Is Having Your Own Workshop Worth The Massive Headache?

Added: 2026-05-23

[00:00:00]So I'm currently on the way to Cashel to show a potential customer an Orine Pat and um a good time to talk about this comment that was left on our YouTube comment section about should we open our own workshop and it's something that I always think about. It's always on my mind. I'm always looking for ways to improve the business, improve our service and all the rest.

[00:00:27]And from the outside looking in, you might think that from a quality control point of view and an efficiency point of view that having your own workshop would be a no-brainer, but it's actually not.

[00:00:40]It's it's a lot more complicated than you might think. There's a lot to think about. There's a lot of pros and a lot of cons, a lot of cons to opening a workshop. And it's something that I'm very reluctant to get into. So, I'll explain why.

[00:00:57]First of all, the pros. We are at a stage now where we have a lot more cars in stock than we did three months ago because the Japanese imports are coming in ticking fast. Um we were kind of hovering between 15 and 20 cars in stock um at any one time up until 3 months ago. Now, we'd have at least 20 advertised, probably 10 more in prep and probably another five or six more waiting to go through prep. Um, as well as about 40 50 cars on the way from Japan at any one time. Um, and as well as all the private market stuff we're buying and all the uh UK cars we're buying. So, there's a lot of cars going through and we could definitely justify a mechanic at the moment, but we currently are renting two premises. Uh, one of them is an overflow yard uh for cars waiting to go through prep and soul cars and all the rest and the other one is our showroom and we don't have anywhere to put a workshop.

[00:02:01]So, the first con for me is not having the space.

[00:02:07]I would have to rent out a third unit.

[00:02:09]So that would be a big extra overhead.

[00:02:12]Um, and then another thing is that third unit would be offsite. So there'd be loads of over and back dropping off cars and I wouldn't really be able to keep an eye on things and manage it the way I'd want to manage it. Um, so as things stand, while we're in this current situation with our premises, uh, I don't think we're in a position to open up, uh, workshop. Now, there is a mechanic in the unit behind us. If he was ever to leave, I would be open to taking that on and putting a mechanic in there, 100%.

[00:02:49]Uh, we also have our panel meters at the very back of the unit. Um, so it really would be a one-stop shop and it would be ideal. Uh, another con to opening up a workshop and having a mechanic is obviously the bigger overhead. So, you have the initial investment of the workshop which would be about 30 grand. Um, sounds like a lot of money, but with the money we're given for outsourcing, we probably wouldn't be too long making that back. So, that wouldn't be the end of the world. But then you've got an extra member of staff who has to take holidays, who is entitled to sick pay and pension and all the rest. And rightly so, I'm not saying that they shouldn't be entitled to that, but if they're sick, if they're on holidays, my cars aren't getting prepped. So while having one mechanic would have those issues, if you were to go full scale opening up a workshop and doing all your own work inhouse, you need at least two mechanics. So now your overheads are really ballooning and depending on the mechanics you get in, your stress levels could be ballooning, too.

[00:04:03]I don't know anything about the mechanical side of the B business. Well, I know a bit, but I don't know anything about managing mechanics. I've never had to do it. Um, so from what I hear, mechanics are not the easiest type of people in the world to manage. They have a very hard job. Uh, very labor intensive, and it can be hard to get them to work efficiently. So, you'd have to be lucky and get really, really good lads. Another issue would be that if I was to have one or two mechanics, the chances of them two guys being a or girls being able to know everything and diagnose every issue and solve every problem that I throw at them is fairly slim. The reason curtains are so efficient for me is because they have seven guys there, including the owner.

[00:04:52]One guy is really quick at doing timing belts, clutches, all the rest, but they have another guy for rebuilding engines.

[00:04:58]They have another guy for electrical stuff and Evan does a lot of the diagnostics. So there is a man for every job there. And if I send up, for example, an Audi A3 that needs a belt, has a wiring issue, and has another funny sensor coming up that we don't know what the issue is between them all, they'll be able to sort it. But if I only have two guys there, one might have a background in BMW and the other might have a background in, we'll say, Audi, between the two of them, they'll be great at BMWs and great at Audi's, but if I have a Merc that's in there with an issue, they may not have seen it before, and they may not be very quick with it.

[00:05:36]Um, so in order to have a fully functioning garage, I really do think you need four or five lads there who specialize in different things. And if you're talking four or five different lads, you need to have outside work to fund that.

[00:05:57]And outside work, although it sounds great, more revenue, more cash coming into the business, outside work is supposed to be an absolute nightmare. I don't think it's something I ever want to get involved in. I did think I wanted to for a long time for the extra money, but from talking to people on the in the trade, seriously, the last few months, um I really don't think it's the can of worms I want to open. And if you're going to have the huge garage with all the lifts and the four or five mechanics and dealing with all the stress of the outside work as well, you're going to need more admin staff. Your overheads are just going to get out of control, completely out of control. My overheads are already gone up a lot compared to what they were, we'll say, a year and a half ago even, with the extra staff, the price of fuel, uh the price of everything going up. So, it's definitely not something that I fancy taking on anytime soon, if ever. Another thing is I am not from a mechanical background, so I might find it a little bit hard to get mechanics to work efficiently and effectively. So, I'd probably on top of that have to get a service manager in.

[00:07:09]And look, mechanics by nature, they have a very hard, labor intensive job. they kind of need someone there all the time to encourage them and to make sure that they're doing things properly and efficiently and not cutting corners. Um, this is just from what I'm told from other business owners. Um, so you'd have a big wage bill and they might actually be that efficient. Um, so, so outsourcing to Evan for example, he's there on top of the lads, helping the lads, helping them with everything, helping them diagnose, and things are just running smoothly because him, the owner, is there. Um, so quality control is actually something that would probably go down if I had my own workshop. Um I think the quality of work is going to be better from outsourcing because you have the owner of the garage there who takes pride in their work who is doing it for himself as well as doing it for me the customer and things are getting done efficiently.

[00:08:16]So from a quality control perspective and I know this from talking to other people who have car sales businesses um who've been there and done it they say outsourcing is the way to go for quality control. very very expensive but if you keep your customers happy they'll keep coming back to you and it'll come back to you in down the line if you are looking after people and giving a good service.

[00:08:42]Sometimes a garage can have their own workshop and they don't have a head mechanic there.

[00:08:50]They have your your normal in-house mechanics and warranty issues are coming back on repeat and customers are getting frustrated and it's just not a good time for anyone. Now, that isn't to say you mightn't get five unbelievable lads who are just fighting to nail every day and who are able to diagnose every single issue and there's no problems, but this is the real world. This is the motor trade. I don't think that is realistic.

[00:09:17]So, my thinking is, and I couldn't do it right now, I would need more space. If the mechanic behind me was to leave, I would consider renting out that unit and putting a mechanic in there, is like this comment suggested, getting someone who has BMW experience, who could maybe work on all the BMWs that we have in stock, and I could outsource the rest to Evan uh at Curtains Garage. He could do the Audi's, the Beamers, the Volkswagens, etc. That would be a good help. And if I ever ran out of BMWs on a week, what we could do with that mechanic as well is get them to go and buy stock on the private market. Uh go and check out the cars, load them up up on the truck before we send a payment. Uh and that would free up me and James, well, more so James and let him focus on selling. Um so I think going forward for the next year anyway, we're going to keep going the way we are. We'll deal with the bottlenecks.

[00:10:13]It's not the end of the world. We're still doing really well and shifting a lot of metal. But going forward in the next couple of years, I think a hybrid system of doing a little bit of in-house and a little bit of outsourcing would probably be the weight of