Regina, Saskatchewan — Prairie province repairers were gathered in Regina, Saskatchewan this weekend despite widespread cancellations from COVID-19 concerns.
This year’s spring fling held heavy emphasis on the industry’s advancing technologies and adapting to the widespread digitization of the automotive industry.
Featured speaker Mike Anderson, CEO of Collision Advice, kicked off the event on Friday morning at 10 a.m.
Last year, Anderson addressed the SAAR Spring Conference crowd with a presentation focusing on the future of automotive repair. He told the audience that, to succeed in this industry’s current climate, shops need to look at where the industry is going and adapt accordingly.
This year, Anderson set the tone for the event by asking crowds if they wanted to succeed, or “DOMINATE” their marketplace.
Frank Terlep continued the theme as he took to the stage to elaborate on digitization as an industry disruptor.
“It’s not just about the collision industry now,” said Terlep. “It’s the entire automotive industry. The bodyshops are being disrupted, the dealerships, the OEMs—it’s everyone.”
In his discussion, he covered how the digitalization of the automobile is changing modern repairs and how to adapt to new calibration and test drive environments and solutions.
“Unless you get your act together and invest in digitizing your business, you won’t succeed,” he scolded.
The action continued on Saturday as Ciaran Downes presented an update on SGI’s Safe Quality Auto Repair Program. Downes shared some concerning stats regarding SGI’s incoming regulations for bodyshops.
According to Downes’ data, only five percent of shops are set to qualify for Tier 2 certification and 15 percent for Tier 1 certification. A further 35 percent of shops have yet to apply for the OEM repair subscription altogether—that’s around 75 to 80 prairie shops.
“Folks, this stuff doesn’t happen by osmosis,” said Tom Bissonnette, director for SAAR in his Spring Conference roundup email. “You must get engaged sooner rather than later. We are only one year from the new accreditation guidelines becoming compulsory and, if you do not meet them by Mar. 1, 2021, you drop to a $46 per hour labour rate!”
Mike Gilliland, president of AutoHouse Technologies, also presented on Saturday, discussing the industry benchmarks that the company is tracking for the four western provinces. He explained that the key measurements shops need to focus right now are not cycle times, but touch times.
“Shops have a lot of control over touch time,” he told the crowd. “The more we can keep our technician’s hands touching the vehicle, the better all other benchmarks like cycle times, gross profits and customer satisfaction will be. Too much ‘work in progress’ or poor internal processes are the major cause of poor touch time.”
Tom Julius from Car-Part Pro was present to deliver an explanation of what the company has done to significantly impact the use of salvage parts in Saskatchewan. Essentially, he said used parts usage has gone up from around four percent to more than 10 percent since Car-Part’s program rolled out—and, with the pending parts shortage due to coronavirus, the company’s program could be a lifesaver, said SAAR representatives.
Dale Hawkins of Saskatchewan Polytechnic was also at the Spring Conference to share the news that the college has taken possession of its new Virtual Spray Machine that SAAR members and sponsors raise funds for over the last year and a half.
Scott Nolin from Sask Apprenticeship continued on the theme of tech talks. His presentation featured a short report on the need to expand current apprenticeship training endeavours to accommodate new and emerging vehicle technologies.
He mentioned that any additional training will have to be industry-driven, and the process could take up to 18 months to initiate, adding that there will be more details in the coming months.
There were also some international visitors at the Spring Fling; Betag’s Dave Flockhart travelled from the U.K. to address SAAR attendees in a panel discussion on advanced metal repair training.
Panellists spoke about their training experiences, sharing how they were able to quickly repair previously considered non-repairable panels using the Betag training and tools.
According to SAAR, Betag’s training has the potential to significantly improve shop touch times, improve gross profit, reduce cycle times, reduce total losses and improve overall customer satisfaction. The next training class is scheduled to take place from May 11 through May 15 in Saskatoon. If you are interested, please contact dir@s-a-a-r.com for details.
SAAR encourages prairie repairers to mark their calendars for the organization’s Fall Conference, to be held on Sept. 11 and 12 in Saskatoon.
According to SAAR, it’ll be an event you won’t want to miss—chock full with presentations from OEM representatives, a talk from Dave Luehr, founder of Elite Bodyshop Solutions, and a full-blown product trade show.
