Brandon Hack of Lake Sumter Auto Repair joins Jimmy Lea to share how mentorship, accountability, and strong processes fueled explosive growth in his shop. What started with pumping gas at his dad’s two-bay Texaco eventually led Brandon through sales, a Snap-on franchise, and into managing a thriving repair operation that has tripled its performance. He credits coaching from The Institute, Bobby Lambert’s mentorship, and holding the team to higher standards for the success. Brandon and Jimmy dive into 300% DVI best practices, educating non–car customers, and the difference between selling vehicle wants versus vehicle needs. They also cover the critical role of tracking gross profit per hour, building processes that make customer care easy, and the power of peer groups to accelerate solutions and growth.

Host(s):

Jimmy Lea, VP of Business Development

Guest(s):

Brandon Hack, Manger of Lake Sumter Auto Repair

Show Highlights:

[00:00:49] - Brandon’s origin story: growing up pumping gas at a two-bay Texaco and eventually finding his way back to the industry through sales and a Snap-on franchise.

[00:01:57] - Mentorship matters: how owner Bobby Lambert and full enrollment in The Institute created a “no option to fail” culture that helped triple shop performance.

[00:05:38] - Raising the bar on ROs: after early mistakes, Brandon sets a new internal standard—clearer work orders, continuous iteration, and aiming for company-best paperwork.

[00:06:21] - Customer experience first: treat every visit like the highlight of the customer’s day to overcome the “grudge purchase” reality of auto repair.

[00:08:04] - Lean team, big output: one service advisor and two techs running five lifts, while the sister shop operates a multi-bay “mecca” with transmission expertise.

[00:14:45] - Tools + talent sell the job: invest in proper diagnostic equipment and skilled techs so transparent test results do the convincing.

[00:16:09] - 300% DVI in action: inspect 100% of vehicles, estimate 100% of findings, and present 100%—with photos required for every recommendation.

[00:17:16] - Make DVIs idiot-proof: circle the exact part, color-code issues, and sanity-check clarity by sending inspections to a non-car person (e.g., your spouse).

[00:20:18] - Don’t go it alone: join 20-groups/masterminds and coaching to gain accountability, faster solutions, and peer-reviewed financials.

[00:23:46] - Live by the numbers: track GP and dollars-per-hour on every invoice so month-end is a confirmation, not a surprise; then drive net profit with cost control.

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Episode Transcript:

Jimmy Lea: Hey, Jimmy Lea here with the Institute for Automotive Business Excellence. You are listening to the Leading Edge podcast, and joining me today is Brandon Hack of Lake Sumter Auto Repair out of Fruitland Park, Florida. Brandon, thank you so much for being here, brother. How you doing? I'm doing great, man.

Jimmy Lea: It's my pleasure. I'm glad. Well, I'm glad you're here 'cause we're gonna talk about automotive repair, automotive shops and get into the nitty gritty of the challenges of a modern shop today. Before we get into the nitty gritty, Brandon, I'd love to find out a little bit more about you and about your shop and how you got into the automotive industry.

Jimmy Lea: What bet did you lose, or what passion did you have that you want went after the automotive repair full bore.

Brandon Hack: It kind of fell into my lap. I grew up in a shop that my dad owned. Started off in a small two bay TCO gas station, full service. So at 4, 5, 6 years old, I was actually pumping gas and doing what, you know, 40, 50-year-old people know nothing about it anymore because it's been gone for so long.

Brandon Hack: So that's how I grew up in it. From there, I. Thought I'd stay in it forever. My dad sold the shop, went and managed the shop for another gentleman. I worked there as well, and then he got all the way out of it and went into doing other stuff. I got into sales and just sold tow trucks, and then I got into a snap-on tool franchise, so I had a snap-on tool franchise that opened the doors that I had.

Brandon Hack: In this area with meeting a lot of fine folks, which got me involved with Bobby Lambert, who is the actual owner of Lake Sumter Transmission and Lake Sumter Auto Repair. He and I became decent friends. He has absolutely been the most incredible business mentor. It shouldn't have happened, and it did.

Brandon Hack: And he is, he's just blessed me. Number one not to pump anybody, but because the guy understands the value of the institute. Everybody is enrolled into it. Everybody has the coaching, everybody has everything that the institute offers, and that's what puts us into. Where we can't fail, there's no option to fail because we are surrounded by good owners, great employees, and then the institute to have the coaching and everything that just, here we are.

Brandon Hack: And it's been an absolute, I can't call it a rollercoaster 'cause it has just been an absolute, we sat on a bomb. We opened this place up and it just exploded. And here we are doing, oh man, triple what the shop was.

Jimmy Lea: Oh I wanna get into all that, but I gotta push the pause button first before we go down there.

Jimmy Lea: You talk about you being at a Two Bay Texaco. My uncle owned a couple of Chevrons with the two Bay. One was up in Mount Carmel Junction up in Utah, and then he bought two more down in Vegas, had the Chevrons with the two, two little bays, and he would. I mean, he would sell batteries and wiper blades. He's like, which absolutely hi.

Jimmy Lea: His favorite question was, which tire gets the nail? The most nails in it. 'cause he had the tow trucks and he would tow the cars in off the interstate or whatever. And which tire gets the most. So I asked you, Brandon, which tire gets the most nails? It seemed like to us it was always left rear.

Jimmy Lea: Left rear. Yeah. His was right rear. Right rear passenger, rear because it was always over on that side and it would kick up and his advice was never drive on the shoulder unless you absolutely have to 'cause you're gonna get a nail. I was like, that was great advice. I appreciate that uncle. He also is the guy that taught us as kids as his nephews.

Jimmy Lea: I mean, you wanna talk about child labor? Oh, absolutely. I'm sure you were there too, right? Here we are. He, and he's like, I'm gonna hire you to clean the restrooms, but first I'm gonna show you exactly how I want it done. So when you come to do it, you know you can do it. Do we go in this bathroom? It was the nastiest bathroom.

Jimmy Lea: Nasty. Oh, it was disgusting. He showed us how to clean it and he showed us how to clean it. Right. He showed us once. Absolutely. And then it was on us. And Brandon, I'm guessing you had the same training.

Brandon Hack: I, I did. I really did. I, my, my dad was, my dad is the whole that's why we're here.

Jimmy Lea: Oh man.

Jimmy Lea: That's so cool. That's so cool. Congratulations. That's wonderful. So talk to me about you getting with Bobby and you start the shop. I love a success story that says, man, we tripled this business. If you got a timeline from going from zero to hero it wasn't zero, and I apologize for that.

Jimmy Lea: It was not zero, but you took it from what it was and tripled it. What does that look like for you, Brandon, as the manager?

Brandon Hack: It definitely, there's definitely a lot that comes with it as far as like, it's not me. It is the team and it is absolutely the team that we have. It all started from there because we, I thought I knew exactly how this works. I thought I knew everything. I thought it was easy and it is not easy. Um, I came in here and we had our manager at the other shop.

Brandon Hack: He was right away, let me go a month and make some mistakes, and came down instantly and started pointing those mistakes out. It was instant when that happened that I decided no more my write-ups, our work orders our ros, everything. We will have the top ones in our company. They will come from this shop, not from the established shop.

Brandon Hack: So we've definitely helped set the bar higher and I, I don't, we haven't hit the top of the bar here. I know that we still, we work every day on making a better ro, but just the numbers are the numbers. I just come in and I do. You treat that customer the way they need to be treated. My thing always is the highlight of the customer's day.

Brandon Hack: That's, they don't like to come to the repair shop. We make it as enjoyable as possible. So having everybody and hearing success stories and having training in the guidance from the other shop with the no-nos. 'cause they've been in business 45 years, they've seen a lot. So they recognized some of the things that were happening here, which is the way the shop used to be ran.

Brandon Hack: We nip that quick and that's what got us here.

Jimmy Lea: Wow. That's awesome. You know, I love that success story. I love that you are treating the customers the way you wanna be treated with respect, with love. I love that because you are right. We are a grudge purchase. Nobody wants to go and pour 2, 3, 4, 5, $6,000 into their car.

Jimmy Lea: I mean. I'd rather put that money somewhere else, take a vacation, do something else, have an experience. But I do know that my car, my vehicle is my second biggest purchase, aside from my house. I've gotta take care of it. So the education is so important. It's so key that you've got mentors that are teaching you and training you and helping you come along.

Jimmy Lea: I love that you set your own standard to say, okay. Is where they want us to be. But we're gonna set our own standard and we're gonna process procedure, we're gonna write everything down so that the highest ros, the highest average repair order, the highest success rate, the highest satisfaction rate from clients and customers, that's gonna come from us.

Jimmy Lea: Absolutely. Yeah. So, how many service advisors do you have, Brendan and thank you that they're all involved with the institute. Where are you at? So, right now

Brandon Hack: with this shop, it's me. It's me and me. Only just you? Yep. Yep. Our other shop, there's four service advisors at that shop, but the new location, it's just me and two techs.

Jimmy Lea: You and two techs. And,

Brandon Hack: and

Jimmy Lea: how many bays do you have with these two techs? We have four inside, one outside. You know, that's a beauty of being there in Florida. You can actually have an outside lift. Absolutely.

Jimmy Lea: Four, lift one outside. Well, congrats. And what does the other shop look like?

Brandon Hack: The other shop is a I call it the Mecca. It is it is a little tight at the top. There are six bays in the top of that, and there's usually three techs that are in that. And then down the hill we have four bays down there.

Brandon Hack: And then they also have another area for a little bit lengthy repairs that they can take over there as well as a, another large two bay shop that is for nothing but classic cars.

Jimmy Lea: Oh my word. That's like the garage

Brandon Hack: Mahal. Yes. Yep. It's the mecca.

Jimmy Lea: Yeah, it is the mecca. Everybody wants to go. That, that's ginormous.

Jimmy Lea: Oh, man. So congratulations to you guys. So it sounds like they're doing some restoration. They're doing some auto work. The auto body work, they got the classics.

Brandon Hack: Well, that one there is just it started as a transmission shop. Oh. So it's like Sumter transmissions. And auto repair. So that's where they'll get the classics in for the transmissions or oil leaks.

Brandon Hack: I mean, there really isn't nothing that they can't do down there. Definitely. No, none of the body shop stuff it's all general repair. And a big part of that shop is the transmissions.

Jimmy Lea: Oh, yeah. My I have a shop in St. George, Utah that I go to Ryan Snow with St. George Transmission.

Jimmy Lea: Transmission and auto repair. And so he's got nine master certified techs in his transmission shop. And the work just slowed down so much. He's like, all right we gotta diversify. So they bought the building next door, which was where they started. They still owned it, but the tile company that was there was like, all right, we're out.

Jimmy Lea: Sweet. We'll take it back. They're doing St. George Auto repair. Out of this one next door and he's got five, six lifts inside of it. And man, they're just taking off. So, when it comes to transmission repair, I know you've gotta be some super, super good jigsaw puzzle assembler or. Absolutely.

Jimmy Lea: Yeah. And he's got nine of 'em that are master certified. Just amazing people. Well, that's cool. So what's, well for you, Brandon, um, what did you come from that you came to something or auto repair?

Brandon Hack: The Snap-on Tool franchise is what got me where I met Bobby, and he and I, it took a long time. I was so intimidated by him.

Brandon Hack: Took a long time for us to actually open up and he bought the business in the middle of me having that franchise. So he's owned it for eight or nine years now. And then once he bought it, then he and I started dealing more together. Just kept getting closer and then we started doing outside stuff. We would, we'd go to concerts.

Brandon Hack: We, we did trips, we did stuff together and got close. Nice. And I never went to him. When I was leaving that to do something else, I took another position in an off-road shop. To sell mainly to get the dealerships and get new truck builds and do that kind of stuff. I wanted to get back out. I didn't wanna be, I don't wanna be attached to a shop.

Brandon Hack: I wanted to be out on the road and doing some sales and oh, I love it. It just wasn't going where I wanted it to go. I got everything I wanted. I became the manager there and I wasn't looking for that, but we just had some things that had to get fixed, so it tied me to that shop to fix these. I couldn't go out and sell the product because it wasn't worth selling.

Brandon Hack: So I stayed there and I helped fix that and then, and we made a big turnaround and got it going and then Bobby and I just started talking one day and he mentioned to me this shop selling. And, um, I told him I wasn't interested. I didn't wanna really be in the shop and kept going. And then we started having a couple issues.

Brandon Hack: Bobby turned, had a birthday, I took him to lunch. And we just started talking about it again. And then he text me later that week, call me, and I called him and I just kind of was like, what do you, what should I do? And he said, you need to go ahead and get out of there. Come over here and we'll print some money.

Brandon Hack: I said, all right, I'll do it.

Jimmy Lea: No, man. That's so cool. So what challenges do you have from going from off-road into auto repair? Is it very close cousins or is it totally different?

Brandon Hack: It is very different. I think the biggest thing that we deal with is your profit margins. Yeah. We just don't have the profit on accessories like we can build to, to operate a repair shop properly and stay in business.

Brandon Hack: Yeah. Um, I think the biggest difference is the customers that came into the accessory shop already knew what the price of something was. 'cause they online shopped it then came to you. Whereas here, they may have an idea of how much that radiator to, to replace is when they come in there, but they're not shopping and getting exact, so it's, it just seems a little bit easier putting a total package together here and presenting that to a customer of what that vehicle needs versus selling vehicle wants.

Jimmy Lea: Yeah. Oh, I love it. Yeah, that's true. People walk in and want tinted window. They already know, Hey, it's gonna be five, 600 bucks tinted window walk in for a starter. It could be anywhere from 500 to 2,500. Do I have to pull the full front off the car? Absolutely. Or can we get to it? And it's not that bad.

Jimmy Lea: It seems that most of my cars have some sort of a panel covering the water pump, and it's tied to some sort of a timing belt with the water pump. It usually ends up being $2,000 anyways. Absolutely. As you can tell I've paid for a couple of those. Yep. Oh, man. Oh, that's good. And so with your, because I agree.

Jimmy Lea: I think we're a grudge purchase. People just don't want come do this and it's good that you make it a easy for them. What is some of the technology that you've introduced into your shop that helps make it easy for customers to buy?

Brandon Hack: I would say the biggest as far as technology is, number one, having the proper equipment to diagnose properly.

Brandon Hack: Um, that's where I struggled in the beginning with not selling the diagnostics. So having a qualified tech that knows how to use it and knows where to go and what to test and use the tools that are presented. When we present that information, that's what sells it. I don't have to sell anything. We've give them, my guys here, have the tools to do that job, to do the diagnostic to run all the tests, evaluate everything.

Brandon Hack: Then we present that to the customer and there really isn't much to talk about. They have everything in front of 'em then.

Jimmy Lea: Yeah. And, well, how much what? What kind of cars is it that you're working on? Are you all makes all models or do you focus all

Brandon Hack: makes, all models. We don't shy away from the Euros.

Brandon Hack: There's just some of the stuff on the Euros that is just I'll do you a favor. I'm doing you a disservice by keeping it here. You need to go to this shop.

Jimmy Lea: Nice. Nice. It's good to have friends in the business that you can say, all right, take your euros over here. Take your problem child over there.

Jimmy Lea: Absolutely. This is our bread and butter. And that's also a lot of equipment that you have to buy. A lot of training you have to supply to your technicians that they can be on the top of their game. What about a digital vehicle inspection for the customer? Do you do a lot of DVI.

Brandon Hack: Hundred percent.

Brandon Hack: We, we follow that 300% rule. So every vehicle that comes in here, 100% of them are going to get a complete DBI and 100% of all that work will be estimated and a hundred percent is presented to the customer.

Jimmy Lea: Oh, I love it. I love it with your I technicians in their recommendations if they make a recommendation, is it a requirement that they have to take a picture?

Jimmy Lea: Absolutely. Absolutely. It helps, right? It helps sell it every time. Yep. Yep. Customers know, they know. They know what's broken. They can see it. Yep. That's clearly broken. Correct. Sometimes you have to point an arrow at it to say, this is what the ball joint is. This right here? Yep. Because they don't know this is a control arm.

Jimmy Lea: This is your sway arm.

Brandon Hack: Yeah. And that's one thing that we have a younger gentleman that workforce, so the technology is there with him because he is younger, so he understands that. And when you use the dbis that we use through, we use tech metric here, but when we use that.

Brandon Hack: He pays attention to every single one of those with the right color, yellow, if it's something that we need to monitor, if it needs to be repaired, it is in red, it is circled so that we don't just send the customer a picture and there's an axle and a ball joint and a tie rod in the picture. The customers don't know.

Brandon Hack: So he, they don't know. He will circle that. And now we have integrated that into the other tech that's here, because right away when I noticed them, I went to the other tech like, look how nice this is. And then what I did with that also was I told my techs to send an inspection to their wife, and then I want them to go there and have their wife tell them what they're looking at.

Brandon Hack: And that's when it hit home to them because they said. My, my wife was looking at it and she didn't know which one was a CV joint, which one was the ball joint? Which one? You know, she had no idea. I said, well, if you put a circle around it and a hazard, you know, a yellow, red kneading? Is that not better?

Brandon Hack: And it just took off. Everybody at the other shop started doing the same exact thing two weeks later,

Jimmy Lea: bro, that's freaking awesome. Brilliant. I love your idea there. Send it to the girlfriend, send it to your wife, send it to your. Whom? Whomever. Yeah. Can they look at it, see it and understand it? If not, then let's take that feedback.

Jimmy Lea: 'cause that's great feedback. It's not critical, it's not criticism, it's feedback that says we can do this better. Correct. Correct. Congratulations, man.

Brandon Hack: Not everybody that comes is a car guy and every, everybody to shop. I think they all know that. So you need to send that and do something like that to a non-car person so that you can see the reaction.

Brandon Hack: And that just makes it to where you can now do your inspections or even the delivery of what you're talking about. You're not, we don't all deal with car people.

Jimmy Lea: It's true and it's true. And not everybody's a car person. Not everybody's been under a car or seen a car on a lift. They've never been under their vehicle.

Jimmy Lea: So to show them pictures for me, I love it. I, it's fascinating. I love looking under the cars and seeing what's there. It's dirty, it's greasy, it's grimy. It's okay. That's, I don't, that's fine. Yep. Teach me. Teach me, educate me, help me understand what it is that's going on under here. Absolutely. Brandon, I'm definitely gonna give you props and credit.

Jimmy Lea: I'm gonna tell a lot of people that they need to send their DVI to their significant other. It works. Send it to your mother. Does she know what you're sending? No. She doesn't know. Absolutely not. Unless she's a car person. Right? Yep. Which it could be. You never know. Absolutely. So if you had an opportunity to go back in time and help your younger self, what advice would you give yourself today?

Jimmy Lea: If you were starting a shop today or managing a shop today, what advice would you give yourself?

Brandon Hack: I think one of the biggest things that has hit me is Bobby is involved with 20 groups as well as the institute. And I honestly I talked to a guy down the street that has a shop about this all the time, and they're totally opposed.

Brandon Hack: Nope nope. We know what we're doing. We don't need, and I honestly feel. That stuff right there is what gets you to the next level. Because you have so many other people that are involved in everything. They're able to look at every invoice. They're able to look at your monthlies. They look at every single thing you do, and you've got 19 people in this group holding you accountable.

Jimmy Lea: I love it. I love it. And our, at the institute, that's our GPG, which is our gear performance groups, they're our masterminds. Currently we have five. We're looking to expand to six here pretty dang soon. So that's coming up next. And you're right. What might be a mountain to you and I, Brandon, inside of this 20 group, there's somebody that has already had to deal with that mountain.

Jimmy Lea: They hand you the solution and say, Hey look, that was just Tuesday. It's not a big deal. Here you go. Here's what you do. Fixed done onto the next. We got bigger dragons to slay than this little mole hill that you think is a mountain. Absolutely. And that 20 group. Oh my gosh. What power? What power that is.

Jimmy Lea: So Brandon which program are you in with the institute right now?

Brandon Hack: Right now, just coaching right now. Right now. That's all I have right now. I meet with Ryan every two weeks and I just do service advisor coaching.

Jimmy Lea: Nice. Congratulations. So you're with Ryan Daily? Yes. Any shout outs for Ryan? I'll be with him this weekend.

Brandon Hack: There's no way that you could hand pick a better coach than Ryan. I mean, I've heard a couple stories from other guys. I know seven to nine people that are with coaching and they had to go through a couple. Um, they're all happy with where they are right now. And it's not that any of them are a bad coach.

Brandon Hack: It is that fit. It is those personalities that absolutely will take you to another level. Ryan was that guy for me.

Jimmy Lea: That's awesome. Yeah. With his, so he's, have you talked to Ryan Mush? You know about his background? I mean, he's told me military Marines we bonded up my daughter, she's a Marine, she's over in Hawaii right now.

Jimmy Lea: He also has a dealership, service advisor, service manager, dealership background. And so his discipline and his ability to focus on the customer, the client, the experience, it is next level. And I agree with you. I think Ryan is a phenomenal coach. He does an amazing job. Just super proud for Ryan and what he's been able to do in such a short amount of time too.

Jimmy Lea: He's really taken it up another level, so that's awesome. Well, good. Well, thank you very much, Brandon. I appreciate it. I appreciate you, um, and your experience. I appreciate your knowledge. Anything you'd like to share with our listening public about Sumner Auto Repair Management advisors? Net profit, efficiencies, process, procedures, anything you wanna share?

Brandon Hack: I the biggest thing that I can share that has made a difference with us is paying attention to the gp, paying attention to what that shop is bringing in per hour. If you don't look at that, all you're doing is looking at a number at the end of the month and you don't know what.

Brandon Hack: You don't know exactly where you are when you build every invoice properly, that is when you know, you don't have to worry about where am I gonna be at the end of the month? You know where you're gonna be at the end of the month, the end of the quarter, however you wanna look at it. Quarters work great for us.

Brandon Hack: Um, we're new, so we are still monthly right now, but quarters is what I'm really hoping to transition into so I don't put the stress of the month. Just it the tools are in place for you. Use them. Pay attention when you are bu building these invoices. Make sure the numbers are right. Don't be in the shop that we came from, that went out of business and the only reason they went out of business is the numbers weren't and nobody cared about the numbers.

Brandon Hack: We care.

Jimmy Lea: And there you go. So you gotta care about the numbers and not only the gp gross profit. Let's also, once we get that in line, dialed in, now let's look at the net profit. What are we keeping? What? Let's control some costs, bring some costs down. We can control some costs, and what are we keeping at the end of the day?

Jimmy Lea: How much money is in the bank? That's very important as well.

Brandon Hack: Absolutely.

Jimmy Lea: Brandon, you are awesome. Thank you so much. I appreciate your work in the industry, building a better business, a better life, and a better industry. That's what we're all about here at the Institute, and we're glad to lock arms with you and have you part of our journey.

Brandon Hack: Very cool. Thank you Jimmy. I appreciate it. I appreciate you. Thank you Brandon. You man, talk you soon.