[Chevelle-list] OT: Seeking out Shop Owners

[Shawn Price]

Since the list has been a bit slow lately I thought I would query the  
shop owners on the list regarding a few things about your businesses.

I'm about to be 'downsized' in the next few months and would love to  
get out of the IT industry. For years now I've been wanting to open  
up a restoration/repair shop for American classic and muscle cars. I  
want to specialize in late '60's and early '70's Chevy's but will  
work on just about anything that DOESN'T HAVE A COMPUTER! (I'm sick  
to death of these damn things).
  Having been a white collar mechanic (Network architect and  
engineer) for several years, and wrenching on the evenings and  
weekends all my life, I think I'm ready to make the jump to business  
ownership. I'm currently working on my business plan and am having  
problems with the marketing and projected revenue parts. My questions  
are:

1) What are some standard shop rates for repair work? And is there  
some kind of guide for how long a particular job should take, such as  
replacing a clutch or other worn part.

2) I know that some folks will want certain things done to their cars  
and trucks that will be considered a project, such as installing  
aftermarket disc brakes, or an updated transmission. How do you go  
about estimating time and materials, and do you use your standard  
hourly rate or do you lower it a bit to hit a certain price-point.

3) What kinds of things do you do to protect yourself against  
liability problems, such as an engine you installed shows up 'blown'  
after a couple weeks, and the customer is trying to blame you, even  
though you know by the Jiffy Lube sticker on the windshield that the  
drain plug fell out from the oil change.

4) Are there any kinds of Shop Owners Associations where you can  
exchange ideas, similar to this mailing list?

These are just sort of general questions to get me started thinking  
about more specific questions later on. And I do appreciate any  
input, comments, warnings, stories you may have. Also if this is  
deemed off-topic feel free to send any responses to shawn at  
zekesgarage dot com.

Thanks for reading the long post!


--
Shawn
'69 Corvette 427 4-Speed
'69 Chevelle SS 396 4-Speed
'69 Charger R/T 383 4-Speed
'67 Chevy C-10 3-On The Tree
'00 Suzuki GSX-R 750 1-Down, 5-Up


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