Lost Links to BDR to X Line Rotors

We lost the links form BDR to our X Line rotors --but very quick reaction by Greg Guyitt solved this -- a call to Greg H and they are now back in our system. We loss links when CARQUEST updates the description filed -- in 95 out of 100 times they leave the description field alone - but when they do update -- we can lose any of our unique data.

We will have to check the end of day for Description fields better - a new years resolution by GH.

Since we keep monthly copies of our data in Excel -it is easy to grab and update
Here are the numbers affected.
53002
53004
5346
5356
5362
5371
5372
5373
5382
5386
5397
54010
54070
54079
5474
55014
55018
55034
55036
55038
55039
55040
55054
55066
55093
55094
55095
55097
5578
5580
80008

End of Month

End of Month is this Friday. Please make sure that the POS terminals get run off. Do not run them off again until Wednesday, September 5th. Make sure that whoever opens on Tuesday, September 4th changes the end of day status. Any questions call me.

Learning Center url

We have been having a problem with the URL ( web address ) for the new CARQUEST Learn Center -- now know what we are doing wrong

Wen you want to bookmark the site -- you will need to type or paste in just this ..... http://tigi.learn.com/independent


If you bookmark looks like this ---it will cause you problems
https://tigi.learn.com/login.asp?sessionid=3-5CCF8A66-7F50-48A5-99D5-5BC5DF8EDDAC&lcid=178418&requestedurl=learncenter%2Easp%3Fid%3D178418%26page%3D1&secure=true


See your store manager for user name and password -- so far each store shares a user name and password --eventually we will get individual user names and passwords -- but t his may take years more than one might think it should.

Christmas Party

I have tentatively booked our Christmas Party for this year at Colasanti's. It will be Saturday, December 15th. The menu is an evening buffet, there will be a DJ. We will have to share that night with other companies. The winery is out of our budget for this year. If anyone has strong objections to this location or the night please let me know ASAP.

Locking Hubs available

Just a gentle reminder that WARN locking hubs are available --see pages 285 in the old 2005 Service Lines cat ( or page OH 58 in 2007 once we get our store copies ( long story )). It seems there is no -e-cat for this just yet --working on

Auto Barn stocks one # UJ 51303

Sudbury store collapes !!

Sudbury store collapses !!

Talking with Moe from Sudbury --his one store collapsed !! Well - his steel shelving collapsed. What happened was the Rotor section collapsed and the resulting domino effect brought down the rest of the steel shelving and some walls that it was secured to!

THIS is important. We continue to add sku's one or two at a time --and we continue to add weight to this ever growing line. I am asking Managers to review the BDR line and to make a plan on to how to EXPAND BDR to other areas so we do NOT have an excess amount of weight on any one area.

To be discussed at next manager meeting.

As a side note --I am somewhat disappointed with CARQUEST --I feel that almost all jobbers will have a fair exposure to this problem and they should be sure to remind other jobbers of the peril to staff safety and to the extra cost of replacing all the shelving that is destroyed when it collapses. I will forward a note to Matt Davis and Steve Gushie.

Payroll

I will be doing payroll on Tuesday, August 28th. Make sure that all timesheets and vacation/sick days are handed in before then. Remember that I will be off on Wednesday, Augsust 29th and in on Friday, August 31st.

Non Smoking Vehicles

In order to avoid having to put non smoking stickers on the vehicles Ryan has asked me to draft a letter for all employees to sign, stating that they acknowldge that all vehicles are non smoking. I have made letters for all the stores. Please make sure that all employees sign these letters. They will need to print and sign their name. Return the letters to me, I will keep the originals here and I will forward copies to the stores to keep on file in case the Ministry stops in. I will also give you copies for each of the vehicles to be kept in them, in case anyone gets pulled over. Any questions let me know.

CTI stand alone TPMS course offered

Please check the CTI blog for details click here for details

Click ---- click here for enrollment form ------ for pdf form to enroll tech's

How many can you sign up?

This is a repeat of a course we offered last year --there are MANY SHOPS who did not attend - but need to know this data - these NEW shops are the shops we are targeting --will you help us?

expand your knowledge thru books

I saw this Globe & Mail article ....


EVERYBODY HATES THEIR BOSS

Here is the Amazon.com page --the reviews for many books are almost as good as reading the book ( and quicker & less money , too). Many reviews are very impressive in their summaries.
Amazon.com's reviews

I also saw an interesting book linked to the above - wow - the title says it all --- curious ?
look at the title of this book - this is original !

I hope we have few who say these happen in our work environment ... ?
Bob Sutton's List of The Dirty Dozen Common Everyday Actions That A**holes Use
1. Personal insults
2. Invading one's personal territory
3. Uninvited personal contact
4. Threats and intimidation, both verbal and non-verbal
5. Sarcastic jokes and teasing used as insult delivery systems
6. Withering email flames
7. Status slaps intended to humiliate their victims
8. Public shaming or status degradation rituals
9. Rude interruptions
10. Two-faced attacks
11. Dirty looks
12. Treating people as if they are invisible

Anyways -- we have strived to have a professional and successful atmosphere - but we have to keep checking with reality to make sure we haven't slipped up somewhere along the line

Open for comments ....

want a video ?

Try this ..... enjoy

engine assembly screensaver

Brake Shoe cores

Question-- 9 out 10 brake shore cores are NO BIG DEAL --and the cost to recycle them is nearly the cost to buy a new core. For example you have to price in the following:
- dollars tied up in core values
- cost to pick up cores
- cost to write core credits
- cost to pack and ship cores

BUT --there are some cores -as the example in the picture - a parking brake RING SHOE or shoes like 795 with special levers attached --where maybe there is some justification for a BLENDED LINE -- most are new cores and a handful are rebuild-able cores -- much like we are going to for the CV program.

Opinions? As a point - the 781 core adds $20 at the supplier lever - that works out to $30-$40 at the garage and end customer level.

Battle of the Glass Cleaners

Petes has challenged D&T to a duel to the death -- who's glass cleaner is better ... Petes is PROFORM PF513. And the winner is .... >????

Auto Barn seems oddly quiet on this

See previous post for Glass cleaner

Dormantraining.com

Have you enrolled in DormanTraining.com yet? Click click here to enroll. The training code is 'carquest'

Let Greg know if you have any trouble signing up ---good training

Menu Board available

Chris Allinotte at ext #3044 has these menu boards available --part # is TRM PM-MB05ECAN. ken has ordered one.

Any other customers have an interest --open to ALL customers and special pricing is $269 for August ( our deal )

new products - 3M

Greg Thompson ( our 3M rep) writes ....

1) The 3M Car Care line has been around for approx 10 years. Starting next year, we will be re-launching the line with completly new packaging and a new marketing program to try to put us in the Maguires league for retail car care products for the home consumer. If you can wait until the early part of 2008, I would recommend it. Nice packaging and some marketing to help do some pull through on the product line. Ièm looking forward to this launch.

2) We are launcing a number of products in September, including the wheel weight system, that are focussed on the mechanical market. Once they have been launched (mid Spetember), I will contact you and set up some meetings
to make that all of your stores are up on these products. We also have a product for cleaning around the base of the studs on the rotors that makes doing this job faster and easier than ever before.

Stay tuned for more details

Web Sites

We have been using the following web sites a lot lately both for information and parts ordering.
www.mevotech.com It is the most up to date and makes up for a lot of info not in JCON

www.eurorotor.com Helps make information easier to understand,plus we have have ordered a lot of late model rotors that World had in stock that we did not even have a listing on.So much for being first to market.If you want a good example look up pads and rotors for a 2005 chev silverado 1500 in j-con.You will have to go thru 4 pages of confusing information to figure out what parts are required.If you go to Euro Rotor the only thing you really had to know was,Is the truck 4 wheel disc or disc/drum.

Greg Guyitt

Special Order parts from Replex - BSP Bravo

We are adding a fair number of special order parts for the CARQUEST line BSP ( made by Replex Fasa ). For example the shoes BSP SLS 795 are now in our system - but they are NOT in the CARQUEST DC system. We have made sub-line #3 for all special order parts. Since we use a special billing schedule logic for BSP-- we have applied this same logic to these.

The 795 are a unique set --as some suppliers will have a CHEAP price -- but they do NOT give you the lever and PIN --and the PIN is the part that Greg Guyitt from Auto Barn tells me that the shops can NOT GET OUT to replace the shoes -so the cheap set is returned and the proper set is ordered and much time is lost by all.

We have FRI BS795 -- but we feel our customers deserve an option to the premium set - this we have waited LONG ENOUGH and have added this and will be adding more as the days go on.

NOTE --the CARQUEST DC will be calling us and saying --hey -- you ordered a BSP SLS795 - that is not a good part --at which time you ask them to 'special order it' for us.

We have made Toronto special order dept - AWARE that Replex is readily available from their Toronto warehouse --the sad fact that NO OTHER CARQUEST jobber has forced the issue until now. Replex warehouse is south of 401 close to Dixie Rd - in case you wanted to know --we added the data into our Plaxo address book as well - in case you need a phone #.

I understand that CARQUEST is still reviewing what additional #'s to add - but we asked for these in Jan 07 - and we feel we have waited long enough. Watch for more numbers to be added --we will LINK using the standard '@BSP 123' from either blue or red shoes so they show up in e-cat

can anyone beat this ? for a glass cleaner

I have had several professional cleaning ladies tell us that nothing seems to work better than RAD GC1 glass cleaner. Only D&T Auto stocks. We have tried AC Delco - they lost ...who is next to challenge the QUEEN of glass cleaners?

CARQUEST DirectHIT demo's #2

Jeff Meyer from Identifix gave us an update - he has signed J&J and Jerry's Auto to CARQUEST DirectHIT. Jeff says average demo takes 30-40 minutes and that the shops --INCE they realize that Jeff knows what he is talking about --really stay and listen and learn for that length of time.

I hope that all salesmen are getting some FACE TIME with our version of DirectHit --each store has one access point - so you can be a kinda knowledgeable user. our job is to NOT be an expert --and definitely NOT TO PROVIDE FREE ACCESS for shops - so think first.

Jeff Meyer can be reached at 866-698-1976 ext 2055 if you have questions.

Jeff is also demo'ing to Essex accounts as well.

ANN is not working

ANN is 'Automatic New Number' -- we have this set up for parts with movement code of 4 or better on major lines. So when something turns from say --a 6 to a 4 - Toronto will automatically send.

However - we have noticed that ONLY store # 1 is having the stock level properly set -- store # 2 and 3 are being ignored ... so an example of CFI 84073 -- it was returned by Petes ( as one would expect - since stock level is zero ) and was sold by A Barn before it could be returned --- but will not re-order.

We are asking that this be foxed asap --- stay tuned for details

new product from A&I Farm Products

Click on image to bring larger - these are in somewhat limited supply a times - as sales exceed stock -- are you getting your sales ?