Your superior intelligence allows you to know who to treat like crap and who not to. I'm glad I'm not as smart as you. I don't treat anyone like that...ever...for any reason.

Why are your doors closed and you're working for someone else now? I thought you had all the answers.

All the small shops in the area closed. Heck, even the dealers have had issues.

I worked at NAPA a long time ago. We always had different price sheets. Yellow was general over the counter pricing. Green was for good customers and shops. Salmon was stocking dealer. Blue was jobber cost. Don't recall what the margins were. Of course for the well known pain in the *** customers there was list price.

:NailHead:

Economy hit us hard. Several of my big customers also went under. I chose to get out. I also had some personal issues at the same time. Gary, you don't know me at all.

Let's look at it from a parts store owners perspective....
You said you paid your people well, trained them well.... and that cost money right?? You bet it did! Now, your in your office behind the counter, and you overhear one of your employees waiting on a customer.... but not just any customer, one of your top 5 customers. You hear what the customer wants, and think, "yeah, we carry that". But then you hear your employee tells them you don't carry it, and can't get it. "Check down the strwet at O'Reilly's they say." I bet you'd be upset too!!
Now, I don't stand at the counter and scream at them, and I don't call them names, and demand to see a manager. I usually just tell them directly they are wrong, then tell how to look it up, or tell them to get out a book.

Yeah, I'm smart, and I'm a smart ass.... but I'm not a scene maker. Give it up Gary. I never did anything to you. Hell, outside of you and I getting kicked off a Facebook page together for I don't even recall what, I don't know that I've ever spoken to you before now.

You guys have to start looking at things from more than just one perspective.....

As a business owner, it's frustrating to get an incompetent parts person. Especially when you've done business for years and years with the store, and you get some newbie flippantly telling you they can't get something you know darn good and well they can.

As a parts store owner, you don't want employees sending people out the door without selling them parts. It's one thing if you really don't carry it.... but another entirely to have an incompetent employee.



Rip on me all you want, but I do expect people who are employed to be able to do their job. I'm expected to do my job, my employees were expected to do theirs, and do it well or they wouldn't be working for me. I will add that I had some of the best employees in the world. They worked hard for me, and in turn, I took care of them. Never had any leave on a bad note, but did let a couple go. The ones that got "fired" were for good reason.... but no one that left on their own, left on bad terms. All that left were actually pretty upset at leaving. Even the ones that were offered better jobs. None were looking for better jobs.... people sought them out.

Someone mentioned better pay..... I do somewhat agree. Years ago, when a mechanic got "too old" to work like he used to he would either go into a management roll, like a shop foreman, or he would move to the parts counter. Some of the best parts guys I've ever met used to be mechanics. Nowadays, experienced mechanics make nearly $30/hr. Some make more, some just less.... but no way are you going to get part stores to pay that. A parts store is going to pay about $10 to start and go up to about $15/hr. When I was looking to close the shop, I interviewed for a store manager position at O'Reilly's. I was appalled at what they offered me. I don't recall the exact number, but it was less than $50,000/yr and that was at a store that sold over $500K but less than $1 million a year. (Don't recall exactly how much... it a few years ago.) For that kind of money, your not going to get experience, I agree. But, training.... you'd think they would train better. Someone is certainly making money at those stores... but not the employees! It's like pulling teeth to get a kid at a counter to open a book. If it's not on the computer in front of them.... it can't be had. Which is not true. Lots of things don't come up on that PC that are in their rack of books. That's why they have parts books.....

Sorry boys.... this subject does get me going. I just have no tolerance whatsoever for incompetent parts salespeople.

How can we soar like an Eagle when we are surrounded by Buzzards??

We have the same problems with getting our Cub Parts. Yea, I have it, IT arrives and is the wrong part? :bigthink:

Not Cub-related, but it IS parts-counter related:

Stopped by my local O'Reilly's on the way home from work to pick up some stuff for our 1981 Bronco and our 1995 PowerStroke. Told counter help that I needed a fuel filter for a '95 PowerStroke. Counter help starts clicking on the computer. Parts counter help stops and says, "What's a PowerStroke?"

I kind of expect this any more, so expectations can set the tone of the conversation. Since I'd rather turn it into a teaching moment rather than getting aggravated, we stepped through the screens and found what I needed.

It was kind of amusing that some of the more experienced help there was not busy at the time, they just stand around and don't even bother to try and help the obviously less experienced co-worker.