We're all creatures of habit to one extent or another. We sleep on the same side of the bed, put one shoe on before the other, take the same chair around the dinner table or drive to work the same way every morning. It helps bring order to our lives, structure to the almost overwhelming chaos each one of us simply shrugs off as "modern life." Without habits, the pure randomness of life's assault on our senses would be more than most of us could handle.
We shop at the same market, head for the same barber or stylist when it's time for a haircut and default to our favorite restaurants more often than we are willing to experiment. We do this for any one of a number of reasons, not the least of which is our own personal reluctance to deal with change, our unwillingness to confront the unfamiliar.
I am no exception to that rule and neither are my folks. We've been eating breakfast together since 1966. And, for the most part, we have found ourselves sitting in the same seats at the same table in the same restaurant for years at a time. It's easier, less stressful, than wandering from breakfast place to breakfast place wondering whether or not the eggs will be "soupy."
In Santa Monica, it was Rae's on Pico. Out here we started out with breakfast at the bowling alley. Then it was a local deli, and for the last few years it's been a little place on L.A. Avenue. I'm not sure why we end up there every morning; it's got to be a combination of the menu, the cooks and, of course, the food. But most of all, I think it's the servers.
I get to breakfast a few minutes after six each morning, sit alone and quietly adjust to the fact that I'm up. I sip my coffee, plan the day ahead and wait for Mom and Dad to show up at just about 6:40 am. Bob arrives at 7:15 for his single cup of coffee-flavored sugar. From the moment we all arrive, we are "on the clock," talking about business almost exclusively. The half-hour or so before my folks get there is mine, however. It belongs to me and whoever is working that morning.
Over the years, I've gotten to know the waitresses pretty well despite my quiet introspection first thing in the morning. At first, it was only as much as the other person was willing to reveal. But, after years of scratching the surface, you can dig down pretty deep. And that may be another reason my car seems to find its own way to the same restaurant every morning.
Mom and Dad have been away for the last few days, so Bob and I have been opening up just a little earlier each day. We've been showing up at the restaurant just a little earlier, too. The conversations have been pretty normal for this part of the year, at least until this morning when normal blew out the window and it became alarmingly clear just how little most people know about our industry.
It started just as Bob walked through the door and our waitress served up an 81/2-by-11 flyer with my second cup of coffee. The flyer was from a local automotive service franchise and was filled with more than a dozen automotive service "specials," all at prices that were just too good to be true - perhaps because they were. My first reaction was to walk across the street to "Mickey D's" for their latest breakfast special, but that wouldn't have accomplished much. Instead, I decided to wait and see what this was all about.
The waitress who placed the flyer in front of me just purchased an 11-year-old Corvette coupe and was planning a road trip up north. She wanted to get the vehicle serviced before taking it on the road. I should have been overjoyed. After all, there is something special about someone who understands there is more to getting ready for a trip than filling the car or truck up with gas. However, there was a problem. Instead of focusing on what needed to be done and why, she seemed to be focusing on the flyer and whether or not it provided good value. Now, I found myself in the unenviable position of trying to explain what all the funny little marks alongside each of the "special" prices meant.
There were stars and crosses and double crosses and some signs I'd never even seen before. Some appeared alone. Others were strung together like charms on a bracelet. One of the symbols indicated multigrade oils were available, but not at the advertised price. Another suggested that front-wheel-drive vehicles and/or semimetallic brake pads were more money, as well. Another implied that some services might "require additional parts and labor at a substantial extra charge" and others might not be available at all depending upon what you were driving or what day of the week it was.
The waitress was interested in a "scheduled major maintenance." That supposedly included a 15-point inspection; oil change; air filter; differential drain and refill; chassis lubrication; maintenance tune-up with new plugs; a new PCV filter; tire rotation; transmission filter, fluid and gasket; cooling system service; brake adjustment; belt and hose inspection (apparently not a part of the 15-point inspection); and wheel bearing repack. All for the low, low price of just $159.90.
I asked her if she realized that all those cute little symbols meant the price she would pay would be substantially higher than the price posted on the flyer. She flashed me a motherly smile as if I was the one who just didn't get it and pointed at the price.
"Is that a good price for all that work?"
I smiled, shook my head and suggested that even they couldn't beat those prices because there wasn't a chance in hell anyone was ever going to leave that facility paying only the advertised price ... at least, not in a Corvette. I tried to point out the symbols and what they meant. I tried to explain how the game is played. But the harder I tried, and the harder Bob tried, the more we realized there is a segment of our population who will never understand just how they are being taken advantage of because they don't want to.
You can "order" up a brake job at the advertised price of $49.95, but that isn't the whole meal. It's just an entr裮 Sure, the rest of the meal is available, but only a la carte! The brake pads are extra, semimetallic pads are extra, pads that will stop the car are extra and so are 4X4s, rear disc brakes, pressed rotors and who knows what else.
You can order up a "maintenance" tune-up, but V6s are extra and so are V8s. You can order an oil change, but only with single-weight motor oil; multigrades are available - but you guessed it - not at the advertised price.
There wasn't a single service on the flyer that was available without some kind of exclusion, without some kind of a caveat, without some kind of additional charge. Only, the young lady who pours my coffee three days a week just couldn't see it. Oh, she saw all the symbols and understood that every service on the page was nothing more or less than a blatant attempt to reel in an unsuspecting motorist with price used as the bait, but she didn't seem to care. All she seemed able to see was the "scheduled major maintenance" at that unrealistically low advertised price.
Did she know she would be paying more? I don't know; maybe. I know what she said, but what she said wasn't consistent with the information she had been given. By her questions she seemed to be suggesting that anyone could do the services on the flyer and questioned why she should have to pay for a "qualified" technician when all she needed was someone capable of performing the inspection.
I suppose I could have argued with her. I had the benefit of both the facts and the experience. We shared the telephone diagnostic hotline responsibilities for a major quick-service lube chain for a number of years. That job gave us more than enough experience to prove that a qualified technician isn't a bad thing to have regardless of how simple the task might be. I could have given her logbooks filled with answers to her questions, but that wasn't what she was interested in. Like so many other motorists, all she seemed interested in was value ... no matter what the cost. The only problem was an innate inability to recognize what actually constitutes value in automotive service.
Purchasing a "scheduled major maintenance" or any other automotive service for that matter isn't as easy as ordering a side of ham or bacon with your scrambled eggs. Even if it was, not all breakfast cooks are created equally and neither are most automotive repair shops. People are cursed with their own unique tastes. Some like their side of bacon crisp or their ham well done. Others like their toast light or dark or somewhere in between. And their eggs ... well they generally want their eggs loose, but not too loose, over hard, but not too hard, or ... you get the idea.
People are no less particular when it comes to their vehicles. They may not know what is wrong or why, but they do know when the vehicle is not "right." They can and do try to communicate what is making them uncomfortable. And, that's where I get lost. I could no more handle the morning rush at breakfast than one of the breakfast cooks could handle Monday morning at our place. There are different skill sets involved, different levels of ability and experience.
It is somehow very wrong to assume that because the word "maintenance" is used in conjunction with the term "automotive service," that just anyone could perform that service with equal skill and ability. It is naive to assume that just because a price is printed on an 81/2-by-11 flyer it is the price you will pay ... especially, when every price on the flyer is accompanied by a caveat of some kind. And, yet, there are people who are drawn to that kind of marketing; people who believe they can order automotive service the same way they order a side of breakfast meat or an English muffin with their oatmeal.
There is one basic difference: If someone ruins breakfast - delivers the toast too dark, too light or cold, the bacon limp instead of crisp or the sausage raw instead of well done - all it costs is a little aggravation and a few bucks. If someone screws up while working on a car or truck, it can ruin more than just your morning and cost more than two eggs, toast and bacon.
