Episode 9 – How Rubio’s Auto Mechanic Builds Community Trust

Brian Davis 0:05
Rubio’s auto mechanic, I am super excited to have you guys come in today. I just, I hadn’t heard of you guys before, and so I would absolutely, I would love it if you could just spend a little bit of time just introducing both of you. And then I’m really excited to get into your guys’s business model, because there’s something about your guys’s business model that I think definitely differentiates you guys from anybody else that I’ve talked with.

Martin Rubio 0:31
Well, we are. We’re very excited to be here. Thank you by the way. Yeah, um, we are brand new in the sense of we just opened up shop. I’m the owner, Martin, Martin Rubio, and this is our technician, ivanvin, yeah, and what we’re trying to do is we’re running the shop with the idea of we’re more than mechanics. We’re neighbors, helping neighbors. We believe in sustainability over profit, and we’re trying to become a financially stable business like, how do I say profitable through fleet accounts with with other companies. That way we can help out the community around us and stuff, whether that’s by eating parts, profit or labor and stuff.

Brian Davis 1:23
Yeah, that’s the thing that’s interesting. Like, so, what is it that kind of put this model, this business model, on your radar? Like, have you been seeing other companies do this similar thing? Or is this?

Ivan Vaveros 1:36
No, um, I actually when, when I became owner of the shop, I’m not actually in the car industry or in this field or anything. I don’t know anything about cars themselves, um, luckily, our technician and stuff has we, he’s helped me grow, you know, build the build the company and stuff, yeah, um, it’s more of our personal journey with things and stuff like that. Kind of like, life experiences are the same thing. Like, you don’t really see it out there, where people just genuinely want to help. And there’s things like, just like, Martin doesn’t necessarily know cars. That doesn’t mean he can’t. And then there’s things where I know that I can help him with, and it’s just in me to help Martin as my friend. And why wouldn’t you want to just help your whole community when there’s something that you can do to help, you know, yeah, I feel like we don’t always necessarily think about how much we can impact somebody without really trying. Like, there’s something that I can do that could be super basic for me on the vehicle, but Martin would never be able to do that, or thinks he would never be able to do that until, you know, I can come over here and show him or do it for him, and just kind of explain what went on, you know,

Brian Davis 2:46
yeah, people just don’t, they don’t know what’s possible or what it is that they can do, and maybe until they see somebody else do it. But what’s kind of giving you guys that perspective, or that value of giving back to the community that you guys are living in.

Martin Rubio 3:01
It’s for me. Anyways, it’s very personal in the sense of, I’ve always been I’m originally from Oxnard, yeah, and I lived in what my wife, quote, unquote, called the ghetto. So when I was growing up, I was the family that would get donated Christmas gifts from other families. We were the family and like the food lines, when two years ago, our Prius, my water pump went out and the dealership quoted me five grand. I didn’t have five grand in my account. Yeah, I did not. I was like, we need to pull this money out of somewhere, and then we still have rent and food to rent food and bills to worry about. But luckily, my friend, who actually recommended me, Ivan, was like, dude, just, just bring it over, buy the part, and we’ll put it in for free. He saved me $4,500 yeah, you know, and it’s to him, we were just kind of hanging out, but he made a huge impact on my life at that moment. You know, I was also homeless at one point, and the only reason I came out of homelessness was through the generosity of other people. I’ve myself have never been a very big money person. I have a home, have a loving family. I don’t need to ask for anything else. I am well taken care of, and if we’re able to help people. When, when me and Ivan first met, I told him I was like, helping people is really, really important to me. If you’re ever opening to eating your labor, you’re like, Hey, dude, let’s help out this person. Then I’ll eat the parts. We won’t make any profit. I’m like, we’ll go, you know, we’ll break even, or whatever, and we’ll help out the community. And he was like, Dude, that’s awesome. I want to do that. So that was, that’s, that’s a big thing,

Brian Davis 4:41
yeah, so you were able to experience it, yeah. Like, you know what it’s like to, you know, need something done to your car, and how not having that done to your car is going to impact your life, and then the lives of the people that are relying on you. For a lot

Martin Rubio 4:59
of people. Well, their car is their livelihood, yeah, you know, you you your car breaks down. Then you can’t get to work, and then you can lose your job, or, you know, with your kid, with babysitting and stuff and all that, it makes a huge, huge difference. And then the average person, the average family, can’t afford a 1000 $2,000 emergency bill. Yeah, you know. And it’s, it’s if we can make a change where we can, where we stay financially viable as a company through working with other, either companies or local businesses, and our technicians are well taken care of, then, yeah, I don’t mind not making profit off parts, you know?

Brian Davis 5:40
Yeah, yeah, that’s awesome, man, yeah, yeah, I think that that’s beautiful. And then what about Yeah? What about you? Evan, well,

Ivan Vaveros 5:48
the first independent shop that I was at, I got really lucky. He was a really great mentor. And every Friday we would go to lunch with him and the few other shop owners that he was friends with. And every time, like most of the time that we would go, we would all talk about, kind of what happened throughout the week, things that we could share with each other, or, like, kind of how to grow and be better within the group. And I thought that was really amazing, just to see a lot of different shops interacting with each other, and then they’re all friends. They all hang out, you know, they don’t compete with each other. They just want to see each other grow and succeed. So that was kind of my first experience with that. And I realized, like, you know, at the independent shop that I was at, he had a lot of friends who would just come and hang out, and then all of his, he didn’t have any marketing or anything like that. It was all word of mouth, yeah, and then that just really showed me how strong community is, or just, you know, if you really take pride in what you do and you do a job, well, people are going to appreciate that, and they’re going to keep coming back, and they’re going to recommend their friends to you.

Brian Davis 6:44
Yeah, totally word of mouth. It’s one of the it’s the most powerful way of growing your business, and I also think the most meaningful, because, like, anybody could advertise, anybody could, you know, put out stuff and drive new traffic and but it’s like to give somebody such a good experience that they are putting their own reputation on the line, and then having people that they care about in their life, their family, their friends, like, go and have this same experience, like, unless they’re sadistic, you know, that’s, that’s, that’s what you want, yeah, But let’s go back to when you talked about that lunch. What was it? What? What were you expecting for that type of lunch to be, and how was kind of like your mind? Mind kind of shifted with what you actually saw.

Ivan Vaveros 7:37
Well, I had, I started at that independent shop because one of my friends used to work there. I used to actually be in sales before, and I just during covid, I kind of decided, you know, I was making good money, but I just wasn’t feeling appreciated enough, and I felt like I wasn’t really helping people. So then I went over to that shop because my friend was leaving, and then I worked there for about a day, and he kind of asked me, How do you feel? Do you do you want to come work here, or you’re gonna go back? And then just feeling like, knowing that I finished something, you know, I was able to see what I worked on and help somebody out. Really felt good. And then so he was always a really like, positive person. He was always talking to everybody and had a lot of friends. So when I went to his lunch, I didn’t really have any expectations. I was just kind of going because he want on Fridays, he like to we’d leave early, we’d go to lunch and then just kind of clean up the shop and hang out. So we just went. And it was really nice to see all these different shops, because one of them worked on Volvos, one strictly in older vehicles, the other one worked on European cars. And it was nice to see that sometimes, when we’d get a car that he wouldn’t necessarily like to work on European cars, he’d recommend the shop that, you know, we’d hang out with, just because he knew they were going to do a good job. Yeah, and it was somebody else that he wanted to see thrive. So I really liked that, because I feel like in the automotive industry, it’s mainly, you always hear that it’s cutthroat, that nobody’s gonna like, you know, put their hand out for you or help you out, like It’s sink or swim most of the time, especially when you go to, like, a dealership or anything like that. Yeah. So it was really nice to see, and I felt really lucky to the first shop that I’m at, like, you know, it’s really like a home, feeling like it felt like a family.

Brian Davis 9:19
Yeah, that’s special, man. And yeah, and it’s, it’s cool to see you appreciate that and that you got that opportunity, yeah, and that that was your first experience. Have you had any other experiences where it hasn’t been like that?

Ivan Vaveros 9:34
Or, I mean, I worked at a dealership, and I feel like I got pretty lucky there too. Like the brand that I was with was pretty small, so there was only like five of us there. We just

Brian Davis 9:45
got to keep on hanging out with Ivan man, right?

Ivan Vaveros 9:48
Yeah, I got lucky man. Or it’s kind of just appreciating everything. You know, you listen to what people have to say, and then, you know, you just value what people say. Not everybody’s going to share valuable information or life information with you. So if. Somebody does I I really take that to heart. You know, they’re, they’re really giving you some piece of advice. So at the dealership, it obviously was more of a dealership atmosphere. But same thing, I feel like I’ve always been, I always like to talk to people. So I’d go down to talk to the other brands, and we would all kind of share ideas and stuff like that as well. So even then, I feel like I got lucky at that point. And it’s also kind of instilled in me that, like you kind of choose the atmosphere that you want to be in, you know, like, if you’re going to put that attitude out there, that’s the attitude that you’re going to get it out, you know. But if you’re just a nice person and you’re just trying to genuinely help people or listen to people, it becomes really easy to just enjoy time and communicate.

Brian Davis 10:40
Yeah, so where do you think you kind of developed that value system?

Ivan Vaveros 10:46
Same thing, just kind of growing up like, yeah, you know, being in the family that did kind of get the free Christmas presents, or, like, food, or, you know, being helped out, you kind of realize that sometimes you appreciate things a little bit more, or you don’t notice things. It Yes. So I felt like, as I got older, I just got presented more opportunities that I didn’t necessarily see that were there for me. So that’s kind of what I like to do to other people, is I want to share my experiences and kind of change people’s perspective. Because, you know, like you said, your mind’s a very powerful thing, and a lot of it is how you view things and kind of the choice that you make to move forward.

Brian Davis 11:23
Yeah, and so how did you guys get to the point where you both knew that you wanted to get into Rubio’s auto mechanic and make it, you know, become what it is that you have a vision for it to be?

Ivan Vaveros 11:39
I feel like it was just same thing, just over time, talking to each other and really getting to know each other, and then just having that communication where we don’t always necessarily have to agree on something, but we’ll listen to each other’s point of view and kind of listen to each other’s facts and either adjust to it or, you know, we can also understand this is where we differ, and then that’s okay, too. And then kind of having the same values, where I don’t necessarily want to do things just for profit, like, you know, I want to be able to help people. I want to, like, do things for other people that I’m able to do. And then he shares that same value.

Martin Rubio 12:14
Our mission statement being that we’re more than mechanics for neighbors, helping neighbors. Actually the reason that we came up with that, or I came up with it, was because of Ivan, where one thing is we were talking about it. One thing is to talk about it. Another thing is to actually do it. And it was a weekend. We’re not open on weekends currently, and we weren’t at the shop anymore. We had just left. We were there cleaning up, and I get a phone call, and it’s from a person who sounded kind of distressed, being like, I’m not from Fillmore. No. Auto shops are open. This is my situation, and I said we’re not open. And none of us actually live in Fillmore, but let me call my technician and see what we can do for you. Ivan lives 45 minutes away. I call him up. I’m like, Hey, bro, this is the situation. What do you want to do? And the only thing he says is, this is why we’re opening up the shop, right? I go, yeah. And he drives all the way back to help that person out. And then we put the car into the shop, and then the next day, I ate the parts, he ate the labor, and we helped out someone in need. And at the end, at the end of the day, we were in the office, and we’re like, that felt good. It’s like, you know, we’re doing what we’re saying that we’re gonna do. You know, at the moment, it wasn’t like, a super smart financial move, but we made more than a customer. We didn’t make it a customer. We made a lifelong connection. Yeah, you know, we helped someone out that was in desperate need at that time. And if you know, someone helped us out like that in our past, things could be very different, you know,

Brian Davis 13:55
yeah, yeah, it’s, it’s like you guys are building into something that’s greater than just material things, yeah? And at the end of the day, like material thing, like, everything’s gonna burn, you know, it’s all going away. It’s like, but it’s like, you guys are investing in people, yeah, you know, you guys are investing in their ability to do what it is that they need to do, to have peace of mind and also to know that they’re they’re being taken care of. Yeah, you know that there, that there is a solution to the very immediate problem that they have, and that, like whatever might be keeping them from that is going to be taken away.

Martin Rubio 14:45
Yeah. And then sometimes I feel like, you know, what we will really want to do is get to know our customers. And sometimes, you know, it’s just knowing what’s going on in somebody’s date. You know, it’s having a conversation. And it’s funny because so I’m still working my nine to five. Yeah, graveyard shift. And Ivan was still working at his other shop for a while. Kind of like, it’s kind of hard to tell someone, oh, you know, you quit your established job to join this brand new thing. And so he was at his other shop, and then he would come after, after he was done over there, and we ended up getting a customer who was like, Oh, I’ll be there at one. We’re like, Okay, awesome. That works out for us. And they show up at 11, and then they were like, oh, we’ll just wait. It’s fine. And then we get there, or I get there first, and then Ivan gets there later. But the whole time that we were talking, it was literally just making that human connection in the sense of, you know, they were telling me everything that’s going on. They were only, they were majority Spanish speaking. And they were like, we’re having a hard time filling out this paperwork because it’s all in English. And I was like, bring it by. I’m like, I’ll help you translate it. And I was like, that’s the whole point that we’re opening it up. We want to be known as the community shop, where people don’t just come in for auto repairs, you know, we have Wi Fi, we have all these things that, you know? I don’t want it to feel like you’re coming into a dealership or an auto shop where you’re just in a waiting room. I want it to feel like you’re coming over to a friend’s house and they’re helping you out with your car, you know. So that was she brought us a thing of, she was a beekeeper. She brought us honey. Yeah, super cool. That’s incredible. Yeah, yeah.

Ivan Vaveros 16:18
So it’s kind of like the same thing where, even then, like, you make a lot of connections to kind of just by being out there and sharing, you know. So if there’s people that we know, friends that need help, and then there’s another friend that’s willing to help, you know, same thing, connect the community and help each other out, like, you know, promote other people’s businesses as well.

Brian Davis 16:38
Yeah, yeah. So what are, what are some of the challenges that you guys because you guys are in the beginning stages of really launching this thing. What are some of the challenges that you guys are facing, and how is it that you guys are going to be overcoming those?

Martin Rubio 16:52
At the moment, I think it’s setting up the systems. I’m trying to figure out, work, life balance, with my family, with my job, when it comes to how we’re gonna run the fleet accounts and how, you know, seeing how we set up the systems To help those people out, in that sense, where I pay, I pay Ivan, 30% flat rate, but 30% of the whole job, not our hourly labor. So I have the conversation with like construction work before I was at my job that I am now. I was going to go to local 300 which is an LA Union thing, and I would always talk to them and like, hey, who makes more money? You or your boss? And they go, my boss. And I’m like, can you do his job? And they go, Yeah, we do it when he’s not here, because we have to do it. And then I say, can he do your job? They go, No. And I’m like, but he gets paid more. He’s like, you’re, you’re the reason that this company is alive right now, like you’re the one, the blood, the pulse of this company, if you guys leave the company falls. And it’s the same thing with Ivan. So it’s the whole thing. I’m like, the only reason that we can do what we do is because of him, is because of the technicians that we hire and stuff like that. It’s, um, you know, I don’t want to be the boss, or I don’t consider myself a boss. We’re business partners. So when it comes to interviewing new people and things like that, it’ll be about like, the communication of, how is he going to work with the team? How is he going to do all these things? Because I don’t want to be the person being like, okay, cool, we did 30% better than we did last year. Yeah, let’s throw pizza party. No, no, no. I put 20% aside for slow months, for comebacks. It’s like, Dude, this is your money. You earn that. That’s your bonus kind of thing, you know? So it’s, it’s a setting up the numbers, setting up the numbers, work life balance. And then he has a far commute too well.

Ivan Vaveros 18:59
It’s about 30 minutes. I live in Oak view, so I drive from Oak view to Fillmore, okay? I mean, it’s still, I feel like it’s still worth it, you know, yeah, and I think the biggest challenge right now is just setting up the foundation. But I feel like we both had really good past experiences where it’s going to take the time to put down the groundwork, but once the groundwork is there, you know, it’s just basically more of maintaining it. So I’ve been lucky enough to be at that first independent shop, and I liked how he ran it, and he was very open about how he ran it, so he taught me how to kind of do the talk to customers, set up the account, and things like that. So that’s a big help on that. And it’s just kind of continuing to grow and really sticking to what we want to do, yeah, and then I feel like it’s just a really big opportunity where, because Martina is my business partner, and we both think alike, and we have similar goals, and we can discuss everything really well, I think that’s just going to be something that’s really going to help us overcome any obstacles that we do cross, just because there’s two perspectives, and we’re always opening, open to listening to each other’s perspective. Yeah.

Brian Davis 20:00
Yeah, and then are there? I mean, you talked about your your old boss, I’m sure that he’d probably be open to if you had any questions, calling him up and asking, Well, that

Ivan Vaveros 20:10
was that first shop that I was at, and then I went to a dealership. And then recently, I was at another independent shop in Camarillo, and he has been really good. So I was over at bumper to bumper in Camarillo, okay? And then that’s where my friend Angel still works. So, yeah, I can still call them, and then we share advice. So he was actually giving me advice on some of the programs that we’re using and kind of what he’s been doing. So his inspection sheets, he was kind of giving me advice on that. And even this week, I’m actually gonna stop over there with him and go over some things on the system so that we can compare notes and kind of build so he was actually really, uh, he gave me a big push too, to kind of be on my own. Because he, when I got there, he said, I really want you to be here because you want to be here, not because you feel like you need to be here. And if you leave, I want you to leave because it’s for something better, you know, yeah. And then with him, it was really, we had a lot of good communication. So sometimes we wouldn’t see eye to eye, but we would communicate, and he would adjust, and I would adjust to that. So that was really nice to see, where you’re able to talk to somebody, and then they kind of reciprocate, or listen to what you said, and then that’s kind of because I like that. That’s the type of person that I want to be, and that’s kind of how we would want to move forward with this business, as well as just being really open and transparent with people,

Brian Davis 21:21
yeah, yeah, you learn how to collaborate, how to work together and communicate. Communication is such a such a huge thing. It’s one of the things that I’m working on.

Ivan Vaveros 21:30
It’s hard. I mean, I feel like sometimes we don’t really get taught how to communicate, and then if you do communicate, it’s not always taking the best way. Sometimes, you know, people take it as complaining, but it’s just kind of everybody’s perspective and how you explain yourself. And sometimes we just come from different backgrounds, so we don’t necessarily share the same experiences or the same verbiage for the same thing. Yeah.

Brian Davis 21:52
And then my wife, she, she’s always she, one of my biggest communication lessons with my wife is Tone.

Martin Rubio 21:58
Tone, yeah, that’s huge. I’ll be

Brian Davis 22:02
like, I didn’t. Say that, babe. And she said, Well, it was in your tone. Yeah, one and

Martin Rubio 22:07
Yeah, one thing that we’re learning to communicate with my wife is, um, like, if she has a tone, because I’m a sensitive guy, and I get my feelings hurt a lot, and she’s like, I didn’t mean it this way, or I mean it that way. We’re learning that a way to diffuse ourselves is like, I’m sorry. I did not mean to make you feel that way. My intentions were not to do that kind of thing, and that I’ve taken that over to the business where sometimes, you know, let’s say clients are upset, and time wise, and all these things, you got to learn how to communicate properly, you know, and that’s one thing that we want to do is also teach the community. Yeah, you know, I feel I have a lot of anxiety before the shop, when I would go to the mechanic, you know, I don’t know about cars. I don’t know if this is actually needs to get done and stuff. So, yeah, communication is huge, yeah.

Brian Davis 22:58
And I love that about teaching. I’ve had my cars in a handful of different mechanics, and I’ve been to some where you take it in, and then they give you a whole laundry list of all the stuff that they have found and you need to take care of. And then I’ve been to I’ve been to others I went to this one in particular is right here in Simi Valley. And they took photos of all the all the like, what was wrong with it? They sent me the photos. They included it in their in their quote They didn’t like, fill their quote with a bunch of other stuff that just didn’t need to be taken care of. And then when I went there to go pick up the car, they pulled out the broken parts, and they showed me from the back, and they showed me, like, what was wrong, what why it needed, why it wasn’t working anymore. And these are, like, parts in the engine. Like, I don’t understand that, you know, you can understand that stuff, but like, they’re taking their time peace of mind to explain it, yeah. And it’s just like, man, like, okay. Like, I feel like I I I feel like I learned something, but I also feel like you guys did exactly what it is you told me that you’re gonna do, and I see the broken part so I know the broken part still isn’t in there, you know, unless it’s just another broken part from the back that they just pull out everybody. I don’t think that they did that, but I have much such a higher level of trust, you know, because you guys, you guys did that with good communication, with full transparency, and with taking the time, taking the time to to do that and to answer any questions that I might have. So I think this, this community connection that you guys are in pursuit of, is something that’s going to be transformative, and not only for you guys in your business, but also for the community.

Ivan Vaveros 24:48
Yeah, well, I feel like sometimes, unfortunately, people feel like going to the mechanic is like going to the dentist, because you are going to get a long laundry list, but sometimes you can take the time to show customers the pictures explain you. We’re letting you know about this because you’re going to need it in a couple services, not necessarily right now, so you don’t need to worry about this right now. Or sometimes it’s nice to hear, Hey, your car looks great. It really looks like you’ve taken care of it. And that’s a mechanic telling you that as well. So then you kind of feel good that your car has been taken care of or wherever else you were at before was

Martin Rubio 25:18
taking care of it, yeah, the picture, the picture thing is something we integrated into our system, and those are the things that we’re figuring out. And then he’ll come up to me. He’s like, You see, this is what’s wrong with it. And I’m like, I still have no idea what you’re telling me, but for sure. But then he breaks it down even more. And you know, that’s something we wanted to implement later on, where we have free carcare clinics. You know, we bring people into the shop. They see what we’re doing, and we help them where, you know, let’s, I don’t, I don’t know anything about, like, an oil change. He showed me how to do an oil change, and I was like, now that you explained it, this is a lot easier, you know, and it’s we want to teach people. We want to build that trust. Where I was saying, I was like, if you ask the average person, where do you take your car and why? And they go because I trust them, yeah. And that’s, that’s basically what we have to do.

Brian Davis 26:09
Oh, totally, totally, yeah, yeah. And then what about just like, raising up mechanics in the community?

Martin Rubio 26:18
Yeah, yeah. That was we actually have a friend who wants to work with us, kind of thing. And again, since we’re not, we’re about sustainability over profit. I am not. I the majority of the money goes to the shop and to the technicians. And when it comes to to things like people that want to help or want to learn. We’re open to sending them to school for it. We’re opening for all those things. Or, you know, like he was showing me kind of thing. It’s, it doesn’t take much to help, you know what? I mean, yeah,

Ivan Vaveros 26:52
sometimes it’s just having the will to learn. So, yeah, I’ve worked on cars since I was, like, 1415 just because I would get cheap cars that were broken, because that’s what I could afford at the time, fix them to drive them. But I never really wanted to be a mechanic, because I felt like it was one of those fields where it was, like, underpaid and you just people didn’t want to, like, take their cars to you, because they thought you were already going to rip them off or whatever, because you’re a mechanic. So it was kind of one of these industries where I thought, you know, I’m going to beat my body up and I’m going to, you know, not make that much. So why would I want to do that? And then after, like, you know, being in sales, and I was making good money, but I wasn’t really happy, I just sat down and thought about what I enjoy doing, and I enjoy working on cars, and I enjoy helping people. So this is something that I can do to help people, and I enjoy it. But then, you know, it’s also where there is the business aspect of it. But when I was working in sales, I was working at a company where the managers would really, like, you know, take care of the company. So, you know, you you get to see how everything works, you know, you get to see how, like, they would get their bonuses, or like things that they get to spend on the store, how they would distribute it. And, you know, I was lucky enough for the mentors that I had would distribute it with the team and really take care of the team. And then you also see how that it just builds a really good relationship. So I was able to see how, because I felt like, you know, my manager was taking care of me a lot, it would push me to do a lot better at work. You know, I would want to do better. I would want to have their back, you know, make sure that they were meeting their goals, because I was meeting my goals. But that can translate to anything, you know, if you just take care of the people around you, they’re going to want to take care of you, because, you know, you have your bet their best interests in mind, and they have yours.

Brian Davis 28:37
Yeah, it’s really like building a positive work culture.

Martin Rubio 28:41
Yeah, we had a guy on Saturday or two weeks ago come in. He needed the machine press, and we, when he asked us for help, I was like, Yeah, dude. I’m like, swinging on by. I’m like, Oh, were you looking for us? He’s like, No, I just Googled mechanic near me. I’m in a tight spot kind of thing. And we got to talking, and I feel like the majority of people just want to connect. You know, everything feels know, everything feels too business nowadays. Um, but we were talking, and he’s like, Oh, I like that a lot. And I took him back to machine press, and I was like, Do you want to borrow it? He’s like, What? What do you mean? And I’m like, the sole point, bro, we’re neighbors, helping neighbors. And he’s like, Bro, that’s that’s too much, and we did the job for him. And I was like, Oh, dude, we’re not that took us two minutes to do. But he was so excited. He was like, You know what, I have three work trucks in my company. I’m gonna start bringing them here from now on. Yeah, yeah. And it’s just that, you know, when you help people out, they help you back. Yeah.

Brian Davis 29:33
I mean, totally, man, totally. So where are you guys at? Like, currently with your business?

Martin Rubio 29:40
Currently, we are open, and we’re taking we’re taking appointments, and I’ve been sending so many emails out, so many emails, and I actually have an appointment on Friday with the fleet account. They have over 50 cars, and they get serviced four times a year. And it’s the whole thing that when. Company works with us. They’re helping the community, not by, like, donations, not by anything, by action, yeah, because they’re helping us stay viable. You know, the majority of that money goes to our technicians. The majority of money goes out to the shop. So, you know, once we clear overhead and all that stuff, everything else is our time, you know? And when we have such a tight knit community that we’re forming, we never want to leave the shop, you know? We’re just hanging out. We’re working on cars. And we had a customer where he’s like, I don’t want to leave yet. He’s like, normally, you go to a dealership, yeah? And you’re like, oh my god, it’s been two hours. It’s like, when is my car gonna be done? But we were, we were hanging out as friends, as a community, if that makes sense. So it’s getting fleet accounts right now. I do, we do want to start posting like kind of plaques of businesses that help us, and then the community knows, hey, this business helps us, so we can help you. You know, so things like that. It’s trying to get the fleet accounts, trying to help out people where we can help them out. But, yeah, we’re still super, super brand new.

Brian Davis 31:04
Yeah, so if anybody wants to, you know, find out more information about you guys, like, where would be the best place you can

Martin Rubio 31:13
google us Google. He has Google setup right now. He has the phone set up right now. And then we’re just slowly working on more things that we’re going to set up. And, yeah, we’re building the website that way people can book appointments and all those things through our social medias, everything’s reveals, auto mechanic, but we are in Fillmore, and then our numbers on there, on everything. And we had a call right before, actually, we came here, and it was from, you know, an older lady, and she was like, Oh, we’re in a tight spot. This is what happened. And I’m like, Okay, no problem. I was like, if you can send us your information, I’ll send you out a quote, and me and Ivan, we’re talking. We’re like, okay, let’s this is, you know, we try to be competitive, obviously, with our prices, but if she can’t do it, I’m like, okay, we can work with you, you know, we see where we can help out and stuff. And eventually the goal is to be covered in fleet, covered in fleet. That way any community member comes and we help them out the best that we can, in the sense of, you know, whether we made a whole fund where we just pay out the parts completely, or they just pay for labor and things like that, you know, it at the moment, it’s kind of like a person to person, person. Totally thing, yeah.

Brian Davis 32:24
But do you see it? Do you see it getting to the point where you’re going to have to have some type of process of, kind of qualifying

Martin Rubio 32:33
the people that’s we were talking about that earlier, because

Brian Davis 32:37
I could see that you would want to keep it to where you have a connection, and it’s relationship based. And so there’s

Ivan Vaveros 32:43
what I understand eventually, what we would like to do is partner with other like community outreaches and things like that, where they kind of have a list of people who might need help, or, you know, in the community where they maybe, there’s programs where people are trying to get back, like, you know, to work, or they need vehicles, or things like that, where we could kind of help in that aspect.

Brian Davis 33:01
Yeah, that’d be awesome, yeah? Like, I had some experience with a nonprofit here in Simi Valley called Sarah’s house, and they help girls that find themselves pregnant, and they, you know, need help. They need a place to live. And so they, they have houses where they could, you know, move in, be taken care of, but then they also have schooling. And they, you know, have different things so that by the time that they are ready to leave, you know, they’re kind of ready to go out on their own. But one of the things that they have is they had a mechanic that would, you know, be over there and on maybe every three months, or something like that. Any of the girls cars that needed work on, he’d be over there, you know, working

Ivan Vaveros 33:54
on it, yeah. So ideally, that would be the goal. So that’s kind of like the whole part of trying to be a community is we’re going to hopefully work with other nonprofits or other areas or people in the community where they kind of already have some people that they know we’re going to need help, and we just can provide either the help or even more resources, or connecting other people within communities to resources that they didn’t know were necessarily available to them. So it doesn’t always necessarily. So we are going to try and help like people, as far as with their parts and labor and stuff like that. But we also want to help just the community by connecting more people within the community. And, you know, helping our community out that way, awesome.

Martin Rubio 34:32
But I get what you’re saying with the whole like the system kind of thing. My thing has always been as a former homeless person, when someone says, Oh, don’t help out this person. They’re just gonna use it on X, Y and Z kind of thing. And I was like, they’re asking for help. Yeah. I was like, it’s not me to judge whether they deserve it or not. If I can help, then I’m gonna help. But it could be those things where, you know, someone could have used the system kind of thing, or something like that. And it’s a far fetched stream, 100% to be viable enough to where, no matter who comes in, we got them covered. Yeah, you know, it kind of like an insurance thing, and again, by companies working with us, they directly affect the community. So that would be the goal. Really cool.

Brian Davis 35:21
Well, I think it’s a beautiful goal. And I love your guys’s hearts, and I love what it is you guys are doing. Is there anything else, any parting words that you guys would like to share?

Martin Rubio 35:33
Um, do you have any parting words?

Ivan Vaveros 35:36
I mean, not put you on the spot. Well, I mean, anybody can feel free to stop by and then, you know, if they also want to see if there’s a way that we can help anybody else out with the same goal, you know, we’re always willing to listen, and we’re here, you know. So if anybody else has any other ideas and ways that we can help the community, or things that they know that the community is missing, we definitely would like to help fill in as well.

Brian Davis 35:58
Yeah, that’s awesome. Well, thanks so much you guys. It’s, it’s been, it’s been great again to meet you guys and getting to hear more about what’s on your heart and what you guys are doing with Rubio’s auto mechanic. I’m excited for your guys’s future and definitely keep us posted.

Ivan Vaveros 36:14
Thank you. We really appreciate you having us on here as well.