“I loved being my mother’s hero growing up. Whether it was fixing a toaster or getting something that was stuck out of the oven, I’ve liked fixing things since I was young,” says Bill Nalu, owner of Interstate Auto Care in Madison Heights, Mich.
“Fixing things” and failing forward in an attempt to make something work again is what Nalu has always admired about working with cars. In fact, it was a failed attempt in purchasing a car that led him down the path toward a career in the automotive industry many years ago.
“I’ll never forget it. It was the week of my 16th birthday,” Nalu recalls. “My father and I drove across Detroit to the proverbial used car lot. He knew nothing about cars and I knew even less than that. There were two cars to choose from in my price range—a ’74 Ford Pinto and a ’75 Dodge Dart—so I did what any ‘wise’ 16-year-old does and chose the two-door.”
As the story goes, the car broke down on the drive home, just a mere two miles away from his driveway. To try and get the car back up and running, Nalu signed up for auto mechanics in high school, and while he learned several valuable skills that set the tone for the rest of his career, the car never really ran long enough for him to rely on it. It was a series of life lessons steeped in the value of trust, and is what has led him to make it one of the foundations of his business.
“Trust is a privilege,” Nalu says. “My customers’ trust translates to a predictable exchange of ideas, concerns and communication around the transaction. And when transactions repeat themselves in an expected manner, you have yourself a database of thousands of customers.”
It’s that mentality that’s led to patrons returning to his shop for 10, 15, and even 20 years.
“When a customer comes in, not because they need work done on their car, but because they were in the neighborhood and want to chat over a cup of coffee, that’s the biggest compliment we can get,” he says.
That’s why it’s critical to Nalu that his customers feel comfortable when they step through his doors.
“One of the most underutilized talents in the auto service industry is customer service,” he says. “The modern automobile is the most important consumer product in the universe. Everything from the newest cell phone technology to electronics is included in today’s modern engines.”
That’s why car owners should trust the folks working on their vehicles, because when it comes to trust, failure is unacceptable. It’s why Nalu and his team only use products they trust themselves.
“There’s something to be said about a product that works. You know it worked 30 years ago and you know it works now,” Nalu says.
As a fan since the eleventh grade (when he started auto mechanics), Nalu trusts Techron to treat his customers’ cars with care and to keep their fuel systems running efficiently.
“Preventative maintenance is such an important factor,” he explains. “Today’s vehicles are more stingy with fuel, and with the pressure to increase fuel economy standards, decarbonization is so critical. It’s easy fixes like these, and products like Techron, that are so important to the longevity of your car, which is designed to keep you on the road for hundreds of thousands of miles.”
To learn more about Techron, visit www.techronclean.com.
