Nationwide warranty, discounted, free technical and shop management training, and earn backs on electronic parts purchases are other advantages, St. Clair said, that have stemmed from his partnership with O'Reilly.

St. Clair started working at his father's repair shop in 1993. He said O'Reilly had always been the shop's main parts vendor, so when O'Reilly rep Dave Etter introduced the CAR program to Larry St. Clair in 2002, it just made sense, his son said.

Scott St. Clair, who said he worked with his father for 11 years building the business from a lube and tire shop to a full-service repair facility, took over the shop in 2004 when his father died. 

"We worked really well together, especially for a father-son relationship," St. Clair said. "When he passed, I had a lot of things thrown at me that he was previously responsible for, so I had to learn a lot. One thing in particular that I learned was the importance of a relationship with our parts vendors."

Through his relationship with O'Reilly, St. Clair said he has found a parts distributor that really wanted to fulfill his needs. 

 
"They have enough trucks and manpower to deliver parts in a reasonable time, which is really a key factor as to why I deal with O'Reilly," he said, adding that at least 80 percent of his parts orders come from O'Reilly, and the local jobber is only minutes away.

St. Clair said the CAR program is also beneficial to his customers because they receive a nationwide warranty on the work performed on their cars.

"If one of my customers is traveling out of town and breaks down, they can get set up with another Certified Auto Repair shop throughout the country that will take care of them under the warranty," he said. 

 
Every day, on almost every invoice, St. Clair said he is using O'Reilly's First Call online parts-ordering system.  The system has proven to be a huge time saver and also provides him with a earn back based on the amount of parts he purchases, he said.

St. Clair said the Snap-n John Bean Visualiner he recently purchased has also been a time saver for his business. 

"The new alignment machine is fast and amazing," he said. "It can find the true center point of the wheel just by attaching the reflectors and rolling the car back and then forward."

He said he hopes to bring on new accounts thanks to the aligner and bring back some old accounts that were unsatisfied with the dated machine he had been using.

"The new aligner gives us a nice printout, which is what the insurance company and customers want to look at," he said. "With the older machine, I was losing some business, so I had to bite the bullet and get the new machine, which has eliminated comebacks and helped get some business back."

Along with the drive-on alignment rack, St. Clair said he has five two-post lifts and an oil change pit in his 4,500-square-foot shop. He added that his Hunter tire balancer, that simulates road force, and Accu-Turn tire changer from Myers Brothers work well for the eight to 10 tire orders every day from Tire Wholesale Warehouse and Shore Tire.  

 
St. Clair said he has three technicians and one service writer but is looking to add another service writer so he can focus more on the business.

"I am doing ownership stuff, service writing, and trying to stay in tune with what is going on in the garage," he said. "I have learned that I have a lot of things to do, and I can't do it all."

As much as possible, though, St. Clair said he likes to stay in touch with his customers and the work performed on their cars.

"If I run across a customer at Wal-Mart and they start talking about their car, I don't want to be clueless about what they are talking about," he said. "Not only that, but I also just like to know that everything is being taken care of."