Auto Profit Masters in the News

Motor Age Magazine

• Keller Bros. named 2009 Top-10 Shop in Nation by Motor Age

  Shops from around the country fill out the top 10 of the fourth annual Motor Age Top Shops Contest. Despite their location around the United States, all of the shops demonstrated strengths in marketing, technology in the bays, customer relations and community service, among other attributes. Read the article here!

• Keller Bros. Turns Shop Into Training Ground While Keeping Vehicles Moving

  Keller Bros. Auto Repair isn't like the shop down the street. Instead of turning away other shops as potential competition, technicians, service writers and owners are welcomed into Keller Bros.' bays to learn more about improving shop operations.

  "We're a little bit different than the average shop on the street. We're actually a training facility that just happens to have operated as a shop for the last 38 years," says David Rogers, COO of the Littleton, Colo., business. "For the last 10 we've been training other shops and their staffs right in our own business." Click here to read the article!

Auto Inc. Magazine

• Why Isn't My Advertising Working?

  "Why isn't my advertising working?" It's a question I hear time and time again from shop owners. They're tired of bad customers, tired of losing money, tired of playing the price game that leaves their bank accounts empty and their bays full of low-quality, complaining, angry customers.

  So why isn't their advertising working? It comes down to what they're advertising and how they're advertising. Changing these two things isn't hard for shop owners, but it does require rethinking a lot of what they've been taught. Click here for the whole story!

• Hiring and Recruiting Winners: Knowing the right questions to ask and listening to a candidate's answers is key in hiring

  To figure out how to keep the right employee, we must first understand that attitudes have completely changed in today's world. A human resources (HR) director for a large, well-known computer manufacturing firm told me a while ago that when she sees more than three years at the same job on a resume, she immediately assumes that the person is complacent and that their resume gets stuck at the wrong end of the list.

  Could it be? Is this the end of loyalty and longevity being viewed as a good thing? Click here for the whole story!

• Just Because It's Slow Doesn't Mean You Can't Grow: Use the slow times to increase your sales

  There are certain times of the year that a bit of a slowdown in customer traffic seems inevitable. These times are the ones where many teams become unproductive and unhappy. If you aren't concerned, maybe you should be!

  Your employees may not always outwardly demonstrate their dissatisfaction, and you may think they ought to know by now that some weeks are just slow, but it's when we relax and think we know what others are thinking that we really get in trouble! Get the whole story by clicking here!

• Keller Bros. Named 2008 Top Ten Website

  A well-organized and clean site just beckons a potential customer to stick around and see what the organization is about. Keller Bros. offers a lot of material on its Web site, but it is organized attractively and logically throughout the site. Click here for the whole list!

• Keller Bros. Honored by Colorado Ethics in Business Alliance

  Keller Bros. Auto in Littleton, Colo., an ASA member-shop since 1997, has been named an "Ethics in Business" winner and was honored at an awards luncheon March 26. The Colorado Ethics in Business Award program was founded by the University of Denver, Coloradobiz magazine and the Samaritan Institute. Read the whole article here!

Parts & People

• APM Releases RPM ToolKit™

  Littleton, Colo.--Auto Profit Masters announced the release of its RPM ToolKit™ to all repair shop owners. This online suite of applications was developed by David Rogers and Terry Keller in their Littleton-based repair shop and was previously available only to full-time consulting clients of Auto Profit Masters.

  RPM ToolKit™ allow shop owners to see their numbers the way that a successful shop does and is an invaluable tool for diagnosing and fixing bottlenecks, installing incentive pay plans for technicians and service advisers, and better allocating and managing a marketing plan and budget. Read more!

Colorado Biz Magazine

• Keller Bros. Wins Ethics in Business Award

  At Keller Bros. Auto, the mantra driven home to employees is "to teach, never to sell," and that philosophy has helped the Littleton shop grow to an operation with 11 service bays and 23 full-time employees who service more than 700 cars per month. The business' roots go back to 1974 when Terry Keller purchased Southglenn Texaco. In 1995 he acquired the shop location at 250 E. Dry Creek Road where it operates today. Although Terry and his wife, Margret, remain the owners, David Rogers has been the chief operating officer since 1998 and handles the shop's day-to-day operations. Read the full article on the Keller Bros. Website or on Colorado Biz Magazine's website!

CNN Money

• How Shop Owners Can Survive in a Cutthroat Market

  There are a lot of things working against your business right now, both in and out of your control. First is the economy. People are putting off expenses that aren't imperative, and they may wait an extra couple thousand miles before spending money on an oil change.

  "Nationwide, the majority of shops are experiencing a downturn," says David Rogers, president of Auto Profit Masters, an advisory firm for auto service shops, and COO of repair shop Keller Brothers Auto in Littleton, Colo. "I've seen many have to take measures like opening extra days and staying open at night, but it's not working." Read the whole article by clicking here!

Fort Wayne Journal Gazette

• Taking care of your car helps the environment and your wallet

  It may not seem as if engines breathe, but they draw air and run it through filters, and if those filters become dirty, the engines have to work harder, adding stress and burning more gas, according to David Rogers, who is the chief operating officer of Keller Bros. Auto, in Littleton, Colo.

  Changing a dirty air filter is a simple step with a big payoff.

  "A simple, cheap thing like an air filter can change your fuel economy by as much as 10 percent because if it's really filthy and plugged, your engine is going to work so very hard to compensate for that," Rogers says. Read more!

Professional Carwashing & Detailing Magazine

• How educating your fast lube customers improves your bottom line

  When dealing with today's fast lube customer, we have to remember that they are more educated, busier, and deeply invested in their vehicles than ever before. Despite these factors, many consumers simply are not confident in which services they actually need, nor are they confident in our recommendations in many cases.

  The absolute best way to put these types of concerns to rest is to adopt and embrace a philosophy and some policies that ensure that your ultimate goal is the customer's best interest. Read more!