Shop Profile: Rydell Collision Center

June 1, 2016
A willingness to take a chance on trying out innovative repair techniques, including early adoption of robotics, has culminated in an inventive level of efficiencies at North Dakota’s Rydell Collision Center.

A willingness to take a chance on trying out innovative repair techniques, including early adoption of robotics, has culminated in an inventive level of efficiencies at North Dakota’s Rydell Collision Center.

“We are very fortunate to work for a company that wants and expects us to always look at ways of improving our process,” says body shop manager Randy Sattler. “They understand that some things will work and some won’t, but you won’t know until you try. We are told to ‘fail early, fail hard.’ You can’t have success without failing sometimes.”

Located at the flagship Rydell GM Auto Center in Grand Forks, N.D., the shop is considered the “mother store” of a vast Rydell Corp. network of nearly 80 independently owned dealerships, including their affiliated body shops, throughout the Western United States. “What we learn we will share with anyone in the group,” he notes. “We are just fortunate that we get to try all these different ideas and processes to find what works for us.”

Founded in 1954 by Leonard Rydell, second-generation owner Wes Rydell “was born into this business,” and since taking the helm in 1976 he has consistently envisioned and implemented the latest in technological innovations and management strategies engineered to produce a pattern of “continuous work flow” throughout the operation. The same philosophy is being carried forward by Brian Rydell as he assumes a third-generation family ownership role.

“Everything we do or try is done with the goal of improving the complete process from the beginning to the end,” according to Sattler, who views Wes Rydell as an important mentor because he displays “the patience and insight to know that we would need to fail in order to learn what we would need to do” for achieving top-of-the-line KPIs.

“Another person that I consider a mentor and who has been a huge impact on me personally and on the success of our shop is the executive manager of our company, Greg Sorum. Greg was typically the day-to-day guy that kept us focused and on-path. When things didn’t go as planned, he was typically the guy that held my hand and really explained to me what ‘fail hard, fail early’ really meant. Greg was there many times to keep the ship righted and moving in the right direction.”

An attention-catching fail arose early in the process of rolling out the new processes. A meeting was held with the technicians during which every step was stipulated on neatly typed sheets of paper. Questions were solicited but none were asked; blank stares ensued and “after just a few hours things on the floor were even more messed up than before we implemented this ‘new process.’”

Randy Sattler

Rydell Collision Center — At A Glance

Grand Forks, N.D.
Location

Wes Rydell and Brain Rydell
Owners

1
Number of shops

62
Years in business

12
Number of DRPs

24,000
Square footage

35
Number of employees

22
Number of bays

4.7 days
Average cycle time

$950
Average repair order

$113,461
Average weekly volume

130
Number of customer vehicles per week

$5.9 million
Annual gross revenue

Axalta
Paint supplier

Chief, Jollift
Frame machines used

Mitchell, Audatex, CCC One
Estimating systems used

www.rydellcars.com
Internet site

 

Upon approaching a veteran technician at quitting time, Sattler was politely informed that the staff had determined that the announced innovations were doomed to fail because the workers were never told why they were being introduced or how the technicians would benefit.

“We did not include them in any way during the development or discussion of the new process,” Sattler ruefully recounts. “We learned that we failed before we even really started by not including the people that are touched, involved or affected by a process.”

The incident reinforced the value of clearly consulting, communicating and seeking reactions when changes are being contemplated – a situation that management promptly remedied.

“Along the way our shop has had a tremendous amount of help from many talented people. Without these people’s patience, time, input and direction we wouldn’t have gotten to where we are today. We are truly grateful and appreciative of all our employees. Without them none of this would have happened,” says Sattler, stressing “the importance of how your employees can affect a shop’s performance. Many times the employees do not get the recognition they deserve, for they are the ones who actually do the work.”

Theory of constraints
The Genesis of this genius being implemented at the shop originated with the work of the late Eliyahu M. Goldratt, an Israeli physicist and business management guru who pioneered the “Theory of Constraints” paradigm that essentially seeks to indentify and rectify “variables” that can render production inefficiencies – as in “a chain is no stronger than its weakest link.”

Rydell and Sattler sat down and “discussed page-by-page” a 2006 groundbreaking Goldratt paper entitled Standing on the Shoulders of Giants to glean insights that could be utilized in collision repair. “This article was my first introduction in to the world of Theory of Constraints,” says Sattler, “and my work life has been changed ever since that meeting.”

Another important development came via a visit with the Colorado-based Repair Plan Network that had been formed in 2008 to assist independent body shops competing against MSOs. “We jumped on a plane and flew out there,” Sattler recalls, which resulted in engaging the services of Bodyshop Revolution, a British consultancy now also operating in Australia, the Middle East and the U.S. that specializes in applying Theory of Constraints concepts to the collision industry.

A Rydell Collision Center upgrade introduced in late 2014 included “tons of training” for a revamping of shop procedures along with modernized electrical circuits and gas lines – plus one of the first American installations of a robotic catalytic infrared paint-drying system.

Although the overall investment amounted to $500,000, Sattler advises his industry colleagues to avoid being “scared off” by such a large figure: Focus instead on altering your shop’s processes within your existing building, since that is far more relevant to your individual KPIs than the hefty amount of funds spent on Rydell’s ambitious site-specific remodeling project.

Five robotic units are in place, and the actual drying time for both paint and body filler now takes just one to two minutes; however long it takes the robotic arms to sweep over the targeted area. “We have reduced our average paint booth cycle to 45 minutes per vehicle. Once it goes through the paint booth it’s back at the technician’s stall.” Watching paint dry and other delays typical of body shop operations have been significantly slashed.

“We made the investment for the future,” says Sattler. “For a big shop the robots will have a huge, huge impact.”

Sattler goes on to explain that your particular shop will present exclusive needs and bottleneck-producing variables. “We’ve taken all of the variability out of the paint side, but it’s less to do with the paint-drying robots and more to do with the process” taking place at each of the assorted stations within the shop.

Bits and pieces
Twenty-six vehicles are addressed each day at Rydell’s amid an average cycle time of 4.7 days and a 4.9-hour daily touch time rate. “Let the guy work on one car all day long. And when he’s not working on that one car he’s helping his teammates with another car. We need all of the team to be working,” Sattler says.

“We’ve found that the in-on-Monday-and-out-on-Saturday is the death of body shop processes,” he points out. “We take bits and pieces (from the Bodyshop Revolution recommendations) and mould our process around it” to fit the shop’s distinct circumstances.

“We’re very good at monitoring and paying attention to operational innovations. We’re looking at all the ways to eliminate wait time from the time that the car hits the floor,” says Sattler. “We monitor the ‘flow’ of every car that is released for repair. If there is a stoppage of that repair on the vehicle, we look at every stoppage and try to determine the ‘why.’ Continuous work flow of every car released to the floor is an extremely important goal for us.”

The 20 technicians are treated like “customers” of the estimators as vehicles are readied for repair. “If our estimating process causes our technicians to stop working on a repair because we missed parts, damage, etc., we address those situations the same as a situation with a customer where we failed at having them 100 percent satisfied with our repair.”

A similar mindset is applied to managing relationships with insurers. “We understand that on every insurance claim there are two customers involved in the repair process, the owner of the vehicle and the customer that is paying for the repair. It is our job to make sure that the customer’s LOE, or Level of Expectation, is at the insurance company’s LOR, or Level of Reality,” Sattler says.

“We all know that many times the customer’s expectations are not the same as the reality of the insurance company. This is how we know we can improve and impact the customer’s satisfaction with us and also the insurance company. Our goals are the same as the insurance company’s – 100 percent satisfied customers that will recommend us to their family and friends.”

Clarity of communications is a critical element of emphasis. “In almost every situation where things did go as planned or expected, somewhere along the repair something didn’t get communicated that should have. This starts a chain of events where people typically look for who’s at fault instead of discussing where the communication breakdown happened.”

Realistic expectations
The largeness of the Rydell dealership network facilitates near-routine use of OEM components. “We have a wholesale parts department that purchases by volume,” Sattler reports. OEM versus aftermarket price-matching is conducted on 70 percent to 80 percent of the orders, which results in a preponderance of OEM products. A given part’s quality is taken into account as well. “We’ve learned over time that rather than trying to fit an aftermarket hood it’s better to use an OEM hood even if it’s more expensive.”

Closely coordinating with vendors is another effective method for reducing variables. “When we decide to change a part of our process where those changes may affect them they are asked to be a part of the discussion so we all have the same expectations,” says Sattler, referencing the shop’s relatively rural North Dakota location.

“We do not have the luxuries of metropolitan areas and multiple opportunities for many vendors. We need to have realistic expectations of our vendors, and treat them the same way that we expect them to treat us. They are a bloodline to our business, and we cannot survive with out them.”

As you might expect, the shop has become a showcase of innovative technologies and management strategies, discussing lessons-learned experiences with the other Rydell dealership body shops to use as they see fit.

“Every dealership is ‘independent,’ but we share with the other body shops. They all process their work a little differently. For us, planning for success in the future is very important. We are learning every day how we can improve and get better. Our door is always open for our dealership group shops and anyone else that is curious about what we do,” he says.

“We know that we are very fortunate,” Sattler observes, “and that our journey of continuous improvement will always be ahead of us.”

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