A person’s office décor can tell you a lot about them…look around, and you’ll quickly learn how they operate, and the wisdom they value most.
In the office of Jesse Parks — collision director at Freeman Collision Center in Santa Rosa, California — one of the first things you’ll see is an encouraging sign that reads: “Failure is a temporary state where the most valuable lessons are learned.” It’s a truth he’s seen play out time and time again over the course of his career, he says.
Parks has come a long way and made plenty of mistakes — but more importantly, learned a ton of those valuable lessons — since first entering the industry without any experience in 2001. Now, he’s running a shop bringing in close to $1 million a month.
“Failure isn’t something to fear. Just the opposite, in fact,” he says. “It’s an indication that you’re willing to push the boundaries of your comfort zone, take chances, think outside the box, and try new processes…all imperatives for running a successful collision business.”
A Chance Encounter
Parks is living proof that one "yes" can change your life.
While working as a waiter back in 2001, he was approached by the owner of a large collision disruptor who asked him to join his team. Intrigued, he agreed.
“I didn't know anything about cars,” he recalled, “and I wasn't really tech-savvy. I was thrown into a sink-or-swim environment that really challenged me to figure it out.”
And figure it out he did. Within two years, Parks was managing his first shop. Soon after that,
he moved on to running larger locations, then a “mega facility” where he perfected the ins and outs of large volume production and working with contractual insurance partners.
“After about 18 years of that, I went on to an elite luxury and exotic environment in San Francisco, repairing a lot of higher-end cars. That's where I really started focusing on correct and safe OEM repairs, learning a lot about the equipment, and managing many high-end certifications.”
When the opportunity to switch over to the dealer world came about, Parks saw it as the perfect way to marry his large production experience with his interest in certified driven repairs.
“To have had the production and DRP experience, then the luxury-exotic experience, and now the dealership…it gives me the ability, I think, to bring in concepts that aren't generally found in dealership collision centers, and it really encourages me to think outside the box.”
Traditional dealerships, says Parks, often focus on just one or two manufacturers, and are often highly regimented in their processes.
“Not us,” he says of Freeman Collision Center. “We're constantly adjusting. I bring on additional certifications, additional partners, new processes, new equipment. I don't look at it like, ‘I only fix this type of car.’ I look at it like, ‘What cars are in our market? Where are our opportunities? What do I need to do to be the best at fixing the cars we’re going to repair?’”
Rebuilding More than Cars
When Parks first took over as collision director at Freeman Collision Center four years ago — a 45,000 sq. ft. facility on the 14-acre campus of Freeman Lexus and Freeman Toyota — the culture was severely damaged, and the shop had been without a manager for several months.
“The car count was down. The lean processes were nonexistent. The employee morale was bruised, and we were doing about $350,000 a month,” he recalled.
It took a lot of effort — and a lot of patience — says Parks, to fix everything that was wrong at the shop and build trust with the team. But his efforts have paid off in a big way. Each year since taking over, the shop’s revenue has steadily climbed to nearly $900,000 a month.
“We focused VERY heavily on training. I realized that I could not expect a consistent repair if everybody didn’t have the same training,” he says “I spent hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars getting everybody up to speed, and I paid everyone properly for the guilds they were in.”
Every technician at Freeman Collision Center is now ASE Master Certified — an impressive feat, given that the shop has a total of 13 production staff in these guilds. And every technician is cross-trained to perform calibrations, alignments, and mechanical repairs, which are all kept in-house.
Parks also took the shop’s OEM certification count from two to 16 — including some of the “heavy hitters” and boutique EV certifications — added staff, secured outside partnerships, restructured pay plans, and overhauled processes…all while building rapport with the team.
“Consistency over time equals trust. If I do the same thing for long enough, people eventually are going to say, ‘That's who this person is,’ and they're going to trust that that's my vision. I had to be very patient, which isn't easy for me,” admits Parks, “and I had to be very collaborative. I had to involve the team in the process. I overcommunicated. Sheryl Driggers (of Collision Advice and also a FenderBender Advisory Board member) frequently says, ‘Where there's no communication, negativity fills the void.’ I'm constantly letting them know my vision, but I don't create the map to get there. I just show them the finish line, and I ask them to help me build the map together.”
Parks travels at least twice a month for industry-related events, and says the shop runs relatively the same regardless whether he’s there or not, “because people know their job, they're invested in the process. The whole team has a lot of buy-in. We make decisions together. And that's really important to me, that they have a say and a voice in building the clubhouse that we're all going to hang out in.”
Parks also employs a culture of merit over a culture of entitlement, rewarding employees for the value they bring to the team — not solely how long they’ve been with the company.
“In a culture of merit, everybody has an opportunity to participate, and they'll never be over promoted by somebody that is less deserving or less knowledgeable than they are, or that adds less value than they do.”
Be Proactive, Not Reactive
Parks is one of the most proactive people you’ll ever meet.
Whether strategizing for the future, testing and adopting new tech like artificial intelligence (AI), or attending an industry event or training, Parks is always working toward staying one step ahead.
“2023 was the end of what I call the heyday,” he says. “All the shops were drinking through the fire hose, if you will. Everybody had more work than they needed.”
Many shops, he said, thought this was the new norm. But Parks anticipated the downturn in 2024 and prepared ahead for it.
“I brought on partners when we didn't need it, and it gave me the ability to set my terms with a few handpicked, like-minded insurance companies that were aligned with our business model and aligned with our view on how a vehicle should be repaired — those who would allow us to write an estimate the way that the vehicle should be repaired rather than a severity-driven model.”
The Certified Collision Group, which the dealership became affiliated with in 2022, has been instrumental in facilitating some of these outside partnerships as well, he says, and empowering the shop to have more freedom in their repairs.
“The heavily certified model is harder than the DRP model, no doubt,” admits Parks, but he believes the high-quality repairs that it results in are more than worth it — both from the standpoint of the shop’s profitability and the best interest of the customer.
And the proof is in the numbers.
From 2023 to 2024 Freeman Collision Center grew 26%, thanks to Parks’ preemptive approach, and he’s on pace for 18% growth this year, too. He’d also like to add a couple more certifications to the shop’s ever-growing catalog.
“I'm really focusing on certifications that either already have or are moving to connected services or restricted parts. Every move that I'm making now is with the intention of disrupting first notice of loss (FNOL) — so the sources that we get our work from are other than an insurance referral — and really working hard to build those up so that we continue growing and can continue to perform in a consolidator-dominated industry.”
The Payoff
There’s no denying that the overhaul on Freeman’s culture and operations has been an outstanding success — under Parks’ leadership, Freeman Collision won the 2024 Lexus Certified Collison Center of the Year for a second time, and was awarded the 2024 Toyota Certified Collison Center of the Year for a third time, alongside other national OEM awards honoring them as a top shop. And for the last two years, two different Freeman technicians won ASE Technician of the Year.
“What does it take to get there?” reflected Parks. “It takes having a staff that's really vetted…and maintaining zero turnover. You cannot measure the cost of turnover.”
That’s why investing in training and staff is Parks’ #1 priority.
“Culture, quality, and retention are at the top of my ethos. Many shops put profitability at the top of their ethos, and they get it. They get it, but it shows their employees that profitability is the most important thing, so then that's all that they care about, too. But if you flip that around and you focus on things that are critical to the business, to the development of the staff, to the shop’s reputation, you're going to get that, and you're going to set that standard, and profitability will follow.”
Ditch Your Comfort Zone
You’ll be hard-pressed to find someone keeping closer tabs on the industry’s pulse than Parks — look to your right or left at an OEM roundtable or council, trade show, or leadership training and you’re likely to see him there.
“I consider myself a lifelong learner,” he says, adding that he’s always looking for ways to take his own advice and make himself “uncomfortable” by surrounding himself with people who will challenge and hold him accountable. At the very top of the list? Mike Anderson and Parks’ cohorts in his Spartan 300 group, where he collaborates with some of the top-performing shops in the country.
“The Spartan 300 group has been one of the most impactful partners I’ve ever had, in terms of my continued success in the industry,” he says. “We focus heavily on innovation and hold each other accountable to correct and safe OEM repairs and use only OEM scanning and calibration equipment. It’s given me the data and insights to successfully navigate a challenging time in our industry.”
In addition to their strict adherence to the highest quality OEM repairs, every member of the group shares Parks’ willingness to be pushed outside their comfort zone as well.
“Any successful shop owner or manager, we were all the new person in the room at some point,” encourages Parks. Everything Parks is involved in now, he says, came from taking that first uncomfortable step, and he’s always encouraging others to follow suit.
“We have to think outside the box. We cannot keep doing what we've always done and expect different results. And we're going to make some mistakes. We're going to bump our head. But like my sign says, that’s where the real learning happens.”
You’ll find that most everyone you meet wants to help, Parks adds reassuringly. Some of the best training he’s ever received, he says, came from other operators. And he consistently learns something new that improves operations at every industry event he attends.
“Most of the time, somebody has already built a wheel. It doesn't mean that we can go take their entire model…but if we're listening with the intent to be influenced, and we're working hard to find the innovation and find the nuggets, there's something that we can bring home from everything and implement in our stores.”
“At the end of the day, we all like talking about cars. We like meeting new people. We like sharing our experience. We like working with somebody that is working to grow their knowledge and move closer to correct and safe OEM repairs. And we understand that it's not easy. It wasn't easy for us, either, when we started.”
So go ahead, get out there — Jesse Parks will be the first one to shake your hand when you do.
