Brad Updegraff’s journey from a small gas-station lube tech to leading a thriving multi-shop operation in Austin, Texas is packed with lessons for shop owners hungry for growth. In this episode, Brad shares how mentorship, smart partnerships, and a forward-thinking approach to technology helped him expand Dave’s Ultimate Automotive from two stores to seven. He dives into customer programs like the VIP discount tiers, lifetime “Premium Protection” warranty, and his signature half-price oil change promotion that doubles as advertising on the road. Brad also discusses the value of adopting digital systems, tracking KPIs, and investing in business coaching to break the $1 million barrier. His focus on training, apprenticeships, and gamified learning builds a culture that keeps his people engaged and his customers loyal. Looking ahead, Brad talks expansion, leadership succession, and his ultimate goal to strengthen trade education and solve the technician shortage for the next generation.

Host(s):

Jimmy Lea, VP of Business Development

Guest(s):

Brad Updegraff, Owner of Dave’s Ultimate Automotive

Show Highlights:

[00:00:27] - Brad credits founder Dave and early internet marketing as the spark that drew him from a small gas-station shop into a growth path with real upside.

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Episode Transcript Disclaimer

Episode Transcript:

Jimmy Lea: Hello, friend. My name is Jimmy Lea with the Institute for Automotive Business Excellence, and you are listening to the Leading Edge podcast. My guest today is one who is on a fast track for super growth. I'm so excited to have Brad here on this conversation as we are gonna talk to him about Dave's Ultimate Automotive.

Jimmy Lea: Brad, thank you for being here. Good morning.

Brad Updegraff: Thank you. That was quite an intro. I appreciate that, Jimmy.

Jimmy Lea: You are on a fast path. So Dave's Automotive, Dave's Ultimate, who's Dave?

Brad Updegraff: So Dave is actually the original founder of the company. Certainly somebody I considered a mentor as I learned in this business for sure.

Brad Updegraff: Nice. And how long have you known Dave? So I met Dave in 2009, became an employee of his in 2010.

Jimmy Lea: Wow. And that was some rough times in the world. We were recovering from a real estate boom bust.

Brad Updegraff: Yes.

Jimmy Lea: Yikes. Yeah.

Brad Updegraff: Thankfully the Austin market was somewhat insulated from a lot of what we were hearing nationally at that time, just because of the tech boom we were actually experiencing at the time.

Brad Updegraff: But you know, certainly felt that.

Jimmy Lea: Yeah. Well, and I think for the most part, the state of Texas. Was protected. State of Texas did a lot of really good things to insulate from that real estate. Boom. I was in mortgages back in the day, so when I hit oh 8, 0 9, 0 10, I was, oh boy. I was done. Wow. I had to figure out what I wanted to be when I grow up.

Jimmy Lea: Yeah. Gotcha. Wow. Back to the drawing boards, that's tough. Yeah. Yeah. So you came on with Dave in oh nine.

Jimmy Lea: Was it a single location? What did that look like?

Brad Updegraff: He owned a South Austin location and this current one I'm in, which is the North Austin location. At the time I came to work at the North Austin location as a service advisor.

Brad Updegraff: I had actually sought out. Dave just basically through what I had heard about his reputation in the industry. He was one of the first to get into internet advertising for the automotive space, and that was super attractive to me. I was in this little gas station repair shop with a, you know, very clear ceiling for what that looked like, and knew I needed better and knew I had a lot more to give to this industry.

Brad Updegraff: And so, Dave looked like the opportunity that I wanted to be in.

Jimmy Lea: Okay, wind it back a little bit further. You're at a gas station a little bit further. How did you get started in automotive? How'd you start the 10 30 weight?

Brad Updegraff: So, that actually started in high school. I was actually, I took the automotive program the senior year we did the the practicum experience out of the dealership.

Brad Updegraff: And that actually was almost a huge turnoff. I wound up going into that. First week and I guess annoying the lead technician I was under long enough that they stuck me up in their tower at Acura watching training videos the rest of the time. So I got an A, but I don't feel like I learned anything, you know?

Jimmy Lea: Yeah. If you don't have that hands-on, you learn theory and theory only takes you so far. You've gotta have that practical hands-on. I, yeah. Imagine

Brad Updegraff: being 18, trying to learn theory too, you know, it was just more of like a

Jimmy Lea: waste. You know? No. And you've already got a DHD and you can't pay attention and you want me to watch a video?

Jimmy Lea: I don't think so. Absolutely. So senior year, you graduate. Then what?

Brad Updegraff: So I actually went to college for a non-automotive program. I was thinking law enforcement at the time. Oh. And was coming back to Austin for you know, basically just part-time work to you know, keep myself, you know, employed and you know, have some money in my pocket.

Brad Updegraff: And the natural fit was an automotive garage. And so I started as a general service lube tech and a state inspector pushing brooms and doing it from the ground level and learning my way through the industry, which, it quickly, I fell in love here in Austin and realized that college was gonna keep me away from her.

Brad Updegraff: And so it that was a career choice to just jump into the automotive space full time. And that really just kind of took off from there. I started trying to learn as a technician but then realized really quickly that my skillset was. Customers and people. And so I transitioned into a service advisor as an opening, came into that little gas station shop and had a great owner that was another great mentor of mine that taught me a lot about what I didn't know in, in customer management shop management and.

Brad Updegraff: I had an amazing time with him, but I still trained as a technician at the time, mainly 'cause I wanted to be able to speak the lingo. And so I actually wound up getting master certified actually after I joined Dave's, but I was on my way by that point.

Jimmy Lea: Nice. Congratulations. So the same gas station, the summer job became the full-time gig.

Jimmy Lea: And now you're up in the front. So how long did you stay there before you sought out Dave's?

Brad Updegraff: So 2010 is actually when I moved over to Dave's. I started making that that. Goal for a shift in 2009.

Jimmy Lea: Wow. Wow. Very cool. Very cool. Yeah. And so what does the journey look like with Dave's? And you start there in 10 as a service advisor at one location and.

Jimmy Lea: How does the conversation go that you start talking about, Hey I'd like to buy you out,

Brad Updegraff: Dave. Well, it actually kind of happened organically, but in the initial conversation when I'm recruiting him for my next boss I told him that I had a goal of being, being I love that

Jimmy Lea: you interviewed him just as much as he interviewed you.

Brad Updegraff: Yeah, it was definitely that kind of interview for sure. I love it. And, I actually had told him right then that I had a goal of owning a third location. Should he decide to open it, I would like to, you know, have an opportunity to get into that with him. Didn't know how, or, you know, how that was gonna play out.

Brad Updegraff: But what wound up happening is we had such a great year in 2010 and 2011 that, dave had been able to step away from the co the company and really focus on what he I guess he found his new passion, which was coaching you know, and shop development. He was working with a TI at the time and decided to try to take that on as more of a a career path, and decided to put this particular location up for sale while he still owned the south one.

Brad Updegraff: My somebody who wound up becoming my business partner in this situation was basically the main financing side of my opportunity. But I had all the industry experience he needed and so we paired up and took off and we were able to expand that Dave's brand quite quickly. So.

Jimmy Lea: Wow. And did you buy the south location too?

Brad Updegraff: Yeah, that was actually our fourth purchase in the group. So we expanded into a close by city, another close by city in two subsequent years. And then that same year is when we actually bought Dave's fourth location.

Jimmy Lea: Wow. Congrats. And now you're up to seven locations?

Brad Updegraff: Seven. We actually took on our seventh location this year actually.

Jimmy Lea: Yeah. And I see your seventh location has like 12 Google

Brad Updegraff: reviews. It's literally started in July. So we're a building from nowhere side of things, so,

Jimmy Lea: yeah. Yeah, I was seeing that. Every location has 600, 6 50, 700, 7 50 Google reviews, and that's solid. I was like, oh, I wonder which one's new. Oh.

Jimmy Lea: That one right there.

Brad Updegraff: Definitely. Thankfully there's still all five stars, so

Jimmy Lea: we're happy. Yeah. Well, yeah. No, that's good. That's good. Congratulations. Oh one suggestion on your website, you do need the new NAPA Auto Care logo. You're right. Yeah. Good catch. And congrats on being the Gold certified.

Jimmy Lea: Thank you. Thank you. That's not an easy bar to step over. That is that's a high bar for you guys.

Brad Updegraff: It really is. And fortunately it was nice to be the first company to kind of, take that on in the Austin market. Really gave us a, an edge with our competitors to be able to offer a warranty that wasn't available out there.

Brad Updegraff: But also the features and benefits that Napa provided to a partnership like that were just accelerated more. And really just opened the door to even more opportunities for me.

Jimmy Lea: Nice. Nice. That's awesome. And I'd love to dig into, you've got three different programs that I was super interested in that I saw on your websites.

Jimmy Lea: Oh yeah. One, one is the the protection, premium Protection plan. Yeah. What is that?

Brad Updegraff: So Ed is essentially a lifetime warranty that we will provide to our best of the best customers after they've earned, you know, kind of that relationship or we've earned that relationship with them. That, that is basically a service that we provide.

Brad Updegraff: And in addition to their normal VIP discount program we for any repair that we do, as long as we're following best practice procedures that, you know, include, you know, things that make sense to do as part of a made. Repair. Then we will honor that warranty for life of the vehicle as long as they are.

Brad Updegraff: Oh,

Jimmy Lea: wow. Yeah. Yeah. So are you then relying a lot on the, parts manufacturers on their warranties and on BG with their warranties and things like that. Are you're relying a lot on those two as well?

Brad Updegraff: Certainly, yeah. So, we do, you know, BG has a program that we've been using for years that is extremely helpful for the customers that are early in their maintenance and that we can start that program early.

Brad Updegraff: It, it does, that company provides an extreme level of. Extended protection just from using their products and been very happy with them. But to go back to that question, the parts vendors are a huge part of that. So we buy quality to make sure that we don't have to turn it in regularly, right. Napa Amen is great with helping with that.

Brad Updegraff: We use a lot of OEM stuff when it's required, but NAPA is by far the best independent repair, you know, parts company that we use.

Jimmy Lea: Napa has a great program and their, the NAPA auto Care program that all the shops that I've ever taken my cars to are Napa because of that nationwide Worry Free.

Jimmy Lea: Anywhere I am, I know I can take it to a Napa auto care center.

Jimmy Lea: And I know they're gonna take care of me.

Brad Updegraff: Fantastic. Yeah. Over 14,000 of 'em across the nation.

Jimmy Lea: Love it. Love it. So now also you talked about the VIP program as well. So this is, that's beyond the VIP. So what is the VIP program?

Brad Updegraff: Yeah, so VIP is a, basically a way of building customer retention for us. And we reward our customers with discount programs that are. Essentially anytime they come in, they can, you know, earn those. And we have simple qualifiers. They have to hit lifetime spend amounts that qualify them into the next level.

Brad Updegraff: And that discounts applied from that point on.

Jimmy Lea: Nice. Nice. I think I would be one of your top VIP clients. When I had, I, and I just sold my truck. I had a Ford F-150 and I was about every six to eight weeks getting that 5,000 mile. Full synthetic oil service. And I was always like, gosh, guys, we gotta figure out, there's gotta be a great program somewhere that we could put together.

Jimmy Lea: And I think you've nailed it with what you're doing on your VIP. So if anybody's interested and you're like, oh my gosh, I need to know more about what it is that Brad's doing here at Dave's Ultimate Automotive, you need to check it out. His website, he's in Austin, Texas, he's got, it is all laid out on the website, so very

Brad Updegraff: detailed, easy to follow for sure.

Jimmy Lea: Easy to follow. Yeah, very good. It's the KISS system. Keep it simple. Yeah,

Brad Updegraff: I hadn't heard that in a while. That's perfect.

Jimmy Lea: That is perfect. So, one of the benefits that I saw too on your website was the half price oil changes. Yes, sir. Talk to me about that.

Brad Updegraff: That is my baby. So, I thought during COVID there was obviously a an issue where everybody was very cost concerned with, you know, their, how much they're spending.

Brad Updegraff: And we needed to figure out a program that worked for, acknowledging that need and trying to also do what, where our need was, which is gaining customers in that time. So we decided to make our oil change program essentially an advertising piece. So how this works is customers purchase for $10 a small football shaped sticker.

Brad Updegraff: I'll use about that. Big says, take it to Dave's on it, as long as they keep that on their vehicle. We give them half price of the oil change. So essentially they're advertising for us that they choose us as their trusted service facility, and in turn we basically do the oil change at half price.

Brad Updegraff: That simple. Dude, I love it.

Jimmy Lea: I love it.

Brad Updegraff: And so what's really cool is having so many locations now and being that this program's several years in the works now I'm pulling up to traffic lights and I'm seeing, you know, one or two of those cars sometimes at a traffic stop. And it's really makes my day to be able to see that kind of membership taken on.

Brad Updegraff: And it seems like customers are really seeing the value in that.

Jimmy Lea: For sure. I'm scheming here, marketing. I love marketing and I love what you're doing with this sticker. Thank you. And I'm wondering, could we take it a little bit further? Could we take it to be a little bit more with this sticker and what comes to my mind, so riff with me on this.

Jimmy Lea: Okay. What if there was a QR code that at a stoplight or in a parking lot, somebody could scan the QR code, select the location they want to go to, and schedule an appointment.

Brad Updegraff: That's awesome. You know, we actually have a QR code already. We just don't put it on the sticker. So that would actually be a really cool addition.

Jimmy Lea: That might be a good thing.

Brad Updegraff: Yeah. I like that. Somebody might be like, what's take it today's about? And that would be a good, easy way to look it up.

Jimmy Lea: Love it. Yeah. What is, take it, Dave's, what does that mean? I love what you're doing. Now there's also a danger in doing that. So if any shop is hearing this saying, oh, I'm gonna do the same thing.

Jimmy Lea: Whoa. Time out. You better evaluate your business before you start doing this. 'cause there's so many shops that hear this and go, okay, well if Brad's doing it, I'm gonna do it half off your oil service. Just put my sticker on your thing. Okay. But somebody has to pay for that.

Jimmy Lea: It's gotta be part of your business plan. Yep. So what do you think are some of those I'm gonna use the word things, but I hate using the word things. What are some of those? Activities marketing plans, pay plans, business plans that shops set up, they tried to implement, and it's what's holding them back from breaking the million dollar ceiling?

Jimmy Lea: What holds a shop back,

Brad Updegraff: in my opinion, it's really the, kind of the unwillingness to adopt, a lot of the technology that's available to us in our space today. If you think about digital vehicle inspections and how prevalent they are now if you think about really even from the repair order software, the ability to communicate with customers differently than picking up the phone now giving 'em easier pay features, things like that, that are designed to enhance the customer experience.

Brad Updegraff: I think when they're not being done and certainly somebody that recognizes that in a competitor or even a different area of their life, you know, they're gonna be attracted to, to looking for that in their service facility big time.

Jimmy Lea: Who, and I love it. I love what you're saying there.

Jimmy Lea: Because we as an industry all the way back to our roots as blacksmith of the town and the city, we were slow to adopt to technology. I'm glad that you are. What are you using

Brad Updegraff: for your DVI? We have used autos serve one from the beginning.

Jimmy Lea: Nice. Congrats. And they integrate in with your point of sale system?

Brad Updegraff: They do. They do.

Jimmy Lea: What are you using for your point of sale?

Brad Updegraff: We use NAPA Track.

Jimmy Lea: Napa Tracks, phenomenal program. And as a multiple shop operator? Napa Trax is able to track all of your locations. Yep.

Brad Updegraff: We actually have they have different enterprise formats you can use. You know, if you'd prefer to have servers in your locations, you can use it in that sense.

Brad Updegraff: They have a cloud option as well. That gives you a lot of on demand availability.

Jimmy Lea: Oh, I love it. I love it. And you also talk about customers being able to pay and pay quickly.

Jimmy Lea: What programs are you utilizing for that pay here? Pay quick Pay now.

Brad Updegraff: So we actually still use a local merchant because I've just basic had a great relationship with them so long, and I'm, I value a lot of personal relationships in my business.

Brad Updegraff: So, we we have that, and then we also have a text to pay feature that we added through that business that I think is, handled through a company called ve, N-U-V-E-I. Okay.

Brad Updegraff: But there's several out there. In fact, one of the Napa sponsored ones is 360 payments. Yeah. NAPA Pay is also coming out, which is gonna be just an extremely good option to consider for certain management systems as well.

Brad Updegraff: Oh,

Jimmy Lea: I love it. I love it. Yeah. I have a Synchrony card. I have a, the Napa

Brad Updegraff: Napa Synchrony

Jimmy Lea: card. Yeah.

Brad Updegraff: Oh yeah, that as well. You bet. Financing is certainly one of those things that, especially in the time that we're dealing with in our industry, that you want to have an alternative for having to pay directly in person like that.

Jimmy Lea: Yeah, for sure. For sure. It all helps. So technology holding shops back and I agree. If they can adopt technology, I, I think as an industry, they've been burnt. In the past, and so they're slow to see it, but once they see others doing it, then it does trickle in more people are doing it. So I would say dvs are more prevalent today than they were 15 years ago, or even 10 years ago, or even five years ago.

Jimmy Lea: I think. Absolutely. If you're in a shop today, you're doing a DVI, it just depends on which DVI are you doing. Yeah, definitely. All right. What else besides

Brad Updegraff: technology? Well, I think if you think of the way that most shop owners become, shop owners in general, they're technicians first, you know?

Brad Updegraff: Yeah. At least that's what I've found in just through our networking and a lot of cases, those technicians don't have a business acumen that helps them with knowing how to manage their p and ls properly and how to structure and, you know, budget for things that they wanna be able to do.

Brad Updegraff: I would not have had that information myself if we didn't have a management success style company that was, that we partnered with to learn those things. And certainly it goes a lot past reading a p and l correctly. And that's really where a lot of the value is helping shops understand what.

Brad Updegraff: Key point indicators are important for for their business success. They are able to give you industry standards to use as a benchmark. Things like that, that are really extremely helpful though for somebody that doesn't have that experience to really gain and understand it in its full picture.

Jimmy Lea: Oh I totally agree with you. Who was your coach? Who was your trainer that guided you through that business acumen?

Brad Updegraff: So, we used a TI way back in the day and Jeff Berman was my particular coach at the time.

Jimmy Lea: I love Jeff. Yeah, Jeff is the man. Oh,

Brad Updegraff: he's great. Yeah. That's phenomenal. Are you still with a TI?

Brad Updegraff: No. We actually left the program a few years ago. There was a point where we realized that it wasn't for us anymore. They add a lot of value to a company that doesn't have you know, that foundation to them. But then at. At one point you know, at that point the coaching changes, you know, because you're just not in that same growth plan and need.

Brad Updegraff: Yeah. And so the maintenance side of it just seemed a little redundant for us, and we felt like, you know, we could probably take it from here.

Jimmy Lea: Yeah. Yeah. We got this now. Yeah. At the institute we have a program for mergers and acquisitions. We call it the high Performance Group. So to be in that group, you have to be an MSO.

Jimmy Lea: Multiple shop operator. Makes sense. And Michael Smith is in charge of the program. He's the one that pulls these shops together. Have you heard about Straightaway Auto? I have not. Brian Bates. So he got these shops together and they decided, hey, we're gonna do this. We're going to represent, we'll have, there were five owners at the time, they represented about 42 rooftops, and they took that and interviewed different private equity groups.

Jimmy Lea: To find the private equity that would fund it the way they wanted it.

Brad Updegraff: Yeah.

Jimmy Lea: Not the private equity that says, Hey, we're gonna buy you out, and I'm gonna show you how this is done. I've got my MBA, I'm gonna show you how it's done. Yeah. Yeah. No we've seen that before. It doesn't work. You don't know this industry.

Brad Updegraff: Exactly. As soon as you mentioned Brian Bates, that whole story kept came back. It came back. Yeah. It's, it was quite remarkable how they pulled that off.

Jimmy Lea: Yep. Yep. He did. And they did, and they are, I think they're approaching 75 locations now, so here in another 25 locations, they'll look at bundling it again and selling it again.

Jimmy Lea: To a next level private equity. Yeah. So at certain levels of private equity, they pay six times ebitda, seven times ebitda. Now you're up to an eight or nine times ebitda and now you're at a 12 to 15 times ebitda. And once you have a package or a bundle, that is significant and this is what's happening in our industry.

Brad Updegraff: Yeah. I'm glad you got on that. Private equity is coming and bundling it up. You know, it's funny. So. There's a lot of shops you know, store owners that I know that seem to be very concerned about that buyout. Some of 'em are actually just waiting for the phone call themselves. But the ones that are planning on sticking in, it's kind of a mixed bag. You know, you have some that are concerned 'cause they don't understand what that's gonna mean to them and you know, if they're gonna have to align with certain pricing just to stay competitive, blah blah, blah, blah. But I have some that look like me, that look at that as a complete opportunity.

Brad Updegraff: The minute a shop goes corporate and it's felt by the employees and the customers, you lose both. Yeah. So that's an opportunity for us to gain so.

Jimmy Lea: And I love that. I love that you mentioned that. That's what Brian has done and the straightaway has done in their entire company and their culture is to keep the local family run business culture.

Brad Updegraff: That's awesome.

Jimmy Lea: That's important. That's so important. Yeah. The PE that they partnered with said, okay, we bought you and da, but you're still on, you're still with us, and we want you to continue to run your business. If you need any equipment. There's a blank check for that equipment. You just order it.

Jimmy Lea: You do it. Yeah. We know, you know this business and this is what we wanna do. This is our plan, this is our growth plan. Get us to that point. So now as these guys are going out looking at shops, they're evaluating, they don't have to spend their own money on it. They're spending the private equity money to buy the shop, so they're growing exponentially.

Jimmy Lea: It's just so much fun. Wow. It's so fascinating because not only were they able to sell the shop once. They're gonna sell it again and again. And again, and this is becomes generational wealth for these shop owners that they are going to be able to stay in the game. And at some point they may decide, Hey, you know what?

Jimmy Lea: Deuces I'm out, me and the wife, my ties on the beach.

Brad Updegraff: Exactly. Yeah. Isn't that everybody's goal?

Jimmy Lea: And when they do. God bless you. Exactly. Let's flip that. Okay. I'm not gonna leave, but eventually I do pass and in my will, I will it to my children. The children are now partnered with the PE generational wealth.

Jimmy Lea: It keeps growing and growing. Back to the original question, what is holding a shop back from breaking that $1 million per year annual sales.

Jimmy Lea: Adoption of technology. We got adoption of technology.

Brad Updegraff: I think actually, you know, being able to get the customers in the door is an evolving challenge. Okay. Internet advertising is obviously key for new customer acquisition. Everybody's using Google or something connected to Google to learn about a potential shop that they want to use.

Brad Updegraff: So it's important to have your space on there but you need to have a multi-layered approach to that, you know. People care that they're doing business with a company that cares about the community. Yep. So making sure that you have a strong community involvement, whether that's supporting local schools combination of that, maybe doing some community outreach if you have people that are willing to donate some energy outside of work.

Brad Updegraff: Things that, can help build that portfolio of your shop as far as the reputation that it has outside of just five star reviews is really big. And I think that unfortunately a lot of companies don't really invest the time and energy or money into those areas. Because it doesn't always give you an obvious ROI, you know, that's something the brand building that you do with that has a long run effect, you know?

Jimmy Lea: It does. I had an interesting conversation with Jeffrey, last name. Come on. Rudnick Pit Crew Loyalty. They run a pit crew loyalty program. And so you talk about community, his involvement is involving the community businesses. So you have an app for your shop and these businesses become part of your program where if somebody's coming to your shop and they earn points.

Jimmy Lea: They can donate those points to the local animal shelter. And once a year you show up to the animal shelter with a check for a thousand bucks. Wow. And you invite all hundred people, 200 people that made this possible. They're giving back to the community. Now you're supporting the next phase, the next level.

Brad Updegraff: I'm gonna write that down when we get off this call. That's a really good idea.

Jimmy Lea: Yeah. Jeffrey Rudnick pit Crew loyalty. In fact, I will send you his information and we should put that in the show notes because anybody that wants to check it out should check it out. It's pretty dang cool.

Brad Updegraff: That's a great idea.

Brad Updegraff: Yeah.

Jimmy Lea: Yeah. That's fun. It's fun,

Brad Updegraff: you know, so, kind of adding to that, we yeah. Going back into the school system. So one of the things that we felt was extremely important for the future and development of our industry as a whole was making sure that we had a good way of creating better interest for the young generation that we want into our industry that doesn't have as much of a, a.

Brad Updegraff: I guess an interest in it at this point and being able to provide a way of training through that. So, we partnered with a local school system and we actually serve as their senior apprentice shop that we work with right now. So what's been awesome with that is, you know, we wind up with more students than necessarily we can handle in our shop.

Brad Updegraff: You know, so somewhat overstaffed, you know, taking on a little bit of extra cost doing that. But we get to train people for our industry that might not even necessarily start out with us when they get into the career field, but hopefully they come back 'cause they really enjoy the environment.

Brad Updegraff: You know,

Jimmy Lea: and that's what they'll find out. They don't know what they don't know. They think every shop is run just exactly like yours is because that's the first shop they go to. Yeah. And then down the road they're gonna go to a different shop, a different location, different gas station, different dealership, different shop culture, company culture.

Jimmy Lea: Yeah. And hopefully they realize and they come back to you because like, Tim Kerian in California, he had a technician that moved away and when he came back he says, I don't care where you put me. I want to be here. He just wants to be there. Yep. I want this is home for me, so figure it out.

Jimmy Lea: So not only is he one of his best technicians, he's also the instructor for the Apprentice. That's awesome. They built him a lean to tent out in the back of the shop because all the bays were full. The bay he didn't have a bay for him.

Brad Updegraff: Okay.

Jimmy Lea: But he built him a bay, put a lift in it, and because it was a temporary structure that he got around a lot of city stuff.

Jimmy Lea: But the dude has to work outside Pasadena, California. Ah, you're fine.

Brad Updegraff: Yeah. I could deal with that every day.

Jimmy Lea: Yeah. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So, tim, phenomenal job at creating culture. And it sounds like, Brad, it sounds like you are doing the exact same thing with your company culture.

Brad Updegraff: Definitely. It's important to have two different mindsets in our company.

Brad Updegraff: We need to be have a hospitality culture for our customers and a training culture for our team.

Jimmy Lea: Nice. Talking about, and I almost felt you say technicians, training for your technicians, do you also train the whole team advisors, managers, leadership? Yeah, definitely. Nice. Nice. Where do you go? What do you do?

Jimmy Lea: Is it all in-house or,

Brad Updegraff: Yeah, it's actually, it's things we've learned through a TI, you know, through the years. It's a bit of a playbook and we've certainly have our own way of doing business that we certainly, follow a protocol and process for, I guess is a good way to put it. But we're accountable.

Brad Updegraff: You know, we review their phone calls. You know, we help them in their areas that they need to improve. If there's particular service development areas that they can you know, learn more in a particular class, we would pay for that, but another extra. Just daily training thing is, we're actually part of today's class.

Brad Updegraff: I don't know if you've heard much about that program, but it's in a fantastic way to keep consistent training in your program.

Jimmy Lea: Oh, I love it. Yeah. Are you in the gamification? Do your seven locations compete against each other? Do you have a top tech?

Brad Updegraff: They do, yeah.

Jimmy Lea: Yeah. That's awesome.

Jimmy Lea: That's a fun name. Are you meeting on it too?

Brad Updegraff: Oh yeah. In fact, we have an admin team that competes against the shops.

Jimmy Lea: Oh, that's awesome.

Brad Updegraff: Yeah. That

Jimmy Lea: is so cool. So they, we, we met with today's class here a minute ago. Probably sometime during the summer and the executive team is. Answering all those questions.

Jimmy Lea: So, Cecil, Kent, and Wayne, they're all competing amongst the three or four of them there in the office headquarters in Ogden. Yeah. And it's interesting to see that Wayne is answering the questions right? And he has no, well, okay. No, he has a pretty dang good garage and he has like five or six BMWs that he works on.

Jimmy Lea: But he's not a. Master technician.

Brad Updegraff: Sure. Kinda more specialized in that area then.

Jimmy Lea: Yeah. Yeah. Well that's,

Brad Updegraff: I mean, that's awesome. I honestly thought I would answer more questions. Right. I get, oh, it's a good mix of technician and service questions that are peppered into my particular profile.

Brad Updegraff: And. I'll tell you if I'm trying to just, you know, get through it for the day and fast track my answers I miss a lot, you know? Yeah. It definitely takes some thinking. But I really I can't say enough about that program and what it means. You know? The other great thing about it, you know, for you talk about culture.

Brad Updegraff: So monthly we actually do prize raffles. So as they're answering questions, they're building points in the yes. In their game, and they're able to use those raffles or those particular points for either raffles or auctions that we host. And so, you know, we're using our vendors to give away products.

Brad Updegraff: We have certain things that we give away just in the store as well. Like PTO day or something like that, just to be kind of cool and give 'em, you know, something. Or, you know, one of the fun ones we get to do with the few of 'em, my employees is a day of golf with me. You know, just dude. Yeah. You know, just to kind of keep it different, you know,

Jimmy Lea: do a date night basket.

Brad Updegraff: Ooh.

Jimmy Lea: Dinner, gift cards, movie tickets. You know, here's a fancy box of chocolates. Date in a basket or date night in a basket. That's a great idea. Oh yeah, that, that'd be rad. I. Gotta love that. Absolutely. Cool. So Dave, what? Dave? Brad,

Brad Updegraff: I get that daily, don't worry. I'm sure you do. Yeah, I'm calling for Dave.

Brad Updegraff: Good being Brad. When the name on the building's, Dave, by the way. Yeah. There's a nice little ninja effect to that.

Jimmy Lea: Oh, there is. And you know what, I've been to so many Dave's automotives across the country and it's never owned by a Dave. That's funny. It's owned by somebody else. Yeah. So, what does the future look like for you, Brad?

Jimmy Lea: You're currently at seven locations. Now what does success look like?

Brad Updegraff: So, we certainly haven't stopped our growth plans. But we now have the ability to be quite strategic with our next footprint steps. You know, now that we have a really good coverage of the Austin and kind of surrounding area map, we intend to go north.

Brad Updegraff: And there's areas, you know, between us and Waco that kind of makes sense to expand into. There's areas out east of us that are becoming more populous centers since Samsung's moving in and places like that. So, Bastrop, Elgin, you know, some little neighboring towns that, you know, seem like they would be good potential fits for our next move.

Brad Updegraff: But I'm also very specific about. What type of shop we're gonna get into. Sure. Size wise, you know, it needs to be 10 bays or more. 10. 10. Yes. That's

Jimmy Lea: a big shop, bro. Okay. It's 10 bays. Yeah, because that fits your footprint, that's your business model. You know how to effectively. Produce a 10 base shop.

Brad Updegraff: Yeah, I would even say eight is a potential. Since state inspections have kind of gone away in this last year from the state of Texas it's less base space needed for that. So I think I could do the same type of business model in an eight based shop. Okay. And you know, certainly we have one in the company right now that's quite successful from a profitability standpoint.

Brad Updegraff: So there's definitely something to the manpower involved with an eight bay, eight bay versus 10 base.

Jimmy Lea: So when you've got an eight bay or a 10 bay shop, how many technicians do you have operating

Brad Updegraff: out of there? So, I'll use the example I'm in for a 10 bay shop. I try to structure four. Diagnostic skill level technicians and three general service technicians at some varying skill level that can do, you know, we call 'em GS pluses when they're kind of advancing to that level where they could become flag technicians. But we you know, also kind of can do ground level startups as well.

Brad Updegraff: You know, somebody that's just trying to learn and become an apprentice in the industry has a space in our environment to try to work underneath the team that, you know, can help them grow and accelerate as well. So we do have a range of that technician. General service technician structure that we try to keep in every shop.

Jimmy Lea: So you've got the general service, these are your C minus technicians. And an apprentice that's a C minus. They're coming up in the industry. And these four, are they the instructors, are they the oversight? Are they the quality control for your general service technicians?

Jimmy Lea: Is that what you do?

Brad Updegraff: We actually try to keep one particular technician equipped in each shop with that role. Okay. Instead of utilizing all of them.

Jimmy Lea: So one, one tech in each shop is the professor. Yes. Okay. Very cool. Oh, I love that. So if there's anybody in the Austin area or are you're, it sounds like you're also expanding out from that going up to Waco and out towards what's east?

Brad Updegraff: East would be heading towards Houston. You know, there's Houston, a little neighboring cities in the,

Jimmy Lea: anybody with a six bay or a 10 bay shop?

Brad Updegraff: Holler. Give Brad a

Jimmy Lea: call.

Brad Updegraff: Definitely give him

Jimmy Lea: a Hollerer.

Brad Updegraff: Yeah, [email protected]. That's direct email, so

Jimmy Lea: Oh, perfect. That'd be good.

Brad Updegraff: So that's the future. At what point do you say, okay, we're good.

Brad Updegraff: So I actually put a date on that for myself when I turned 55. So I've got nine years left now.

Jimmy Lea: Nine years to 55. Yeah, dude. Congrats. Thank you. So at 55 that becomes the opportunity to cash out. Do you still have a business partner or is it all you? It's all me now. Oh, congrats bro. Thank you. Thank you.

Jimmy Lea: So by 55, how many shops you want? 55 shops,

Brad Updegraff: you know, I don't know that answer to be honest. Okay. It's more of a, more about, I don't wanna be putting words

Jimmy Lea: in your mouth, I don't want you to knee jerk reaction this, but it's something to think about. When you do hit 55, what's the goal?

Jimmy Lea: If it's just 55, you know you're gonna get there.

Brad Updegraff: Sure. I think we've already grown to the size of a company where it's gonna take a strategic buyer for for a purchase for us.

Brad Updegraff: You know, and so there's already that kind of, that mindset of what that looks like down the road.

Brad Updegraff: I

Jimmy Lea: gotta plan for you, brother. We need to talk. Okay, cool. Alright, congratulations. Well, if you were to have a magic wand and you had one wish, you can't wish for more wishes. What would you change in the industry?

Brad Updegraff: Just one wish. One wish? Yep.

Brad Updegraff: Ooh. I think the biggest one for me is. That there isn't a pre, that there was already a program built centered around the trade industry better than it is today that is focused more on automotive than it is. If you see, you know, electrical companies, plumbing trades those have had very thorough programs for the longest time.

Brad Updegraff: And it seems like the automotive space is just slow to catch up to that. And I think it's created the problem we have of a technician shortage right now. So if I could wave my widget magic wand, I would do away with the technician shortage and have a better building program.

Jimmy Lea: I love it better education for those coming into the industry.

Jimmy Lea: Better education for those that want to become part of the program. And I think what you've also dialed that in on your shops, you know that you've got a professor that's gonna guide the GS down the path. So you've got that outlined. We need that on a larger scale. Right. Brad. I love it. I love it.

Jimmy Lea: Brother, thank you very much. I appreciate your time. Appreciate you showing up for us. I've enjoyed it, Jimmy. Thanks for having me. Alright. Thank you brother. All right. We'll talk soon.