The group engages in an honest conversation about industry image, the need for higher labor rates, and the vital role of technician recognition and continued networking.
00:00 "Tools 2025: Meeting Success"
05:24 Supporting Solar for African Schools
12:01 "Striving for Effective Communication"
20:58 Promotional Shorts and Circuit Troubleshooting
24:27 Accountability in Vehicle Repairs
27:36 Online Creators' Ethical Responsibility
33:19 "Revamping Labor Rates in Trades"
40:18 "Profitability of Brake Suspension Work"
47:15 Seeking Appreciation and Change
50:32 "Rethinking Industry Value Perception"
57:21 Paul's Dubious Car Flipping Tactics
58:35 U-Haul's Business Model Explained
01:08:00 Mutual Respect and Encouragement
01:14:01 "Collaborate Beyond Platforms"
Follow/Subscribe to the show on social media!
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Filter:
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Technical
Too Afraid to Ask
Car
Dodge Journey
"...hings. So, yeah, me, it's been more of a personal journey. I'm trying to expand my knowledge and of course,..."
Car
Honda CRX
"I did the car flip over? Yes. I made the car flip over CRX's dude ramp. And they land in the side bags. He like, it did a front somersault, flip, turn, run. Wow. We ate that one though. Yeah, we ate that."
"Tools 2025: Meeting Success"
Supporting Solar for African Schools
"Striving for Effective Communication"
Promotional Shorts and Circuit Troubleshooting
Accountability in Vehicle Repairs
Online Creators' Ethical Responsibility
"Revamping Labor Rates in Trades"
"Profitability of Brake Suspension Work"
Seeking Appreciation and Change
"Rethinking Industry Value Perception"
Paul's Dubious Car Flipping Tactics
U-Haul's Business Model Explained
Mutual Respect and Encouragement
"Collaborate Beyond Platforms"
Select text to request an explanation
Ego is very fragile.
And I'm. We.
We are all need our ego, especially with mechanics. Yeah.
We're all crybabies.
We are all crybabies.
We are.
Yeah, yeah.
100.
Yeah. And we need to be told, good job.
And sometimes we have some losses.
Yeah.
Right. So when you have a win like that, you just want somebody to say, good. Good job.
Hey, man, nice find.
Thank you.
How hard was that? You know?
So we're all sitting here this afternoon at Tools 2025 in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and everybody, when they were asking me, what did you want to have happen, Jeff, at Tools? And I'm like, if I can get. And I'm sitting with friends, first of all, I'm sitting with people I really consider friends. But if I could get Chuck. Chuck Henson Chuck to meet Keith Perkins and Paul Danner, I can consider the trip a success. If I never do anything else, I could blow the Jeep up on the way home. It wouldn't matter. It'd be all worth it. So I'm sitting here today with Paul Danner, Keith Perkins, Chuck Engine Chuck, and you all know me, and we're at Tools 2025, and we're here to just kind of just shoot the breeze and talk.
So, Paul, as always, so cool to see him.
I know, man. I'm glad. I'm glad to be here. We didn't do any other podcast recordings, and. Yeah, I told you. I was like, I want to sit down with you, so. And you said this idea, and I was like, yeah, let's do it.
Yeah. And, Keith, you and I are becoming pretty frequent talkers, which is awesome. I love that.
Yeah.
So, you know, and. And Chuck, you and I, you know, since ASTA last year when you attended, I've really kind of started to reach out and. And go back and forth. And you. We were talking last night how you wouldn't even have gone to ASTA if I hadn't gone on Live with you and backed you into a corner and said, you really should go.
I wouldn't be here if you almost do that. You didn't have to come on my live this time, at least. But honestly, you definitely. What's the word I'm looking for? Facilitated the fact that I'm even here. But after. After this one, I'll be trying to hit all of them in the future.
It's a big. And, you know, I want. I want everybody to understand it's a big financial responsibility and expense to make these. These trips. And so I appreciate everybody that does. Like, I don't say that enough? Because, like, with this podcast, what it does is it allows me to make these trips for, you know, not a huge expenditure out of my pocket. But for people in business, this is still a very expensive thing for you guys to be doing. The time away, plus the expense of getting here.
So I want to say again, I appreciate everybody that makes these trips. So let's do guys like Paul start with you. What's kind of. How's things?
Yeah, I started a head cold today. Kind of sucks.
And you.
I'm like.
Of all time.
I'm like. So that's what's new for me is I'm like, I just want to take a nap.
Yeah.
But I'm good.
And you're. You've brought the charity thing here, which we really have to talk about. You're doing a big raffle. So silent auction, I guess, is a better thing to say.
Yeah. So we, you know, we're kind of expanding a little bit with what we do. And, you know, I was telling. I was telling Chuck last night that we, you know, we've been this first time we've met, too, which is kind of awesome. We've been doing the YouTube game since 2012 and, you know, gets old sometimes and, you know, not that, you know, I'm stopping any of that, but we just kind of looking beyond and what's next. And that's when Kristen and I, you know, decided we were going to start this charity.
Yeah.
And so we're here today not really representing Scanner Danner, but representing SD Charities, Inc. And my wife is the president, and Brett Faidley, who's run, you know, organized everything. It was his idea to do a. A tool auction.
Yeah.
And so, yeah, we set that up, reached out to vendors, and we were just blown away by everybody's generosity. I wish I had names to name all the companies that. That donated to us.
We had top Don sent some stuff Pico and.
And Autel and.
Yeah.
But I'm all Milwaukee and I know. Yeah, it's a 4 4-425-A.
Yeah.
A good kit. Yeah. When we have some coaches that.
Yes.
You know, offering. And Rick White of 180 Biz just offered an $18,000 coaching package that I just put on the auction. And when they. When they ran that at Vision, I think it brought in like $6,000. And I mean, for that one piece alone and, you know, all of this for this one, it's just really cool to be able to do this with my wife and to kind of give back to the same community that supports what we do. It's, you know, our mission statement for SD charities is helping the automotive community and beyond. And this particular one, we are staying within the community. There is a school in Senegal, Africa, longtime premium member of my website, a friend, we developed a friendship.
He's a fellow believer and it's kind of a Christian based organization too. And over the years we developed a friendship and I learned what he does. And a few years ago, before we ever even did the charity thing, we were still. We've always been charitable in what we do. We were able to purchase a generator for the school because their electric grid so poor in Africa and now what they're facing is petroleum's an issue for the generator because with, you know, all the stuff going on with whatever politics, let's leave that aside. They're trying to go solar because it, it'll be more affordable for them. But it's a few hundred thousand dollars to be able to do that. And yeah, granted we're not going to be able to raise that kind of money, but to be able to hand an organization like that maybe 10,000 or a little bit more to, you know, put a dent in this like idea, whether it goes to solar for them or just helping them out.
The unique part about their program is they are allowing the students, they're taking in outside work and they actually pay these guys to while they're at school. So you talk about it's not just school, it's like these guys are developing a skill and they're paying and they're able to help feed their families while they're in. And we just wanted to be part of that. So special thanks to tools and what they did for us and opening that up for us and giving us a platform to do that. So they'll have the drawing tonight and that's why we're here. It's pretty awesome to be here not as Scanner Danner, but to be here as SD charities. And like you said, Chuck, I think what that'll do is we'll be at a lot more given that.
Now, Keith, you kind of shared with me last night kind of a short little bit of a plan that you've got going on in your area where you kind of shared like you, you kind of want to do the Zeb Beard thing and dominate Oklahoma. Can you, can you share a little bit or.
Yeah, I mean, we're looking at properties right now for building the next shop. Yeah, it's not quite. Zed found me a facility that's larger than his because he's like, I found one larger than mine. And I was like, okay, what are we talking about? Outside of the budget for right now. But, yeah, that's. We're working on that. We're working towards it. The numbers are.
Everything's working where it's supposed to. We're succeeding where we want to. You know, by the hair of our channel, I'm taking everything and we're. We're slamming it right back into business. It's. I'm not buying any boats right now. I'm not buying.
So if you're not familiar, the boat thing is a big joke that goes back a couple years now in the A saw group where, like when the divide was really big and wide between shop owners and staff, everybody, the running joke was become, if I pay you straight time or hourly, I can't buy the boat that I want to have. So now that when you see somebody reference a boat, it's that joke, right? And it has. It's like chlamydia. It's staying with us.
Yeah.
It's not going away, that joke. So it's pretty good. I think it's only a matter of time for you guys. I think it is.
I'm not rushing it. I'm not worried about it. It's going to happen when it happens. Yeah. All the things are moving where I want them to move. They're moving faster than I want them to move. I. I'd rather just keep it all in control in the area.
That way the quality of everything is exactly the same all the way across.
Yeah, yeah. You don't.
I got a bunch of. Bunch of moving parts right now. I've got a locksmith business that's in a Conex box, basically. Entire inventory, entire van, entire structure. The management system. I built the. I wrote software for it that has everything ready to go. I need to get a technician, get them trained in what we're doing, build the rest of the processes and put them in it and go.
I've got a bunch of little moving things, stuff like that. I got a software company that's kind of kicking off a little bit, got some interesting. Everyone's doing the ADOS thing right now. You know, where they. Where you take pictures of the car and you. What this is. I'm working on something that's more like for programming and keys. So we select the car, we select a module, and it says, these things need to be done.
You're going to need two keys. You're going to have to do this relearning. You have to do this. A used one will work. We've determined this aftermarket tool will do it. Do this part of the job. X, Y and Z. Yeah.
Very cool. A lot of.
For someone like me, that's. That's for, you know.
Yeah. I'm trying to build it out so it's ready to go, and then it can just be used by everybody.
That's awesome.
Yeah. As a support tool.
Right.
And you. You. You're doing some. Some really interesting stuff too, I've seen as of late.
I mean, I can't follow up on these guys. I mean, I'm just still a guy in my basement on a truck, you know, when it comes down to it. But I've just. Honestly, yeah, I've been. ASTA kicked it off for me, really. And I've just been trying to expand my knowledge, the services I could provide to the shops that I go to and diagnose for. I was talking to Keith last night, and we were saying how, like, once you start doing something out of your normal realm, that it just starts falling into your lap. It's like the first time I was on your show, I was talking about how I was just getting into EEPROM work, and then when I was at asta, I was saying how great of a EEPROM class it was I took.
And now I had all these new tools and then I got home and then I very quickly found out, wait a minute. On e problem. I'm 10, 15 years behind. Everything's MCU now. Now I got to figure out everything on the MCU side of things. So, yeah, me, it's been more of a personal journey. I'm trying to expand my knowledge and of course, share that knowledge with everyone that I possibly can once I learn it myself, so that they could use that if they need to.
Yeah. And that was. The whole thing for me is like, I've seen you come so far in just, you know, your, Your, Your. Your shift in truly starting to know your own worth. Right. And you and I have lots of conversations behind the scenes where, you know, you said you were there six hours working on a car, and it took you that long and it kicked your butt, but you got to the bottom of it. Right. And.
And sometimes you're like, that made no sense financially.
Right.
Right. But it's what you do. And I mean, there's so much of that still resonates because I know everybody at this table has been there and done that and will continue in the challenges we see in life will face it that way. Because it's just the only way we know how to be. We can't let it beat us. And I think that's so cool. Me, I wanted to talk about. Because we're online creators and we're technicians.
Yeah. And there's a responsibility that comes with that, right?
Only fans.
Yeah. Hey, I'm not judging.
I'm talking about it at the last podcast I did with you, and I bought it. I own only wrenches dot com.
Do you?
I have it. So there we go.
Nice.
And, you know, it's one of them things where I've had a real kind of awakening in the last year where I'm trying to be. I don't want to say nicer, but just sometimes bite my tongue a little bit more. And if I am going to say something, say it in a little bit more effective manner than what I've been known to say it. Because as it keeps, you know, people reaching. Just before I come up here, somebody sits down at the table with me as I'm finishing up lunch and tells me how every Tuesday morning, they cannot wait to turn the podcast on and listen to what I. My guest and what I have to say that week. And a lot of it, thank God, is mostly what I think they want to hear, what the guest has to say. But, I mean, that's a big deal, right? When I pick.
Because like I said to him, I'm so scared sometimes that it's the shop owners that I'll be alienating by constantly having the conversations that I'm having. But I'm finding that it's the other way, where it's like, no, man, I'm running a shop. And so much of what you put into, we're adopting in our culture, and it's like, it's a weight. And it used to be the only person that would say that to me would be Lucas.
Right.
And it was like, okay, that's one guy. Now, when it's in the hundreds of people that say that to me, it's like I'm starting to embrace the fact that I have to be better.
Believe it or not, people are actually there to listen to you as well. I mean, just before we walked up here, I went to go find you, and there was someone thanking you for what you do, you know, for the industry on the podcast and telling you how his whole shop listens to it and. Yeah, you know, so. So believe it or not, yeah, they're there for you, too, Jeff.
Funny story that I've shared. I just started a new job three Weeks ago. And I sat down with my employer when I sat down to do the interview. And of course, he calls his boss at the next location, that we'll call it the main hub of the shop. And he's like, oh, yeah. And Jeff, by the way, has a. Has a podcast. I'm like, oh, my.
Here we go. How did you. I did. Because it's not on my resume. How does he know? But he knows from talking to a reference of mine that, like, he has this podcast and the guy says, yeah, everybody in the shop, every Tuesday morning is blaring it in the shop. And I'm thinking, no raspberry.
Like, awesome. Yeah.
So at least there's no hidden part of it that they think, you know, there's no expectation.
Yeah.
They already understand what it's going to be.
Yeah. But I'm always thinking, do I have to then really censor myself? And I just. I've kind of come to the conclusion that I'm not going to censor myself. I'm going to be exactly what I've always been, just me. And. And, you know, if it. If it cost me something or people think I got to really watch what I say about where I work, or it's never going to be like that. Know what I mean? It's like, I don't go naming names, but, I mean, if I tell you a story that I witnessed in my career, it's because I witnessed it.
It happened. It's the legit truth of, like, what I went through. So. But getting back to the responsibility thing, I think that's what we all have to do. And we kind of talked about. Because sometimes it gets a little. Like, you. You hate Facebook.
I hate Facebook.
And it gets a little fray and you sometimes struggle. You gotta back away.
Cause I hate all of it.
Yeah.
I want a flip phone.
And I wanna.
I wanna. I wan. And taste some chickens around.
Unplug. Yeah. So it's like I'm trying to move away from the negative. Right. So it's like. And I'm not here to call out anybody, but it's like. And you and I have talked when we're building a platform or a message or getting on our soapbox, whatever analogy you want to use, we have to remember that, like, it's one thing to say the customer didn't get it fixed, and it's another to go throwing a shop or another technician under the bus. And for.
For 20 years that I've been engaging with people, I always, from the technician standpoint, always wanted to say well, they probably didn't pay the tech enough or give them enough time. And that's why the car is still not broke or is still broke. And the reality is sometimes that's true, sometimes it's just not true. It's not incompetent. It's just incompetence. Right. They're not tooled up, trained up, didn't know.
Don't care.
Don't care. That's the hardest one for me to swallow as a pill because it's malice. Right. And I want to think that we're all not that way. We're all above board and doing the best that we can. We're not, but we're not as a society. We're not. Yeah.
And it sucks. So I choose to keep my circle of people who don't throw others under the bus. And you have the great example of going back to that shop that you talked about with the bus, with the airbags, but it's not really, though.
Yeah, that was. Yeah.
And can you kind of share with me? Because Liz kind of shared it with me. The. She said to me last night, she said, well, Keith had a new customer come in because of that video. Can you kind of just touch on that a little bit? How the power of that.
Yeah. I mean. So for the shortened story for the guys that probably haven't seen it, Mini Cooper was brought to me to program a module. During programming of the airbag module, I recognized that some like this was a collision car from a body shop found that they had removed the pretensioners and the airbags. They cut all the connectors and soldered in resistors to get in the bags.
Themselves in the pretensioners.
The pretensioner circuit for the seatbelts.
Oh, gotcha. Okay.
There were two airbag codes. I didn't investigate much further once I found it was that I was just like, all right, get it out of my shop. I want to do with it.
Yeah.
Ticket on it or nothing. You don't owe me any money. You need to leave. You need to knock.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Had a conversation with him because then you're.
You could be live.
Yeah.
Right. You don't want your name attached.
And I didn't. Luckily I did not program the module. I luckily actually got nothing done but found that and was like, okay, because I called him on the phone. He admitted to it.
Right.
He was like, oh, yeah. He's like, yeah, I put two point ohm sensors in there. Like two point.
Two point ohm.
Two point ohm sensors. And I was like, huh. Older guy. And he was just, he was totally fine with. I explained it was wrong and he wanted to argue that it was right.
Right.
Tens of thousands of cars come with no airbags. I'm like, yeah, this one came with it. Or came with tensioners to. Anyways. Yeah. I made a video. I was frustrated. You shouldn't throw a bunch of people on the bus or whatever.
But this is a safety problem. This is one of those like, hey, I see this all the time. But now I have the person that admitted to it and they think it's okay. Yeah, like it's not okay. Like, don't do this if you're doing this. Don't do this if you're seeing. If you're buying a used car. Be careful of this.
Yeah, blah blah.
That was meant to be done as a troubleshooting guide. You put your 2ohm resistor in and code goes away. Your circuit's fine. Yes. Module's fine. Don't leave it there.
Right. And he tried. I was going to leave it there. Is that why you cut the connectors off flush soldered and then. And electrical taped it? Oh, and then tucked it back in the panels and clipped the panels back on. That's why that happened.
That's crazy.
Had it been like hanging out on the side with resistors plugged in it there, I'd have been like, yeah, dude, I, I do. I carry hundreds of 2.2.2, 2.5, 2.7 ohm resistors to test air.
For testing.
Yeah.
Like it's not for fixing. For testing.
Exactly.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then, you know, then we're beholden to that. Our responsibility is like when we, when we show that as a testing method, we explain very clearly why we did it and why we don't do it and why we don't leave it there. You know, this thing that's. That comes that question that. But anyways, it brought a customer come in, said, I saw your video. I appreciate your integrity. And I was like, I'm, I'm not perfect.
I will. You know, these are, this is how we work. And it's brought in a couple people. I also lost about 60 of all my collision center work. Yeah, I lost like 30 grand a year right out of this.
So did you.
Yeah.
I mean, and that collision workout because.
Because this guy's been in town for 50 years.
Right.
So all the small mom pops. I have zero of them anymore. I very, I have very few collision work at all anymore. I probably lost closer to 100k. But the other because our growth, I can't really tell.
Yeah.
Because we're growing constantly. So it's hard. But it's like I saw a reduction in movement forward. So yeah, I lost tens and tens.
Just because they were, they were mad.
That you called that guy out of the bus.
Yeah, yeah.
I mean, when Jeff's talking about responsibility though, like, I kind of see that as with your platform, that's your responsibility to show that right. To educate people on the fact that this is not the right way to do this.
And if we're using that methodology. We've all done airbag videos.
Right.
And we're testing them and it's like, man, we got, I got to think more about that. Like.
I chuckled. I can't think of an airbag video without blowing up.
I do, I do know, know that story. I don't know if everyone listening to this does, but.
So there was somebody. You took the occupant classification module and unbolted it and moved it with it plugged in and, and then some airbags went off in the vehicle.
Well, I, I was doing a final step. Was the circuit for the, it was in the door. I forget what sensor.
It was like an impact sensor.
Impact sensor on the door. Yeah, driver's side door. Doing some voltage measurements and whatever they're using, you know, bias wise wasn't there. So doing circuit integrity. I, I, I couldn't get rid of the code no matter what I did.
Right.
So I'm now doing checks at the module. I'm ready to call the module. I'm just going through the normal motions.
Yeah.
Powers and grounds. Make sure no opens and shorts in that one side.
Yeah.
I think I even took like one of the other sensors out and swapped it. Yeah, took because it was a new sensor on the driver. Yeah. But it's on the page. You have to pay to watch me blow up the airbag. So I talked about it.
Yes.
We put some shorts out there and used it in, you know, in like promoting and stuff. But to watch the whole process, it's on, it's on my website. But I, I realized I couldn't, I couldn't get to the pins where the module was that where the connector was. So I was like, no big deal. I'm just going to unbolt it and then turn it over so I could access the pins and because I want to do loaded circuit key on powers and grounds. Right. Which in hindsight that I should have used an external load like one of Chuck's tools he makes should have used something like that I realized as I'm checking it that I think there was a ground. It wasn't a ground wire, but it was like a sensor ground circuit that was showing me high voltage that I was like, oh.
Because the board ground is on the. There is no ground on this module. The. The housings, the ground.
Right.
I realized that and it still didn't connect the dots that there's a rollover sensor in this module. And I'm like. I'm like, oh, that. I created that because I unbolted it.
Yeah.
Soon as I connected a jumper wire to ground to give the module the ground so I could finish my test.
Right.
I was good. I was good. I connected it. At first I thought the side curtain airbags blew because the. The jumper wire connection and the little arc that I saw, it wasn't. It was. I connected it and then I turned it and the second I turned that module, bam. Anyway.
Yeah, that was fun.
Not to take away. Short story of that, one of my tech, Zach, he went out to a shop to go lock an orc module in a Dodge truck. And he went out and they had both of them laying there. So he locked orc margin, got a program with ytech left, went around to go do a Mercedes around the corner. And he heard and then didn't think anything about it. And then Justin, the guy runs on, is like, Zach, he just blew every bag in that truck.
Oh, man.
And so the kid was fine. He was okay.
Yeah.
But he went to go switch the modules, left the key on and was like, is this the new one? And turned it over and see if it had junkyard writing on it to see if it was some. Some used model because they had a used module they were using for testing. And then they ordered a brand new one for us to lock to it.
So it did the steering and the driver's bag and passenger or just the side curtain? Mine was just the side curve.
He blew the front bags, grab the module and like flipped it over like. Like, just.
Paul just made the car go like this.
I did the car flip over? Yes.
I made the car flip over CRX's dude ramp. And they land in the side bags. He like, it did a front somersault, flip, turn, run.
Wow. We ate that one though. Yeah, we ate that.
That's what I was just going to say.
You guys, fifteen hundred dollars worth of.
You did the right thing.
I mean. Yeah, it's on camera too.
I'm not just gonna.
Right. I want to use this footage. It was worth fifteen hundred dollars you.
Could have just put resistors.
Oh, yeah. Yes.
So going back to it, that's the responsibility of us. Right. And you know, I don't want to always, but when you, when I correct you for when you say throwing that other shop under the bus.
Yeah, what?
We're not throwing them under the bus. We're actually advocating for the industry and that's where people are listening to us sometimes when we have. You have your posts and your rants and you do, and you do. We're not throwing other people under the bus, but we're advocating for the right way to do things and the doing it the wrong. We're not really interested in the excuses anymore. But why people do it the wrong way, we've all heard them, they're not original. And let's just move on past it. And if you want to do you, you do you, right.
We're all never going to be able to completely stop the shenanigans. We can't. But it's like the more that this trickles down into people understanding that our responsibility is to give the people back a repaired, safe, reliable vehicle. The right way. When other people say, hey, dude, that's not the right way, they're not calling you out, but they're just saying, maybe you don't know. And that's it. Calling you out is like, we've seen that, we've been part of that. And then like you shared with me last night, you know, the more that you learn the behind the scenes story of what's going on, then we sometimes end up with egg on our face and I don't ever want to do that again.
And we're just kind of talking about a particular engine job and a guy with a big following and all this kind of stuff. It's. You shared with me how you guys have been able to kind of not. I don't want to patch it up, but you've had words after the fact and that guy that everybody wanted to crucify extended to you a really nice gesture.
Correct. And I look at the person and the situation or the people, I should say, and the situation in a completely different light than I did even the last time that we were on the podcast together at asta, to the point where I, I've got a, I've got a shame about it. You know what I mean?
Yeah.
And it, you know, at that point I thought it was taking a toll on me for whatever reasons. And at this point I realized it took a toll on me for different reasons. And you get this kind of platform and you get people to reach out to you and sometimes you're led into feeling like you're doing the right thing when there's a key point of missing information in there.
Yeah.
And because of that, I realized that even if I think I don't know Bob's big tire sales store is doing the wrong thing to their customers and they're selling them used tires and calling them new, I'm not going to speak up about it anymore. I just, I, it's not.
Yeah.
That's not my business. And as much as I would hate to see someone, you know, get sold used tires, told that they're new and everything.
Yeah.
It's not my next door neighbor and it's not my place to even enter myself into.
And there's, there's levels to, there's levels of the unprofessionalism. Right. So we kind of have to, I think, pick our battles in that way. And then we have to realize sometimes that it's like I've always tried to not. Because I didn't have both sides of the story. I always wanted to. Going back to. I always wanted to because I have such love for my brothers and sisters that do what I do as a tech.
I always wanted to blame the customer.
Right.
And, and as that hasn't been right either. And so there's a lot of people owe apologies for because it has been just straight up incompetence or shady shit going on that they didn't get what they were paid for. But, you know, so it's just, it's accountability, man. It's transparency and accountability. That's all what it's about. And you know, I, the, the people that are out there immediately just making their whole platform about shops are ripping them off. And here I am with a big shiny truck doing all this charity work. Like I don't have any hate for them.
But I mean, that narrative, the end of the day, serves you and it does not serve the industry.
Right.
And I think that if we are going to have a platform of getting out there every day and monetizing ourselves through online creation, that we have a responsibility to look at the industry that we're using to monetize ourselves out of and be honorable to it. And that's why it's like everybody that pulls up and says the other shop didn't do this. Right. You don't have the second side of the story. You're not showing paperwork, like find a different way to highlight yourself without doing at the expense of Your brothers and sisters, I guess, is what I'm trying to say. So, yeah, it, you know, that was a funny one for me because that's the first person that kind of is like, I don't want to say has done me wrong, but has, like, I thought I saw potential there to really turn what they were trying to do around. And at the end of the day, they're doing good, they're doing well. But, you know, it's like we talked about, you know, towards the beginning of the new year, if it all goes away tomorrow, the monetization from social media, you have to be able to survive without that.
Right.
And that young man doesn't.
Right. And I think that's a big part of it is like, you know, social media obviously is not going anywhere, but if you put it in the hypothetical sense of social media disappeared, the. The Internet broke. The Internet went away. Okay. And all you were back to before the ages of the Internet. Tomorrow, the people that are specifically making videos catering to giving food to the homeless, and they're making all of their money off of that. They're not going to be able to make any more money.
That's right.
Because them giving food to the homeless, no one's going to be paying them for that anymore. The second social media disappears.
That's right.
And us being in our industry, unfortunately, I, you know, I do feel that it gives the impression to people that we should be giving this away for free.
Yeah.
When that's not. We're here to make a profit. We are like, I grew up poor. I didn't understand until very recently. And I'm still learning how to charge what I should be charging and how it's not immoral to be doing that. But I just, Yeah, I just don't think it's a great look.
And all of us in some way or shape or form have been involved with or worked for people that don't value themselves. You know, you and I talk about that all the time. Right. And it's. And it's. It's tough because it's. I feel pulled sometimes. I really do.
But at the end of the day, like, I'm almost broken in the sense that, like I said to you last night, you know, somebody could be homeless living out of the car, and the car would cost $4,000 to fix, and that's still going to be the bill. I may then turn around and collect the money, and then I might turn around and give them $1,000 worth of groceries, but I'm not going to try to figure out how to make the bill from four to three, so they keep the thousand. You understand what I mean? Just a little bit of difference there, because at the end of the day, then everybody that didn't necessarily want to devalue themselves for that particular transaction, and this is what I want the shop owners to understand. They didn't have a say. They didn't have a choice. And then we forget that at the end of the year that we're looking at it going. They're not all that effective. They're not all that productive.
And it's like, whoa, that column that we did all that we don't even think about. So it's heavy sometimes. This is the kind of stuff that plays through my brain when I'm thinking and interviewing so many people and thinking about this kind of stuff. And it's like, I just stay steadfast with what I think is the right way to do things, and.
Well, I think it's helping a lot of people. Jeff. So you keep doing what you're doing. Little things. Yeah. I mean, even for people that maybe lurk sometimes and catch a little bit here and there, you know, you're still picking up nuggets that can be used and applied. Just the example you just gave is one where, you know, you're discounting that particular job because your emotions are involved and your idea, your. It's admirable what you want to do.
You want to take care of this person. But what you're not realizing is if that's your operating system, then you're not able to take care of your technicians. You're not able to take care of your staff because you're kind of undercutting what they need to discount the customer. To, quote, take care of the customer. And it's not the mindset that's wrong. No, the mindset is right. Like, it's admirable. It's.
It's, you know, it's just. But you're not thinking the big picture because behind the scenes, you're struggling to make pay. You're struggling to bring the guys in you need because you're not able to pay them more. And what. You're not real.
These.
Some of these owners aren't able to connect the dots where it's starting from.
Yeah.
And I think that's one of the biggest takeaways I've. I've witnessed in all of you guys with Lucas and. And David and you and some of these other guys talking about Matt Fonzlow and, you know, Sean Tipping you know, all these great podcasts talking about similar things. Like, it's, it's been real eye opening for me and I'm not a garage owner, but I know some garage owners and, you know, it's nice to be the little chirping birds in their ear, right? Like, hey, man, you should, you should probably try this, you know, and. Yeah, yeah, start seeing small changes, big thing. It's good, it's good what you're doing.
So can I ask everybody then what's kind of, you know, and there's no particular answer or whatever. What's the wish that you have for the industry right now? What do you, what's the wish that you have for it? If you could snap your fingers and say, I wish this went away, or this all of a sudden became so much easier, what would you wish it would be?
I guess, Chuck, I can't, I can't, I can't snap my fingers and come up with one. Honestly, I really just, I, I wish we stopped being the butthole of the trades. When it comes down to it, I wish that we all would band together. And this is so hard being that you have 18,000 dealers and how many independent repair shops in the country? But, you know, I've been saying this for a long time is I think that we need to step out of being the butthole financially in the industry as well. And I think that labor rates should be much, much higher than they are and that those labor rates don't necessarily go to the owner's pocket as much as it does to the staff's pocket. Once that starts going in the staff's pocket and they start doing more quality work, we can finally start to engage and bring in young people into this that we really need right now. And the other thing too is you raise that labor and now you're, you're adding so many things like this new value with shop owners of buying tools for their techs coming into the industry. Now you've, now you've got the funds to do that and, you know, maybe you've got that flashy box that's going to attract a young guy into the shop.
And what's so tough about that too is on what Paul was saying is that when you're especially one that grew up poor, when you're a technician turned business owner, it's so hard not to see it as I'm giving away 100 bucks versus my business is giving away 100 bucks. And that 100 bucks doesn't affect me as much as it affects my Business which in turn down the road very much affects me, you know, and you.
Have to think because. And I think that's just a little oversight at a lot of people in business. They think they are the business. The owner is the business and it's a team is the business. Right. You know we talked to, I talked to a guy and he, he had his best month ever. But at the same time he talked about the struggles his tech had health wise in the last month which led to some mistakes happening and they made it all right. They got behind it, they got ahead of it and he still had his best month ever.
But I look at him and ask him and it's like, that's some pretty big mistakes, like you going to fire that guy? And he's like, nope. So that's where I would have 10 years ago, I would have probably wouldn't even ask that question. I would have just assumed that that guy was definitely going to be gone. So I mean I think that that's co. And it's only through him networking with the people that he's networked that he's realized that it's like. And maybe the shortage is part of this too because it's like, yeah, there's three big mistakes there but you're not going to get that level if you fire them. And this is the thing. And going back to the tool thing, you know, the shiny tool Keith as an example has, that's been just the norm at L1 forever is he supplies the tools.
All the tools. All the tools.
That's awesome.
Yeah, it's amazing, isn't it?
Every socket, flashlight, flashlight battery, everything.
That is awesome. And that's the thing too is I, I've decided at this point I'm going to. My business is a guy. It's just a guy. It's going to be a guy. I'm not going to have a shop. A lot of people think that I had a shop and then I couldn't make it in the shop so I turned mobile. Now I had my mobile business for four years before I started the shop.
I'm just not a good shop owner. And I realized that in myself. Keith happens to be a good shop owner. I'm not what I would consider a good technician. And, and I can, I can build a business around that by providing things that other very good technicians in my area can't provide.
What's, what's your wish?
My wife's a good shop owner. Just so we're clear. Gotcha. I'm a technician.
Shout out To Liz? Yeah, yeah.
I mean for real, like for anyone listening, 100%. Liz runs the shop. She tells the guys what to do, tells me what to do. I will go out in the shop, be like, hey, what are you doing? Like hey, can you help me? Blah blah. And I go, Liz told me that you would come ask me to do something and she said to tell you that you need to go in there and talk to her. And I'm supposed to do this. I said that's probably a great plan. I'm going to go in the office and talk to her.
That's legitimately how it goes. I, I make some weird back end decisions and stuff. Like I figure headwise, make some directions we're going. But she implement I'm, I'm ideology, she's implementation.
Yes.
Yeah.
That's so cool that the two of you have like an awesome like husband wife combo within your business.
She's a rock.
We were just talking, we had that conversation last night.
That's, that's incredible version of that.
You're talking to Benji, what's Benji's last name?
Burris and Chris and him.
And, and when he brought his wife on.
Yes.
How his business was stagnant and, and then it just took off after bringing her on like his daughter. And it's a great story.
This story happened after I went to bed. This is a long after midnight.
It was really good. It was really good. And I was giving Keith props too with, you know, with his wife and all the stuff that Keith does is like for, for where he is. If she wasn't involved, it really would have been a choice between his family or his business.
Yeah.
And you're going to lose one of the two. And the fact that his wife is there with him is just really, really cool to see. Like from the outside watching them operate together and seeing her smile and you know, it isn't just, she's not just there humoring her husband. You could tell that she's every bit a part of it earlier.
Yeah. Honestly, when I went to take the class, like I haven't had any personal experience meeting Liz. I met you at ASTA and we talked online and stuff like that. But yeah, aside from that it's not like we're like, we've been hanging out, you know, drink beers together for years. So I really had no idea who Liz was and that she was, I'm sorry to say it, she carried 65% of that class. Yeah, yeah, she did. Yeah.
Yeah. The Ados thing is her baby, so that's her, that's her passion project.
She is literally a rock star. She could get in the van tomorrow and get the work done.
She did programming.
She did.
And then she did some diag. She's good at network diag, which makes me mad. Yeah. But to answer your question. Yeah, I actually. Same thing that you said. Actually, I would rather that we like for everyone listening, the math's been done a bunch of times. We need to be like $420 something dollars an hour, right.
For automotive repair to be where everyone else has been. That's why you see all these electrical companies opening brand new buildings with new trucks, taking care of employees, offering vacation 401k health insurance and stuff. And you see all these shops like I can't do it. We can't do it because we need literally 20 times the amount of equipment cost wise that a plumber needs or an electrician needs or any of those things. And we need way more training, way more tech. I mean we do plumbing, we do electrical, we do H vac, H vac, we do everything. I just put a blower unit in the register at my house and my daughter was like, how do you know how to do this? I was like, because it's like a car. But easier.
Yeah, right?
Yeah.
But easier and would cost more. Yeah, yeah.
And for those listening that don't know Keith, his $425 an hour suggestion is because is the type of work that Keith is talking about.
Right.
It's the type of work. It's not. We're not going to charge $425 an hour to change your brakes.
No.
Or breaks.
And so my, if I can say mine as a follow because it ties right into that is why is brake suspension work still to this day more profitable than a diagnostic eye? And within that realm, however you want to fix it, however whatever you want to do within that realm is why we cannot attract the people we need for this field. Not everyone can do the diagnostic stuff where you have 15 different variables and each of those variables have variables within themselves. The minds that can handle that kind of work. It's not an intelligence thing. It's literally you're born with it or you're not. And there are certain minds that don't like to even be in that realm because it's uncomfortable. I'm not going to spend time there. If it's uncomfortable for me, I don't like it.
If I don't like it, I'm not going to be good at it. So where are these minds that we Need. Well, we can't attract them because the grease monkey is making. It's our image is just. But it's our image. But he's also the real actual grease monkey who's just a parts changer, which is fine. That's fine, too. I'm not knocking that.
We need them, too.
Right.
But to attract the ones we need to fix these cars and the complexities of these cars today, we can't attract these minds because our pay system's so royally screwed up. And we still have a mentality that we all fight, which is customers think that they shouldn't have to pay for diagnostics.
That's right.
And, like, then we get into semantics and we define diagnostics and we shouldn't call it that. We should call it testing time. I'm good with all of that, but, like, if I could change one thing, you know, just having that conversation with my brother yesterday, he's like. He's like, paul, if I lose this guy and this guy, and I'm just gonna downsize and I'm gonna tell everybody no. With all these problem cars, and I'm just gonna do. I'm just going to do the easy stuff.
Yeah. Brake, suspension.
Why. Why is our field like that? And it's not a knock at that.
Idea because where you were going was. They're making all the money.
Yeah.
Those technicians are getting paid more because the way our pay system is, our structure is built.
And it's easier. And it's easier.
Yeah.
Like, why would I pick this really difficult path other than, like, my. Some of us are weird. All of us at this table are weird.
Yeah.
We all have some. Something that's off in us that likes the challenge of fixing this thing that nobody else could fix. Or maybe it's not even that. It's just like. I don't know. It's like a. It's a challenge to the car. Like, this thing's not going to beat me.
That's right.
I'm going to. I'm going.
I am smarter than this.
I think I can fix this. And we get this, like, thrill. This, like, dopamine hit big time whenever we fix that car.
Yep.
And we don't need. It's not a mailman job. We don't. You know, it's like, open the mailbox, put it in next, and I got like, 5,000 more to do.
Yeah.
Your mind's like, it's not that kind of job. It's your challenge. You're. You're not looking at the clock. You're not like. And then when you fix it, it's like, yeah, like I, I don't even need. Even if you have a shitty boss, I said swear word, okay, keep me even. If you got a crappy boss that doesn't ever praise you or tell you good job or anything, this area of the field is one, you don't need it because you generated your own atta boys as you watch that car leave that nobody else could fix.
So I'm gonna show we all got.
The screws loose because we do it for way less than what we should be doing.
So, yeah, I'm gonna share my little story because you just needed on something really big about the dopamine and the kick and the data boys that you don't have to hear. The last employer that I had, we had a, we had a Mercedes CLK, a 2012 blue tech come in. And now when he hired me, he knew I hated hate European cars. Hate them. And you know, this car came in at long story short, customer said intermittent, no start. And we went down this not a rabbit hole. Well, he kind of. But it was like.
And I get in the car and drive it, drives fine, starts up, drive it again, starts up, finally go, what? I need more from this boss. Oh, don't go down the rabbit hole on this. Just change out the batteries to start. Because the customer says it's happened right after. The customer put a brand new battery in his car to see. Okay, now that's behind the passenger side seat, down on the floor. And he's like, so we're getting another battery and. And the secondary auxiliary battery.
So finally I go, I takes two hours. I have nothing else to do. Base tied up gives me nothing else. We're sitting there and I go through. So the whole car, I'm like, well, I'll go through and check the fuses. Like so every fuse in the car. Because we're trying to find this intermittent thing. All the fuses are good.
Cool. Get the two batteries put in. That's 450 bucks for two batteries in this thing. And they labor and everything. And of course then we go to the car and now it doesn't start. And I go to the Autel and I grab the thing because the Autel I put on before and I could see all the topology, but I couldn't communicate with any module. And I'm like, that's weird. And I go to Mass because I'm not familiar with an Autel tool.
And he goes, that normally means it might need to update the Autel So we update the autel. And then of course, everything communicates as 105 codes. All can. Lost communication with this, lost communication with that, lost communication with this. So I give him the printout. Well, he loses his. I didn't plan for effing this today. And what, Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
And I'm sitting here going, I've been doing exactly what you've been told me to do. And I don't know, like how, why I'm the brunt of this anger, whatever, but, you know, so he goes out and he starts the phone, the friend thing. We're, you know, calling another shop and another shop for help and all this kind of stuff. And I'm walking down around the car and it's sitting there in the bay. And when I say the bay, this is an old center post air hoist.
Oh, yeah.
And I'm smelling something as I walk down the passenger side. That's a burning smell. I've been doing this 30 years. I know what that smell is.
Yeah, your brain goes, oh, oh, wait, what's going on?
And the key has been off at this point. So I reach up, stick my head, lay down on the floor, stick my head up under the rear bumper and like, it's getting stronger. And so I reach up and I touch. What? I don't even know what it is, but it's a blind spot monitor on the right hand side. And it's hot to the touch. Oh, that's cool. So then I put the thing up on the air hoist and I reach up there and I try to unplug it. It's so melted you can't even unplug it.
Yeah, right. Now, none of the codes that I saw, because at 105, I didn't look at every one of the 105. There was lost communication. So I wasn't like. The code gave me to go down to that right rear corner. It wasn't identifix. Had nothing on this. If you look in, no start or whatever.
So I reach up and I go, hey, you gotta come and see this. So I pry the module down, we try to unplug it. We cut the wires off, cut the wires off, tape over each wire, go and clear the code. So there's only two codes left that are saying lost communication with that. And the car runs perfect. It'll go into park, it'll start 100 times. We call up the dealer and the dealer says, oh, yeah, that happens all the time. This is a price for a new module in a pigtail so he calls the customer and tables their pair of customers, says, I don't want to fix it.
Just if you can make it so that it'll run and drive. I'm trying to get rid of this thing. Not once did that employer kind of look at me and say, good job or thank you or wow, Nothing. And so that's why within like a couple days from then, I had made the decision that this was not going to get better for me. It was only going to get worse. Let me preface by this. I didn't need him to give me a hug and say, great, you pay me. I'm very much like, I've accepted that some people are going to be appreciative of what I can do or what my instincts and my experience lends me to do.
And then others ain't gonna care. I'm good with it. But people listening, you sometimes what you don't do that way cost you a lot more than if you would just be, you know, and it is what it is. I can't, you know, I can't change who that person is. That is just his personality. That is. There's a lot of pressure on his plate. Right.
He's eight months into his new business, and there's a lot of irons in the fire, and he's trying to keep his head above water. Totally get it. But, man, that hurts sometimes when you think you do something to hear a good job. Yeah.
I mean, you know, the male ego is very fragile, and we are all need our ego, especially with mechanics. Yeah.
We're all crybabies.
We are all crybabies.
We are.
Yeah.
Yeah.
100%. Yeah. And we need to be told, good job.
And sometimes we have some losses.
Yeah.
Right. So when you have a win like that, you just want somebody to say, good job. Good job.
Good catch.
Hey, man, nice find.
Thank you.
How hard was that? You know, How'd you feel?
That man smelled it.
Yeah.
It's awesome.
Which is like. And I, I, I was telling him, like, for all my years of, of learning at his knee, for hypothetically. Right. Yeah. I didn't stick a meter on that. I didn't go and go, oh, I had 130 ohms or whatever. I didn't do nothing. I trusted my instincts and what I've always used.
Yeah. And it was like, well, that's weird that I know that's a problem. Yeah. It's funny now.
Stinks too. And it doesn't tell me nothing.
Yeah. And yet if you go back, so not a not A plug for Identifix. But if you go to Identifix and type in can, it's the top hit that comes up is that blind spot monitor. But if you go to no start or no park. Yeah, doesn't come up.
Right.
That's a big thing with Identifix, though, is, you know, sometimes the confirmed fix are spot on. Like that. You got to type the right word. And the less that you type, the better.
And I'm not saying we all need to be using that program. That's. This is not a commercial for that.
Right.
But here's the thing.
The right hands, it's a powerful tool.
Yeah.
The right hands is right hands.
Correct.
Yeah.
Any of those hot buttons, like all of us at this table, we see one that's like very high on the list, we verify it. It's not time to change the part.
Right. It's a shortcut. It's a shortcut. Oh, you know What? There were 47 hits that said this. Two hits that said this, one hit that said.
Right.
I'm going to investigate the 47 hits. Oh, wait, that's not my problem. Yeah, good thing I didn't buy it.
Yeah, good thing I didn't buy it.
Moving on.
Right.
Yeah.
Right.
And the beauty of this is our brother Brian Pollock sent me a video before I found this on this of a Ford product that he had the rear bumper off. Same thing. Blind spot monitor on the Ford is shutting down.
Can very common on Chevy, too.
And so we have to look like people are listening for. We have to look beyond the name of the badge on the thing and realize that this stuff is all a lot more in common than we give it credit for. You've been saying that for years. And learn to treat it as a system and a circuit and not as a pattern failure kind of thing. Even though. So that's going back to it, like the pattern failure, unfortunately, in our industry is why we go back to. We're not really ever valuing ourselves because once it's out there, we take the value of it away.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
You know, and we got talking about the Toyota control arms last night is an example of, you know, if you still bill 14 hours for them, there's something wrong with you because, like, you know, and I mean, I. Well, if I can do that job in two hours, you know, I should only charge two. And then we got talking and it's like, but if you can diagnose something in 30 minutes, but he takes three hours, does that mean he shouldn't have charged three. Because you didn't to.
No, not at all.
Right. So that's where I think in the industry, we're always walking that fine line of, well, he did it for free, so you shouldn't be able to charge or he did it for half. Do what is right for you. Right. What you need to do. Don't listen to what your neighbor's doing. Don't even. Again, the customer is the one telling you that.
Did you see it happen that way?
Yeah.
Then don't always believe what you're told. You know, my wish is that we just, you know, continue to keep making the strides that we're making. I think it's been so cool to see. And.
This helps.
These kind of events are massive, massive enabler. Right. When you start to see the. The feedback in the network. And I probably give more hugs than I shake hands at this point.
Right.
With the people that I'm starting to interact with because it's like we're. They're so vital now for my headspace that it's like, I'm not going to just shake your hand. Like, if you're a stranger, I'll shake your hand because maybe you don't want to smell my beard, but, you know, if. If we're tight, you're going to get a hug. Right. Because that's just the way it is. It's. And.
And to be clear, when I said this helps, I'm talking about, not necessarily this event, I'm talking about the people that are listening to you and to us.
Right.
We're reaching people.
Yes.
And what we do, we're having an effect on people and what we do in a positive way.
Yeah.
And we're sharing ideas that allow them to take an idea and build off of it and the next round to even do something better than what we did. And, you know, it's a good thing. You know, there's a lot of negativity surrounding what we do because, you know, some people have the idea we. We cheapen the industry somehow and we don't need to touch on that.
I'm a bad guy on multiple ends. Charge too much. I'm ripping people off.
Yeah.
I'm supporting other shops I shouldn't support and keeping them in business because I'm a mobile guy.
Yeah.
I'm devaluing the industry by showing module work.
Yeah. Oh, yeah, me too.
Oh, you, you too? Yeah.
Well, so we've all heard the. Devaluing the. I've heard that same thing too.
It's like showing people how to.
I mean, but I've, I've always been a technician, trainer. Like, that's.
Yeah.
Chuck, you may not know this, but I, I, you know, when I started filming in 2012 with YouTube, I mean, it was Charlie bit me and Double rainbow guy on YouTube. There wasn't. There was.
Yeah.
Repair videos. No, there were some, but very small. Yeah. So I, I just heard about the platform. I'm like, oh, it's free. I can upload there. Oh, and you guys can access it. So I had, I started filming just to make my class better.
Right.
It wasn't even. I didn't. There was no such thing as What? It's a YouTuber. I don't know. Right. What is that?
Earlier you said how far you've come when you're talking to me. I have videos that are older than all of yours.
Nice.
Yeah. So I was making videos before that. I just didn't do it as well.
Yeah.
As structured.
Yeah. So, yeah.
When you said 2012, I didn't know that my channel's from 09.
Yeah. 2012.
Yeah.
Yep. And then I didn't monetize anything for like the first year, even though I could have. I didn't know anything. I didn't care.
Right.
I'm just trying to train. I have a tool now that I, Yeah, I'm teaching them in class. You know, I wrote a book and they have that. And then I'm, you know, now, now I can show them procedures as I'm doing mobile, like you, as I'm at these shops, I'm just going to pick up the camera. I'm like, okay, we talked about this and this and this. And here it is live. Now, this is what it looks like where we apply all those hard topics. See, it's not so hard once you're, Once you use it.
And so that's what I started doing. But then to have people say it cheapens. How does that devalue the industry?
With your, with your reach. I mean, anyone's reach in this room, honestly. Yeah, I have like 400 and, I don't know, 30 something thousand followers. I don't have 430 something thousand mechanics following me.
Yes.
So when I make a statement about, let's say, raising the labor rates or I'm showing people how to do something, a lot of them aren't technicians. And the hope is that it interests some of the younger guys to get into this industry or shop owners that follow me start going, yeah, you know what? Why the hell am I still charging $85 an hour when the dealer down the road is 240 an hour now. And I could do more than the dealer can.
It should be 40, 60 max.
40, 60 max.
So, Paul, we got to fill you in on. On the TikTok side of things. There was a used car lot guy that made a. Made a.
He.
He walked right up to the Hornet's Nest and jumped on it with both feet and pissed all over the fire. He literally said, like, these all mechanics are, you know, they're. They're. They're ripping people off your mo. You guys shouldn't charge more than $60. And buckle, buckle, buckle. If you're gonna charge them more than that, take it to the dealer. Well, it blew up, Paul, and he.
Said, shop should be 120max.max if you.
Have a beautiful shop. Yeah, I forgot what example he gave. 125.
He's in Florida.
Is he attack or something or.
Yeah, he's used car salesman with 15 cars on his lot and a Porta Potty out back.
I wish you guys could see.
I haven't seen the Porta Potty yet, but I don't know if it's fair. I started that. I said it's a Porta Potty, but. Because, like, it looks like a trailer, Paul, right up front of a car lot, right? And he, you know, and he shows videos himself going to the auction, and he. He just kept going like he got the bone in his mouth and like a dog. He just.
If you notice, though, he walked himself back on a lot of.
Well, I didn't notice that other videos.
Did a lot of people.
He's not making a lot of money, Right. I wonder why.
Oh, yeah, A lot.
A lot of people jumped in and defended the industry or.
Yes.
I have a habit of getting triggered by something like that and then making a video. And then like, you usually. I feel like it's always me to get triggered first, and then I make.
Yeah, yeah, I haven't made one yet, but I'll make one. It'll really upset him, right?
And then people follow suit, you know, but, yeah, and the. The videos after that, all of a sudden it was, well, I'm not telling you what to charge, you know, and I'm not saying, you know, so.
Because Paul, like, for him, he goes to the auction and buys a car for whatever, we don't know, it's never disclosed. And then he brings it home and marks it up. Whatever he can get away with. Does as little as possible. As little as possible to make it safe and reliable. Calls in a mobile guy, no offense to mobile guy, allegedly, to. To put on a bunch of, you know, really cheap parts that may not fix. He goes, all these mechanics that came by and I charged, paid them to fix it to put a fuel pump in, and the car still didn't run.
They still wanted to get paid. They still charged me. Did you supply the pump?
And he said, he doesn't pay for diag.
He will not.
Will not pay for diag.
And this is perfect. I never have to see here or deal with this guy ever.
And he feels up charging on parts is wrong, yet his whole business model is to upcharge on a car he just bought.
Yeah, yeah, that's a part, bro.
That's a. That's a part. That's a. That's a lot of parts. Yeah, you just bought a bundle.
Someone's just not thinking through everything here. The Internet taught him real quick, didn't it? Yes.
Like, four videos of his. One of them, he was like, I'm thinking about getting out of the car game because I got all these friends as a plumber, and they're making money and they're buying boats and buying trucks, and I could barely keep keep up. And I'm like, I think if you're paying your guys 60 bucks an hour to fix your car, you probably aren't getting very good repairs. So you probably aren't making much money.
He used to have a moving company, and this was his famous line. He says, I was in a moving company, and if we didn't sell boxes because we're not in the box business, we're in the car business. All the other extras that people put on, or he thinks that we in our industry are putting on to up the price. And I said in my video response, I said, no, we're offering services, and that's what people want. Right? U Haul has made billions of dollars because of the fact that you show up to get a U Haul truck and they have boxes that you can.
Buy to put your boxes in the U Haul. And he wants to go to U Haul and Lowe's and.
Yeah, but he can't see that method.
The used car salesmen are the worst.
Well, here's the thing, though, is one of my best friends is a used car salesman, and he is like. He's. He's like the unicorn of used car salesman. Yeah, he fixes stuff that comes back that no one else would ever. Hey, my right rear window switch stops working. I bought this car three week, three months ago. Just drop the car off I'll look at it, I'll fix it, don't worry about it. Yeah, it does a six month in house powertrain warranty.
I mean it's internal lubricated part failure.
Obviously he's trying not to sell junk.
Right? Correct.
Trying to provide good services.
I just. Blanket statement made.
Right.
Used car salesman.
Except for Chuck's best friend.
Sorry. Whoever you are. Sorry.
I mean don't get me wrong, he is the only used car sir that I got. The used car business that I service and I've fired about five or six other used car businesses that I used to service but he is like the unicorn of five years a year.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And. And your famous customer, that shop, he was gonna sell that car.
Oh yeah, yeah. He's, he's a body shop and car sales.
Oh wow.
Yeah.
So there was a double win.
That's illegal in New York by the way.
That's the name body shop to sell.
A car with any airbag issues or tampered with Airbags. Yeah, it's as of like two, three years ago. Became illegal.
Yeah.
So that's you know, in a nutshell for me is like when I keep that, that kicked off and again here's the beauty of this, right. Like Paul's not in the platform TikTok site as much as heavy but you know, you and I, when we saw that go down, it's like a united front immediately against you know, something that, and we're not looking for fights but.
It'S like we're going to spend more time on TikTok.
We're going to stand up for it.
Honestly.
Should I have a chann know just we don't feed it like we feed the other monsters.
Yeah, right. Yeah, right. And we're, and I, I say all the time it's been so pivotal for the growth of my platform. It's been way cool, way more effective and you know, yeah, it's tick tock. And Chuck's gonna coach me through a lot of how to improve mine because nobody apparently likes to see my face like this. And you know, it's, I told him.
I was gonna edit out his pauses. Send me the videos. A lot of your pauses out, you.
Know, but I mean if I can get it as polished as, as you and Chris Enright do, then I mean I'm laughing. Like I said to you, I said how did you manage to do that? You know, in one of your videos and the same thing with Chris, I'm like how did you get it to like you split it all up. And he's like, I'll, I'll teach you at asta.
Right?
So that's pretty cool. So, yeah, that's, you know, that's the power of this platform is, you know, as we make, we make the change, you know, we stand up for ourselves and say, I'm not okay with that stereotype anymore. And this is why. And it doesn't matter if I convince him or not. I don't care. I'll never meet the man. I don't need to convince him. But it's the other hundred people who don't know, who aren't in the realm, just agreeing with him blindly.
I'd rather talk to them about why that is. Then, then let it go on.
You know what's crazy though, was that that video performed well for me and I would almost expect that video to have a lot of negative comments.
Right.
Because it performed. Yes, right. Which is sad to say, but that's kind of how Tick Tock works a lot. I mean, I'm sure YouTube and Facebook are the same way, but.
Yeah, oh yeah, there's controversy's always right.
But the, the comments were all in support of us and not of in him. And then you go to his video and he's got maybe, you know, five people supporting him in the comments and 40 people telling him he's wrong.
And they.
That's the power of it too.
Of the four supporting them, of the five, four of the five were other used car, other used car dealers.
Right.
So of course they're going to support or himself.
He probably thumbs. He probably liked his own comment.
Right.
Now, again, you always know when those.
That video got 150,000 views. Again, it's not 150,000 used car salesmen watching it. It's not 150,000 mechanics watching it. So now the consumer has a better understanding of why our pricing is our pricing. And that's just always the goal, you know.
So in closing, what's everybody, you know, have to say about going forward? What's the goal for them? What's, what's in the next three months? Paul, what do you want to implement for yourself? Anything changed?
Well, we haven't been too public about what we're doing, but so last year we paid out twelve 1099s through the company.
It's awesome.
And I want to expand on that more. I realized I sucked my then 16 year old into this business. He's now 24, about to have a second kid. Thanks, man. Appreciate that. And you know, I realized that I need to build this business to something that I can hand to him because I drew him into this and I need to maintain it for him. And so ultimately this idea has been set in motion for a long time. But we're, we're trying to build on our platform.
I feel like that I have covered the foundational stuff from. If someone doesn't know anything about electrical from square one, to get them to X level, which will give them that nice foundation. And then we can just continue to build off of that and have other trainers come in, other guys, you know, bringing us content, which is what we're doing, by the way. I'm open. Keith and Chuck. You too, Jeff.
I'm down.
Yeah, but we're. So, we're doing that and it's working. And you know, I mentioned the charity when we started. This field has always been good to me. There's not ever been a time where I've said that this field sucks. I may have had a day where I've said, no, not may have. I've definitely had days where the best description I can give you is just give me a shovel, I'm gonna dig my own grave. Throw me in it while I'm alive.
Just bury me a lot. That's how I feel. That's how this field can make you feel sometimes. But other than those, the field has always, always been good to me. And we, you know, we started that charity together, my wife and I, and given back to the field, that's been really, really good to me. And what we feel like we're sitting on something that, that we can within, you know, five or six years will probably be empty. Empty nesters. Just my youngest two are still at home and the older two are gone.
And something that I can do with my wife together, where we don't have to be so self focused, where we can look to others and see where we can help people and you know, it just really provides. And you guys all know this when you, when you help someone or even it's kind of the same thing when you fix that car. It's the same thing. When you hear that feedback from a student that's like, hey man, you know, I quadrupled my income because of you.
Yeah.
You know, like, that's like, that gives me goosebumps still, even just talking about it, like talk about dopamine shots, you know, and when you're, when you're doing stuff like that, it's just then you're not worried about yourself so much. And so ultimately that's where my Headspace is, you know, I'm here, not really. Like I said, not really representing Skanderdanor, but representing our charity and just see where it goes. Like, I'm nervous. I watch numbers and algorithms, and people are paying for me. Like, can I make this thing work still using my foundation, but can I build on it with other people's help?
Yeah.
And that's what, that's what ultimately, where I'm at, I recognize that none of us are promised tomorrow.
Yeah.
You know, I could get in an accident on the way home, and then I am no more. I, I want to set my family up. We, We. We continue to live debt free, which is a big thing too, as a. You know, this could all crash and burn for all of us and, and whatever we do in a heartbeat. And I, I think living, Living debt free is really important. If it all crashes and burns, I can just. I just go work for my brother, and I won't even care what he pays me.
Yeah.
You know, and I'll just go home at the end of the day and I don't have to think about any of this stuff. I miss those days, like walking the toolbox. I miss. I'm done. I'm going home. I'm gonna play the PlayStation, you know, go play some hockey. My mind's not in on the job, and this, this doesn't provide us that. But it's been a great field.
We're, but we're happy with what we're doing and, you know, we'll see. It's. It's still defining itself as we go, and we're, we're excited. I'm just, I'm really excited that we got to meet too, Chuck.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
It's pretty cool.
Not, not to put it lightly, you've always been a fucking legend. To be here, sitting at the same table of you is the highlight of my life at this point.
Well, I mean, so feelings mutual, man. I, I only know a little bit about you, but I know Jeff talks really highly of you, and I've seen your stuff, and I, I, I like your, Your excitement and, and your, your passion comes through, like, with the few videos that I've seen, like, and, and, you know, your stuff, which is really cool to see, man, so I appreciate it. So keep it up. Don't listen to the naysayers. And, you know, you know, someday we'll both be sitting with our flip phones and not caring about anything because I have my Nokia. There you go. Chickens and goats, man. Let's go.
Yeah.
Come on. Out. We'll watch squirrels.
What about you, Keith? Same. Same kind of question. Like the next three months, six months, the year I hope to get some.
Of these projects I've got started done. I'm a never ending disaster. So I will. I will never quit coming up with things. So it's in three months. It'll be a whole nother set of things.
Right.
I'm so scatterbrained. Yeah, it's. But I got a lot of fun stuff that I hope to get done. Traveling a bunch of this year, hoping to slow it down next year a little bit and just do some of the big events again. I'm doing like a lot of private shop training right now, so I'm going to different shops every. It's like every weekend.
Yeah.
I think Liz said that she has 36 weekends out of this year that are.
But you do. You do it with her, right? A lot of it I'm doing with your family.
A lot of doing it with the kids.
Yeah, kids were here.
Kids are here, so.
Right. It's awesome.
So we're having a blast. Got them. We got them L1 shirts. They're running the booth.
You guys are riding the wave together. Oh, yeah.
That's awesome.
So that's why I'm okay with 36 weekends. Because 36 weekends with my kids and why. Or. And. Or wife. The kids don't come every time. She doesn't come every time. But it's.
It's enough that we're not. I'm not missing out.
Yeah, that's awesome.
We're spending a ton of time together. So I hope over the next three months though, we got some new guys coming to the shop. I got a new guy started Tuesday. Hopefully this does really good. So congrats, George. Hope you're. Hope you're killing it. And then.
Yeah, that's. But it's also been a blast being here because it's kind of fun. I always, I always was like, never wanted to have quite what you had and never wanted to have quite what you have. Just because I don't have the attention span for it or the dedication for one single thing. I like the fact that I'm doing all the things.
Yeah, right.
You know, doing some modules, doing some videos, doing training, traveling, still running a shop, doing. I, I like that. I like the busyness. I'm.
Yeah, yeah.
I, I couldn't retire.
Yeah.
Yeah.
You're. You're a guy that functions on five hours worth of sleep. And as always, your mind's going in a million directions. Squirrel, you know, Second.
So what about you, Jealously? You had all the stuff to play with them.
I have been playing with this thing the whole time. I. I want to put it up here and spin it, but then the.
Camera'S on me too.
Like, I'd have been sitting here doing this.
I'm watching, going, this is.
That one's squishy. It doesn't work. And so that one's not as good.
Chuck, what's the next? What's next for you?
So over the last couple months, I would say I've been investing heavily into more tooling. The reason that I got into programming years ago was because I got screwed by. I guess I won't say the name because we're on the podcast. If it was one of my videos, I'd have no problem saying, oh, Spaceship two. But essentially that company was the reason that I got into programming. Now, as I've accidentally delved further and further into it, I see that there's a fundamental problem with a lot of my customers that have the same issue that I did when they send out a module for programming or cloning.
Yeah.
So I've been investing the tooling into doing that. I'm hoping within the next. Actually, hopefully about the next month, I'll be offering that as a service, not just for shops, but for people for module. Maybe not repairs at first, but cloning, programming, stuff like that. You need something for the vehicle, at least you know, you could get it from a source that is going to do it correctly or if it's one of those modules, because everything is module to module case basis that I'm still learning on someone that's going to make sure they do the right thing. Unlike a lot of these bigger companies that just tell you, yeah, send it back and then we couldn't find anything wrong with it. Can't give you your money back.
I sprayed another coat of paint on it. Try this.
Right? Exactly.
Yep.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. We changed it black this time.
Starship, too, I was thinking. I was like, oh, I know who you're talking about.
That's great. That's great.
Starship 2. Starship 2 is the reason for my entire programming journey.
And I will hook you up the best I can with, like, the resources I'm using for that right now.
That's cool. I appreciate that.
Yeah. Because I got like a form built out and stuff where people fill it out and then. So you can. I'll give it to you.
When I saw that your site was on the screen, I saw there was a Little eeprom thing up there. And I was like, oh, I guess I'm gonna have to go to Keith's site and see.
So he's got.
There's a whole other side for the module repair that. I'll. I'll get you all the resources I got.
Well, very cool.
So, Chuck, as you perfect this part of your. Your craft, keep me in mind in the future for doing a class for me.
Yeah, we.
We're paying guys and, you know, it can be a mutual thing too, you know, and this is for, you know, other people listening to Shameless Plug for what I'm trying to. Trying to build. I would try to recruit Keith, but I think we might be a little bit in competition with each other. But that's okay.
I don't think so. I think we complement really well.
I wonder.
I wonder too, if at class not to cut you off. I heard a class yesterday, a guy was like, I'm not where you are yet. I'm still Scanner Danner. And I'm like, nice.
You're.
You're past where you need to be.
No, that's good.
Be here. I was like, you need to be both. Like, they're both.
Yeah, yeah.
They compliments.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I do the other stuff that you're not doing as much of.
Well, I've talked to Keith. Exactly. I've talked to Keith about that. Us doing some type of collabs too. But my eyes are open to like, it's really. I didn't mean to steal your fire here.
No, you're up. Oh, no, no.
I just. I'm interested in the younger guys and I'm interested in Chuck. So. Yeah, I'm just trying. I'm just trying to recreate. I'm just trying to. I'm trying to recruit Chuck. I've already tried to recruit.
Recruit this guy sitting next to me and, you know, he's got too much on his plate right now and. But I think we can. I. I think we could definitely work together and it would be fun to work together with you too, sometime in the future, Chuck.
Yeah, I'd be happy to.
I think that'd be an excellent collaboration between the two of you for sure. Right. I think that, that, like I said last night, that's what brings one platform closer to the other platform. I hate that divide of, well, I'm only on this app and I'm not on that app. Like, man, this industry, there's so few still people really putting out the kind of nuggets that people in this room are doing that, we gotta look past the platform and it's like, okay, try to find another way to follow that person then, or collaborate with them or something like that. So, you know, I tell everybody, make a. Make a commitment to go to a training event in, you know, next year and do that network of people, because you're going to sit through some great classes. But, man, when you sit there at night and have those conversations, like, that's when the real power comes out, you know, and it's.
It's. I'm blessed to have all of you here and I'm blessed to have everybody be able to call you all friends and, you know, thank you for sitting down with me today. This has been.
This was.
This was the whole reason for making me making this trip was to have this recording done.
That's awesome.
And, you know, I love all of us. You guys are fantastic. So thank you, everybody.
Keep up the good work, man.
Thank you, man. I love you all. Talk to you soon. Hey, if you could do me a favor real quick and, like, comment on and share this episode, I'd really appreciate it. And please, most importantly, set the podcast to automatically download every Tuesday morning. As always, I'd like to thank our amazing guests for their perspectives and expertise, and I hope that you'll please join us again next week on this journey of change. Thank you to my partners in the ASA group it into the Changing the Industry podcast. Remember what I always say, in this industry, you get what you pay for.
Here's hoping everyone finds their missing 10 millimeter, and we'll see you all again next time.
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