AGE RANGE OF SHOP EMPLOYEES
We’ve talked a lot about the difficulty shops have in hiring younger techs, and this is reflected in our respondents—only 5% were 24 years old or younger. In contrast, the old guard is hanging in there: Nine percent of our respondents were 55 and up.
GENDER BREAKDOWN
While diesel repair is still a male-dominated industry, women are definitely catching up—they made up nearly a quarter of our respondents!
SHOP NET PROFIT IN 2022
We have good news on this end: More shops are paying attention to their net profits and losses than in recent years. In 2020, 20% of shops didn’t really know how they were doing; by 2022, that percentage dropped to 10%.
DID SHOPS RAISE THEIR LABOR RATES IN 2022?
Seventy-six percent of the shops we surveyed told us they raised their labor rates in 2022. The other 24% did not. A shop’s location may impact its labor rates: the Southwest had the highest overall increase ($13.10 average) with the Northeast right behind it ($12.20 average).
HOW MUCH DID SHOPS INCREASE HOURLY WAGES FOR TECHS IN 2022?
We looked into the average hourly raises technicians received in 2022. Ready for some surprising facts? Shops that employ the lowest number of techs also handed out the smallest raises (averaging a $3.10 per hour increase). Meanwhile, the biggest shops—employing 41 or more techs—increased their hourly rates by an average of $8.20.
YEARS WITH CURRENT EMPLOYER AND YEARS IN INDUSTRY
Though the industry is still in the middle of a shortage, the techs that remain are often very loyal. We asked technicians how long they'd been with their employer; those who responded said they've been with their current employers for an average of six years, and have spent an average of 12 years in the industry overall.
ARE YOU ACTIVELY MANAGING CORES?
Eighty-three percent of shops are managing their cores. This is a great new high—up from 76% in 2021 and 76% in 2020. That does mean that the other 17% of this 2022’s respondents either didn’t manage cores or only managed them occasionally. That’s not a number we like to see, though it’s an improvement over 2021 (24%) and 2020 (24%).
TIME TO SOURCE AND PLACE AN ORDER FOR A NON-STOCKED PART
The majority of our respondents told us it takes between one and six hours to place an order for a part that isn’t in stock. Just 31% of the parts managers who responded said it took between one and three hours; 29% said it took between four and six hours. Meanwhile, 5% needed 13 to 24 hours to find and order a part.