The shop, celebrating its one-year anniversary this month, runs on a concept that puts employees in groups and pays each group 38 percent of what they earn in labor, said General Manager Brian Spillars.

Currently, Spillars said, the shop has two body teams, each with an A and B member. The A member is the team leader and manages the B member. As the company grows, a C member will be added to each group. The paint team, consisting of three employees, is broken down into an A, B, and C member.

Although they all have different levels of experience, they all rotate responsibilities throughout the week, Spillars said. 

   
"Without the team concept, we wouldn't be rotating our painters," he said. "If you had a lead painter, he would be your painter.

In this case, we have our best painter teaching the other two guys how to be the painters that we need."

"With the team, because of the different levels of expertise, the A guy has an interest in bringing the B and C guys along and leveraging what he knows," Perry said. "We want the A guy to be educating, and we want to incentivize him to do that so the team concept leads into everybody either training or learning."

From a management perspective, Production Manager Jeff Lewis said the team concept allows him to manage only three individuals, rather than eight because team leaders are responsible for managing their team. 

Some strategies that Spillars said he has implemented to make the team concept work include putting the majority of the body work in the center of the shop so body technicians can meet in the middle to help each other out.

Another key is allowing the A member to interview potential B and C members during the hiring process, he said: this strategy gives the A member a firsthand opportunity to see if the candidate will make a good team member.

The team concept increases productivity and efficiency at the Collision Center of Columbia, as does the cutting-edge equipment installed by Autobody Equipment Solutions, Spillars said.

The facility is broken into two 9,500-square-foot buildings, one designated for body work, the other for prep and paint. The buildings are equipped with the latest Car-O-Liner frame machines, Pro Spot i4 welding machines, Freedom prep stations, Chronotech paint booths, Tsunami compressed-air systems, and Eurovac portable vacuum systems, Spillars said. 

   
"The new frame machines are more expensive, but productivity-wise, we are doing the work with four people that it would (otherwise) take for eight people," Perry said.

Spillars added that time is saved during set-up and through the Blue Tooth technology measuring system.

Along with the Car-O-Liner frame machines, Spillars said the technology available on the Pro Spot i4 welders has made the operation time shorter for his body technicians.

By entering a VIN into the welder, a technician has access to all information regarding the type of steel they are working on and temperature it needs to be welded at, Spillars said.

"The time it saves not having to figure that out is immense," he said. "When they are working on every type of car on the road, they are bound to pull something in that is new or different. When the information is available on the piece of equipment, the technician doesn't have to look it up in a book."

The Freedom prep stations have also been vital to the operation, Spillars said. The stations do not lose heat or AC because the air recirculates through carbon filters. The paint building was designed so cars never have to back out. The vehicles are always moving forward, which makes things more efficient, he said.

Spillars said he attributes a lot of the layout design and equipment choices to Dan Sommerhauser, owner of Autobody Equipment Solutions. 

"Dan had a lot of experience regarding what worked and what didn't," he said. "He would take us to a shop and show us how he laid it out there, why he did it that way, and how it could be applied here. It was a lot of input from a lot of different situations he had." 

Although equipment plays a key role in the success of Collision Center of Columbia, Spillars said it takes knowledgeable employees to make it all come together.

"You can go out and spend all the money you want, but you have to have the right people," he said. "This place would not be doing what it is doing now if it wasn't for Production Manager Jeff Lewis and the experience he has brought."

In all, Collision Center of Columbia has 15 employees including himself, Spillars said: four body technicians, three painters, a parts manager, production manager, two estimators, a receptionist, a detailer, and an accountant.