"Car dealers seek workers, even as makers slash jobs"

Car dealers seek workers, even as makers slash jobs
By Adam Terese
THE WASHINGTON TIMES www.washtimes.com
Published June 16, 2007

The major U.S. automakers are cutting jobs across the country, but
auto dealerships are begging for workers.
More than 108,000 jobs are open at U.S. dealerships, ranging from
mechanics and salesmen to receptionists and bookkeepers, according to
a study by Automotive Retailing Today, a coalition of major automobile
companies and dealers.
"When you think of dealerships, you think of car showrooms; but
it's a business like any other business," said Denise Patton-Pace,
executive director for ART.
All those openings have affected dealerships.
The worker shortage has caused employees to work longer hours at
Russel Toyota, said Mark Putnam, sales manager at the Catonsville,
Md., dealership. The sales department is a bit understaffed at his
dealership, since more cars are being sold. He said he may be hiring
more salespeople this week.
For many dealerships, filling the service department has
especially become a "struggle," said Gerard Murphy, president of the
Washington Area New Auto Dealers Association.
Fewer workers in service and other departments often means less
work can be taken on, said Bob Armstrong, business office manager at
Patriot Buick-Pontiac-GMC in Williamsburg. To cope with the demand,
his dealership has extended its hours by one hour every day.
"That has helped smooth out the workload," Mr. Armstrong said.
The struggle to hire mechanics partially comes from a need for
more skilled mechanics, especially as dealerships expand and car
technology becomes more complex, said John Wheaton, vice president of
College Park Honda.
"It's not just a matter of taking apart an engine anymore," Mr.
Wheaton said. "It's getting very complicated."
Mr. Murphy said the difficulty in finding service employees could
affect customer service if not addressed. But he said automakers have
stepped up the quality of automobiles, meaning fewer technical and
mechanical problems with vehicles. That increase in quality has
resulted in fewer customers in the service department, he added.
In recent years, it has become even harder to fill technician
positions, said Jesse Toprak, an analyst with Edmunds.com, a publisher
of automobile pricing guides.
"In terms of technicians, there's a strong growth curve because of
a lack of qualified people," said Mr. Toprak, who has been in the auto
industry almost 13 years.
Reflecting that trend, the study found most available jobs were in
the service and sales departments.
But sales-department openings are likely being caused by turnover,
Mr. Toprak said. Although auto dealerships reported strong new-vehicle
sales during 2006, the new-car department saw a 3 percent decrease,
according to the National Automobile Dealers Association, a McLean
association for new-car and truck dealers.
That decrease in new-car sales has created high turnover in sales
jobs at dealerships, Mr. Toprak said. Because sales have dropped, it
means less profit potential for a salesman. Declining profits on new-
car sales make sales careers look less attractive, he added.
"It's becoming harder to make a decent living being a car
salesman," Mr. Toprak said.
To compensate, dealerships are focusing more on back-end profits
that come from financing and insurance instead of just front-end
profits, or selling the car, he added.
So far, those unfilled jobs have not affected customers
dramatically, Mr. Murphy said.
"It hasn't had a deleterious effect, at least to my knowledge," he
said. "It's a potentially huge issue without intervention."
This is the second study conducted by Automotive Retailing Today
on job openings. The first, in 2006, found an estimated 104,803 job
openings.
Carter Myers, chairman of the coalition, said he was surprised to
see so many jobs available during the 2006 study. But this time
around, he expected it.
In the new study, the most job openings -- 25,149 -- were in the
South Atlantic region, which includes the District of Columbia,
Maryland, Virginia and six other states. It is the biggest region in
the survey.
In all job areas, dealerships are seeing the jobs becoming more
computerized and professional, Mr. Myers said. Compared with the past,
dealerships are hiring more people with college degrees or college
experience.
"The Internet has helped us hone the sales process and it's helped
the buying process," said Mr. Myers, who has been in the automobile
dealership industry for nearly 43 years with Carter Myers Automotive
in Charlottesville. "Customers are more educated, so we need to be
more educated. It's become a tool for both sides."
The study, conducted by Harris Interactive, surveyed 742
franchised new-car dealers about the estimated number of vacant
positions at their dealerships from March 28 through April 12 of this
year.
Mr. Myers said jobs at dealerships will likely continue to be
available, especially as the baby boomers start to retire.
"That's going to become interesting when it starts in three or
four years," he said. "It's a much more complex environment."

 

Absolute rubbish and bull crap.

No business ever had problems finding workers who were willing to
compete for them.

Competing for workers means offering more money and benefits than
the business down the street.

Where the shortage is, is dealerships who are looking for workers that
they can pay peanuts to.

My observation is most businesses are run by managers trained during
the 70's and 80's where there was much higher unemployment and they
are used to the idea they can fire at will and there will always be someone
new clamoring to get the job.

The 90s changed that and it was painful. They thought the recession in
2000-2004 would straighten out the common workers, and put things
back to the old high unemployment, choose workers at will. But
now unemployment is dropping and these managers and business owners
are concerned since they might actually have to raise wages to attract
people.

Ted

 

I totally agree with the fact that the dealerships would not have a
problem finding
the labour force they require if they would only come up to the times
and realise
that they have to pay a decent wage , at least to compare to the other
trades . The
typical auto tech puts a great deal into the constant advances in the
new automotive
industry , ie : tools , training ,. The expence of tools alone is
usually in the tens of
thousands . When the wage is not comparable to other trades it does
not bring new
people into the trade , without new aprentices , because it takes
years of training ,
in the next few years the dealerships will really see the depth of
it .
Being from the atlantic canada area I am only aware of our typical
wage and
ranging from $8 to $19 and the average being $15 or $16 with little or
no benifits , it is
not a very inviting trade to the younger people. The company I work
for and others run near
around the clock to keep up with the work load . What will happen is
up to them
Sink or Float

Sam.

 

wrote in

The average mechanic working at most dealerships has a basic set of hand
tools and maybe an assortment of a few extra goodies usually no more than
a thousand dollars.
Whatever you are smoking must be good stuff.
Now if you meant a descent independent shop then you would be correct.
Most every profession has the same requirements for competent technicians
and the average is about 30% competent, about 30% who get by, and 40%
should find another profession.
All these well trained auto techs seem to dissappear before they make it
to the auto repair shops. Have you tried to find where they dissappear
to?

 

Thats funny!! I own 3 air tools valued at over $1000.00 My lap top and my
Star Mobile Diagnostic scan tool was $2400.00

 

hey glenn whay did you buy a mobile scantool did the dealer not get one? or
does your shop have 20 techs??

 

This is one of the "under the radar screen" issues more than anything
else. And, it's not new either!

To be a successful tech, most usually end up with a roll-around Snap-On
Tools tool box (or a similar brand of tool company's box) that can cost
upward of $6K by itself. That's BEFORE the tools go in it.

Dealerships do have manufacturer-specified special tools for
techinicians to use to do particular repairs. This would include the
various scan tools PLUS computers to run them and connect to the factory
computers for new "flash" updates and such. But, as mentioned, most of
these things are kept under "lock and key" lest they disappear (for one
reason or another, including being left in a customer's vehicle when a
service advisor might have needed the vehicle to deliver to the customer
when the tech was not around).

So, to expedite their repair activities, many techs purchase their own
special tools and scan tools and computers so they don't have to rely
upon the dealership for these things. Plus, if they go somewhere else
or do some work on weekends, they will have what they need to do the
jobs off-site from the dealership. Updates can be expensive, but they
are not coming that close together any more. In many cases, private
shops can purchase similar tools from different sources (operative words
would be "OEM quality sources").

Therefore, it would be easy for a tech to sink over $10K in tools and a
box to keep them in. Usually on "time pay" to the tool truck's
operator.

Compensation might be an issue, but few younger kids want to get their
hands dirty or deal with what dealership or private shop techs deal with
to make the same or more amounts of money as other jobs might pay. It's
been noted that a tech in a larger and higher volume dealership of a
luxury import carline might make $70K plus, but I suspect the more
real-world figures would be closer to $50K. But it all depends on how
many labor hours you run and where the dealership is located.

Labor hours can also depend upon what the manuals say each job should
pay. That can be a variable landscape, in many situations, not to
mention "warranty" or "customer pay" issues.

By observation, the technician and possibly parts department employees
are where the most urgent needs are. Typically, office work and sales
people can be found if they are looked for, with all due respect.

Sales people, typically move around a good bit, from dealership to
dealership. This "mobility" can hurt themselves if they are looking for
a career as such, but as long as they are successful at each place,
that's all that really matters. Still, getting an established clientel
can take 3-5 years at one location. Once the clientel is established,
they can be notified of any changes of dealership by the salesperson.
Be that as it may.

In the private sector, there has been much ink about the cost of
employee turnover. IF the company has a formalized training program,
then a dollar value can be put on these things. Few dealerships have a
training program (possibly except for some of the larger ones who have
programs for vehicle sales people--read the fine print before you become
a salesperson, you might have to pay for your own training), so they
don't really see these same turnover costs other than in a little
nuisance in getting new employees up to speed on how to (basically)
operate in a particular area of the store. Manufacturer training
programs are much more numerous now than in the past though, with
"incentives" for employees to paricipate and place highly in their
testing. You never really "get out of school" in the car business, any
more, whether it's sales or service or parts.

By observation, the car business is still a good business to be in . . .
except if you happen to be at a "corporate" store instead of a
dealership that's owned by the person whose name is on the sign. Even
that can be variable, though. Some of the alleged advantages of being
part of a "corporate" store, for the employee, sometimes don't really
pan out . . . from what former employees of those corporate stores have
told me. But, it can be a place to start in the business.

There have been lots of changes in the past 30 years I've been in that
business, but one thing has not changed (regardless of how many times
people try to reinvent it!) . . . you take care of the customer's needs
and thank them for their business (even if it hurts).

Enjoy!

C-BODY

 

the big thing you missed about techs is now it requires a full education
before coming in the trade meaning trade school or a 4 collage degree and
for the most part those grads from these sources get grabbed up before they
go to the dealer network and they are warned alot on how dealers inner
workings are so they shy away from them. now. there is the pay as you train
low end employees dealers owners love because they can get away with more
as far as no benefits. charge bacs if they are flat rate
and a trainee can do the same easy money tune up that a ase pro can do but
at half the rate so the dealer sees a higher profit and less cost of sales
figures, then the ase techs do the tough warranty work. and get tired of
that and leave after a few years of that crap but like you stated less
youngsters are not wanting to get their hands dirty resulting in a less
dependable tech workforce that will bite them in the ass in the next 10
years as shit really gets to the next generation of advancements on cars
and trucks
now the scan tools we have at the shop i work at have a gm scantool that is
updated on a regular schedule with gm through a local dealer works real good
and we have a bdm pro from blue steak the equals the drb3 and fords scan
tool now if you have a laptop u can get software from a company that gets
into all gm stuff and all ford and d.c including can and will do odb2 for
the asian cars and all i can say is you have not seen anything yet

 

apparently techs are pretty lazy and or ignorant they dont have to know
how to use proper punctuation and capitalization there is not aything
wrong with that other than it shows laziness and a disrespect for
whoever is going to read what they wrote it also can lead to mistakes on
interpretation since the reader doesnt know where one sentence ends and
the next begins sometimes where you do sentence breaks can change the
meaning and it also requires unnecessary effort and time on the readers
part working thru what can though possibly good information otherwise
appear to be ignorant mumbo jumbo

Bill Putney
(To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my
address with the letter 'x')

 

Play nice Bill or you can sit in the corner

 

I sawee.

Bill Putney
(To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my
address with the letter 'x')

 

It ok, no time out needed this time