Marty Hollingshead 
With the rising costs of fuel and wages, among other things, how do we effectively pass these costs to the customer? First, let’s look at what our true cost to deliver is. Have you thought about, or do you know, what your cost to deliver really is? To find your true cost to deliver, you … Read more
A Happy Customer is a Steady Customer We will talk about Sales, getting orders, fulfilling them, and managing the sale after the sale. So, to start off with, what drives sales? The obvious answer here is having what the customer needs. Once you have taken the order, now the real work begins, which is fulfilling … Read more
We all focus on sales and growth, but with current events, inflation, and the overall cost of doing business, we have to say to ourselves, “is more really more?” Since the pandemic, if you are an auto recycler and you haven’t seen a dramatic increase in sales, you need to take a serious look at … Read more
Auto Recyclers have two main sources of revenue: mechanical (driveline suspension), and collision parts (body parts and sheet metal). Let’s look at the challenges and opportunities of selling crash parts, and how we can improve it. There has been a-lot of talk about “selling deeper” into the car. I say “let’s try to sell better … Read more
First of all, let me say this: how you compensate your employees, whether it is salary, hourly, commission, or a combination thereof, in itself is not going to make your company run well. The unique thing about this industry is that we have many ways to do the same thing differently. There is no right … Read more
As many know, I am about to assume the role of President of ARA. While this is an honor, and I am truly humbled, it got me thinking about our Association and the industry, with its past, present, and the future. One thing I always keep in mind is to “always remember your roots, never … Read more
One of the first steps in being successful is not only knowing your numbers, but what drives them. The people that concentrate on the drivers usually stay ahead of the curve. What drives sales? The obvious answers are: inventory, purchasing, and your process. The best success is made by having the ability to identify trends. … Read more
What We Can do to Prepare and Position Ourselves for the Next Year After eighteen months, we are now entering what we hope will be the post-COVID world. So, I want to talk about what we have experienced in the past eighteen months, what the future holds in store for us, what we should expect, … Read more
In talking with other Recyclers and business owners, there seems to be a common problem. That is: they need additional employees but cannot seem to find them. If you look at the beginning of the pandemic, there were massive layoffs and business closures. Most of these people wanted to work, but could not. As this … Read more
Let’s take a look at Commission/Pay for Performance. I will first touch on the Pros and Cons of this model. For the owners, on the surface this looks like a good idea. After all, if business is slow, payroll will be lower. In theory, this sounds great, right? So now, let’s take a look at … Read more
The Right Stuff: What it Takes to be a Mentor Back in 2018, ARA launched the Peer-to-Peer Mentoring Program. RD Hopper was the founder of this program. His vision was to bring together some of the best operators to act as mentors to those that were in need of help. The object here was to … Read more
Our goal as Auto Recyclers, obviously, is to sell as many parts as possible. To do this and to increase our opportunity for a larger piece of the pie, we have barriers to overcome. Some barriers, like the OEM repair procedures, are imposed by others, but at the same time, I feel in a lot … Read more
Back in January of 2017, I wrote an article about the Five-Year Plan, and what does the future hold for Auto Recyclers? So, now four years later, I just want to recap the problems facing us and what changes we have seen. We will start off by looking at problems that were facing us and … Read more
I want to talk about the importance of safety and compliance and its return on investment, as well as the cost and potential liabilities. Let’s start off with the question of what exactly does compliance mean for the Automotive Recycler? For this article, we will talk about two main areas of compliance, the first being … Read more
I’m writing this article to talk about all of the challenges we are facing as an industry, all the adversity that we will need to overcome, as well as the uncertainty about current events facing all of us with COVID-19. One thing is for certain, we are living in a different world now. These are … Read more
I would like to talk about the future role of commission-based salespeople in the auto recycling industry. One of the byproducts of the COVID-19 pandemic is how it has accelerated the shift to internet/e-commerce purchases. With the advances in information and technology that we have, anyone can find almost anything online in short order. There … Read more
YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR I started in this business back in 1973 and like the saying goes, if you live long enough, you pretty much will see and hear everything. In May of 1983, I left my former employer of seven years to come to work as a salesperson here at Northlake. I … Read more
Whether you are a small business owner, a fortune 500 company, or the average working person, this is the question that you are now pondering. This has hit us fast and hit us hard, and the bad thing is that we are really not sure when it will end. Also when this is over what … Read more
Let’s look at current practices in place at the Salvage Auctions we attend. Vehicles are put up for auction on the sale date. Now, these auctions are live, online-only. You can, of course, preview these vehicles before the sale, but you have a limited amount of time to do so. Who are the buyers at … Read more
I recently attended a research study on reuse and recycling of batteries in electric vehicles on November 7th and 8th at Argonne National Laboratories in Lemont, Illinois. Delanne Bernier and I were there to make a presentation and represent ARA at this event, which was called the “Recell” Conference. This was a well-attended event by … Read more
THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE: SURVEYS, REVIEWS & FEEDBACK In previous articles, we covered Sales Basics, Employees, Inventory, Procedures and Processes. All of these areas revolve around the three Ps, which are People, Process, and Product. We will tie all of this together with the importance of Customer Service and the perceptions that are created for individual … Read more
The Importance of Consistency in your Process In previous articles, we covered sales basics, employees, and inventory. We will now talk about your procedures and processes and how doing these things properly can lead to a quality product and top-notch customer service. First, ask yourself this question: Which people in your company are involved in … Read more
The important thing to remember here is that sales and revenue are a by-product of your inventory and your process. Purchasing When I was new to the business, a wise person told me, “Always remember, you make your money when you buy the car.” He also said, “The parts that come off of these cars … Read more
At 3:30 on Sunday, July 7, I was ready to leave after working all day. At this moment, I saw on my server screen what turned out to be one of my worst nightmares. It said all of my files had been encrypted. After making a few calls, one of them being to the person … Read more
While this will show up on any Balance Sheet or Financial Statement as an expense, your company’s most valuable asset is your people. They represent your company and project an image of who you are and what you do. This image and perception can be either positive or negative. The employees in your company make … Read more
In my role with ARA as a mentor, I created some basic instructions for Recyclers that I am mentoring. After looking at this first one, I said to myself, “This is something that is relevant and of use to all recyclers, myself included.” I think that we all from time to time need to focus … Read more
I’m back at work here after attending the ARA Legislative Summit and Hill Day, and this got me to thinking about our association, its history, where it is now, and where it is going. 75 years is indeed a long time for an association to have survived. Even back in the earliest days of automobiles, … Read more
There have been a lot of changes recently with ARA, our National Association. ARA and its leadership are focused on how to better serve its members, and the biggest need as I see it is in training and education. ARA is reinventing itself, and more importantly, each and every Recycler in this industry must participate, … Read more