There are tons of daily and long-term decisions you have to make to continue growing your business. That means there's a lot of information to keep track of to stay organized.
With the right tools, like real-time reports in your shop management system, it's easier to organize and track everything happening in your shop and to use all of that data at your disposal. In this case, that tool is a modern shop management system.
With every aspect of your shop managed and tracked with a cloud-based SMS, shop owners can use real-time reports to forecast the health of their business and gain a sense of how much money their garage is expected to make before the end of a week, month, or year.
Here are the most important auto repair shop metrics to track in a cloud-based shop management system.
1. Realtime Productivity
It’s good practice for business owners to have a strong understanding of not only their team's performance overall but also the clarity they need to drill down to look at individual performance as well.
While the exact metrics might differ, both technicians' and service advisor productivity output can be measured. Then armed with the right information, owners can identify and celebrate the wins, while also identifying and working towards areas of improvement.
How Realtime Productivity Reports Power Decisions
With your finger on the pulse of your team's productivity, you can better invest in their growth.
For example, you'll understand which technicians or advisors might be in need of more training. You can then work together to create a plan to help them reach their maximum potential, and measure their progress over time.
Another idea could be leveraging your team's performance data to gamify your shop management.
2. Profit Details
The Profit Details Report gets into the nitty-gritty of the profits you’ve made across all repair orders during a given time period, as well as within individual repair orders.
How Profit Detail Data Powers Decisions
Understanding where your profits are coming from, and the ratio of your profits, over time, enables you to adjust your pricing for parts, labor, sublets, and fees so you can strike better profit margins and investigate anything that looks off.
For example, you might see that your total parts profit was only a couple hundred dollars during a particular month. If this number is lower than what you’re used to seeing, you can start reviewing individual repair order details to try pinpointing the reason behind the lower number.
3. Declined Jobs
It’s an understatement to say that customers don’t always approve every line item on their estimates.
There are some repairs that they want to save for later. The Declined Jobs Report helps service advisors keep track of each “no” so they can reach out to that customer later and get a “yes.”
How Declined Jobs Data Powers Decisions
It’s easier to sell work to existing customers than to sell work to new customers. When a customer declines a job that’s not pressing, service advisors gain a natural conversation opener.
So, when the time for that repair rolls around, a service advisor can contact that customer, say the time has come around for that repair, and ask them if they’d like to come into the shop. Bam, that’s a sale!
4. Sales Details
Understanding your shop's data not only enables you to maximize your profit margins, but also see exactly what brings in the largest profit, and even helps you identify where your biggest losses might be coming from.
How much have you sold in parts and labor over a given time range?
How much money have you collected from sublets, fees, and taxes?
What’s the dollar amount of the discounts you’ve given customers?
How Sales Details Data Powers Decisions
Of course, profit will always give you a more accurate understanding of how your business is doing financially since it reflects your business’s bottom line.
But your sales (revenue) numbers will give you a picture of your top line: exactly how much money is coming in.
You might see, for example, that you have high revenue, but in comparison, your profits are low. That gives you a clue that your business expenses might be too high.
You might end up ordering more parts than you end up using, you might lose a part in a deep dark corner of your shop, a part might get stolen, or a part might just accidentally get left out of a repair estimate.
When used together, Tekmetric’s Parts Purchased Report and Parts Usage Report can help you and your team keep track of the parts in your shop. You can see if you’ve actually been using what you’ve been buying and make adjustments as needed.
How Parts Purchased and Usage Data Power Business Decisions
Used together, the data in each parts report will help you identify any discrepancies with your parts that show up during the accounting and repair process.
For example, if the Parts Purchased Report indicates that your shop purchased 50 units of a particular part last quarter, but only five of those units were used, you have a starting point to figure out if your shop can scale back.
6. End of Day Metrics
Think of the End of Day Report as a holistic overview of how effectively your shop has been selling repair work during a given time range (you’re not limited to just viewing your shop’s stats on a day-to-day basis!).
In other words, the End of Day Report breaks down your shop’s overall shop metrics for the time range of your choosing.
How Real-Time Data Powers Decisions
The data found in your End of Day report can power various short-term and long-term business decisions that help you maintain a profitable shop over time.
For example, if you see that your gross profit dipped over the previous month, you can check a few other data sources to find the root of the problem, like how many new customers your marketing efforts have yielded and your current parts and labor rates.
Make Decisions Backed by Data
Sometimes we start with the “blank page” problem. Or put another way, you don’t know what you don’t know. Without clarity into exactly what’s happening in your shop, it can be difficult to identify the best opportunities to simplify, maximize, or even grow your business.
But when you make business decisions based on real-time data, you have peace of mind that the numbers are backing you up—that yes, it’s time to hire three new technicians or install another bay.
Features that enable you and your team to work more efficiently
Features that enable you and your team to enhance the customer experience
Ultimately, the modern features we’re about to dive into will free up your time as a shop owner. Instead of stressing over small day-to-day details, you’ll be able to focus more on the high-level aspects of advancing your business.
With Digital Vehicle Inspections shops can go the extra mile and introduce a new level of transparency through a frictionless experience for the customer.
They can get clear pictures or videos to show them what's wrong, have the inspection results sent to their email, and approve or decline work with just the click of a button.
However, while this is super simple for the customer, for Service Advisors, finding the right inspection can be time-consuming. Especially when your shop is training new service advisors and introducing them to your standard operations.
To save your Service Advisor's time and effort, we are excited to announce our newest feature: Default Inspections.
This feature streamlines the inspection process and makes it easier for you to provide great service to your customers.
Scaling your auto repair business requires moving beyond simple spreadsheets and paper repair orders. You need a robust shop management software that has enterprise-level features, centralized real-time reporting, and helps you provide a consistent customer experience across locations.
This guide breaks down the top enterprise software solutions for auto repair shops with 2+ locations.
Top 5 Enterprise Solutions for Shops With Multiple Locations
Finding the right software partner for your expanding shop is critical to your success. Below you will find our top overall picks for multi-shop operators (MSOs).
Multi-shop owners love Tekmetric because they can run their entire business, across all locations, from one platform. Featuring an all-in-one shop management solution with centralized real-time reporting, marketing, payments, and 70+ integrations, Tekmetric makes it easier for you to manage multiple locations. Why we picked Tekmetric:
Centralized reporting: Real-time dashboards enable you to see how each location is performing. You can track financials, employee performance, shop metrics, ARO, car count, and more.
All-in-one solution: Instead of switching between platforms, Tekmetric offers shop management, POS, and CRM in one place.
Company history: Built by a former shop owner, Tekmetric is often praised for ease of use, simple onboarding, reliable support, and listening to customer feedback.
Shop-Ware is designed to help you maintain consistency across multiple locations with unified customer history, reporting, and employee management features.
Why we picked Shop-Ware:
Reporting: Find the metrics that matter the most to your business.
Customer experience: Standardize your customer experience across locations.
Employee management: Easily compare employee productivity and manage permission levels.
Protractor is a popular shop management system for shops with multiple locations or franchises. Protractor offers advanced reporting features and shop management features so you can run your shop confidently.
Why we picked Protractor:
Reporting: Performance tracking, insights, and employee productivity monitoring.
Fullbay specializes in heavy-duty truck and trailer repair shops. Most standard shop software struggles with the complexity of fleet maintenance, but Fullbay was built for it.
Why we picked Fullbay:
Centralized inventory: Track parts and inventory across all locations.
Integrations: Fullbay has plenty of industry interrogations to keep your shop running.
If you are looking for a lighter software solution, Garage360 might be a good option for your shop. Supporting quick-lube, body/collision, and fleet, Garage360 can be used in a variety of shops.
Why we picked Garage360:
Versatile: Can be used in multiple shop types.
Permission control: Manage your employee permissions across locations.
Reporting: Pull the data you need to make informed decisions.
Pricing: Starting at $79/mo (billed annually).
Which software features should I look for when I manage multiple shops?
If you are comparing software options for your chain operations, these are the modern features to look for:
Centralized real-time reporting: Tired of trying to guess how each shop location is performing? Pick a software that can pull the data you need from any location or aggregate it across shop locations within a user-friendly dashboard.
Inventory/parts management: Tracking parts can be difficult as you expand. Find a solution that can track inventory levels and transfer parts as needed across locations.
Standardized workflows: Having standard workflows streamlines your shop operations. Select a software that can standardize your operations, prices, and procedures.
Employee permissions:Managing employee permissions is critical to ensuring the safety of your company data and holding employees accountable. Pick a software that keeps your business secure.
Single vs. Multi-Location Management: What are the differences?
Why can’t you just use a single-shop system? The difference lies in automation and control.
Standardization: In a multi-location setup, you need to ensure that technicians at every shop are following the same workflow and procedures so your customer experience is consistent.
Visibility: Single shop software may have reporting, but you need to be able to compare metrics between shops to make informed business decisions.
Security: Multi-shop software provides employee permission settings and typically comes with advanced data protection.
Pricing: Most single-shop software options will charge you per user or limit repair orders. Enterprise software will grow with you and charge based on the number of locations.
Final Thoughts
Choosing an enterprise-level auto repair shop software isn't just about features; it's about finding a partner that helps you maintain a consistent customer experience as you grow. Whether you prioritize inventory management, deep metrics, or standard procedures, ensure you find a solution that can grow with you.
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