A word from someone who has done it............
First and foremost, the business I started in 1996 is an oil import and wholesale distribution and sales to industry. in 1997 I decided to open in a second office in my wife's home town, 450 miles from here, but that did not have enough industry to justify, but where I had 25,000 sq.ft. of land on the highway for "future" use.
So I dug pits to change oil and built ramps for washing cars and trucks/busses.
I already had an insurance policy for responsibility, hired my brother-in-law to run it and a few others.
The biggest pain was filters. Slowly but surely I ended up with more than 100 different filters, and Murphy's Law always won out. If I got down to one of a given number, that day 2 cars would come in that needed it.
Then I added one pit to my main warehouse here in Santa Cruz due to customers who used my oil in their plants and wanted it in their cars (and I couldn't guarantee that little shops used ours. Again the filters......... Fortunately we found a filter store that delivers, so we can call and they bring what we need if they have it. Otherwise I loose one person and an hour or so, plus gas, while they go get one.
Of course for me oil was not the problem. I already had a warehouse full. All group II or traditional synthetic. And now I have 30,000 Donaldson filters of 750 different sizes , so I only have to call occasionally for others.
I think the place you can make the most money, and do the public the most service is transmission changes. For $500 you can by the exchanger at Harbor Freight (I have two of them). I charge retail for the oil, plus $20 towards the machine. It's a half hour job if you do it by the book, although my guy in the small town stops the machine when it has pumped out the fluid and drops the pan, inspects and advises customers of anything serious, cleans the filter, puts it together and restarts the unit. I think the places in the states charge way too much for this service.
First and foremost, the business I started in 1996 is an oil import and wholesale distribution and sales to industry. in 1997 I decided to open in a second office in my wife's home town, 450 miles from here, but that did not have enough industry to justify, but where I had 25,000 sq.ft. of land on the highway for "future" use.
So I dug pits to change oil and built ramps for washing cars and trucks/busses.
I already had an insurance policy for responsibility, hired my brother-in-law to run it and a few others.
The biggest pain was filters. Slowly but surely I ended up with more than 100 different filters, and Murphy's Law always won out. If I got down to one of a given number, that day 2 cars would come in that needed it.
Then I added one pit to my main warehouse here in Santa Cruz due to customers who used my oil in their plants and wanted it in their cars (and I couldn't guarantee that little shops used ours. Again the filters......... Fortunately we found a filter store that delivers, so we can call and they bring what we need if they have it. Otherwise I loose one person and an hour or so, plus gas, while they go get one.
Of course for me oil was not the problem. I already had a warehouse full. All group II or traditional synthetic. And now I have 30,000 Donaldson filters of 750 different sizes , so I only have to call occasionally for others.
I think the place you can make the most money, and do the public the most service is transmission changes. For $500 you can by the exchanger at Harbor Freight (I have two of them). I charge retail for the oil, plus $20 towards the machine. It's a half hour job if you do it by the book, although my guy in the small town stops the machine when it has pumped out the fluid and drops the pan, inspects and advises customers of anything serious, cleans the filter, puts it together and restarts the unit. I think the places in the states charge way too much for this service.
