Are you using the right PPF gear to make money?

Chevy Cobalt

Woe is the SUV and truck markets when sales figures are discussed these days. First the high fuel costs the public has gone amnesiac on. Then the economic downturn that readjusted the purchase and use of larger vehicles to low levels.

Miles Hubbard, of Katzkin Leather, knows the 'inside' business.

Bedliner systems, coatings and equipment —  spray-on, drop-in, roll-on, etc. — were created to protect truck beds and give them longer life, as well as protect the sundry items people place, lay, set, shove or throw into the beds. Like any safeguard, each has its benefits based on driver preference. Following are some of the bedlining systems to consider as you show your clients what might best be suited to their own purposes.

If you want to keep your customers coming back to your shop, give them a surprise. Do something unexpected for them, and your name will earn a prominent place in their mental filing cabinet, securely filed under Shops to return to and Shops to recommend.

The surprise you give your customers doesn’t have to be a big one. In fact, simple, small touches resonate with meaning and make them feel like their car is more than just another job on your list.

We’ve all heard the phrase, “Let’s rock and roll.” It usually means let’s get started or let’s ramp up this project a notch or two. For Jared Pugh and his Rock & Roll Offroad (R&RO), it means both. Starting in 2003, Pugh kicked his hobby into formal business, but you wouldn’t know it by looking at it. That’s because R&RO looks more like an event than a business. And that’s just the image Jared Pugh wants.

Automotive aftermarket customers rank near the top of the list when it comes to pe  -Read more-

Back in August I took a break from the everyday work world and spent some time in Alaska, driving around, hiking up a couple of those massive mountains (the smaller ones, certainly not Denali/McKinley), wending through willows along bear-scatted-and-tracked trails, and boating in one of those glacier-fed bays in one of the most-impressive and magnificent  places in North America.

The 49th state’s gotten plenty of play of late, what with its governor being named a vice presidential candidate and one of its very-long-time senators being indicted for not disclosing hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of gifts and services he received from an oil services contractor.

Reality stinks. But, then, what’s really real?

Overall car sales are dramatically down; dealerships have been paring sales, service and secretarial staffs; fleet business to rental car, government and commercial buyers has slumped; automakers have been running on a fume and a prayer desperately looking for the right formula to nudge consumers onto their lots and into their showrooms; and Washington has been devising tax breaks and other dollar-saving incentives to catch the auto nation public’s eye. Plus, in the wake of the $50 billion Madoff ponzi scheme, more questionable investment machinations that for years had garnered great returns, often for the well-heeled, have collapsed, revealing their inner-workings’ failings.

Bob Lutz is doing it again.

The 77-year-old vice chairman of marketing at the new GM is moving as fast as President Barack Obama — whose first eight months have been marked by rapid-fire national legislation — to remake, reposition, rebuild, re-promote, refine and help rewrite GM’s future history.

And with GM’s too-iffy record on vehicles that people really want, a real marketing maven is needed.

But does GM really have one? The one?

Lutz came out of a planned retirement at the behest of CEO Fritz Henderson to help bring GM into the 21st century. Lutz immediately took over responsibility for advertising from Mark LaNeve, who had been GM's marketing chief since 2005. LaNeve retains responsibility for GM's U.S. sales.