By Mike Davey
Hamilton, Ontario — March 7, 2016 — Collision repair requires regular investments in both equipment and training for a facility to remain competitive. But are Canada’s collision shops making those investments?
The majority of them are, according to the results of our latest survey. The vast majority of respondents to our surveys nearly always identify themselves as owners or managers of collision repair facilities. This particular survey had a surprisingly high number of respondents from facility employees, including both office and production staff members.
Our next survey focuses on special materials and a look to the future of vehicle construction. You can take the special materials survey at this link.
In total, shop owners and managers comprised about 83 percent of responses, with the remaining 17 percent identifying themselves either as technicians, painters or other production staff or as administrative or office staff. Of the owners and managers, 21 percent identify themselves as affiliated with a franchise or network. The remaining 79 percent are independent repairers.
We asked the owners and managers if they had purchased any new equipment in 2016 and also if they planned to make any equipment purchases in 2017. When it comes to new equipment, it turns out 78 percent indicated they had made a purchase in 2016, while the remaining 22 percent did not. Oddly enough, these numbers were exactly duplicated when looking forward to 2017: 78 percent indicated they plan to invest in more equipment this year, while 22 percent said they won’t.
Responses from staff tell a somewhat different story. Only 25 percent of techs and office staff indicated that their workplace had purchased new equipment in 2016, but 65 percent said their employer planned to purchase new equipment this year. Of those, welding equipment seems to be on the top of the shopping list, followed by health and safety equipment and scan tools.
Turning back to the owners and manager, the most common types of equipment purchased in 2016 were welding equipment, health and safety equipment and scan tools. Each of these drew responses around the 54 percent mark, with some minor variations. The next most commonly purchased items were centered around the spray booth, with around 27 percent of our respondents indicating they had purchased a new spray booth, other refinish equipment such as spray guns, and compressors. Again, there were very minor variations to these figures, but they were all around the 27 percent mark. It should be noted that respondents could choose more than one answer, so the percentage figures given will not add up to 100 percent. For a complete breakdown, please see the chart below.
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| This chart shows the percentage of respondents who indicated they had purchased a particular{source}<br/>{/source} type of new equipment in 2016. Welding led the way, closely followed by health and safety {source}<br/>{/source}equipment and scan tools. |
We find very different results when repairers are looking ahead to purchases in 2017. Welding equipment and health and safety gear drop down to 9 percent, but scan tools remains robust. In fact, it was the single biggest category for what repairers are planning to buy in 2017. The chart below lays out the details. Please note that as with the chart above, respondents could choose more than one answer.
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| The chart above highlights planned equipment purchases in 2017. This time scan tools are{source}<br/>{/source} the clear winner. |
We also asked owners and managers to indicate which particular item needed the most investment in their own shops in 2017. This question was less focused on equipment and more on total shop operations. Judging by the responses we received, the area most critically in need of investment is OEM certification (31 percent). Previous surveys we’ve run have indicated that this area is top of mind for many repairers so this isn’t a surprising result. Looking at the rest of the survey responses, 15 percent indicated that equipment was the area most in need of investment. This tied with technical training. Process and procedure improvements were the most critical area for 23 percent of respondents. Additional production space and employee engagement were at the bottom of the priority list, with just 9 and 7 percent respectively.
The last two questions in this survey were sort of curve balls. Rather than asking about investment, we asked if administrative costs had risen in the last five years. These costs have indeed risen for 77 percent of our respondents. Those who indicated that the costs had risen were also asked why they thought this was the case. This was another one of those questions were respondents could choose more than one answer. Looking at all the responses, 9 percent said they had previously been understaffed in this area, 41 percent said that wages had gone up in their region so they had to pay more and 38 percent said the business had grown, leading to a need for more staff. However, very close to every shop owner and manager (97 percent) surveyed indicated that these increased costs were due to insurers downloading administration onto shops, leading to an increase in staff to deal with it.
Our next survey focuses on special materials in vehicle construction and how they can impact the estimate. You can take that survey at this link and watch for the results next week on collisionrepairmag.com!
