How a Turbo Engine Intercooler Works

How a Turbo Engine Intercooler Works

Auto Parts Store Applies for a Liquor License

If you worked around here you would see the beauty in this story. Why hasn't someone thought of this before? It will revolutionize the industry... Not many cars will be repaired correctly, but we will all have fun in the process!

Read the article here...

Naked woman steals two cars (one a police car) then gets tazered...

Sorry But I Had to Post it ...

Video Courtesy of KSL.com

Driving here can be interesting!

I found this article in Popular Mechanics online magazine that highlights interesting or scenic roadways around the world. If you think about it, cars would not be nearly as fun without good roads and exciting things to look at or steer around. Speaking of that, I grew up in Gwinnett County, a suburb of Atlanta, Georgia. It was one of the countries fastest growing counties for about 30 years. As such, I don't believe there was a day of my life where I didn't see our county mascot (the orange construction barrel) along the side of one road or another. Recently, road planners have decided that we need to be more like Europe in our driving habits (don't ask me- ask them?) and are beginning to tear up perfectly good intersections and replacing them with round-abouts. A friend of mine recently explained with a red face that he sat there and counted 37 instructional signs at a new round-about installed at the entrance of a county park. I personally believe these are funded by accident attornies in collusion with local police departments. Each group stands to make a mint as confused motorists run into each other and miss turns or stop signs (resulting in tickets and fines). Anyway, back to the article, I believe I would die of a heart attack if I had to drive on that cliff side road in China...

The Downside of Buying Auto Parts Wholesale

What could be bad about buying auto parts for less? Why would we say anything negative about our process? I am so confused!?

I have found that being fairly blunt in my honesty tends to make my life a little more sane and simple. I live by the credo, "Under promise and Over deliver...". Rightnowautoparts is a wholesaler, pure and simple. We do not have retail locations. We do not sell parts "over the counter" to the public at any of our warehouses. Many of our parts are sold in multi pack quantities that don't really make sense,for example... Whenever I need tail light bulbs I don't buy them from my inventory! Our 1157 light bulbs are sold in packs of 10 and I typically only need one or two. Even with my savings it still makes better sense to just buy two at the local retail parts store. The same thing holds true for some gaskets, o-rings, hardware and even a few special bulk pack oil filters. These items are made for the main market we cater to; Dealerships, Jobber stores and garages. We also aren't always going to be the best option on low dollar items because our minimum freight cost of $9 added to a $5 part makes it $14 and not such a great deal anymore.

But ...

Many are finding that our prices are very worth the bare bones nature of our auto parts offering. By opening the door on the same inventory, from the same locations, at the same prices, to the general public we are making some of those budget breaking repair jobs actually do-able. Like I have always said; "If saving a few hundred dollars on the parts means the difference between fixing the air conditioning or using the 52 method (driving 50 with 2 windows down), then let's get that car fixed".

I am from Atlanta and can actually remember when the first Home Depot opened. Their idea of selling hardware and supplies from a bare bones warehouse at HUGE savings seems to have worked pretty well. We are just adding one extra cost savings invention (the internet) to do the same thing on a national basis. Hopefully we can help save you some money in the process.

Thanks for your business!! Tell Your Friends!
Brad

Why Can't We Buy That Here?

Back in the early 80's when I first got into the automotive business "Grey Market" cars were big. Basically you could buy a Mercedes or BMW overseas, ship it over here and make the changes needed to drive in the US, then sell it for less than you could buy a comparable car from a dealership here. Of course the government decided that would be fine as long as they got their cut, about equal to any profit generated, and all of that came to an end. That doesn't mean that the cars over seas aren't still pretty cool. Many of the autos marketed over there have equivalents in the U.S., but here are several that cannot be bought here.

Click this link to read the article and see the slide show...

Summertime !!!

OK, you have your vacation planned, your sunscreen and bug spray purchased (they're in the same bottle this year!) and you are ready to sit down on the back deck with your barbeque grill and iced tea... Have you forgotten about your car? Here is an article posted by MSN about the things you should do to take care of your car this summer.

Top ten things for your car this summer

Electric Cars with Sound !!

Electric vehicles have the cool advantage of being almost silent. Apparently there are some disadvantages to that though. This article highlights some plans to address this. The Fisker Karma, an $87,900 plug-in hybrid expected to go on sale next year, will emit a sound — pumped out of speakers in the bumpers — that the company founder, Henrik Fisker, describes as “a cross between a starship and a Formula One car.” Hopefully they will come with a variety of sounds that you can program and change as your mood suits you, including silent mode.

Fisker considering partnership deals

It seems that I am enamored (along with many others) with the idea of all electric cars with beautiful styling and huge performance. I seem to keep coming back to the Fisker Karma as my favorite, soon to be released, model. The problem for me is the $88,000 sticker price. Now I can justify quite a bit of payment to offset what I am currently spending on fuel for my Ford Expedition which averages about 12 MPG. Somehow the numbers are still pretty far apart. So, I have come up with a plan...

Companies should implement an incentive plan for employees who would like to switch to all electric. First, there should be a government subsidy for the first 20% of monthly payments for the first two years. Second, companies should grant an equal 20% tax exempt subsidy for employees who will agree to automatic payroll deduction. Finally, a prominent place would be constructed and provided for these employees to park and recharge their cars each day while they were working. This may be dreaming, but we wouldn't have many of the things we take for granted today if it weren't for someone dreaming of the concept and then moving it forward.

Thanks for your business! Tell Your Friends!!

The title of this post is the way I generally sign the e-mails I send out. Being fairly new to the retail world on the internet (despite 80 years in the wholesale auto parts business) I work daily trying to find new ways to market our site . I would like to ask your help in a small way to promote our business. I am working every angle I know how to let everyone know what a great price we are offering, especially on ACDelco and Motorcraft parts. I have found that Google highly regards comments made in blogs and forums. If you find the time, please share your experience with fellow vehicle owners in whichever way you feel. If you are on Facebook please click the link here on our blog and share our site. There is also a link in the middle of our home page to share on MANY pages. I would really appreciate the help!!

Most of the people I have spoken with seem quite appreciative of our pricing and customer service. I love those e-mails and phone calls. I also need to hear from anyone who did not have a good experience. Most companies are bound to make a few mistakes if they grow as quickly as we have. Please take a few moments and send me your comments, compliments, complaints and ideas to Rightnowautoparts@gmail.com and I will strive to live up to your expectations.

Thanks for your business! Tell Your Friends!!
Brad Catron
Ecommerce Evangelist
www.rightnowautoparts.com

Do You Have a Coupon Code?

The interface we are using to process our wholesale inventory web orders has the coupon/discount code question built in. It is a typical function of retail selling over the internet. When we turned on the site we made the decision to go “all in” on our discount to try to set ourselves apart from everyone else on the internet. Basically we feel that our everyday prices will beat our competitors pricing, even on those special occasions where they offer a coupon. The price we offer the general public is typically better than the price dealership parts departments buy their parts directly from GM for! So, we don't offer a coupon for the blank on your checkout page, but our prices are still the best you will find anywhere. If you see a better price on ACDelco or Motorcraft, please e-mail me at rightnowautoparts@gmail.com and I will look into it.

The Beauty of Channel Conflict

“Channel Conflict” is a term not well understood outside of the distribution world, but the struggle within is having far reaching impacts on all of us. Basically it is the fight between “partners” in a given distribution channel over who gets to sell to whom. Those were the good old days when things were simple…Nice neat silos with very few conflicts.

Into this fairly smooth model, around 1997 was introduced Google. Very few people had the vision to project the impact our current search engine driven world would create. In fact, even now many are trying to cling to the way things “used to be”. If there are two things we Americans are good at they are embracing change and fighting change. In the auto parts world we emulate both. There were a few imaginative companies who built a model around the internet as early as the AOL and Yahoo days. A couple of the strongest can be seen even today as leaders in internet sales of auto parts. A quick look at just two current internet auto parts stores shows that www.rockauto.com and www.autopartswarehouse.com are averaging 50,000 and 80,000 hits per day! Couple that with the statistic that over 60% of auto parts sold online are sold by E-bay, and you start seeing the staggering implications of scale.

This new E-economy business model hangs on a vast distribution network tied together through internet connections linking all of the old players in new and different agreements. Most of the players don’t want to admit to the fact that they are supplying this behemoth, but they are unable to turn down the added volume it produces. It really is a very impressive system where three and four step processes are done in a virtual marketplace and HTML agreements disperse profit percentages automatically based on coded algorithms. It all works great most of the time. There are still some opportunities for fine tuning the process where links are removed from the supply chain and the savings passed along to the end user.

If you asked your average mechanic if he would allow his customer to buy their own parts over the internet and install them, he would probably say no. If you did the same at a dealership you would be laughed out of the place. I suggest that we are living in a changed world and our cozy distribution silos that we built for the past need to be torn down. Increasingly the three, four and five step process of getting parts from the manufacturer to installed on a customers car are too time consuming and costly. How many housewives take that $1500 A/C job quote home and do a price comparison on Google. Ask the car dealers about how well they can protect margin on automotive sales now that the underlying cost information is laid bare for everyone to see on the internet. Information empowers people to be more intelligent in their decisions. I believe those distribution partners and repair facilities that are willing to support this new type of customer will be the ones able to thrive in this new economy. From what I can tell, the trend is towards an increase of 10%-30% on labor charges. That way both parties to the transaction feel they have benefitted.

In the distribution world we constantly bicker amongst our partners about who has the right to sell to whom. The dealership doesn’t want the distributor to sell to his wholesale customer. The retail store doesn’t want OE in his garage customers shop unless it was channeled through their store. The warehouse distributor doesn’t want his manufacturer going direct to their national fleet accounts. In the real world out there all of our customers are looking past us to the internet and who can get them what they want the quickest and at the lowest price. This new market is not going to go away. The customer now has the part they need in their hand… who wants to get paid to put it on their car?

Some People Like Ugly - 50 Worst Cars

I love articles like this because they typically generate outrage from lovers of certain models. I will agree with the Cadillac Cimmaron. My mother had one and not only was it horribly ugly, it cost twice the Chevy Citation whose sheet metal it shared. Plus, although it was only 3 years old, every week another accessory piece would fall off (like a rear view mirror or the glove box door). However, I believe you will find people who will fight you about their Delorean or El Camino or Chevy SSR. I for one would love to find a VW Thing for under $10K.

Citroen Metropolis Hybrid

When I think of Citroen I typically imagine a unique, somewhat quirky european design. If you add Hybrid to the discussion you might think ridiculously small euro-city car that can park sideways in a three foot gap on the curb. Not so... This car was unveiled to, and designed in, the newly emerging Chinese luxury car market.They mention numbers like 94 MPG and 454 HP which, I agree with the article, must be pure fabrications from fantasy. Concept cars that will never be produced sometimes stretch the truth a little ;)

Ford to Shut Down it's Mercury Brand

Ford Motor Co. said it will discontinue its 71-year-old Mercury brand by the end of the year and expand its Lincoln lineup with a new small car.

Ford’s board voted today to cease production of all four of Mercury’s models in the fourth quarter, Mark Fields, the automaker’s president of the Americas, told reporters. Ford will send letters to 1,712 Mercury dealers this week offering them buyouts and giving some the chance to merge the Lincoln half of their franchise with Ford showrooms, he said.

“Given our improving financial situation, it really allows us to absorb the short-term cost of discontinuing Mercury,” Field said, declining to reveal the expected expense. “We’re very proud of Mercury’s history, but we’re now looking forward.”

Read the entire article here...