Shop owners relocate from Argentina to join forces with U.S. franchise

Oct. 30, 2018
Moving a great distance to set up a new business can be tough. Add that it’s in another country with cultural differences and language barriers — not to mention reversed seasons going from the Southern to Northern Hemisphere — it sounds daunting.

Moving a great distance to set up a new business can be tough. Add that it’s in another country with cultural differences and language barriers — not to mention reversed seasons going from the Southern to Northern Hemisphere — it sounds daunting. But to business partners Mario Gonzalez and Sebastian Pacheco, it was definitely doable, particularly with the help of a franchisor.

At a Glance:
Mr. Transmission
Tampa, Fla.
Location
Sebastian Pacheco and Mario Gonzalez
Owners
1
No. of shops
<1
Years in business
4
No. of employees
4,000
Square footage of shop
3
No. of bays

Their story starts in Buenos Aires, Argentina, when Pacheco had his car serviced at Gonzalez’s shop. “I’ve always loved cars,” says Pacheco. “I used to work on the weekends on my car; for it me it was a hobby at the beginning. Then I met Mario, first as a customer, then as a friend, and I started learning a lot about cars from him.”

For the next five years Pacheco assisted Gonzalez in running the shop in Argentina’s bustling capital, but saw greener pastures in the United States. “In our country we were always going through a difficult economy because of security situations,” he explains, “so we started looking for a place where we could work in a better environment with more possibilities to grow, to have a better life.”

To that end they focused their search on Florida. “We looked first at Miami, where we liked the kind of life,” Pacheco comments. “Then we looked [on the Gulf Coast] at Venice, Tampa and Sarasota.” Meanwhile they also found a franchise fit with Moran Family of Brands, based in Midlothian, Ill.

One of the nation’s leading franchisors of general automotive repair since 1990, this company has assembled a variety of products and services through various brands. Perhaps their best known brand is Mr. Transmission, which is typically paired with Milex Complete Auto Care, covering the rest of the car.

Owners Sebastian Pacheco and Mario Gonzalez

Moran also has two aftermarket service divisions: SmartView Window Solutions, which provides window tinting, and Alta Mere, The Automotive Outfitters. Moran literature describes the latter as “high tech automotive accessories and driver safety products,” such as “security and radar detection systems, remote starters and keyless entry, and hands-free blue tooth phone systems.”

And while these brands are frequently licensed in various combinations, Pacheco and Gonzalez were the first franchisees in Moran’s history to put all four together at one location. There was just one little hitch to that plan …

“When we signed the contract with (Moran), we hadn’t yet secured the location,” explains Pacheco. “At that point the options were Sarasota and Tampa. We started looking for a shop in the two places and (Tampa) was the best choice.

“We spent a month getting to know this area,” he continues, “and we found a balance in Tampa between the quantity and kind of people that we could provide service to, and the quality of life that we could get there. We checked demographics; (Tampa) has people from almost all parts of the world: Europe, Russia, South America, Central America. The Latin community is a big one but we focus on everybody who needs our services.”

They eventually found a 4,000 square foot facility that had previously specialized in repairing German brands, but had been empty for two years. “It was in really bad shape,” says Pacheco, “so we re-did all the floors, changed some walls; it took two months to get it ready to open,” which they did in June of 2018. Pacheco assumed the duties of general manger, dealing with vendors, interviewing new employees, as well as advertisement and marketing, while Gonzalez ran the shop.

“The idea was to be a one-stop shop for everything that your car needs,” Pacheco says.  “At this time we’re not only thinking about maintaining all of these services, we’re thinking about added more, like high-quality detailing (that includes) polishing and cleaning the car. That’s not something the franchisor does. We also paint small parts of the car, like the mirrors, door handles — but we’re not a full body shop, we only do some details so the car will look nicer. These are things we did in Argentina.”

Skill and ambition are about all Pacheco and Gonzalez brought from Argentina; everything else had to be built nearly from scratch. But for that they had help from Moran. “The company provided us with some vendors and also with training for each brand,” Pacheco explains. “We also spent a week with the owner of (another franchise) to learn about everything else. We worked there, met with customers, employees, and learned how they managed the place.”

And Pacheco points out that they are still learning. “We are trying to learn how to present the services to the customer, how to manage the employees, and the way that people think—that was the main difference between here and Argentina,” he comments.

“It’s very difficult to buy a car in Argentina, so the people there take more care of their cars. Here people might only use a car to get from point A to point B, so we’re trying to educate people to insure the cars not only work fine, but we also try to make the cars look nicer. We help them maintain their car so they won’t have to spend so much money on it.”

Thus every part of their program, from Milex’s preventative maintenance, to SmartView’s interior-saving window tinting, to their own detailing services, all complement extending the use of a customer’s car. However Pacheco, who used to sell advertising for a Buenos Aires TV station, also utilizes the latter as a marketing tool.   

“Every car that comes here, even if just an oil change, we do a complimentary detailing of the car,” he explains. “We leave the car looking better, so when the customer sees the car they’ll feel more comfortable. When we do bigger (tickets), we offer other complimentary services, like taking care of leather interiors.

“We think of that like an advertisement,” Pacheco points out, “because that customer is going to tell a friend, and they’ll tell someone else, each time referring more people — because they get more than what they expected.”

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