May 2020

MAY 2020 AFTERMARKET 11 Above: Avia Autos’ customer Mr Doyle, waiting at a safe distance for his Mazda www.aftermarketonline.net businesses in order to help support their clients for essential MOT and repair.” Finances With traffic levels around 80% down according to some estimates as a result of Britain’s partial lockdown, is doing the public-spirited thing and staying open actually going to be cost-effective over the coming weeks and months? “I have no idea if it is going to keep the lights on if I am honest,” observed Hayley, but that is something where I am going to rely heavily on the advice and support from our government to address. I run a transparent business. If I need to access support, I hope that will be there for me. I feel it is a little bit pointless trying to access that support right now, because I don’t need it right now. Right now, my skills are needed to keep cars on the road.” Marketing We asked how customers are finding out Avia Autos is still open? Was Hayley actively marketing the fact that the business is open? Have she changed thee marketing message? “We have changed our marketing strategy,” she confirmed. “We are not encouraging travel to our workshop though. We are placing notices of our opening hours and the services that we offer on our social media platforms. We have also updated our Google Business listing. We are not doing any special marketing to encourage footfall. I don’t think that is a model that would work for us. I also don’t think it would help the current situation.” That seems like a difficult balance to strike: “We are not actively discouraging people. We are trying to be transparent around what the law is, and what people require. Some things are very easy. You need your brakes done? We will fix your brakes. That is a really nice and simple one.” Essential Does it get complicated then? “It is more difficult to make that call when someone says they have a need for something, such as ‘I need air conditioning’. Maybe they do, and maybe they don’t. It is not up to me to determine somebody’s medical need as to whether they have a requirement for air conditioning or not. However, I have chosen as a business not to support that as a service.” What about work that could be seen as extraneous, but actually has a safety impact: “We are alignment specialists. We also do a lot of corner weighting, and alignment for specialist track cars. I found this one a lot more difficult to analyse. On balance, we have opted to drop corner weighting as a service. “However, with alignment I think this is still an essential service to keep people safe on the road. As a result, we are providing alignment services for normal cars, especially if they are in for MOT or essential repair anyway. It is not something we will do unless the customer says ‘I have just hit a whopping great pot-hole, and every time I try to drive my car is veering off to the left’. “At that point it is out of alignment territory and into the realm of repair if I am honest.” We wondered what Hayley would do if it veered into ADAS territory: “I don’t know and thankfully I don’t have provision for ADAS yet. I don’t have to answer that question, and at the moment I am quite pleased about that.” Practical It continues to be a highly fluid situation for businesses. Garages have to assess where it is practical to stay open, and where they will need to consider closing. In a classic example of this, after we spoke to Hayley, she took the decision to close the doors at Avia Autos for the duration. Many of Aftermarket’s readers will be looking at their options, and having to make similar choices. Whether you stay open or shut up shop has to be the right decision for your customers, your staff and for you. NEXT ISSUE More garage stories from the Coronavirus front line