All EpisodesAuto Care AssociationSeason: 1Episode: 106Cohost AIMMDYNAftermarket Data Reality Check

Welcome And Guest Introduction

Welcome to AutoCare on Air, a candid podcast for a curious industry. I'm Mike Chung, Senior Director of Market Intelligence at the Auto Care Association, and this is Indicators, where we identify and explore data that will help you monitor and forecast industry performance. This includes global economic data, industry indicators, and new data sources. Hello, everybody, and welcome to another edition of Auto Care on Air Indicators. I'm Mike Chung, and I'm happy to introduce Rob Petrowski. He's vice president of research at IMR. Welcome to the program, Rob. Thanks so much for joining us.

Thanks for having me, Mike. I appreciate the opportunity. Looking forward to it.

Yeah, and I've known you for a couple of years now, even prior to your joining IMR. So tell us a little bit about yourself, your career arc, a little bit about IMR. Would love to hear about that.

Sure. Sounds good. So my career in automotive started back in 2001 at a small uh boutique market research firm in the Detroit area called the ITB Group. And um it was great working for a small company early in my career. I highly recommend that. You know, there's just a lot more all hands on deck. There's less uh barriers between positions, and you get an opportunity to do a lot of different things. Um, and there um I did vehicle research and was fortunate to do some you know vehicle benchmarking, uh traveling to different auto shows around the world and Asia and Europe. So great early career experience. Um, and then from there I went on to an OE supplier, a Japanese Karetsu supplier called Koyo. And um I did automotive parts forecasting for their plants. And um, you know, each one of these stops, you get a lesson, right, Mike? And there it was, you know, uh how black swan events can impact the supply chain. So being responsible for forecasting, we had the tsunami tsunami in Japan in 2011, and I I saw firsthand how that can wreak havoc on a um an organization. Um, so after that, I went, I spent about a decade at uh Federal Mogul and Teneco and had another great experience there working with great people. Um, and a couple of the really uh notable things, you know, there we did a lot of um big data projects. You know, I was listening to your podcast with Nathan Shipley talking about what Circana does to collect point of sale data and inventory data. We were doing the same thing at uh, you know, a manufacturer level and had a lot of success with that. And then, you know, over time things change in the industry. The auto care demand index came out and we started to integrate that into what we were doing. So now we could measure, you know, measure our performance each month against a benchmark, you know, by category, by month. And we even used it to measure um our ROI for marketing activities. So um kind of watch the industry progress from a data standpoint. Um, and the other great thing that happened then was I got exposure to some new leadership that came from the CPG world, and you know, they really had the desire to do more sophisticated market research. So I got involved in things like you know, global customer segmentation and things like that. So um, and then naturally with that experience in market research, um, I transitioned over to IMR in 2024 when uh Bill Thompson decided to retire.

Oh, what a fascinating journey. I mean, being able to be in different segments of the industry, see firsthand parts manufacturing that can only just increase your kind of knowledge and I guess expertise and fluency with all things automotive, I would think, right?

Yep, and a good feel for you know the the big challenges that manufacturing plants or manufacturing companies face, both on the OE side and the aftermarket side. So it's been good kind of rounded out um experience in that way.

What IMR Does And Why

Terrific. And uh appreciate that you and your colleagues have used autocare products uh throughout different points of your career. And tell me a little bit more about IMR. I know that it's uh the uh, like you said, Bill retired, it's under kind of new ownership and so forth. Tell me a little bit about that.

Yeah, so I had a great relationship with Bill Thompson um while I was at um Federal Mogul and Teneco. And, you know, if I had a question about the industry, I would call Bill. And if he didn't have the answer, he would say, you know, talk to so-and-so. Um and we we try to continue that culture, by the way. We want our clients to call us uh with any kind of questions about the industry. But um Bill sold IMR after, you know, it's a 50-year-old company. He had been there almost the uh three decades, four decades, sold it to Endeavor B2B in 2023. Um, and then he stayed on for a year, um, and then was really looking for a successor in mid-2024. And because I was a big client of IMR during my time at Federal Mogul, and I was very familiar, especially with their syndicated data products, um, it was a natural fit. And um, so came on board with IMR and um it's been great so far. It's uh, you know, everything I anticipated on the IMR side, but what I didn't anticipate was um working with Endeavor B2B, these great publications they have, um, you know, National Oil and Lube News, Modern Tire Dealer, Ratchet and Wrench, the list goes on, um, fleet, fleet owner, fleet maintenance. And um, so from a research standpoint, having those great editors and subject matter experts available is tremendously uh valuable. And then if we're doing a strategy project for a client, once it's completed, we have this great media organization that can help them um with marketing for whatever they're doing. So that's been a great uh transition.

Inside IMR’s Consumer And Shop Surveys

Well, it sounds like a really good synergy and it makes a lot of sense for IMR to go under the uh Endeavor umbrella, if you will. And you mentioned there's syndicated research, there's also custom research. I mean, maybe for the benefit of those who are listening who are not as familiar with IMR, you know, maybe just tell us a little bit more about the company and your offerings.

Yeah, so the two main uh segments are syndicated survey data and then custom research. So on the syndicated side, we basically we're talking to 100,000 consumers a year. So we do a quarterly survey of 25,000 per quarter, and it's all about vehicle maintenance. So we start by asking them what vehicles are in their household. We record all of that information. Um, we ask them about their utilization of those vehicles, and then about repairs over the last three months. And we have about 200 parts and services that we're tracking in that survey. Um, and then all of that data, um, the outlet they selected, their DIY versus DIFM versus install it for me, all of that sort of path to purchase, and then the actual purchase event is recorded, and all of that is made available to our subscribers in an online query tool called WorldTab. Um, and the strength of what we're doing is the sample size, right? It's a huge survey, and so we have a lot of confidence in the data down to the year make and model level. Um, and um, so the other product is a repair shop survey product where we talk to 500 general repair shops a month, so 6,000 a year. And it's um a mix of general repair, tire, uh, quick lube, and and then break and muffler shops, repair uh specialists like that. And it's all about the traffic that they're seeing, their shop firmographics, and then we ask them about who their first call supplier is, second, third, why, you know, their awareness of different outlets, and then we get into category-specific questions. So basically, we cover five categories each month for the entire year. So at the end of the year, we've got 60 uh products covered. Um, so those are the syndicated products. Again, they're available through a um a user interface, and then we do also uh custom research projects of all types in those same areas, consumers and repair shop environment, and that we get beyond that into collision and things like that as well. So, but mostly probably 90% of what we do is the automotive aftermarket.

Sample Design And Longitudinal Consistency

Oh, well, thanks for sharing that and the syndicated that you talked about, the consumer and then the repair shop. I mean, what a great way to kind of complement what you're seeing from a consumer standpoint and then kind of, shall we say, validate from a from a repair shop side. So, I mean, I see you're nodding your head, and I can imagine from a I guess a sample design perspective, I mean, that's such a huge sample size for the consumer study. And I remember talking to Bill in the past with regard to having balance from a census perspective and I guess uh the the year make model having representation across so many different segments. Am I kind of uh remembering that correctly, Rob?

Yeah, absolutely. We go through great efforts to uh to to make that sample match the vehicle population. So as the data comes in, we're balancing to vehicle makes and then also the age band of each vehicle. So obviously, if we get too many uh 20 and 20-year-old vehicles and older, it's gonna have a much higher um repair rate. Um, we don't want too many new two new vehicles. So we balance that carefully. Um, and we sample based on the US geography. And in the end, we feel very confident that you know what we're reporting represents what's happening across the country because it and it's enabled but yeah, enabled by that big sample size, really.

Right. And I think about say uh polling for elections. I think it was maybe the 2016 election where you had one individual, two individuals in a particular um segment that was basically um under polled and it wet led to kind of misinterpretation of the polling results. And so similarly, you and your team are looking at okay, let's make sure we're representing the population of vehicles and owners and so forth appropriately. So that makes a lot of sense.

Yeah, absolutely. And the great thing, Mike, is that the practice has been in place for so many years. So, um, and we really try to maintain that continuity over time so that our clients can look at what's happening this year and feel confident that you know everything was measured and sampled the same way it was five or 10 years ago.

Inflation And The True Cost To Own

Right, great. And you know, I'm gonna come back to this topic a little bit in terms of sample design, recruitment, and kind of uh sort of, you know, any challenges with regard to people's attention spans. But before I go there, I want to talk a little bit about kind of industry trends, right? And you had highlighted um black swan, tsunami, when you're talking about your um earlier in your career, and certainly the last few years has had no shortage of black swans, right? You every day, I feel like every week in the news, there's something that can sort of affect a lot of industries, including automotive and automotive aftermarket. And kind of when we were talking ahead of the episode, you highlighted a few like demand outlook, inflation, AI, tariffs, and there's a whole suite of them, but maybe we can just cut, you know, talk about a couple of them. I mean, what kind of what have you and your team been observing that's kind of interesting to talk about? Maybe pick one, we'll start with that.

Yeah, I think um by far the the biggest macro issue is inflation, right? It's it's such a massive issue. I mean, if you look at um, you know, the purchasing power of the dollar, it's declined 90% since the 1970s. This is just a a huge uh macro trend beneath everything. And I think COVID just made that accelerate even more, all the spending that at that we did. Um, and now we're sort of paying the price for that. So um we we really feel like this is gonna impact our industry tremendously. Now we're we're a non-discretionary industry for the most part, so I think demand is gonna be stable. I think we're in a good position from a demand standpoint, but there's gonna be a lot of movement underneath in terms of brands and outlets based on the pricing pressure on consumers. So, you know, Mike, we we have one slide where we just look at the cost of ownership, where we look at, you know, new vehicle prices, you know, financing rates for new vehicles, um, the cost to insure a vehicle in the US, and then our own data on annual maintenance costs. And, you know, there's just these tremendous uh increases across the board. And um, we feel like we're that logically is gonna put a lot of pressure on the consumer, and we're seeing that in our data, both on the consumer side and on the repair shop side. So that's that's the number one issue. Um, and it's you know across all industries, but I think again, we're because of our non-discretionary nature, we're a little bit more insulated from it in terms of total demand, right?

Delayed Maintenance DIY And Repair Financing

Sure. Yeah, great points. I mean, I remember was it June of 22? Inflation that month was like 9%. And while it's come down to say three, four percent, it's still compounding. And and and we've seen the uh CPI consumer price index for maintenance, for vehicles, for just about everything that's kind of automotive, mobility, wallet um related go up. You mentioned insurance and gasoline kind of has a mind of its own. I think you know, recently it's gone up because of world events. But um you you you touched on something interesting regarding discretionary, non-discretionary, and with I think you mentioned nearly 200 categories that you're following with regard to parts and service. Um, tell me a little bit about some of the activities you're seeing from, I guess, the consumer and the repair shop side, because I know delayed maintenance is a thing. Um, oil changes, you could say that's a little more on the essential side, I would think, right? And perhaps there's a little bit of discretionary element in terms of, okay, I'm gonna go from premium to regular, or I'm gonna delay the my oil change, things like that. Can you maybe highlight some of the things you and your team are seeing?

Yeah, absolutely. So delayed maintenance, we do a big um annual uh study of that from our data that we, you know, share it in the fact book. So that's gonna take place in a month or so. But um we see um, you know, when when we talk about discretionary versus non-discretionary, there's obviously some aftermarket categories where there's a little of both. So we did some proprietary work recently in aftermarket wheels, and that's an example of a category where a significant share of it was performance or upgrade, and a combination of economic, you know, inflationary pressures and tariffs in that category has really hurt demand. I mean, significantly. So um, wherever there's that um performance uh portion of it, it's gonna be hurt bad in in in times like this. Um, but in terms of consumer behavior, um, you know, we see we ask a lot of explicit questions like uh if you had to repair your vehicle tomorrow, would you be interested in financing major repairs? And we just see that tracking up over time, which reflects that consumer needing that that type of support. Um so a lot, a lot of um a lot of um other macro trends, like one that we feel is related to that pressure on the consumer is is the DIY trend. So, you know, 10 years ago, you know, we would were talking about DIY as you know, gonna this is gonna go away because of vehicle complexity, and that hasn't happened at all. And one of the factors I feel like is that desire of the vehicle owner to to to try to save money by doing a repair themselves. And YouTube plays a role in that, certainly. I know it does in my personal experience, but um, you know, DIY share has been stable and even growing in a lot of categories, even those that are are more complex, uh, you know, uh engine rebuilds and gasket replacements and brake jobs and things like that. So um, so that sort of stickiness of DIY, I think, is a sign of uh some pressure on the consumer. Um, so we're seeing it uh in all different ways. And then, you know, like to your point earlier, we can then validate that from the repair shop side as well.

Sure. Uh, you know, a lot to unpack there. I I'm gonna pick two or three things just to dive in a little bit. Um, totally hear you with regard to some of the performance aspects, right? Where it's more discretionary. Um and depending on the consumer, how much disposable income they have, it might be those special rims, it might be some other part, but if it's gonna be subject to tariff, then perhaps that can um change things for me as a consumer. And the second thing was you mentioned uh financing terms and extended payments. And it's interesting too because I wonder if there's the um I I think I heard you say the consumer is looking into that more. And I feel like across the board, uh whether it's Klarna or other, you know, I can't remember which one it is, but like if I buy a pair of tennis shoes online, I have the option to pay it all now or perhaps split it up over several monthly payments. Maybe it's a firm. Um so but if I go to the shop, it's kind of like I gotta put it all on the credit card. They typically don't provide that option, which makes sense. But then when I get my credit card bill, I guess I have I might have an option to pay over time. So are you seeing um I I'm kind of interested in your reactions to what I just highlighted there.

How Shops Respond On Pricing Parts

Yeah, we don't have too much detail beyond that, but you know, and we know that from experience that there's credit programs available, especially with some of the big national repair chains. But um, in general, that that desire to finance the repair, I mean, folks aren't doing that because they have excess savings, right? And if you just look at the savings rate and the decline in the savings rate um recently, you can see that um coming through the data. So, so yeah, that's certainly a trend. The other thing, Mike, in the repair shop environment, when we try to sort of triangulate that is we ask them um once a year, you know, are your consumers, are your customers um more sensitive to the prices that you're providing? And we see a clear trend that they're absolutely they're reporting that yes, my consumers, my customers are are are more um sensitive to the price when I'm when I'm quoting the work. So um uh so that's coming through as well to to kind of confirm what we're seeing on the consumer side.

You took the question right out of my mouth, and uh thanks for providing that sort of like we're talking about validation from the repair shop side. I mean, are repair shops concerned about this? Are they like kind of uh how are they reacting?

Yeah, it's funny because we you know we asked a question in the same in the same month about um their use of entry level or private label parts. And uh we do see an increase across shops in in using util utilizing entry-level parts. And so a lot of times that's a controversial take, and we'll talk to shop owners that say, I would never do that. I don't I always use premium. But the bottom line is you know, every shop across the country has a unique customer base and a unique economic situation. And a lot of times there's a relationship there, and um, when the the customer, the vehicle owner is stressed about it, they're gonna do whatever they can to try to bring that number down, to try to um, you know, knowing how critical their vehicle is to them. So so that is a clear trend, those entry-level uh increase in entry-level parts to try to help the consumer out.

Yeah, and you know, it touches on a couple of things, right? You uh mentioned uh the parts as well as perhaps there's more proclivity for a consumer to say, well, maybe I can do this myself, or maybe I can order a part online, bring it to the shop, and the shop may have a vested interest to perhaps continue to do that job because they want to keep the customer loyal, right? Now, of course, the customer may have to sign a waiver to say, I'm not gonna hold you liable for XYZ, but is that some of the um are those? Some of the things you're observing in the marketplace as well, Rob?

Yeah. So we do track what we call IIFM, install it for me in the consumer survey. And um we do see that as a strong trend. It you know, it it became a hot topic a few years back and was added to the survey. Uh, but we asked questions about um uh who who installed the part, if they purchased it at um a retail outlet, but then they indicated that it was a do-it-for-me repair. So we can estimate that install it for me component. But yeah, that I think the bottom line is um when a repair represents um significant financial stress, that vehicle owner is going to do whatever they can to try to make it more manageable. Um, and it you know, one way we see that come through the data as well is it's kind of a simple um metric, but um their desire to research repairs, that's in an uptrend over recent years. And we feel like that is, you know, you're more likely to spend time to research a repair when it's significant to your household finances, right? So that's a trend as well.

Keeping Older Cars With Major Repairs

Yeah, it makes perfect sense. I I had a personal experience where I took my vehicle in for an oil change, and while there, the uh the manager of the shop let me know that my strut had blown. And it was kind of like, okay, can I get away with just doing the left one? Or do he's like, well, you really should do them both. And we looked at the different options available, and there's like a firmer option that wasn't really appropriate for my vehicle. Maybe it was more sports-oriented, but this particular brand was appropriate for it, but it was still a pretty big hit to the wallet. So I totally what you're saying just resonates so deeply with me because that was a recent event. And like you're saying, the purchasing power has decreased over time, and we continue to see inflation across the board. So no wonder the consumer is stressed, if you will, or in in challenging circumstances.

So we also on the repair shop side, we track repair order dollar values, so how that trend is uh in the repair shop environment. And that has been just a strong uptrend um in recent years. So um, so yeah, that it inflation is alive and well in our in our uh part of the industry for sure.

Definitely. And you know, we could talk a lot about um, well, I guess you know, it's worth mentioning, right? The price of a new car, 50,000-ish, average age of vehicles continuing to incrementally rise year over year. So I guess good signs for the automotive aftermarket industry in terms of continued service, that's post-warranty period, and from a pragmatic, from the consumer standpoint, kind of pragmatic to keep the vehicle um a little bit longer, so long as I guess it it be it's kind of depends on the situation, right? In terms of has it been paid off, or are there other things that perhaps that uncertainty of what's the next big thing, right?

Yeah. Yeah, and Mike, we see that when we look at replacement rate data. So some of those those big dollar repairs, like engine replacements, for example, or engine rebuilds, you know, the rate of replacement for those is up significantly. And um one of the reasons has got to be hey, this this vehicle that would have previously been scrapped, it's now worthwhile to do a major repair to keep it running because of you know that what you mentioned with uh the new vehicle prices. So that's a clear trend. Um, and I think it also reflects that you know those changing dynamics with uh you know new versus used vehicles and the declining scrap rate.

Yeah, I think I was reading that the average, like so we talked about $50,000 for a new vehicle. I think the average finance amount is just under $44,000. So I think the bulk of or the average monthly payment for a new vehicle is $800, and the average term is like six to seven years, basically. So, you know, that's a lot of money for a long period of time that's even extends post-warranty. So it can be a little daunting, especially if you haven't purchased a new car for 10, 15 years, where you get a little bit of a sticker shock thing going.

EV Replacement Rates And Surprises

So yeah, there's I think they said recently 20% of new vehicles financed are over a thousand dollar payment. I mean, you're talking about um approach approaching, you know, mortgage level. Um, and uh, you know, your vehicle is it's necessary and it's but it's also probably your fastest depreciating asset that you own. So I think folks are are taking those kind of decisions um with uh a little a little more seriously, and and that's coming through in uh in the data as well. That average vehicle age just seems to climb endlessly every year.

Right, right. You know, those are really really great insights regarding inflation and how the consumer is responding, the repair shops, what they're seeing. Some of the other things that you highlighted were like replacement rates across the different propulsion types, AI related employment uncertainty, other things that are kind of uh coming across your radar as you're diving into your survey results.

Yeah. So, yeah, the AI-related on employment uncertainty. I mean, I think we're starting to see that. And everybody's talking about it anecdotally, especially how it's impacting young people just out of college. Um, you know, I I had lunch recently, Mike, with uh a former uh colleague of mine who was uh our coder. He, you know, wrote all of our code in Python and he's moved on to bigger and better things now. And you know, he told me he doesn't write code anymore. He prompts code, he prompts AI to write code, and then he reviews code, but um, based on his experience level, he no longer needs to write it. Um, so you know the job market is changing significantly, and it's just one more of those um those uncertainties that the consumer is facing. Um, and then you mentioned you know, looking at uh the different powertrain mixes and and when we were looking at um replacement rate data, and that's been really interesting, Mike, because again, going you know, I it's like you go back 10 years and think about what people were predicting. And um, you know, with EVs, the cost of ownership, you know, was uh the big benefit, right? You you don't need to purchase gas, but you also uh have lower rates of repair, less less uh less braking on the vehicle, less things breaking. Um, and that you know, now that a lot of those vehicles have aged quite a bit, we can see in our replacement rate data that um that's not it's not so clear-cut. There's a lot of uh steering and suspension parts and um drive line parts that have higher rates of replacement um on the EV versions. So um, so that's kind of a moving target. Obviously, the outlook for EVs has changed dramatically in the last three to four years, but um still a lot of great repair opportunity for shops on EVs based on what we're seeing.

Good to hear. And um, you mentioned kind of the when you're comparing replacement rates across the different uh propulsion types, certainly there are going to be some differences um from kind of category to category. Are there other ones that kind of jump out at you that I mean, some of the ones you mentioned, like certainly um oil and filters, but are there ones that have surprised you that perhaps you know you may have said, oh, I didn't really expect this much of a difference or them to be the same?

A lot of like HVAC components, there's some HVAC components where we actually see higher rates for EVs, which is surprising. Um, but the others kind of make logical sense when you talk about some steering and suspension components where there's they're weight bearing. Um, there's obviously EVs are much heavier, so it makes sense that there could be faster wear for some of those components. Um so um, but the other the one that was has been surprising, um, where we're just not seeing validation in our data for what we hear anecdotally is tires. So we do have a tire replacement rate, and we haven't seen that rate of replacement on EVs surpass uh ICE or hybrid vehicles yet, but um, that still may bear out as those vehicles age.

So sure. And there could be other things at play, I suppose, just kind of hypothesizing, because that was something certainly people were kind of had a keen interest in. And it makes me wonder if the tire manufacturers, as they're developing tires for different um vehicles, were like, okay, for EVs, we're gonna expect higher torque. We need to make uh a stronger tire. So I wonder if if there's if that could be one of the fruits uh that they're seeing from perhaps a little bit of the RD in the lab there.

AI Job Uncertainty Meets Survey Fraud

Yeah, I would imagine they're yeah, they're accommodating for for that. And sure, um obviously there's with new vehicle tires, you know, there's there's all sorts of dynamics at play. I know I've had some vehicles where man, this car has such a smooth ride, and then the tires lasted 20,000 miles. It's like that's why it was such a smooth ride because they put really soft tires on it. But um, but yeah, I think that's probably you know, there it's a moving target, you know, things like um even brake pad thickness. Um, we've heard that the there's changes in brake pad thickness because they don't need the same thickness they did um on ice vehicles because of regenerative braking, things like that.

So fascinating. Yeah, like you said, it's a kind of an evolving industry. You have a lot of um adaptation from parts manufacturers, and that makes perfect sense. And just rewinding a little bit, when you're giving the AI and the coding example, um, I can see how that can play into the mindset of a consumer because perhaps before I make a large purchase, maybe there's there might be some underlying concern about my uh the stability of my paycheck, my future employment. Um I was thinking, are there is there more that you're seeing from either the consumer side or how it's perhaps AI is being implemented across the industry? I guess it's a long-winded tell me more.

Well, we we talk about AI uh often on the market research side because um, you know, I I guess I'm sort of segueing us and segueing us into uh a conversation about actual survey data, but um that AI is something we're thinking about every day because anytime you have um an online survey with an incentive, you attract uh fraud, right? There's gonna be folks that are gonna try to use an AI-enabled program to defraud the survey. And unfortunately, they're very good at it. These AI systems are are are very good at imitating an actual survey uh participant. So that's a constant struggle. And um so what we've got to do is use AI to sort to sort through the data and to prevent that that type of fraud from occurring. So so I guess a big picture I'm saying, you've got to leverage AI to prevent AI from causing you issues in other areas.

Well, well, you bring up I and it's a great segue point because I feel like this is a good time to sort of go into some of the, shall we say, challenges of data and research, if you will, because um when I was earlier in my career, and only maybe five years ago, there was the concern of professional survey takers, right? People who could kind of figure out what the screener questions were, go through it, spend the right amount of time on the survey, and kind of get their carrot at the end. And what you just highlighted is another great example of what re market res the market research industry has to be mindful of people using bots to get even more carrots, right?

So exactly. Yeah, so we have a partner that helps us to use machine learning to look for those patterns, um, and certainly to find uh to find AI respondents, but also um nonsensical respondents that you obviously are are just trying to get get to the end of the survey to get the uh incentive. So but it's uh it's an ongoing challenge and it's it's always gonna be um another moving target that we've got to deal with.

Attention Spans Survey Length And Participation

Right. And to the point of nonsensical, I remember one of the kind of flags was an open-ended response that doesn't make sense and it was gibberish. But now with the natural language processing and the the ability for the chat GPT and and others in that realm to make such very conversational, eloquent statements, it's it it it the it just ratchets up, so it makes a lot of sense. Um another thing I was thinking about is I know for myself, attention span is not in it it's kind of gotten shorter and for even taking surveys because the a number of survey requests we get seems to have gone up. I mean, is that something that you and your team talk about as well?

Yeah, I think there's um you know, any any effort to connect with per potential participants through email is has become more difficult uh over time. So that's something that um we've got to deal with. And then to your point, Mike, about attention spans, um, survey length is, I mean, it's the basics of of market research. Survey length is just absolutely critical. And so we're all always looking at how to become more efficient in how we deliver and look for opportunities to cut anything that's um not really important or not being utilized by our clients, so to try to manage for that.

Right. And all the more challenging, I suppose, when you have a longitudinal survey where you're tracking many, many different things. So it it really does require um uh a fine, I guess, level of attention to detail and the art of creating a survey that gets what you need that is germane.

Synthetic Data And New Research Channels

So Yep, absolutely. So the only yeah, the the great thing there is like I said before, because we we we were literally trying not to change these things over time. So so it's a lot of of just making minor tweaks to make it more efficient, but ultimately we've we want to keep everything as as uh stable as possible so we can you know leverage that um longitudinal nature of the survey to get to get get more value from it that way.

Makes perfect sense. I mean, from a future of data um perspective, are there other things that you and your team are kind of watching? I mean, you had highlighted a couple of things, and I think we touched on some of them, like AI-enabled fraud or survey products, and uh perhaps maybe on the research product side, like are there other things that kind of are in the uh in I don't know if it's the right word, but the skunk works. I guess the labs, I mean are there other things that you guys are sort of like um working on, if I if I may.

Yeah. So the one thing, and I don't know, Mike, if you've read much about it, but this this concept of synthetic survey data is interesting, right? So taking taking a small sample of actual um human data and then basically using like a large language model to extrapolate it out to make it a larger sample. Um it's very controversial, but it's you know, there's a lot of companies that are offering um you know cheaper, faster uh survey uh tools using that sort of methodology. Um it's not something that we're into, um, but um that's that's a big industry topic right now. And then, you know, for us, um in terms of the changing interaction of people with their emails and things like that, you know, we we're looking at ways to partner with under other companies in the industry that they actually have a digital connection to repair shops, for example, so that we can deploy surveys directly to technicians in the shop. And that's been very successful for us, and we want to build on that. Um, it's more efficient, it's uh faster, cheaper, and it gets better results. So, you know, it's like we we we do things sort of the old-fashioned way, but we're always looking to uh improve, become more efficient, become smarter, and we're gonna have to to be successful because it's the pace of change with technology.

New Coverage Like ADAS And Cameras

So absolutely. I'm and to the point of the synthetic data. I think it was just the other day I read in the Wall Street Journal about a company. I want to say it's it's called Aru, A-A-R-U, or A-A-R-A-U, but basically founded by three teenagers. You know, two of them had started off in college, and a couple of weeks later they were just pursuing their their uh their their new uh startup. And it really is is uh revolutionary, and it's it's the type of things that are really coming up fast in the rear view mirror for industries like market research. So it's it's fascinating to kind of uh I'm I'm uh appreciate your bringing that up. So I guess thinking about all that we've talked about, Rob, we've had such a rich discussion. And are there is there anything that kind of we've talked about that you want to sort of put a footnote on or anything else that's kind of top of mind for you?

Fast Fun Questions And Wrap Up

There's there's nothing that we haven't really talked about other than um, you know, we we're in terms of we changed our um methodologies like we talked about, we're trying to always looking at changing methodologies, but also changing product coverage. You know, we we've added a lot of new products that are more relevant now from a repair perspective, like instrument panel displays and uh external cameras and ADAS systems. So um just trying to keep up with the pace of change in our industry and um make sure that we have coverage of everything um our our clients need to make good business decisions.

Uh that makes a lot of sense because when we look at the evolution of vehicles, right? The the computer on wheels and all of the ADOS electronic parts, it makes perfect sense that you have to kind of keep uh updating the survey to keep up with the uh to match the the technological changes that have been implemented. So thanks for sharing that. So I guess like um I'd like to just kind of close it out with a couple of fun questions here. Um maybe we'll start with a couple of just simple ones like um favorite vacation spots or if you're gonna host a dinner party, what kind of food might you serve? Maybe we can start with one of those. Any of those kind of sort of sort of resonate?

Yeah. Well, every vacations resonate with everybody, right? Um, we we you know, fortunate to live in uh southeastern Detroit, very close to Lake St. Clair, and you know, that makes every weekend a vacation in the summer. So, you know, my um family, my extended family, we all spend a lot of time on on Lake St. Clair boating and um and uh fishing and water skiing and all that kind of stuff. So um very blessed to be in this area and to take advantage of that. So um, so yeah, for vacations, like I said, every weekend is a vacation and we make the most of it. And you know, with college-age children, you kind of get to that point, Mike. You will at some point where it's like you recognize that they're gonna be gone soon, and you just want to spend more time with the family, and that's kind of the stage that we're at right now.

Sure. Well, thanks for sharing that. Um regarding fishing, what kind of fish are you catching?

Oh, everything. Everything. I that's been a passion since childhood, and um and uh it's a great place to live in Michigan, surrounded by water at all times. So um, so at I fish year round, and um, it's just a great way to escape, right? Uh the way I explain it to people is when I do when I go fishing, I revert back to a 12-year-old boy immediately. It's like everything else you forget about. So it's great.

Oh, what a great way to escape. So let me just do a couple of speed round questions here. So I'll give you two choices. So let's let's give this a try. You ready? Sure. All right, coffee or tea? Coffee. Beer or wine? Beer. Snowboarding or skiing.

Oh, sno skiing. I prefer to snowboard, but I'm too old now.

All right, winter Olympics, summer Olympics. Uh summer. Stick shift or Automatic.

I hate to say it, but automatic.

Um what were the other ones? Pickleball or tennis? Oh pickleball. Again, that's an age thing, but yeah, pickleball right now. Okay, so you're away from the age ones for this last one then. Fly fishing or deep sea fishing?

Ooh, I would say fly fishing, though I did go deep sea fishing in January, and uh we we caught a uh 350-pound bull shark, which was a half-hour long experience. It was a lot of fun, but fly fishing for me. More solitude, Mike.

350 pounds. Oh my gosh, your your forearms must have been like toast. Oh wow. Congratulations.

Five of us took turns.

So it was absolutely a picture someday. Rob, thank you so much for playing speed round. More importantly, thanks so much for um being an involved and engaged member of AutoCare through the various companies you've been. I heard ITB, I see IMR, there might be other three other three-letter companies that start with I. Um, I'm not pursuing a uh career as a humorist, but we've really enjoyed having you as part of the program. Uh to all of our listeners and viewers, thank you so much for tuning in to this one. So until the next time, thanks for uh joining Auto Care on Air. Thanks for tuning in to another episode of Auto Care on Air. Make sure to subscribe to our podcast so that you never miss an episode. Don't forget to leave us a rating and review. It helps others discover our show. Auto Care on Air is proud to be a production of the Autocare Association, dedicated to advancing the autocare industry and supporting professionals like you. To learn more about the association and its initiatives, visit autocare.org.