@shadowfax. Everything is geared towards preparing students for college. Beginning in elementary school, students have to take state required multiple choice exams. This continues through high school. This gets the students ready for college where the students sit in large lecture classes and are evaluated with multiple choice exams. The students then graduate from college with their only skill is to complete multiple choice exams. However, there isn’t much demand for multiple choice test takers.
I learned a lot outside the classroom from mechanics and repairman who explained things to me. When I couple the knowledge these men shared along with growing up in a family where money was tight and we had to do as much as we could for ourselves, I received a good education outside the classroom. A good shop class would have been of great value to me. When I took physics, what I learned from experience made the theory in physics make sense.
I try not to waste time arguing with someone who is uninformed and stubborn. When myself and my business partner were independent mechanics in the late 1970s our best parts source had been in business since the late 1940s. Their parts were OEM or better quality and nearly always in stock. Our discount which was called ‘Jobber’ price back then was normally 40% off retail. The invoice had our price and retail price. I am unaware of any mechanics charging retail plus 40%!!!
The local Toyota dealer charges retail plus 50%, apparently. Unless you tell them you’re going to buy the part elsewhere at the retail price. Then they cave pretty easily.
Did you research the retail price of that catalytic converter? The price you found online was probably wholesale, there are dealers online that sell parts greatly discounted from the retail price.
Not really. I just searched “oem Toyota parts” and found several priced the same. I believe I got it from Olathe Toyota, if I recall correctly. I assumed Rockauto or similar wouldn’t carry an oem cat, but I’ve never looked.
But, I believe Asemaster stated his markup was about 35% over the price he could get the parts from his supplier, which is already 10-15% over what Rockauto would sell the parts for (low retail). Not trying to pick on him, I bet his shop is first class.
I don’t believe not wanting to pay through the nose is being a cheapskate. I don’t even want to go through the BS of arguing self-interest with a shop that wants to insist it’s their way or no way. Yes, there are honest garages but there are also lots of places that seek to take advantage of customer ignorance or lack of knowledge.
I find this argument about the garage losing money by my supplying parts rather simplistic. Fact is I am saving them time, and not having them wait for parts to arrive. Typically a shop will have to diagnose a bad part with a car on the lift in a bay. They either tie up the bay waiting for parts to arrive or they have to move the vehicle and then later bring it back in. There is no paying for an employee to call a parts place and go through the ordering process. There is also no future financial risk for them as they do not have to warranty their work and it’s me assuming the risk. Lastly does the garage charge a higher labor rate to work on a BMW as compared to a Honda Civic? Why should it get to make more profit dollars off expensive parts rather than more commonplace ones? And may I ask where is the incentive for the garage to save you any money whatsoever when the most profitable parts will always be the most expensive ones?
Your mind is made up so I don’t see why you keep posting because nothing is going to change . You have a shop that does along with you requests , end of story.
You do know that the garage just calls or, in some cases, clicks and tells the parts supplier what they want, right? The parts shop delivers it. I don’t think the garage is going to be falling all over itself to reward you for saving them all of 30 seconds.
Your approach to this puts me in mind of why economic systems that are sound in theory, from communism to capitalism, inevitably fail or develop major problems. Both the inventors of the economic systems and you utterly fail to take human factors into account.
The shop is absolutely taking a risk installing your parts because even though they will tell you they won’t warranty it, you might just be a total jerk and sue them when something goes wrong.
And even if they win by going before the judge and explaining that there was no warranty because you supplied the part, they still have to stop working and drive down to the courthouse and sit around for a few hours until your case is called, and then argue it out with you in front of the judge and possibly a jury, and then drive back to the shop and put in a long evening playing catchup so that their jobs don’t fall behind.
And all so that you can “save them time” by supplying the part. And I know, you’re gonna tell us you would never do such a thing, and that’s nice and all, but there are a lot of people out there who would. And why should a shop take a risk on some random customer who might or might not be a reasonable human being?
I had the experience of installing the wrong part. My parents had a 1969 Pontiac LeMans that needed a water pump. My brother was in town and said he would fix it. I went with him to the auto parts store. He had all the information: 1969 Pontiac LeMans, 350 cu in V-8 engine, air conditioned, power steering, auto transmission. We went back with the pump to my parents’ house, installed the new pump and found the pulley didn’t line up with the other pulleys and couldn’t install the belts. My brother had to get back home, so it was up to me to redo the job. I took the water pump back off and returned to the parts store. It turned out that there were three different shaft lengths for 1969 Pontiac 350 engines. I went back and installed the correct pump. Had I taken the first pump to a repair shop and the shop had installed the wrong part, I would have a double labor charge. Had the shop.provided the pump and installed the wrong pump, the additional labor to install the correct pump would be on the shop’s dime.
Now I know there is a mark-up on parts. The university where I was employed had a buying organization we could join which I did. We could get discounts at the merchants who joined the organization. One business was a local auto parts store. We paid the same price as a commercial repair shop. When I did my own work, I bought my parts there–carburetors, generators, fuel pumps, spark plugs, etc. However, for a job I was having done by an auto repair shop, I had the shop supply the parts. Our buying organization gave us discounts at electronic stores, electrical supply stores, and even cents off on gasoline at a couple of filling stations. There was about a 100% mark-up on vacuum tubes (remember, this was a long time ago). There was an appliance store that gave members a good discount on refrigerators, wash machines, etc. With big box stores, the buying association is long gone.
My personal way of doing business is to establish a good working relationship with the businesses where I trade. I had had some work done on my previous Sienna at the Toyota dealer. When I got the Sienna back, I opened the hood a couple days later and found the technician had left a little ratcheting box end wrench under the hood. I went back and returned the wrench. A couple months later, the battery was down on our 4Runner. I charged the battery for a couple hours and took the 4Runner to the Toyota dealer. The service department checked the battery and charging system and concluded that the 4Runner hadn’t been driven enough. Mrs. Triedaq had broken her ankle and couldn’t drive and I hadn’t used the 4Ruuner very much. The Toyota dealer didn’t change me for the electrical system check and I even helped myself to a donut and a cup of coffee in the waiting area. The service department people know me when I bring my vehicles in.
Not saying this applies to you . . .
But it’s VERY common that the customer buys the wrong part or buys parts of 
quality
Assuming the mechanic racks the car and then goes to grab the parts that YOU supplied, only to realize they’re either wrong or quality . . . now he has to lower the car and park it out back, while they try to resolve the problem that YOU caused
How’s that saving them time . . . ?!
As others have already said . . . your mind is made up and you’re not willing to budge one inch
Say I own a shop, in my state my labor rate has to be posted on the wall. I decide tosell all parts at my cost and figure out I will have to raise my labor rate $25 an hour to wind up with the same income I have now.
My customers walk in , see my new labor rate ,turn around and go down the street because hwe is now $25 an hour cheaper than me.
Does that sound like a good business plan to you?
If the auto repair business had evolved differently and there was no profit is selling parts, them labor rates would be higher but still competitive with each other.
The system did not evolve that way and when you want to supply your own parts , you are trying to take money out of the shop owners pocket.
Would you be happy to see a sign saying " Labor $90 per hour, $115 if you supply the parts "?
More than one time I rode my bike downtown to the Rexall drug store that had a tube tester trying to keep my $5 TV working. Usually had to buy one or two tubes. No idea what the heck I was doing.
I needed to replace the water pump on my Aurora with the Northstar engine. I bought the Delco pump from Rockauto and the special tool to get the thing out. I think I spent all day trying to get the thing out and nothing worked. Finally I gave up and took it to the dealer with the Delco pump I had bought. I dunno the mechanic said he pump the pump in and it leaked so they put one of theirs in. I’ll never know if it actually leaked or not but the pump from the dealer wasn’t more than $10-15 more than the Rock pump. Plus the labor charged was only for the one operation and was actually pretty reasonable. I threw the pump away. I think it was $35.
@bing. Our university buying association had a tube tester we could check out. I think to join the association was $15 a year. For me, it was worth the money to get parts for my car, a penny off on gasoline, check the vacuum tubes in my television and audio equipment, and buy the tubes at the price a TV repairman would pay for them.
I wonder sometimes if it was easier to stretch my salary in the old days when my vehicles got lower mpg, but required more maintenance or with today’s vehicles that get much better mpg and need less maintenance, but are expensive to repair when something does go wrong. I could probably have kept my old black and white set going forever. Today’s flat screen are tossed when something goes wrong. One thing is certain: I felt I had more control.of my environment in the old days.
I was married and had a child before we had a TV, I was delivering furniture and appliances for $1.25 an hour when someone asked me if we could haul away their old one. I hauled it home and took all the tubes out and (23 of them as I recall) 6 tested weak and 3 were blown. I replaced them all for about 10 bucks at Olsen’s. Anyone else remember Olsen’s?
My first car came after we had 2 kids. I was working the loading dock and the city buses suddenly stopped running after midnight and I was working til 1am or later. It was a 6 mile walk home in Feb. in Buffalo. Three days later I bought my first car for $20. It had been sitting alongside a building, buried under a snowbank since fall. The owner had planned on junking it once he could get at it. I gave him junk price for it, bought a junkyard battery, filled a small bottle with gas, dug down to it with a snow shovel, put the battery , squirted some gas in the carb and it fired right up.
These days young people think you have to have enough money to buy a house, a new car and be secure in your job to start a family. Then they have to go running to fertility clinics to start a family because they are in their 40s.
Heh heh. I feel your pain. I’ve been to Buffalo but never in the winter but I’ve seen pics.
You’re overthinking this and making it more complicated than it is and taking it personally. It’s about profit–pure and simple–and we are not out to get over on anyone. We don’t go to work to make friends, we go to work to make money. We are clear and up-front about our pricing and what a job will cost and it is up to the customer to decide if he would like us to repair his car. If the guy standing behind you is willing to pay more to fix his car than you are, he’s going to get my attention.
I don’t know what you do for a living, but let’s say you’re an accountant. You can work on Joe’s taxes for 5 hours and make $800 profit. You can work on Bob’s taxes for 5 hours and make $500 profit. Which customer will you take in first?
Let’s say you’re a painter. You can paint Joe’s house for 5 hours and make $800, or you can paint Bob’s house for 5 hours and make $500. Which customer will you take first?
The Joes out there are the people that buy our parts, the Bobs are the people who want to bring their own.
You may choose to schedule in both customers, and soon you will find you have more work than you can handle. You can expand, grow, add staff, and still not have the capacity for all the work coming in the door. What do you do next?
The options are move to a larger, more expensive location or start to trim off some of the less profitable work. It’s a simple business decision. Jobs where people bring their own parts put less money in our pockets. And for a shop that is consistently busy and booked out, they just can’t afford to do that.
Our work carries a 3 year/36,000 mile warranty. If we can’t warranty a job we won’t do it. Your plan does not fit in with our business policy.
You’re on the right track. The 71 LTD that’s getting a carb overhaul and the 56 MG that’s getting suspension rebuild is billed out at our classic/custom rate, while the 08 Subaru getting head gaskets is billed out at our standard rate.
We offer senior, AAA, military, and student discounts. We offer seasonal maintenance packages at a discounted price, customer appreciation events twice a year, and others.
Ding ding ding! We have a winner. I wasn’t around 100 years ago, but I imagine the first place to get parts for your Model T was the Ford Dealer. If you needed a head gasket, you went to the dealer and bought one, and they made a profit on it. If you couldn’t replace it yourself, you had the service department do it, and they made profit on the job. They didn’t lower the price of the gasket because you also bought labor from them.
An excellent analogy Bing. Why is it that nobody gets mad at the dealer for marking up parts, but they think the independent should not do it. The Ford dealer buys parts from Ford and marks them up, the dealer is an independent businessman and not all the parts the dealership installs come from Ford and I don’t see people carting their own parts to dealerships. I also don’t see people carting parts to national chains like Sears or Pep Boys either, but the guy in your neighborhood who probably gives you much better service than a dealer or chain is the guy you want to lose profit. I have news for you. if he does good work and is honest, he probably has plenty of work without dealing with you.
If you want to save money , do your own repairs. The cars are more complicated today, but there are YouTube videos on practically everything. It is not like the 50s when you had to trudge to the library and hope they had a manual for your car and no one had it checked it out or word stolen it or took out the oages you needed.
Yep. The store by us also sold what I suspect were inventories of parts and subassemblies you could scavenge for parts or use to build something else. I had the first color tv in our family by fixing one the neighbors had thrown out. They were mad I was able to fix it…
Thank you for the response. If I read it right your argument comes down to fear of legal action. In the real world of course that would be not only uneconomical but legally problematic. And for what its worth, a garage potentially exposes itself to that with every job they do.
The scenario I am describing is not that of an emergency repair, but planned servicing of the car. I am not asking to replace or diagnose a bad bushing, I am replacing all of my suspension components. Not only am I supplying the parts I am also supplying the relevant pages of the factory service manual so that the mechanic does not have to search for torque values. And guess what I also insist the mechanic uses a torque wrench. These are real time savers for the garage
Any garage that wants to refuse my business is free to do so. It’s indicative to me of their attitude towards clients.