PIT STOP OIL AND LUBE started in 2002 in east Texas. When owner Aaron Porter looked to get into quick lube ownership, he knew right away that he wanted a diverse operation. The first shop he bought had an attached car wash and a truck rental service built right in. âI think they complement well,â Porter says. âCar washes arenât huge profit centers, but in my opinion, anything you can do to get traffic on your lot is going to help complement your core business.â Pit Stop expanded over the years into new locations and added a general repair division to the company. By 2019, the network included seven quick lubes, five car washes (three attached to quick lubes), one full-service repair shop and the truck rental business. Porter sold to Grease Monkey in late 2019, but he shared his career experience with NOLN. Porter says that the diversified operation sometimes tested his management skills, but it can be a great fit for the right market. âPeople want the one-stop shop experience when they can get it,â he says. âAs long as that doesnât detract from your core business, I think that if you can do that without adding a whole bunch of expenses, then itâs always a win.â Lending expert advice for this story is Bryan Stasch, who is the vice president of program and content development for the Automotive Training Institute.
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People Division of Labor Knowing how to manage your people in a diversified operation is crucial. Itâs the largest expense of doing business, so finding efficiencies among profit centers is a great way to keep overhead low. But spread people too thin, and the product suffers. âYouâve got to be willing to make the financial investment in adding that staff,â Porter says. âBut everybody has got to maintain that focus. It would probably be on the shop managerâs shoulder a lot to make sure that theyâre constantly reminding staff that weâre adding this new repair bay or service, but we cantâ even let our quality slip with our core business, which is the quick lube.â Trouble can form when a customer service employee at the front desk is handling quick lube customers and truck rental customers at the same time. Stasch has seen shop operators add a profit center that seems like a turnkey solution but just ends up splitting customer service in half for both. âIt usually just makes your people at the front counter very inefficient,â he says. Porter said his truck rental division did well enough in business that he dedicated a full-time employee to that role. By clearly defining the roles, the employees werenât moving back and forth between centers. âIf youâre providing bad customer service in your truck rental because youâre understaffed and youâre not running it as good as your quick lube, then it makes your quick lube look bad,â Porter says.
A Little Cross Training While the daily roles need to be clearly defined, that doesnât mean skilled employees canât be ready to work in multiple centers. Stasch says that having people trained for more than one profit center provides a backup plan if somebody needs time off. Itâs also a training ground for future managers.
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