Ever heard of M.A.R.S.???

[ChipKing007]

I agree that a lack of sales ability and/or lack of motivation is what causes most windshield repair technicians or any small business owner to fail.

Sales ability is what builds a windshield repair business quickly, but repair quality and excellent customer service is what keeps customers coming back. I am not a super salesman, I wish I was, but I still manage to do pretty well in the repair business.

[MARS]

I have been watching this topic with interest and feel the time is right to reply with a balanced, educated response to the complaints about my marketing philosophy, Comments on MARS as a franchise and my thoughts on the industry and where it is heading in general. I personally regard the quality of repair carried out and inadequate training far more significant than how one generates their business. But enough about that for now. I will start at the beginning.

Back in 1991 I left the RAF (Royal Air Force) after serving 13 years as an aircraft engineer on Tornado fighter jets. The first Gulf war frightened the hell out of me and the thought of the riches associated with self employment went a long way towards that decision to leave.

I started a VIN etching business, generating all of my business by cold calling customers. I got pretty good at it but it wasn't consistent enough and one day I met up with a Glasweld franchise holder near to my home town in deepest, darkest England. I was very impressed how his Glasweld injector could repair that nasty chip on my windscreen (windshield) and I decided there and then that I was going to do this. My first set of equipment was from the now defunct Optikleer NVS who were based in Boston, Mass, who incidently I got the idea for my UK company name from.
I then switched to Esprit, Novus, and a few other since dissapeared systems. I was easily sold by the hype so I tried quite a few and whilst they were all OK, didn't really perform anywhere near what I had seen with GlasWeld. Eventually I sourced a ProVac (GlasWeld) and got pretty good at my repairs.

Mid 2003 I was approached by a friend who wanted to do what I was succesfully doing and he became the first Optic-Kleer franchise holder. We used and still do use Delta kit and have always been happy with the service we have received from Brent and his team. I must admit that Delta weren't my first choice but have always served my company well and with good training produce brilliant results.

The original intention was to generate business in the same way that I did but things dont always go to plan and my third franchise holder just couldnt sell anything, never the less glass repair. He suggested a different approach which we tried and the rest is history. Two years later we were turning over $5million per year in glass repair. Times were good. We created the best looking, most professional glass repair sales center in the world. Our latest version is even better.

The adverse effect that our success had was that the insurance companies began to look at their glass expenditure and in the UK started to make things harder. Direct billing went for a lot of companies, Prepayment was introduced by others and some just decided to deal with the national replacement companies exclusively. And we all know what we think of them.

I have always tried to be fair and create excellent working relationships with my franchise holders. I have always endeavoured to give them the best set ups, literature, uniform and graphics for their vehicles. In a nutshell I tried to take the industry upmarket. In my opinion we achieved just that. Along with GlasWeld we were the two largest Repair only companies in the UK, if not the whole of europe.

With success comes increased opposition. When we started there were around 30 companies direct billing glass repair in the UK , today there are 470. I had to do something to support my guys. A chance introduction led to MARS buying a controlling share in Optic-Kleer and moving my family to the US to replicate what had been created in the UK. The only difference was that glass repair was to be the lead in for upselling other services to our customers. MARS have since launched succesfully in the UK off the back of Optic-Kleer and our first UK operator is completing their post training mentorship this week. A number of others are lined up to begin training soon as well. MARS use GlasWeld equipment so we are able to carry out extremely good repairs.

That brings me to the bit about $30 repairs. I have found that the buying power of a dollar is roughly equivalant to the buying power of the pound in the UK where we charge

[screenman]

Nice one Eric, best of luck over there.

[splitpit]

You failed to mentions MARS reliance on gimmick marketing. But that's ok, I already know the answer to that one!

[sunshine wr]

"That is why I set the price in the US at $30. It isn't mandatory but is a great tool to get us on the car and in a position to upsell more expensive services.">>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>So that's why those martians around here keep trying to sell me their standard pro-vac Glas-Weld equipment. MARS do you have a location.

[MARS]

Up until recently MARS concentrated solely on the wholesale market. I have set up their retail franchise which uses glass as the lead in. A lot of wholesale guys dont touch glass. Hence the pro-Vacs for sale. If you can get one for a good price then rip their arm off!

[MARS]

In reply to Gimmick marketing. Why not? So long as its ethical and legal I cant see any problem with it. A one man operation probably wont need it but a large multinational can generate huge increases in profit by a carefully thought out marketing campaign.
In Texas the code enforcement police would drop on me like a tonne of rocks if I did anything illegal so we have to do things properly.

[sunshine wr]

I don't use the standard pro-vacs and I have enough PV 2000s to keep me busy and they always want top $$ because HEY! it's brand new, never been used.

[MARS]

How do you get on with your PV2000's? I prefer the old ProVacs. Lighter and not much slower in my opinion.
I don't want to turn this into an advert for GlasWeld though because I feel most bad repairs are caused by inadequate training as opposed to equipment. A good technician with a poor quality injector will in most cases perform better repairs than an inadequately trained technician with the worlds best injector.
Training is the key. Gary Michens ( I think the spelling is correct) once quoted "there is no such thing as a bad repair, it's either repaired or it's not"

[splitpit]

Word is, the MARS guy in this area pretty much struck out when it comes to all of his other offerings other than WSR. So now, with a trailer full of equipment that is gathering dust, he's hoping that WSR will be his salvation. And since he can't get any dealer work with any of it, he's turned into a parking lot tent jockey pushing the free repair gimmick hoping that he'll wrangle in a few that need his other services.

I've seen one of his repairs that he did for a neighbor of one of my customers. He asked me to take a look at it because he had concerns.
It had unfilled gaps and leg tips. It looked pretty sloppy. Will it hold over time? Maybe so. Maybe not.

If the quote, "there's no such thing as a bad repair" is true, than what is this?