There have been a lot of changes in the industry since I appeared on the cover in February 2002.

The ongoing information technologies revolution would be the first change.   The volume of knowledge and data available is allowing both the collision repair industry and the insurance industry to better understand the data, which enhances benchmarking ability or measurable matrices.

Changes in materials would be the second big change, advanced equipment which places more demand on specialized training, i.e. aluminum, curtain, seat and side airbags, hybrid vehicles and waterborne paint. The changes in improved technology place more emphasis on training, whether from manufacturers or I-CAR.    

Our shop has spent more than $600,000 in equipment and in the last five years we have spent about $200,000 on training. The training cost has more than doubled from the previous five years. 

This trend will continue due to the vehicle design, materials and innovation. This will demand new equipment and innovative repair techniques.  

In theory the Canadian collision repair industry will have more consolidation in the future because of economies of scale. I predict that there will be a dramatic increase in equipment and training costs, in combination with a shrinking bottom line. In essence, I see our industry as experiencing further downsizing over the next five years.

When you look at any industry and how it has changed in the last five years you will find one common denominator…technology.  This cannot be more true than in our industry.

Our clients (car owners and insurance companies) have become more knowledgeable about the industry therefore demands have shifted. Society has become accustomed to the whole “instant gratification” scenario which brings on added pressures within the business. Consumers are demanding better quality with less cost involved and within a shorter period of time.  Insurance companies expect the same.   As a result we have introduced “lean manufacturing” to keep up with the demands of the consumers. 

Lean manufacturing allows us to minimize waste within the production of completing our product.  What this means to Mascarin’s is identifying all areas of duplication in our repair process in order to process a higher quality product using less time and materials.

The introduction of this new system has allowed us to continue providing a quality product in a shorter period of time therefore giving the consumers what they want.

This of course didn’t come without the added costs of new equipment, training and downtime. 

At Mascarin’s we welcome these technological changes.  It drives us to be a better producer and leader in the industry and we will continue to be Northwestern Ontario’s Premier Collision Facility!

There have been a lot of changes in the industry since our shop was featured on the cover five years ago. Frankly there are far too many changes for me to go into them all in detail, so I will talk about the changes that I see as being the most significant to the collision repair industry.

Consolidation in the insurance industry has been growing over the last five years. I expect that this trend will continue. With fewer insurers two key things occur:

1. The opportunity to see more standardization with repair guidelines and procedures is real and the challenge of addressing the performance measurements that are in play today is important. 

2. There are many opportunities to streamline procedures that allow us to do what is expected of us and to do what we do best, repair the car properly.

Personally, we are up for the challenge. We have a process driven repair facility focused on repair efficiency and quality. We have continued to evolve our business strategically, in the areas of both new equipment purchase and continuous training, while at the same time ensuring we are provided with a reasonable measure of profitability to continue to invest. 

Customer pay work continues to grow at a relatively higher level than it did five years ago. I fully expect that customer pay work will continue to be a significant part of our business and the consumer continues to have high expectations of what great service is and should be.

We pride ourselves in what we offer as a collision repair facility and the value that the CARSTAR brand has achieved in continuing our growth.

I was asked to reflect on the changes that have taken place in our business and the industry since I was on the cover in August 2002.

I am sure all of you have seen further consolidation of both the insurance and repair industries in the past 4 ½ years, although this trend has somewhat slowed in the past 18 months or so. I have seen the re-emergence of resistance spot welders with more emphasis being placed on new repair technology by the auto manufactures and I –CAR.  Weld bonding was not even part of our vocabulary in 2002.

Speaking of I –CAR, we now see a renewed interest in training thanks to their new delivery method and the commitment from some insurers to promote, if not mandate, continuous training in their DRP programs.

There has also been a change in our estimating platforms as most are now web- based products with data reporting capabilities. I am sure that we do not fully realize their capacity and will see more of it in the near future.

 I have seen the pendulum swing in regards to our consumer pay versus insurance pay over the past few years. At one time, consumer was paying for their repairs rather than put in an insurance claim for fear of cancellation or huge rate increases. This has changed somewhat although we still see the customer pay   higher than in years prior to 2001.

We are continually working to become more efficient in all aspects of our operation, from the front office to the detail department, by using the latest technology to help us adapt to these changing times. On thing that has remained consistent in the 27 years that I have been in business is change, from full frame vehicles to uni-body construction, more use of plastics, aluminum, boron steel and more, from single stage paint to 2 & 3 stage, from multiple coats of clear to, now in some cases, only one coat of clear. Waterborne paint is on our doorstep and this is just another change to which we must adapt.

All that being said, I believe the biggest challenge we face is our ever-shrinking profit margins. It is not unusual to find that over 48% of a repair is now parts, with very little profit margin. The depressed labour rate is not keeping pace with today’s rising cost of labour and overhead, let alone allowing us to realize a return on our investment. Yet, we are expected to have enough resources to invest in new equipment and training to meet the challenge of dealing with today’s well educated and demanding consumer and an ever more demanding insurance industry who constantly pressure us to reduce costs while providing superior customer service to their policy holders.