Shop Name: Schoen Auto Repair
Owner(s): Ben & Heather Lee
Location (city, state): East Rochester, New York
Staff Size: 5
Shop Size (in square feet): 5,000 square feet
Number of bays: 5
Average Monthly Car Count: 170
Annual Revenue ($): $800,000
Neighborhood Garage
Schoen Auto has the classic industrial aesthetic you’d associate with an auto repair shop. It’s got a fresh coat of gray paint over a cinder block-constructed exterior and features a metal entrance under a red awning three-quarters the way down the roadside facing part of the building.
Operated by Ben and Heather Lee, the shop is commercially zoned within a residential area. The pair have plans to relocate soon.
“We're already in the stages to build a new building, a larger building,” says Ben Lee, who worked at the shop eight years before acquiring it in 2018.
Ahoy, Come Aboard!
Once inside the shop, guests are greeted by Schoen’s service writer Matthew Roy, who is also a member of a local children’s musical entertainment troupe known as The Happy Pirates. Roy infuses the shop with a shot of positive energy to enhance the customer’s experience and offers a more than pleasant phone presence.
On the walls of the shop, pictures of Rochester hang to give it a local vibe and there’s a waiting room complete with coffee and refreshments. A glass window separates the lobby from the shop, which allows customers to see inside the work area.
Keeping It Tidy
Schoen Auto has one main garage door that opens to reveal five bays.
“When you go through the garage door, you can see two lifts right in front of you and then two lifts to your right, and one lift behind you, which is the bay that is directly in front of that glass that our that our customers can see,” Lee says.
He keeps a tidy shop devoid of tool litter and inventory clutter for a more polished environment, which is in line with what his customers have come to expect.
“We've got all of our equipment packed, tucked away in a corner so that it's not an eyesore. We try to keep the shop clean. We don't keep a lot of inventory on hand because it can clutter up the shop,” he adds. “We've got laptops for each tech, and we just bought a brand new scan tool.”
Schoen stands on its three pillars mission statement: education, experience, and honesty. It’s something his technicians and service writer understand and his customers have come to expect.
“We take detailed notes. We can't let a person leave the shop not fully understanding the work that was performed and the value that they got out of their repair,” Lee says.
