CollisionCast

After several decades of premium repair service to their community, Don and Diana Gould turned over the shop to their friends Brian and Heidi Meyers. Hear how the transition went, what Brian and Heidi strive to preserve, and how they'll forge a new legacy at Gould Body & Paint.

Stan Medina, the owner of Certified Collision Works in Corpus Christi, Texas, breaks down how shop operators can market their business via social media in a cost-effective manner. 

Tim Hoege is program director and instructor at Madison College in the Auto Collision Repair & Refinish program . Today on CollisionCast we discuss the challenges and opportunities of a modern collision repair program.  Hoege also recently appeared on NBC15 and Spectrum News to discuss the program and collision repair industry.

Donielle Lopez is the owner/operator of Xtreme Auto Works in Chandler, Arizona. Leaving the world of corporate marketing to enter collision repair, Donielle uses the skills from her old career to bolster her new one. 

This week on CollisionCast, we speak with Susanna Gotsch, director and industry analyst for CCC. She shares her general outlook for the industry and reviews a few points from her January monthly outlook, which can be read in full here . 

In his debut, The MSO Project podcast series, DJ Mitchell, regional director for Joe Hudson's Collision Centers, discusses his thoughts on the Caliber Collision and ABRA Auto Body merger. Mitchell thinks the merger will take time to be fully completed but says that even for smaller regional MSOs, there are significant lessons to be learned from the merger. 

Bill Vallely, an I-CAR instructor and the president of BSR Inc., breaks down the key elements to consider when you implement an apprenticeship program for estimators at your shop. 

Greg Lachner has spent most of his life working in body shops. Now, through his company Auto Body Training Solutions, he galvanizes others to learn the best and most efficient ways to fix their vehicles once, and only once. 

Today on CollisionCast, we speak with Brittney Valentine, customer service representative for All Angles Collision Repair, located in Wichita, Kansas. Brittney shares her experiences as a customer and how it affected the way she views her customer service role; Valentine not only focuses on making her customers' experiences memorable, but also helps train other customer service representatives at...

Jim Huard, a managing partner with Fix Auto, explains how shop operators can best go about educating their staffs regarding rapidly evolving vehicle technology. 

Today on CollisionCast, we're joined by Dr. Nick Morgan, one of America's top communications theorists and coaches. Dr. Morgan is the founder and CEO of Public Words consulting company, and shares a few strategies about bettering your everyday body language for yourself, your employees, and your customers.  

2018 FenderBender award winner Cynthia Varnell reveals how her employee initiatives outside the shop empower them from within. 

Charlie Robertson, president of the Collision Career Institute, explains how shop operators can prepare their entry-level workers properly in the modern era, and eventually make them a shop asset. 

DJ Mitchell has seen it all as first the COO of Car Guys Automotive and now the Regional Director of Joe Hudson's Collision Center. Listen to his insight as he discusses the unique challenges and opportunities of new staffs, new shops, and growing a family business. 

Josh Avello, an automotive collision repair instructor at Ranken Technical College in St. Louis, explains how shop owners can help prepare their technicians for success when they take welding certification tests. 

Mitchell’s latest Industry Trends report explores the importance of having a complete, objective view in its feature article, “The Power of Perspective: Seeing the Full Picture of a Claim.” Nina Smith, Mitchell’s executive vice president and general manager of casualty solutions, explains how integration and how the technology and data provides the insights required to give adjusters a full pictur...

Shop owner Danny Szarka explains the best, current methods for finding quality entry-level technicians among job applicants.

Dubbed "the future of collision repair" by industry superstar Mike Anderson, shop owner Jason Boggs, joins CollisionCast to discuss his evolution as both a shop owner and a leader. Boggs discusses how he figured out  his own leadership style (and how it differs from his shop owner father's), how he tweaks his leadership style according to the employee, and the surprising parallels between collisio...

Barrett Stamps, manager of Auburn Collision 1, shares his secrets to not only providing excellent customer service but gaining customer loyalty. 

ABRA Auto Body & Glass has made moves to becoming not only the repairer of choice but the employer of choice. FenderBender sat down with Carmen Thiede, chief people officer for ABRA, and dived further into how the company goes about finding, retaining and developing leaders.

Brian Wasson, manager, program delivery for I-CAR, shares the ins and outs, from price to flexibility of the product, of choosing the right welder for your shop. 

Travis Fitchie was only 20 years old when he was promoted to the manager position at Apland's Auto Body. Jodie Apland, vice president of the shop, and Mike Apland, president of the shop, witnessed Fitchie raise the shop's sales through a "bite-your-fingernails" stage. Here is why and how the Aplands decided to hire a millennial manager.

Robert Molina is this year's FenderBender Award winner in the Executive category. He led his $12 million body shop beloved by his Miami community by investing in people and technology and instituting a customer-first mentality. Here's how he built his massive, technologically advanced operation.

Island Fender used to receive 90 percent of its business from DRPs. Feeling he was losing control of his body shop, owner Van Takemoto decided to tone his DRP business down. While painful at first, now his business is thriving. Here's how he did it.

While, ideally, driver-assist systems reduce the likelihood of crashes, there are still going to be opportunities for work for collision repair shops. To help clear things up, David Aylor, director of active safety testing Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, gives a rundown on the current state of ADAS technology and how those vehicles affect body repair procedures.