Empty Shop? Do it Right. Competition Doesn’t Matter

There Is No Competition If Your Heart Is Right

Here’s the thing about competition… there isn’t any if your heart is right.

Most of my customers aren’t sitting around worrying about “market share.” They’re trying to keep their schedule full. Keep plates spinning. Keep work coming in and going out the door without problems.

That’s real life in this industry.

So while I can sit here and talk about how I approach business, the truth is—it’s the same thing you need to do in your shop.

I want what’s best for my customer. Period. I work for them. Period.

If there was a product that worked better for you, it would be on my truck.

If there was a company that could take better care of you, I’d go work for them.

That’s not marketing. That’s how I look at this.

Because at the end of the day, you’re not competing on products. You’re not competing on price.

You’re competing on trust.

And trust doesn’t come from saying the right thing. It comes from doing the right thing—over and over again.

Let me give you a real example.

When I owned my shop, I can think of exactly three customers I could not make happy.

Not three types of customers. Three people. I remember their names.

The first one… honestly, there was nothing we were going to do to make him happy. He had done the same thing to multiple car dealerships and detail shops.

We agreed to refund him and walk away as friends. That should have been the end of it.

It wasn’t.

He badmouthed us everywhere he could.

And you know what we did? We stayed positive. Every response, every conversation—we stayed professional.

To this day, I don’t think he realizes he was our best marketing.

People saw how we handled it. People saw who we were. And that mattered more than anything he said.

The second one… the work was good. No issues there.

But she had problems with our location and our communication.

And whether we agreed with it or not, it didn’t matter.

We learned from it.

Because here’s the truth—if one customer says something, there are 100 more thinking it.

That one situation made us better. We tightened up how we communicated. We paid more attention to how easy we were to work with.

That’s how you grow.

The third one… we just flat out screwed up.

No excuses.

We had a squeegee that was scratched. It scratched the tint during install. We saw a dog hammock in the car and tried to blame it on that.

We were wrong.

And it cost us.

It took me six months of constant, positive communication to earn that customer’s trust back. Six months of not getting defensive. Six months of showing up, owning it, and doing what I could to make it right.

Eventually, he gave us the opportunity to fix it.

That one stuck with me.

Because that’s the part people don’t talk about—when you mess up.

And you will mess up.

That’s where your reputation actually gets built.

Not when everything goes right. When it doesn’t.

So when I say there’s no competition if your heart is right, this is what I mean.

It’s not about being perfect.

It’s about how you show up for your customers—especially when things aren’t perfect.

Pricing? Yeah, it matters. But it’s just a number.

Convenience? It matters too. But that’s just part of doing your job right.

Service? Everyone says they have it.

But real service is when your customer is trying to make a comeback and comes up a little short—and you make it work.

Real service is when your customer loses his shop, and you go to his house. Not for the sale—for the customer.

That’s the difference.

I grew up working in my grandfather’s lumberyard.

He knew his customers by name. He didn’t waste a stick of lumber—even if it was warped. And he always took care of people.

Not because it was good business.

Because it was the right thing to do.

So competition?

If someone can take better care of your customers than you can, they should use them.

Same goes for me.

But if you focus on doing right by your customers—consistently, honestly, even when it’s hard…

You’ll find out real quick you’re not actually competing with anyone.

You’re just building something most people aren’t willing to.