The difficult moment that is characterising the general and financial economy in the world today is located on the front pages of every newspaper: primary banking and commercial businesses that are failing, drops in consumption, shrinking pay checks and salaries, families having serious problems just to balance the budget, and more and more frequent loan requests. The automobile sector also associates with the incredible hike of fuel prices, which isn't exempt from the troubles.

The sale of cars, new or old, is dropping considerably:     -26.42% in August 2009 compared to August 2007, -12.04% in the first 8 months of 2009; in addition, strong drops in used cars (-18.2% in the last term).
The incentives that favor the sale of new cars and to scrap older cars (those which, until recently, were the types that entered more frequently in our shops) are making the auto industry more youthful, thus causing our interventions to become more complicated. 

Examining the auto repair market in Italy, we can at least say that the number of workshops here is double the amount that more advanced European countries have; in addition, their level of quality is far lower compared to other nations. The cars of today, as previously stated, have changed in a radical way. They don't even seem like the distant relatives of the 500, Uno, Alfetta, and Fulvia, which were making the auto repairers of yesterday happy and whom, just like the unforgettable song by Lucio Battisti, only needed a screwdriver to make miracles happen...... 

And what do independent workshops do?
Not all of them are there looking, let it be well-intended; in fact, there are those that oppose the activities of the "battleship" taking ideas from their initiatives or putting into practice the more up-to-date proposals of the parts dealer. But these examples are still too little and the larger part of auto repairers live every day attending to phone calls or spontaneous visits from motorists.

So can we think about turning around our own business and seriously prepare for new possibilities?
Let's look together at what we can do to target the most important objective from the part of whom operates in any area of business: gaining loyalty from clients which, said in smaller terms, means knowing how to maintain the  faith granted to us at the moment of the first supplied service.
Above all, it is necessary to understand the phenomenons of change which weigh upon the business and look to change the current way of working to be more profitable. So let's try to identify the key points that we can work on to better our business:

The image of the workshop and greeting customers 

It's necessary to enter a well-constructed workshop and immediately notice how cleanliness, the appearance of the staff, organisation of the office, and departments in charge of repair constitute the first positive impression. In a modern workshop, the motorist is greeted with politeness, with a hand shake, obtains an estimate without needing to ask, receives information about the work that will be done, and is given the date and time that their automobile will be ready for pick-up.
Moreover, it is important to find some time to explain things to the customer that they may not know: the opportunities provided from the Monti laws, the advertisement from the promotion on air-conditioning systems or brake pad subsitutions, or the reassurance about the expiration notice from the service on their car.
After the profitable meeting, the motorist will receive the keys to their car with courtesy and can return to their business serene and satisfied about having left their "precious love" in good hands.
When the customer comes back to pick up their car, which they had left for an important intervention, they will find it washed and fragrant!
Your customers will remember this nice gesture for a long time.

Support information, training courses, tools
The first ones have become, by now, the true "iron of operation" that cornered the classic keys and tools which worked on cars of an older generation. Thanks to them, we enter in the brain and heart of modernity, we dialogue, we set up everything at our best avoiding the "hood syndrome" that hits the auto repairers who, once opened the engine compartment of a modern car and accounted for the difficulty of the work, closed it and, often times, brought the automobile to someone who could give them a hand to fix the problem... insurmountable. 
With regards to this fact, it seems fundamental to us to underline the fact that the number of auto repairers willing to participate with assiduity to the various training courses is always excessively low.
It is important to remember that, without training and refresher courses, they can't acquire those notions that allow them to continue to operate with competence and seriousness.
Programs exist that help us compile an estimate, to find necessary spare parts, to put a warranty into effect, to remind clients of their various expiration dates (also payment expirations), to keep an updated list of clients and their relatives and, why not?, to send them birthday wishes, reminding them that they can come in for a free check-up on their vehicle on that special day.
There are a lot of things to say about tools, important components for performing at best and in securing your own work as well as being useful for noticeably reducing costs: an out-of-date tool doesn't assure speed or perfection of the work being done.

Choice of the Auto Repairer
We don't want this point to be read like an exaltation of our business as spare parts distributors and service providers to bring "classic water to our windmill".
We instead believe that the choice of the Auto Repairer should be done with the intent to find a real and appropriate "Partner" to collaborate with to develop our business at its best.
The Partner is a sort of member, of a person or a business in which it has faith, someone that supplies precious advice for strategic decisions, for important decisions such as a new software or tools, to give professional updates when we need it, to sustain our business and increasingly better the traffic coming into our workshop, and to make it more difficult for "fast fit" businesses who are joined together by unfriendly foreign groups that are entering in our country and that, often times, we pretend to ignore.

“It's clear that the Auto Repairer should be, above all, a supplier of auto parts but certainly should not be only a supplier of auto parts“.

Additional guarantees on new and used;

Credit by consumption 

They are both very important tools that allow us to work with tranquility and to have the security that, after working on our customer's cars, we don't have to worry about the work in which we are not grand experts and that steal that precious time that we should dedicate exclusively to our work as Auto Repairers.
For these arguments, Zago Ltd. is keeping busy; on page 10 you will find the schedule for a meeting dedicated to additional guarantees on cars; other evenings just as important, will be scheduled as soon as possible.