Riverview, New Brunswick, is a pleasant East Coast town neatly located between the banks of the Petitcodiac River and the Acadian Forest, not too far from Moncton.

Autosphere is always on the lookout for a successful and confident Automotive Service Provider to reveal to you and maybe throw some advice: some ‘get ahead’ tips that you as an ASP can use in your own business because it has worked for them. We like to ask warehouses and jobbers who they would like to recommend as a good service provider, someone who has provided their customers with what they need—a spot-on fix and great service. With that in mind, this month’s featured ASP is Darren Philips of Darren Philips Auto Repair.

Following a dream

Darren Philips started his own auto repair business in February 2003 after working for GM dealers for 15 years. “At the age of 33, I finally decided to follow my dream of owning my own shop—Darren Phillips Auto Repair—which is located in Riverview, New Brunswick. I started out with one bay first, then I went to two bays. After a few years I added two more bays and after a few more years, I finally added three more bays. In addition, I put in a comfortable. waiting room for our customers,” he tells us.

Darren Phillips Auto Repair has grown to now employ seven technicians—four licensed techs and three apprentices, plus a windshield tech and two service advisors. “I sincerely believe in training the next generation of techs, but this does come with some downfalls as does any training in any industry,” Phillips relates.

Windshield installations

“We took on a windshield business a couple of years ago to broaden our scope of work and now we also do ADAS calibrations to complete our windshield installations successfully. Because we constantly need it, our ongoing training consists of NAPA courses and online courses through distributors. I decided early on not to go with a banner program. In addition, we have a very good relationship with our customers and know most of them by name; indeed, most of them are just like family to us here at our repair shop.”

As a GM tech, Darren was fully trained on servicing General Motors vehicles, but did not have the needed training for other makes and models on the road. He says, it was a steep learning curve in order to feel comfortable with working on other vehicles in use today. He related that this is where good information platforms come into play.

Using learning platforms

Darren states, “We have used just about every learning platform such as Motor, Mitchell 1, Identifix, etc. Today, we as a shop use Identifix as we find it to contain most of what we need to repair the vehicles we work on so successfully. As for our diagnostic equipment, we have used Snap-on, Launch and Autel, with Autel being the tool most of our techs like using best.

“I believe we have been successful in business over the last 23 years because of our commitment to customer satisfaction. I know any business must be profitable to be successful—you need repeat customers that have faith in your abilities and your integrity. Our main commitment is to our customers first and always!” Darren states emphatically.

Looking to the future, he says that “I see the automotive repair industry being around for a very long time as I do not perceive AI doing our jobs. I see that the future for young people today is very different from years gone by and I think their future is in the trades because of AI, since a lot of other jobs are going to be replaced by the AI technology! But let’s face it—you are always going to need a carpenter, a plumber, an electrician, an auto tech—the list goes on and on!”