Tales from the road: Making it memorable

Sept. 3, 2018
Mac Tools dealer Brian Teets goes the extra mile to make his customers feel appreciated.

After working as a service manager at a Ford dealership, Brian Teets of Delaware, Ohio, decided that he didn’t want to stop working in the automotive industry. After weighing his options, Teets realized there hadn’t been a Mac Tools dealer in the area for a number of years.

“That’s what pushed me towards Mac,” Teets says. “I wanted to stay in the business. I’m not really in the business anymore, but I’m still in and out of dealerships and I’m around cars all the time.”

He has been driving a tool truck for two years now, and he says, “I love it. I wouldn’t tell anybody not to do it.” Teets seems to have found success from the start, and was a bronze level dealer in 2017, his first full year driving a tool truck.

Being a new dealer for a flag that hasn’t been in the area for a while, Teets had to put in an extra effort starting out to gain the trust of local technicians.

“I’m still fighting an uphill battle against our Snap-on guys around here, so that’s my biggest challenge,” he says. “But I’m slowly climbing the mountain.”

Teets drives a mixed route in his 18’ Chevrolet C5500, partially urban and partially rural. He stops at a variety of locales, including heavy duty truck shops, farms, airports, Meineke Car Care Centers and, of course, dealerships.

Along his route, Teets says that while he offers an assortment of products, a few have stood out as top sellers.

“I sell a mixture of everything every week,” he says. “We had a promo last month on multimeters and I had a hard time keeping those on the truck. I sold bunches of those.”

Teets also mentions a unique tool that he says has gotten great feedback from customers.

“One thing that guys are asking me for that I’ve been selling ... is the [Lock Technology] Texas Twister,” he says. “It’s a neat tool, and it does  exactly what it’s designed to do. People love it so far.”

Teets notes a couple of other items that customers like, including the Mac MDT 10 scan tool and the cordless 20V 1/2” drive impact wrench.

“As far as I’m concerned, our 20V 1/2” impact gun is basically top of the line,” he says. “I have won battles with our competitors’ guns out on the road. Comparing one to the other ... putting lug nuts on and taking them off. I can put lug nuts on with my 20V and my competitor’s gun won’t budge it.”

A tool dealer couldn’t ask for a better demo than that.

One big-ticket item that all dealers love to sell is a toolbox. But Teets takes a slightly different approach when he makes a box sale; he makes it a special experience for the customer.

“I had a toolbox sale on Wednesday, and I kind of like to make a big deal out of it when somebody buys a toolbox [from] me,” he says. “Instead of being at the shop for 20 minutes or half an hour, I was there well over an hour taking pictures and putting the drawer liners in for him, and helping him switch stuff over from his [old] box into his Mac box. A lot of times I’ll put the box out beside my truck and put [the customer] over there and take their picture against the side of the truck, and I always put them on Facebook. Guys like that.”

While it’s hard work and long hours, Teets doesn’t seem to regret his decision to become a tool dealer one bit.

“It’s something you have to work at,” he says. “There’s a lot of work involved in this – it’s not your normal ‘eight-to-five and go home and forget about it.’ It’s 12-plus hours a day sometimes, and then you don’t even forget about it when you get to go home.

“But, you reap the rewards instead of someone else. You’re your own boss. That’s Mac’s slogan: Be your own boss. And it’s true, we are our own boss.”

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