I have a 1994 Jaguar XJS that has been off the road for the past year and stored in my garage. I recently had it towed to a Canadian Tire store near my home (there’s no Jaguar dealership anywhere near me) to have them look at the battery and alternator. It was starting but not holding a charge and seemed a minor issue.
I was stunned when the service advisor called me back and said they can’t work on my car. Or any Jaguar for that matter.
I advised them it was really pretty minor stuff, and that another Canadian Tire had worked on it in the past for a similar problem. No dice. She felt bad that I had the car towed there and went to talk with the manager.
“No, we don’t service any Jaguars,” she told me. Then I was further taken aback when she offered up a list of other brands they won’t service either, which included BMW and Mercedes.
Since I had never encountered this before, I visited the Canadian Tire national website where they proudly state on the homepage: “We Service All Makes & Models: Bring your car to any of our 3,000 licensed technicians for expert guidance on all makes and models.”
Well, that’s clearly not true. At least not for the store in Keswick, Ont. that I took my car to.
Canadian Tire markets itself as “Canada’s Garage” but clearly some of their garages are only interested in working on some of Canada’s cars.
I called another Canadian Tire store in Scarborough, Ont. and the service advisor said they would look at it. I asked him about why he thought the other store refused, and he offered that it’s really dependent on whether their mechanics want to, or are able to work on that car.
I didn’t feel like calling every store to find out their policy so I called Canadian Tire Corporate to explain what happened and asked if they had a policy. They explained that it’s up to the owner of each of the stores to decide which vehicles they will work on. “It’s the owner’s decision,” they told me. “They are all individually owned and operated.”
Now apart from the nuisance of having to find another place to get my vehicle serviced, this helps prove that the increasing complexity of today’s vehicles (even though my Jaguar is much older it was still refused) is really going to create huge service opportunities for dealers.
This is only one example, but part of a growing issue for the aftermarket as they struggle to have enough highly-trained service technicians to handle the next generation of vehicles, particularly with advanced safety tech, electric and hybrids and whatever else comes next like hydrogen.
The aftermarket service industry grew rapidly as a result of perceptions that dealerships were too expensive and not as convenient.
Now, dealerships are in a position to win a lot of that business back as the aftermarket pulls back from servicing the complexity of today’s vehicles.
Advantage Dealers.
