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with an Automotive Fr America is a car culture. From the earliest models to the fins of the ‘50s to today’s hybrid highway haulers, we’ve always been amorous for our automobiles. Some people consider them their babies, while others take the more mundane view that they’re merely a means of transportation. But, whatever the relationship, the fact is that millions of Americans rely on their vehicles and that means maintenance, which can mean a lucrative franchising opportunity for the entrepreneurial minded. The Automotive Aftermarket Industry Association (AAIA), says the industry “encompasses all products and services purchased for light, medium and heavy duty vehicles after the original sale including replacement parts, accessories, lubricants, appearance products, tires, collision repairs as well as the tools and equipment necessary to make the repair.” Mechanical repair makes up approximately 50 percent of the industry’s revenue; collision repair, makes up 30 percent of its revenue; car washing, makes up 10 percent and oil change and lube, also make up 10 percent. Window tinting, any other type of car maintenance or customizing or car rentals and sales are also important players in the automotive franchising industry.
Franchising USA
Investments Vehicle maintenance is a great market to get into now because it’s needed now more than ever. The AAIA says people are keeping their cars longer and driving them further than they did in the past. In fact, the average car currently on the road is about 10 years old, a result of improved manufacturing practices. “In 2011, the average car owner was keeping their car about 10.8 years. The reason being is cars are being made much, much better than they had in the past, as well as the cost of new cars has increased quite significantly,” Chip Baranowski of Honest-1 Auto Care said in a Franchise Direct article. “So our consumers that we’re dealing with on a daily basis in our facilities are people who are treating their cars as more of an investment.” This mentality of keeping our cars longer also has to do with the last recession changing our thinking as a society. We’re now more prone to fix something if it’s broken rather than dispose of it. Results from the 2012 Aftermarket Consumer
Outlook Study, which was done by market research company NPD, show that nine percent of people purchase the least expensive aftermarket products for vehicle maintenance, while 40 percent of the people surveyed said they purchased what they believed to be the highest quality products regardless of the price of those products. Quality was also the highest rated attribute that consumers said they looked for in regards to aftermarket automotive products. What consumers seem to be saying is that they are treating their vehicles more as investments now than something they plan to replace in a few years and they are willing to put the money into those investments to keep them running.
Trusted Professionals Maintenance is being entrusted to professionals because cars are continually becoming more technologically advanced, meaning it’s not as easy nowadays as in the past to perform maintenance at home. It’s not even enough to be known