Streamlining the Mundane: How Automation Buys Back Time [THA 469]

This is the Automotive Repair Podcast Network.

Hey everybody, Karm Capriotto,

Remarkable Results Radio and another Town Hall Academy.

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My guests will talk about that.

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Hey, let's get started.

Look who's here.

Tristan Sweeney, shop owner and co-founder of Shift Automotive.

Hey, Tristan.

I'm good. How are you, Karm?

I'm great, man.

Excellent.

Saim Raza, co-founder, Shift.

You know, this thing about Harvard,

I've never ever been around an individual

who's graduated from Harvard.

And I'm, I guess, honored to say that you did it.

Or you've done it.

I guess.

Nothing special here.

My parents just wish I was a doctor or so.

Not a doctor.

Oh, geez. Oh my God.

I'm just a lonely software programmer

in the automotive business.

He could have been contender.

Yeah. My three older siblings all went to med school.

So they're like, you know, Sa, I was the youngest.

They're like, it doesn't matter.

Just do your own thing.

So it is what it is.

So we met at ASTA.

He dropped the name of Bill Nailu.

Of course, a great friend, good supporter of the podcast.

Everybody knows Bill.

And, you know, Bill's working with us on some stuff.

Shift-automotive.io and just in case you want to go

to their website and see what's going on.

But yeah, we're here to talk about that stuff.

But, you know, how did you end up getting

to have a shop, Tristan?

I mean, were you in the industry?

Were you curious?

How'd you get to be a shop owner?

Not by accident, certainly.

I have been in and around the industry since I was younger.

I worked for some industry folks.

When I was in high school, I have been building

and modifying cars since I was 15 or 16.

And then in 2023, I met the folks at Shop Genie

when they were first getting started.

My background has been in building early stage software

for businesses of all different sizes and industries

in different startup capacities.

And was introduced to the guys at Shop Genie

and joined that team and really kind of fell in love

with the craziness that is the auto repair industry.

And about eight or 10 months into that adventure,

realized that this was gonna be home for me for a while.

I was really gonna enjoy building solutions for the space.

And as a product guy, I figured the best way

to know the problem was to experience it myself.

And so I set off on this journey to try to find a shop

that could be my testing ground and raw experience

of what it is to own and run an auto repair shop.

The thing that I love about both of you

in your anointment into the industry

is, Simon, you somehow decided to go

and visit automotive shops

because you love the smell of brake cleaner.

Well, I've been in contact.

So I grew up in Michigan.

I'm in Michigan now.

I've always been surrounded by the automotive industry.

It was something that I realized

that I was kind of unfulfilled to kind of backtrack.

Yes, did graduate from Harvard, not a doctor though.

So my parents are still wishing I'm back there

in the medical world.

But I worked for a few Silicon Valley startups

in the West Coast.

I realized that a lot of tech,

a lot of particularly AI tech was just kind of like,

wasn't really doing much in the real world.

And then I came back home.

I just wanted my career to matter.

I wanted it, maybe that was a bit idealistic.

So then, yeah, I visited 150 repair shops in person,

in the cold, and just talked to folks.

I've hit up every single repair shop

in the metropolitan area.

I just talked to technicians,

talked to service riders, talked to owners,

and realized that this was an incredible space

that just is really unique.

And I just fell in love as well.

There's a lot of folks who are doing really good,

honest work, but are kind of like,

there's good software out here,

but there could be something better.

When I was working at one of the Silicon Valley startups,

I connected with Tristan.

Tristan actually onboarded Tristan, we were coworkers.

So then Tristan and I got back together

and we realized that, hey, we can use our skill sets,

we can use our backgrounds to help.

Actually, our first product was on technicians.

We wanted, and we still have a product light on that,

but was helping technicians die cars faster and better.

When you've demonstrated this concept to people,

did they like it?

Did they help you to say, ooh, it could do this?

Was there an excitement behind it?

What's the, guys, I don't care who talks about this.

Where was the evolution of the idea

to create shift automotive to help,

again, you say technicians, I say specialists,

because they're brainiacs in those bays.

They're not techs anymore in my mind.

Where was that evolution of, ooh, this is so cool,

and it kept you working on it.

We picked technicians first because it felt to me

like the area of the space that had been largely ignored.

If we look at what software is available in the space

and the innovation that's happened over the last five years,

it's been focused elsewhere.

The tools that technicians use,

especially from a repair data and diagnostic standpoint,

are largely similar to what they have been for a while.

And so that's why we focused there.

And what we found was that while it was painful

and there were things that,

there were workflows that could be improved,

the pain wasn't great enough to yield a change of behavior.

And so in software, the things we talk about

as we look at how you find product market fit

and you find folks that are obsessed with what you're doing

is the change needs to happen naturally.

And if it doesn't, you'll find yourself just fighting

to get them to use the thing that you're building.

And if that's where you're at, you haven't found it.

You haven't found the thing yet

that has that sort of magical feeling of this is what I needed.

And so the feedback we were getting was that

this is useful, this is cool, this is different.

And also I'm gonna just go back and use the repair guide

that I was using before

because I know exactly how to use it.

I've been doing it for 20 years.

Did they want an easy button?

They wanted an easy button,

but they weren't necessarily willing

to change their behavior to get an easy button.

And that is common.

Oh my God.

I mean, I think you just nailed it.

We can now, the episode's over with.

You're right.

Even myself, I want something new,

but when I realized I got to make some flips in my routine

and how I think things through and how I process stuff,

I stay where I am.

Yeah.

Yeah, same with me, you know, yo-yo dieting.

Sometimes you say, I'm gonna use my fitness towel.

You get on it for a day, for a week.

And then you lose three pounds.

And then you just go to McDonald's

and then you're like, oh, you're back to where you started.

So, you know, some of that behavioral change,

it's like, things sound great in theory,

but when you're actually trying to do something

for the latest software,

is it gonna solve it?

There's no silver bullet, you know?

Well, you know, when we were designing our listening app,

all I kept thinking about was an easy button

just to make it so easy for the listener.

Give them a lot more than they could get

from an Apple or Spotify, really focused,

but try to make it easy.

And we continue to do that.

So I get that.

I really do.

One of the great talking points that you have

that I am more excited than you could possibly imagine

is the customer experience.

And I've been having some dialogue of late

as to how do we create an experience for the client

that goes beyond what we currently do.

And what we currently do in many cases

is we don't even talk to people, we don't even see them,

okay, and COVID gave us that.

And in some cases, they may call

and we may never see them

because they drop off and they pick up later

to have that intimacy and that customer relationship

and how we can promote the fact

that we've got the latest equipment

and we've just sent our people for some continued training.

We rarely get a chance to speak that.

How could we put our arms around that,

this balloon out there and pull it in

and get something that's off the charts?

You guys agree or disagree?

I think it depends.

I agree largely with you.

I think the customer experience

is the thing that allows shops to set themselves apart.

But I think we create sometimes this idealistic idea

of what we see in our business and how we wanna present it.

And we maybe don't spend enough time thinking

about what does the customer want?

And I think I'm a big believer

in like meeting the customer where they are.

And I think that applies in a lot of different scenarios,

but I think in auto repair it's particularly important

because you're gonna work with a wide variety of customers

who are there or wanna interact with you

in a wide variety of ways.

So I think for the customers who care about that,

for the customers who want to see sort of behind the curtains,

being able to find a way to give them an avenue to that

is important.

And then for the customers who don't, maybe not so much.

You know what I just heard,

which was a very powerful statement, see behind the curtain.

And we have to determine who wants that

and then we'll give it to them.

And the other ones that are living life,

skipping along on the high side,

we have to recognize that and just make sure

that everything on the skip high side is perfect.

Got that.

That's just a brilliant deduction.

I like that.

Skipping the high side or the people who really want in

and they really wanna know

and tell me about the person who fixed my car.

I don't think we're promoting our people enough.

I don't think we have those, if you will,

honor frames out there with their picture,

their little bio, their ASC, certs.

I don't know if we're doing enough of that.

I'm not sure we're proud enough

of puffing our chest out with our people.

Can software do this for us?

I think there are ways that it can.

I think that there are a lot of opportunities

to promote your team and to promote the folks

who are doing the work that are providing the experience

that your customers are having.

I think the dealership world sometimes

probably gets this right in a different way

with some of the things that they do

and the ways that they promote the folks

who are working on your vehicle

and with like video inspections and things like that

where the customer sort of interacts

with the folks behind the scenes a little bit more.

On the independent side, yeah,

I think software could help with it, certainly.

I think it's not a one size fits all approach

and that's what I think makes it challenging overall

in this industry is that I think oftentimes

we're in search of a one size fits all solution

that is the right thing for everybody

and the reality is every shop is different

and what they want is different

and what they need is different.

And every client's different.

Part of our talking points in our discovery call

just to get to where we are here today

is the talk about adapting to the changing landscape

of vehicle owners.

What's your view of the vehicle owner?

How long they wanna keep their vehicle?

What they wanna invest in?

Yeah, I was actually talking to my mom about this today

where a new vehicle is $50,000, right?

And amongst a lot of my friends, you know,

I'm on, I'll call myself the board of Gen Z millennial.

You know, a lot of us want to just have a reliable vehicle

where it's kind of strained on budgets.

So I feel like a lot of folks are just trying to extend out

their existing used vehicle.

You know, I'll call, say it, I have a 2013 Toyota RAV4.

I hope it's 198,000 miles.

I wanna keep it another 100,000, you know?

You know, I'll take it to actually,

it needs to go next to Bill's shop.

I need to do some maintenance on it.

But yeah, like that's what I see

the perspective of a lot of my friends are like,

can't really afford a new vehicle

or getting used vehicles from a friend or a relative

or even face the marketplace even just crazy,

but that's how it is.

And like just trying to extend the life out

because of just tight budgets in these days.

You know, as a shop owner, Tristan,

how do you see this changing this ever evolving landscape?

And I just saw some kind of post on,

I don't know, was it Hyundai or was Honda Toyota

were building these little tiny cars overseas,

these little $15,000 things.

When I was a kid, that's what we could buy a car

for $8,000 and that was not what I was a kid

probably in my 20s.

Is that an answer to solving the affordability crisis?

You know, I know this may not have anything to do

with our episode, but I'm asking, what's your opinion?

I mean, I think that is a big part of what is pushing

the folks that are in those positions to fix rather than buy

is that there isn't really a truly affordable new car option.

And so yeah, I mean, I do think that if a brand

can come out with something that provides a really

compelling basic, you know, A to B experience

at a competitive price point

that hopefully has some reliability to it,

then yeah, I think that could be a disrupter.

But in the world we have today, the reality is,

like Simon said, your average vehicle cost new

has gone way, way up.

And frankly, the cost of repairing a vehicle has gone up

but it has really more gone up with like inflation

and sort of just the times as labor rates and things

have adjusted and tariffs have affected parts prices

and that drives, you know, additional costs, the end user

but they haven't gone up in the same way

that the cost of a new vehicle has in addition

to the fact that interest rates are much higher

than they were several years ago.

And so we are finding in the shop that I think

we're surprised every day by the amount of work

that somebody is willing to approve on an older vehicle

and it forces us to have to not make assumptions

about what somebody may or may not want to do to their car.

Not selling from your own wallet, right?

Not selling from your own wallet,

which is I think every shop has to contend with

and every service advisor has to contend with

because there are times where when you're in the industry

you have a skewed perspective of the value of something.

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You know, most shop owners feel trapped

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never come back.

It's frustrating, it's exhausting

and it's not your fault.

The industry average is 54%, one and done.

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You guys created Shift Automotive.

With what we have just said,

here's Simon coming to your shop saying,

I have 100 and some thousand,

I ain't willing to go down for 50 grand or more

because I know when I go into the dealership,

I'm gonna look at a $69,000 luxury car

because it could last me another 10 or 12 years

like this one did.

Where did the software start

and why is it there to help a transaction like this?

Yeah, so one of the easiest ways to bring services

that are required to the forefront,

I think is through the manufacturer intervals.

They provide us a clear indication of the services

that are required for a vehicle

to as a best practice to extend its life.

What that does is removes the,

well says who from the customer

when you say something needs to be done.

And so what we have done is in part of our product,

we have raised what those OEM maintenance concerns are

against the vehicle's current mileage

and the vehicle's service history

to highlight where the gaps,

where the things that have not been maintained,

what are the things that we can show to the customer

that need to be done

in order to per the manufacturer's recommendations

extend the life of their vehicle.

And then at the same time,

where does our shop's opinion differ

from what those OEM recommendations are

that we may standardize across the board?

We may say, hey, we wanna check your battery

every 36 months or we may just recommend replacement

every 48 months to avoid the problem

or we might recommend a brake fluid flush

at an interval different than most manufacturers

because of our experience.

And we can easily raise those in that same workflow

so that you get a combination

of your shop's specific recommendations

and your OEM recommendations for a specific VIN

to extend that life.

And you can present that to the customer

with the reasoning behind it all in one step.

Okay, why do I always gravitate to the medical field

when I hear great stuff like this?

I just wrote down the word blood test

because that's what you were describing to me.

We've talked about this on our show

over the last 10 years, a whole, whole bunch of times

about extending the life of that vehicle

and what does the customer really want

or get from good maintenance programs.

And it's no different than a blood test.

I mean, the doctors is, listen,

you're getting up there, right?

Simon, your car, it's getting up there.

It's got 150,000 miles getting up there.

We gotta pay a little bit more attention to it

than we had in the past when you were in 50, 60,000.

And so that DVI thing, which is a blood test,

and let me explain how that works.

We need to get you in here a couple of times.

In fact, the battery that this is and that's,

and is the consumer according to how you see things,

gentlemen, willing to buy into that,

if you will, doctoring with this vehicle?

I'd say so because, you know,

speaking to that point earlier,

folks wanna extend the life of their cars.

I'm not gonna buy a new car and sure,

it's a bit more pain.

Yeah, it's like the ARL or the repair order

might be a bit higher than expected, a few hundred bucks.

But, you know, people, I think there is a consumer

behavior change that is active,

especially in the past few years.

And in the shops that Shift is active in,

people have accepted it and people,

the shops have been able to quote more and sell more.

And the customers are end up happier.

They've actually accepted it.

How we Shift helping to make this work, guys.

Yeah, so what it does is it allows for single click

additions of all of the existing maintenance

recommendations by Vin onto the inspection report,

onto the repair order where appropriate,

and into the summaries so that whether the customer

approves the work or not, they get a documentation

of the OEM intervals and the shop intervals

that they are overdue on or the ones that are due soon.

And then on that existing ticket,

you get a one click addition to just add,

to streamline that workflow for the service advisor.

And that ultimately really gets down to sort of

the nuts and bolts of why Shift exists.

We are a tool to streamline workflows for the shop.

Whether you're a technician, a service advisor,

or an owner, our goal is to give you the tools

to let you spend your time on high value workflows

rather than on sort of mundane,

more just automatable things where the person doing them

isn't providing a positive influence or negative influence

on the outcome.

It's just this needs to be done and it gets done.

You know what I just took away from that statement, Tristan?

People know me.

I always say, I wrote this down, I wrote this down.

This is what I've been doing for 10 years.

You fire my brain up.

Here's what I wrote down.

You put words in my mouth.

That's what I wrote down.

Because you're basically coming back,

you're giving me all this information,

putting it on the repair order.

I gotta read it, I gotta understand what it means.

But if it comes back in a great format,

intelligent perspective,

then as I open my mouth to share this,

you're putting the words in my mouth

in an intelligent processor way,

or I have to be smart enough to be able to read what I say

and interpret it right back in non-geek speak to the client.

Or in some cases, you don't.

I think that's the beautiful part about it is that

in some of these situations,

when you are not talking to a customer necessarily

before they're intaking this information,

you're providing it to them in a structured,

reliable way where you're not worried about

was the punctuation right?

Did I capitalize everything?

Did I write something in a way that looks professional?

You just know it was done right.

And it's there on the inspection

and it's there in the estimate and the customer views it.

And depending on where in your specific shop's flow

you talk to the customer, you're all set.

So I didn't have to go to AI to make it nice for me.

It's there.

Yes, like our whole platform is supported by AI,

which I think is an important distinction,

which is that AI is a tool in the tool belt.

It's not the solution.

And so with all the different resources

that we have at our disposal,

AI is certainly prevalent inside of our system

to help process information and access information

where it's relevant.

And in one of those ways is how we structure

the way things are written to people.

It's one of the, I think, best simple uses of AI

and one of the features in the product

is that for things that we don't generate on your behalf,

in a single click, you can just clean it up.

We're not gonna add context.

We're not gonna add content.

We're just gonna make whatever you wrote sound professional

and be capitalized and have the right punctuation

and not have spelling errors.

And I think there's a friendliness

to clean concise communication

that drives trust with a customer.

I love that friendliness.

You guys are saying an awful lot

of great powerful words here

that I think would excite a shop owner to say,

yeah, that's me.

I gotta have something like this

in supporting of what we do

because we all want a greater shop efficiency.

We want more vehicles.

We wanna say yes all the time

and we need tools, not necessarily wrenches or scopes

to get that in and processed.

And dare I say the word sold?

Exactly.

And so the outcome is higher ARO,

items being approved more often

and a cleaner documentation of that entire process.

And we're not changing the outcome

of what you're doing necessarily.

We're just changing how you got there.

If you are running your shop

at the way I imagine a lot of your listeners are

where you're making sure that your communications

going out are clean and concise and professional

and that all of the maintenance items

have been added onto the ticket

and they've been explained to the customer.

We're not changing that outcome necessarily.

We're just allowing you to get to that outcome

in one or two clicks

instead of spending five, 10, 15 minutes

depending on the situation,

putting all of that together,

which just gives you time back to do other things

because in a shop time is quite literally money.

We're in an industry where our ability

to generate additional revenue

is based on a capacity of time.

And so where we can make these minor improvements

on things that are done over and over and over again

on a daily basis, they add up.

They make a difference in what that shop's ability

to turn over additional work

or to improve on processes or keep the shop clean

or whatever the case may be

that doesn't just roll into the next day.

Want to chime in at all time at all?

I know this is your partner over here, Tristan.

He's doing a great job,

but I see your brain on overtime here.

Car count has gone up for a lot of shops,

but how I think about shift is that ARO.

Is that like, if you've got the right parts,

the right labor, the right communication,

then it's about the customer trust.

If you can back that up with the OEM info

with the latest understandings of AI,

shops deserve the best version of AI.

And in many other industries,

there's a lot of money being spent

to modernize healthcare, right?

To modernize government tech, to modernize finance.

But something that I'm just really excited with shift

and obviously with Tristan

is bringing that latest kind of friendly,

kind of actually your partner AI.

That's what has been so inspiring.

And like, for example, we have one shop owner.

He's literally one man shop.

Like right now, he's got a voice assistant,

wherever I call him, I'd never get him,

but he's got a voice AI, he's got an email AI,

and he's got our AI as well that helps him run the shop.

We've got some other shops that are MSOs,

like three locations, if not more, very well organized.

So that's the thing, it doesn't really matter,

something that I've learned of many hundreds of shops

is that like, it doesn't really matter how sophisticated

you are or where you are on your ownership journey

or as a client service advocate,

because I know, I wanna talk about the language as well.

AI can help.

And I think there's just a lot of, it can be a friend.

It doesn't need to be the scary thing that we're like,

oh, what's it doing, what's it coming?

Like it can be an advocate for your shop and auto repair.

Guys, I am inspired by this discussion.

And part of the think that I have going

is what I would call the review of all of my systems.

And I've got software doing this

and API integration over here,

and this click and that over here on this third screen

because they're not integrated.

And all I keep thinking about is where is the consultant

in our industry that says I'm going to do a thorough review

of everything front of shop, back of shop,

back office is doing and using.

And I think of our great friends over at Wicked Filed

being able to do certain things here.

When I think of all these great add-ons and support systems,

we're going to get to the point where there's going to be

20 or 30 options like you guys are new to this

and you're coming on with a brand new toolbox, if you will

and neat news, something that we've learned from the past.

And now, here's the way forward today.

And in three years, there's going to be someone

who rethought that again or you guys are going to keep paying.

Will we ever someday, my question is,

have consultants to help us with all this?

I think we already do to some degree.

I mean, I think coaches are consultants

or they can be depending on what your engagement is

with them.

Yes, I knew you were going to say that somehow.

Interesting, I thought that through

and I know a lot of great coaches that just,

they don't want to get that deep of a dive

into every bit of why this piece of software

fits perfectly in this shop and vice,

because then they have to go to school

or have an extremely strong relationship with you.

Or maybe what the coaches need to,

and again, I'm just brainstorming out loud here,

is they would want to take your system

and someone else's and bring that into their offering

or into their expertise cloud, if you will.

And then go to their clients and says,

listen, we've partnered with and these we believe

will make you, not only are we giving you great guidance

and coaching and leadership and financial advice,

you need to have boom, boom, boom and this.

Yeah, and I think informally,

some of them are doing that today.

Now, I think the way that oftentimes works

is it's just what they're recommending

is whatever they are using or whatever they have used

or have been exposed to,

which isn't necessarily what is the best option

that is available, but best is subjective.

I think the other responsibility there

is on the software company itself,

like where you see some of these companies be successful

and be successful very quickly,

which I certainly got to experience with Shop Genie,

is when you over support your customer base

and you reach beyond what your cloud of influence is,

I think you provide a really unique experience

as a software vendor.

Just today, I was on with one of our users

who was having some challenges with their management system

and having a hard time understanding

how something could work and the natural response would be

to just direct them back to the support team

of their management system,

but it's just as easy for us who spend all day

working in these different systems

and me who spends all day working on it

as a shop owner as well in my background,

like it doesn't take but five minutes for me

to sit there and answer their questions

and that delights our customers

because we over support them.

We become what they feel like is a part of their team

rather than just another tool that sits

in the proverbial toolbox.

You're a giver.

It's the only way to be.

Yeah, you're probably like me, it's tough to say no.

Yeah, I definitely overextended myself due to that

and the ROI is certainly not short term

on some of those interactions.

Well, you've been there and done that

and you saw what happened with Shop Genie

and you've kind of got a taste of that culture

on where that has gone.

But yeah, I mean, when you said,

they're going back to the consultant,

it's almost like, Simon Tristan, I see that

you've got this really neat new cool thing

and I'm not calling it a thing,

but it's a thing, okay?

You're not wrong.

I know, you can say it, you can say it.

I don't, I don't.

I felt wrong.

I felt bad.

No, no, no, I don't mind.

I got my guests out here and I'm calling them a thing.

But to your point, as you were saying,

listen, this is what you gotta do

and you gotta read the manual or go over here

and you're not flipping the right switch and blah, blah, blah.

Guys in your capacity that are so smart

and have this level of knowledge

and how software connects and hooks and works,

you should almost be a consultant first

and then sell your product second.

Well, in some ways, I think that's what we are.

It's like people reach out to us

because there's something about our product

that has scratched an itch for them of a pain point.

And so then those initial conversations

are largely consulting conversations.

It's understanding their problem at a deep level

and then helping them understand whether or not

we can solve that because on a not insignificant number

of these conversations, they'll come in thinking

that we might be able to do something

or thinking that the software does something

or not being aware that it does something

and those are only unearthed

through a consultant-like approach to those conversations.

And sometimes what that means is like,

hey, Joe, I can't solve this for you.

Here's a place that you can go look

or here's what you can use in addition to our solution

to help solve that.

And that's where I think like having partners

and having other folks in the industry

like Alex and the team at Wicked File

who are phenomenal when a customer asks a question

or a potential customer asks a question

about a problem that we don't solve,

knowing where to send them is phenomenal.

Yeah, I actually talked to a shop owner yesterday

in Colorado and I was saying,

hey, did you use AI tools this, that?

He's like, honestly, after hearing about Redshift,

my ARO is good.

I'm actually interested in car count.

And I was like, here you go, sir.

You should talk to these XYZ folks.

So like, I think if you have a more long-term approach,

I think that just leads to more

of like a consultative relationship

where I think a certain time,

certain, if you think long-term enough

and you care long enough, like, it's fine.

Just recommend it to someone else.

Like maybe, and then I emailed the shop owner.

He said, he gave me some good feedback and he said,

okay, maybe not a good fit for me,

but I'll afford this email to another shop owner

who might be interested in your stuff.

So I think you just have like a casual,

just like just be human, be normal.

Like it goes a long way.

I'll tell you, you got to talk to 10 people

to get one sale, isn't that always the thing?

The 10% close rate, right?

It's no different than in the shop.

Like a lot of the things we experience,

and honestly why for me, I think running the shop

has been not natural, but in some ways natural

is like it's not that different from the other businesses

that I have been in at a fundamental level.

The work being done is different,

but ultimately the goal is to delight a customer

in a way that makes them tell 10 other people about it

and then consistently provide that experience

so that that result continues to sort of travel down

the chain of your community.

That's what it is.

This has been a fun, interesting, inspiring to me.

And I look at you two guys as geeks, okay?

No disrespect intended.

The highest level of respect that I can.

And I'm sitting here, we've had a discovery call.

I, you know, a lot of stuff came out.

I saw a mini demo, I think it asked.

And then I can't imagine you guys standing at your counter

talking to someone watching a thing get printed

or you guys probably just see code

going in front of your eyes all the time.

Oh, I could write that better.

Or why did that do the white that screen pop up?

I can't imagine what your lives are like

if you're geek 10 Xers.

I think it's no different than anyone

who just loves to solve problems.

And I think honestly, that's where a lot of folks

find their path in auto repair is loving

to solve hard problems that nobody else wants to solve.

And so there is a uniqueness

to spending your life thus far building software

because when you interact with software

you certainly have a different perspective

on what it could do or how it could work or things like that.

You don't sort of accept the status quo as much

which frankly is how shift happened.

Like a lot of this is born out of me being in my shop

and using the software that we had

and finding these gaps that I was frustrated

just didn't have a solution.

The beautiful part is that then I can build them

with our team and provide them to the industry.

Like that is really where this all sort of came from.

And so I think it's a blessing and a curse.

And we actually have two other co-founders

I grew up with in Michigan.

They worked at Ford

and then they also worked to other tech companies as well.

So that's that like unique kind of understanding.

And I think they're more on the technical side

so they might see like the matrix of it more, but...

Yeah, I should set the record straight

for an appeal and a deal's sake.

Neither was I am nor I write code.

And that is very important facts because...

Oh, I thought you did.

We do not.

So my life has been on the product side.

Yeah, it's about understanding both sides of that equation.

Oh my God.

I don't know if we have time for this, but years ago,

years and years ago, I was really so good

at sitting down with a programmer

and explain to him what I needed in a computer piece

of soft big green screen days, okay?

And explaining to them, the customer sees this.

This is what I want to have happen.

I need this to be the ultimate result.

You need to save this over here and then call it back.

I loved to do that in my old, old days,

way back in the family business.

And when I hear you guys say we don't write code,

either did I, but now I can relate to you.

I can relate to you in such a way.

I'm sorry, I shouldn't call you geeks.

No, no.

But I bet you one thing, and here's my final thought for you.

When you guys are working on V whatever, V12, V20,

whatever, and it comes out and how excited you can be,

since you're not code writers,

cause code writers, I don't know if they get really excited

about that stuff, but the people who help design that stuff

and you put it out and you say,

oh, I can't wait for the world to see this.

This is so cool.

I'm with you.

I know what I get.

I do.

This was really more fun than I expected it to be.

And actually more profound in my think that I had

shift-automotive.io, Shift Automotive.

And it's Tristan Sweeney co-founder,

along with Simon Raza, who's the co-founder,

and Tristan owns Honest Automotive.

And Cary, North Carolina, just outside of Raleigh.

All right guys, best of the holidays to you.

Likewise.

Thanks for the time, Carm.

Thanks, man.

Thank you.

It was fun.

Thanks for being on board to listen and learn

from the Premier Automotive Repair Business podcast,

Remarkable Results Radio.

Get your episodic education on the ARPN listening app

at automotiverepairpodcastnetwork.com.

Also enjoy the podcast on our

Carm Capriotto YouTube channel.

Carm is all for advancing the professional

automotive service industry.

Until next time.

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