Walk into Christine Tanner’s office and you’ll find a wooden ampersand symbol with June 25th, 2022 on it. The date is the day that Tanner took over as full-time owner at Bulldog Tire & Auto. The meaning behind the ampersand is both inspirational and heartbreaking.
The ampersand, Tanner explains, is a broken infinity symbol, which shows that nothing will last forever. A year prior to Tanner taking over the shop, her husband, Mike, who owned the shop, passed away. They would have been together 25 years.
The ampersand also symbolizes hope for Tanner, as it is the symbol for “and.”
“There is always an ‘and’ and my story will continue,” Tanner says.
The day Tanner took over as shop owner, she stepped into a new role so she could build on the legacy that her husband started.
Backstory:
Mike Tanner opened Bulldog Auto & Tire in Arkansas, Kansas in 2017. At the time, Christine worked in corporate America as a brand manager. The couple found out that Mike’s kidneys were failing and they got on a transplant list in 2018. In August of 2020, they found out there was a kidney available.
“We were looking forward to this–it would give him back his energy and outlook on life,” Tanner says. “He was in the end stage but he wasn’t on dialysis and we had a good match. We were very hopeful.”
Unfortunately, over the course of the transplant, he developed sepsis. It was 10 months of being very sick, being in and out of the hospital, and surgeries. In June of 2021, Mike passed away.
“Your life is just changed,” Tanner says.
Problem:
During those 10 months, Tanner was her husband’s caregiver and helped manage the shop from a distance while also doing her full-time job remotely. They were fortunate to have a great team in place at Bulldog who were able to keep the shop running while Mike was sick. They continued to run the shop for a full-year after he passed while Tanner was faced with a difficult decision–keep her job that she was comfortable with or take a leap on something she knew very little about–running an auto repair shop.
The answer for Tanner was keeping her husband’s legacy alive. She left behind corporate America and took over ownership of the shop. However, her and her husband had different management styles and she knew very little about auto repair. After an incredibly difficult journey she was faced with another daunting task–actually running the shop.
Solution:
Luckily, Tanner had people at the shop that she could rely on and she still has two people that work for her that worked for her husband. She says that they often talk about what Mike would have done in certain situations. Still, she was entering a male-dominated industry that she knew very little about. She knew she needed to learn how to be a more assertive leader and establish better boundaries.
“I had a big fear to overcome–I’m not a tech. How do I know what I'm doing?,” Tanner says. “I used that as an excuse. I can’t use it as an excuse.”
So, Tanner joined a coaching group with Rick White and that helped her get through to today. She now has friendships with shop owners across the country that she’s able to bounce ideas off of.
“There’s no situation that’s unique to me,” Tanner says.
Tanner is also a part of MWACA, which provided some initial mentoring for her and has been a great resource for her.
Tanner has learned that what she thought was her biggest weakness–the fact that she wasn’t a tech–is actually a strength.
Aftermath:
When Tanner took over, she admits that she probably lost some customers but she also says that they’ve seen customers that they wouldn’t have had. She believes that being a woman and having a different management style has helped her shop stand out.
“I wanted to be the shop where you can ask any question,” Tanner says. “I will explain anything.”
Tanner has gone so far as to hold car clinics for women and for customers who are 50 and over.
Takeaway:
Tanner knows that she’ll never know everything that there is to know about running a shop and that she’ll always be working on that. One key lesson that she’s learned is that you can’t let fear keep you from taking a chance. Pushing through the fear is key and Tanner was able to do that by finding mentors that she trusts that have helped her along the way.
What would her husband think of the job that she’s doing?
“He’d be proud of me,” Tanner says.
No doubt that he is.
