View From The Trenches

One of the most distressing situations that has evolved over the past decade or so is the sad manufacturing condition of the new auto glass that we are asked to install. Where else should every purchase we make be placed under such scrutiny that mediocrity and acceptance of minor imperfections become commonplace because the alternative choice can be far more flawed? What is even more distressing is the supposition of harsh economic realities ahead that the situation will continue to spiral downward.

Any observant apprentice can enumerate many of the larger reasons why our manufacturing quality has dropped so low and so quickly. The auto glass industry has embraced globalization and cheap imports have altered the marketplace. It has become a convergence of international politics, corporate contraction and greed. Domestic manufacturing has declined due to that pressure along with the current decrease in domestic auto production. In order to survive, there have been cuts in manpower, output, plant closures, delays in maintenance, technological advances and, for some, a shift of manufacturing outside the borders of this country. It’s a classic case of, “If you can’t beat them, join ’em.”

Never in my 29 years in this industry have I had to work so hard to try to protect my customers and minimize my liability in trying not to accept or install a piece of newly purchased auto glass that was more visually, structurally or cosmetically defective than ever before. To those who purchase in far higher volumes than I do, I truly feel your pain.

Let me share with you just a few production-based problems I’ve encountered in the past month or so:

- A delaminated frit of about 3-inch circumference in the upper corner of a windshield that had blue delivery tape applied by the distributor that first unknowingly hid the defect.
- Two sidelites that were mislabeled for the wrong side.
- One sidelite that had hardware bonded in the wrong place. I’ve had bonded parts in the past fall off as well.
- Two mirror brackets that gave way when the mirror was installed.
- At least five windshields that had misaligned layers and at least a few more that had questionable bends along the top sightline of the glass.

Last week, I stupidly cut myself on laminate that had extruded from a windshield when I pulled it out of my truck rack without gloves, which was a first for me (the cut, that is, and not the poor finish on the windshield).

How many ill-fitting, distorted windshields can be caught in time? How many improperly tempered parts are discovered prior to install? The easiest defects to find are the mis-bonded sidelites that are impossible to install. Where do we send the bill for the increased labor just that one single mistake creates? Multiply the time lost by the number of incidents that occur. In short, if you think you are saving money with lower material costs, think again. We are all subject to paying a higher price with defective parts.

I am purposely not naming names, although creating a “Hall of Shame” could possibly embarrass a number of manufacturers. In truth, pointing fingers isn’t going to help matters, but what can be done to improve our product? I find it very hard to pinpoint another industry where the quality bar has dropped as low and as fast as the aftermarket auto glass industry has.

We as retailers are as much to blame as any other sector. We, like any other consumer, demand lower and lower prices from distributors and producers. Import barriers have been lowered and the floodgates have opened for cheap glass to enter our markets. Retailers have seemed to accept the trade-off of lower quality glass for a higher financial yield. The first influx allowed wholesale prices to drop and raised profit margins for many ailing distributors In order to compete, domestic manufacturers cut costs, shifted production to other North American countries or simply outsourced their labels to be fabricated by the same manufacturers that created the oversupply situation in the first place. Sadly, all these actions had the effect of compounding the loss of product quality and it is very sad to see that attribute not mourned by enough.

Installers care for the most part. We are the ones on the firing line, so to speak. Who gets stuck having to stop a job because the part doesn’t fit and wastes time trying to rectify the situation? Who likes to return and redo a windshield install because the customer complains of a distortion? I won’t forget distributors who suffer more of an economic burden due to returns.

The point is we all have to care. Would you want your surgeon to put in the cheapest artificial joint? What if you bought a newspaper and the news section was always missing? What if you bought a loaf of bread and twenty percent of the slices were stale? How about just finding two or three stale slices? There is a certain expectation of quality throughout the world of consumers and this industry seems to lack the fortitude to provide quality at a high level.

It starts first at the furnaces, ovens and clean rooms of our manufacturers. Don’t forget the boardrooms as well. One could say that the whole wellspring of our industry starts right there. The decisions that are made in inside those walls shape the product that the public looks through after installation.

I am quite aware that many of both domestic and foreign auto glass producers are suffering. Some are up for sale; others are looking for partnerships and mergers. Some may just shutter permanently. It may sound foolish of me to suggest something that may cost money but I just think it behooves the manufacturing sector of our industry to stop trying to “outcheap” the competition and actually make a serious effort to actually construct a properly made corner instead of continually trying to learn how to cut one. That would be a welcomed start.

All of us are being sorely tested by a shrinking economy. For many, it will be just a struggle to survive. It has been said that the despised cockroach has withstood the ravages of evolution and time and outlasted many other species. I certainly hope that insect does not become the symbol of our industry. We can do much better. We can demand a better quality product to start with. One of these days, the public is going to wake up and realize how far they have been sold down the river by this collective avarice. To cite one of my favorite Proverbs, “He that troubleth his own house shall inherit the wind” (Proverbs 11:29).

While viewing the ending credits of a fairly good western this week, “Appaloosa,” I heard a song that should be adopted as the theme song of the Independent Glass Association (IGA). Titled “Scare Easy,” it is written and played by Tom Petty’s alter-ego band, “Mudcrutch.” The song’s refrain really caught my ears as being qualified to become an anthem for the independent glass shops both here in the United States and abroad. The first few lines go like this:

I don’t scare easy;
I don’t fall apart when I’m under the gun.

Perhaps the greatest pervasive weakness I see among the majority of independent glass owners and installers is the fact that we are an industry that reacts instead of acts. We whine and complain about our competitors, big and small, instead of putting our heads down and simply working about how we can improve and prosper. How can you let fear, instead of intelligence, dictate your business model?

We have a large international company that has bought its way into the American market. Its business model in the past has largely consisted of buying the assets of production-driven glass chains that drove themselves into bankruptcy through excessive discounting. They recognized the shift in insurer attitudes toward outside management of glass claims and the cost benefits associated with it. This company perceptively has exploited that change and now has a pipeline for new business without having to participate in the catfights of the past between shops for agent referrals. With claim administration, work is directed seamlessly to its installation arm on a national level and that has caused a monumental shift in both pricing and new insurance business for the remaining glass shops.

It is my humble opinion that too much time is spent gnashing our teeth in anger and in fear in this situation. I’m not suggesting that we dismiss the issue of deceptive referrals, but we had better act to improve our own company’s brand and its reputation so that customers would ask to, if not demand to, use our services instead of lying down like sheep and accept being directed to use in-house installation firms by third-party administrators. Convincing the customer to use another shop is basically the only offensive tool we have to foil this sort of practice. The insurers have little incentive to change the current structure because it simply meets their needs. Fewer employees means lower expenses. Limit the number of vendors and keep prices depressed and this structure provides a favor able and unified claim payment system. This is a classic situation about size and the benefit it brings to corporations. That is a model that will be very resistant to change.

We as independents have to acknowledge that, monitor and act upon the shifting abuses third-party administrators inflict upon its competitors via client accessibility and pricing along with payment issues. Yet we have to stop wallowing in self-pity and act to inspire and secure new customers to use our services. Why else did Columbus act to increase its cable TV advertising? To validate an emerging brand name that the customer hears during many a claim process.

The second half of the song “Scare Easy” goes like this:

You can break my heart but I ain’t gonna run;
I don’t scare easy, for anyone.

The other main issue comes from within. There are far too many incompetent, dishonest and ultimately dangerous people out there who claim that they are glass installers. They sell and install almost always at a low price based on the cheapest imported glass, least expensive adhesives and generic mouldings using at best minimally trained installers or at worst uncaring or lazy ones who have no reluctance to shortchange the customer’s safety or vehicle’s integrity since they have little of their own.

To me, this situation is far more vexing and frustrating than what any third-party administrator can inflict. Cash work is a far larger and still growing segment of our market due to people electing to save money on insurance by going to larger deductibles or by going bare of any sort of property coverage. It is the nature of the shopping public to equate low price with value and in our industry nothing could be further from the truth.

As the economy declines and more pressure is put both on the American public and ourselves in the auto glass installation industry, this issue of unlicensed, un-certified, uninsured and unprofessional practices has to be addressed. If not, many of us who have been legitimate in both industry-accepted practices and legal standards can be swept away by these cheats and imposters making any sort of professional acceptance by the public much harder to attain. With the acquisitions and the economic recession, we are seeing more layoffs in our trade making the chances increase for even more installing start-ups to re-enter the market and, in doing so, further depress quality and prices throughout the country. I see it every day and the unmitigated garbage that they inflict on the wholesale and public markets infuriates me. Due to dropping volumes, distributors welcome them with competitive pricing which just re-primes the pump for the hack market. This area has to be addressed at some point or this industry should just allow Wal-Mart or Home Depot to sell urethane and glass.

What can be done? I suggest increasing your Internet/online presence. You can use your website as a selling point. My 2009 resolution has to do with just that. Explain what makes you a better choice. Inform your cyber shoppers about what makes a good install. Communicate to them why you use certain products or adhesives. Hopefully that just won’t be a short sentence saying, “They were on sale.” To those shops that are large enough to consider more expensive media advertising, I would recommend doing so. You need to get your message out.

There is a story about Alexander the Great visiting a Greek temple that has this mass of knotted rope called the Gordian Knot. When asked its importance, Alexander was told that whoever could unravel this rope, would rule the world. Alexander takes his sword and cuts the knot apart. His action was a prime example of thinking outside the box. We need to do the same but still stay focused on what can make us successful. As the move tag line said, “There is no crying in baseball.” The same is true in the auto glass industry. This is no time to be easily scared.

Since I began writing this blog, I have gotten a fair number of e-mails. Some pertain to my essays, other times not. This week, I received an outline for a John Grisham-style novel from my friend Larry Carlson who lives in Austin, Texas. Let me share with you its bare-bones plot line. The main character is a single guy (Young Mel Gibson or Tom Hanks type), who is an auto glass owner/installer who lives in Columbus, Ohio. He installs a windshield for a sexy past lover who has recorded some incriminating evidence against her insurer/TPA who tried to steer her away from using the protagonist. She ends up being murdered after she files suit against the TPA and the hero becomes the prime suspect when DNA evidence from bloodied paper towels that are left at the scene are tied to him. The heroine happens to be a Jennifer Garner type CSR from the TPA who accidentally overhears management ordering the death and contacts the hero, trying to help. Together they prove his innocence and bring down the evil TPA. (In a footnote, Larry has suggested that with the right amount of sex and violence, millions could be made just with the movie—Lee, from Alan Auto Glass, are you reading this?—and paperback book rights.) He also credits much of his story’s creativity to the ingestion of a few Silver Bullets. And here I thought his talent was just the result of ordinary heredity.

Point taken, but I submit that the truth is far stranger than fiction. When I try to explain parts of our industry to outsiders, their eyes tend to glaze over with bewilderment. When I get to the part about third-party administrators, disbelief becomes apparent as they question how a major competitor can act as a neutral and impartial party to both a consumer and a business rival. I’ve never been able to give a proper answer to that question, but I don’t understand the college football championship selection method either.

We have a few new operational wrinkles of TPAs that have come to light as of late. As usual, I’ve seen the demanded discounts rise by a percent of two. One new cost containment feature is the moulding discount. It seems that some administrators are demanding a 20- to 25-percent discount off list for windshield mouldings. I buy a fair amount of dealer-purchased mouldings and since I send in proofs of purchase, the TPA is basically demanding that I sell them at no profit. I’ll do that when they sell me my insurance at cost. If one uses aftermarket mouldings, the Precision list becomes the price bible and the discount, I assume, is taken there. What it seems to me is that this is some sort of attempt of TPAs to counteract the use of cheap generic mouldings that I guess are being billed under the Precision prices. One wonders where that trick was learned. Funny, when I peer inside a certain branded van, it’s not hard to spot two to three rolls of T-number mouldings. To paraphrase a current credit card company’s commercial ending question: What’s in your invoice? I would like to ask the same of them.

However, the latest egregious and outrageous action that is being reported by independent shops is the practice of a particular TPA’s CSRs giving cash quotes to high-deductible claimants under the guise of informing said caller what glass price is considered “fair and reasonable” and just by chance that an out-of pocket install could be scheduled immediately. What I am surprised at is that the in-house service rep doesn’t shill a Sham-Wow or a Ronco dicer at the same time.

If not illegal, this should be. To me there is a line, dare I say, of trust; that most customers assume that they are talking directly to their insurance company and not to a hungry, even predatory, glass company. A TPA often can cross that line to secure sales for their installation division, particularly with certain insurer’s callers. I’ll admit if the shoe were on the other foot, I’d probably be doing the same thing. Why not? Business is slow, one has a valid customer on the line, give it your best shot and give the customer an unsolicited cash quote. You have nothing to lose and a potential sale to be made.

With that said, the whole practice reeks of manipulation under the guise of authority and that should be of concern not just to independent shops, but regulatory agencies as well.

Getting back to Mr. Carlson’s novel idea, I would like to add a few plot lines. The handsome owner/installer also writes a blog and the Jennifer Garner heroine had developed an intellectual attraction to him through his writing and just possibly through his thumbnail photo. That’s why she contacts him in the first place. In trying to prove his innocence, she also brings internal data files taken from the TPA with her. The files show all sorts of financial hanky-panky and secondary mark-ups that would be extremely embarrassing if disclosed by the blogger. The final suspenseful chapters would deal with the two of them proving his innocence, escaping the clutches of the company’s hired assassins and in the process they bring down the entire corporations. Sort of like “Lethal Weapon II” meets “The Da Vinci Code.” It might not make Oprah’s book list but I’d bet that it would the New York Times one. They’d publish anything.