Meeting & Agendas

TJ: Let me just introduce myself, my name is TJ Bragg and I’m the department chair for the Automotive Collision Repair and Refinishing Technologies program at Austin Community College. Let’s just go down the list, I have Hannah and Joe with me here. Hannah Alford: Hi! My name is Hannah, I am the Administrative Assistant for the Autobody Department. Joe Barron: I am Joe Barron and I am an instructor for ACC’s Autobody Department. TJ: Let’s everybody introduce themselves. The first person is Chris. Hi, my name is Chris Vogler, I am the Regional Vice President for central Texas’s Caliber Collision. TJ: Thank you sir, Kelly… Kelly Gardner: Hi, I am Kelly Gardner. Benjamin Ramirez and myself run All Ready Automotive Body and Paint. It is a local shop here in Austin. Benjamin Ramirez: Okay Benjamin. Okay, I am Benjamin Ramirez the operations manager/owner of All Ready LLC. Thank you for joining Benjamin. Yes sir. Chris Jimenez: Chris go ahead and introduce yourself to us sir. Hi, my name is Chris Jimenez and I am an adjunct instructor at ACC. Perfect thank you very much sir. Where do you work at? I work at AutoNation Toyota Collision Center and have been here over 5 years now and collision work for over 20 years. TJ: Alright, thank you Chris I appreciate it. Charles Reed: Charles Reed, AutoNation Collision Center where Chris works. Thank you sir. I have one more on the phone. Yes, I am Don Armstrong with Caliber Collision and have been with the company for 30 years this year. I am part of the group that heads up all our groups apprentice program for Caliber Collision. TJ: Awesome, thank you very much. TJ: So just recently after the election, Prop A that ACC put out, which is essentially a bond was a $770 million bond went out and it passed greatly with over, I believe, 70% of Austin. That means that part of that bond, $220 million is going to build a building in Southeast Travis County, the land that was bought 8 years ago near the airport. We have been waiting for this bond and since it passed, that means our department will finally have our own campus. An actual shop on an ACC campus instead of using the AISD facilities in the evenings. It is fantastic news! We have only ever offered night classes and we have had extreme luck offering them. It means that everything is going to completely change for us. So, we are going to have to design a shop with 15,000 square feet to teach out of, which is 4,000 more square feet compared to Crockett. I want a room where industry can come in and have I-CAR classes there and various meetings, since we would be a very neutral location since we are a teaching facility and not competition. Don’t know how fast it will be built but guess 4-5 years. It is our first step towards our own shop meaning we can offer day classes and expand.

TJ: This semester is a weird semester and for whatever reason it is not just us, it is college wide. The whole college is down by anywhere between 25-30% or more on courses throughout. It is strange since normally when the economy goes down then we start getting more students because they want a higher paying job. We are losing students. I had about 5 students this semester that were actually registered and in 2-3 classes and even after the semester started they dropped. We followed up with these students to find out what is going on and most of the time we think it is financial. The students can’t afford to have a job and go to school which is weird because we are night classes. However, we are seeing as the students don’t see the time spent in school as, as important as going to get a job somewhere. I had a student ask about how much a starter position pays in the various areas and we are saying anywhere from $15-$17 per hour. Student says man that is less than what I make at Sam’s and all I do is stock boxes. Really you are making $18 at Sam’s Club and student says yes and that it would be hard for them to leave to make less. I said, yes, I understand that but in the long run you are going to make more. He says, yeah but right now I just can’t afford to do that even though it is minimal. The lose of a dollar would greatly affect them which makes a difference since the price of everything skyrocketed overnight. ACC hourlies don’t make less than $20 starting out which doesn’t include benefits is the lowest paid position. I am wondering if you all are having the same issues with employees doing the same thing. Leaving for higher pay. Chris Vogler: We are seeing the same thing since most people are living paycheck to paycheck at that wage. Looking at the payrate they start with first and not the future or long-term investment working in the industry. It is sort of shifting but has been consistent over the last couple of years. Kelly: Even the higher skilled techs are requiring more money just to afford, specifically here in Austin. The ones that are just coming in don’t see that they will be making an expediential increase that comes with learning a skill rather than right now money. How do you bridge the gap depends on how much they can learn and retain in what amount of time. TJ: This is across all of ACC is a decrease in students and demand for more pay increasing. More pay and easier jobs or easier work. Autobody is highly skilled and they will have to build all those different skills and the time that it takes to get them. Students would have to see beyond the monthly paychecks. Benjamin: You have to be highly skilled to make a bunch of money right out the gate in any areas of our industry but reality is there is a minimum of a 2 year learning curve and that’s hard to grasp in this age. Chris Vogler: Sam’s Club’s goods price increases allowing them to increase the wage rate. The collision industry doesn’t move that fast due to contracts and slowly adapts over time to increase starting wages. But it may not be understood that, that is how it works. It is a battle that is being fought by the industry to increase them. TJ: I-CAR is addressing it since there is a huge need for more techs right now. There is some movement to try to help the industry with this. Chris: Will you guys continue your night classes in the new shop? TJ: Yes, our night classes are our flag ship and always part of our plan. Even if we have them at one or multiple places.

TJ: We are trying to retain students and get them employed. One way we are doing this is by the internship program. If we could get those students working in the industry then they will be better for it. That way they can be learning it and then applying it in the shop during the day. They can see the progress of their learning in their job. We have students currently in some shops right now. Would anyone like to talk about some of our students that are employeed with them and the value of hiring someone graduating from ACC rather than someone off the street? Chris Vogler: Love that they are I-CAR trained, the awareness they have with collision repair when they get to us, I-CAR welding certified. Chris Vogler: The students get out of school at 10pm and come into work early in the morning, but they are well rounded and more serious about their career like that is their decision. There is less turnover since they know that is what they want to do. Off the street people just like cars and want to try it out. We don’t have enough history with those people but ACC students already come for the most part knowing they want to do this and happy to do internship. TJ: We see the benefit of students working in a shop while in school and they are better able to improve on their skill more quickly. We provide good students to the industry which represents us well. Don Armstrong: We encourage and want them to complete the program because of the advancement that they can get quicker. That way they can make more money faster and staying in the program will help that in a quicker time period. It is an approach we can continue with to keep people in the industry. Our partnership can and will make that happen.

TJ: VR headset is one of the newest things we are getting. It is strictly involved in painting and encourages future/potential students by experimenting with a virtual spray simulator. (He discusses what the VR headset does and shows images of what it does) Tells them about how it will be taken to career fairs to recruit and offers to let them experiment with it if they want. Tells them that we are getting it from a grant. Chris Vogler: It’s amazing what technology is allowing people to do.

TJ: The last question I had is about trying to get and retain students is based around social media. We have Facebook and have just recently started to use it again. We were wondering as an industry what works for you? Do you post on social media? The different platforms you use? Does any one thing work better for you than others? We are just wanting to gain as much knowledge on this as possible for anyone that may know. Floor is open to talk about it. Chris Vogler: We have Facebook and personally we get traction on it, but it seems like Facebook is kind of getting the older generation/crowd. Instagram and TikTok seem to be where it is at. Those are getting more hits as far as the company from the younger crowd. That is the trend I am seeing. Kelly: Younger generation is using TikTok more than Google to find out and learn about things and how to do things. Like what is such and such and will search it on TikTok before any other search engine. Our company uses Facebook and we do get a lot of hits but it’s a little bit of an older crowd. TJ: I have been seeing that it is TikTok too but we will have to figure out how to incorporate that in or see if we can. Like little videos to show the industry and what we do in class. That is all I have, so if you have anything you’d like to say or any questions it is open floor to do so. Chris Vogler: Keep giving us ACC students. We want to have them in the industry. We were in a that discussed the long-term advantages of the collision industry and one of the main ones was that even when we go through a recession it withstood it unlike some other jobs. It’s been a steady giant throughout the test of time so far. The growth of the industry and the need for techs is higher than ever before. Need to train techs and let them know what a fantastic career this is and how they can in the long-term really support their families. I appreciate the partnership. Going back to social media, you can also just do an advertisement instead of a video. Kelly: Chris are you noticing a lack on either just one side like the paint side or just the body side? Or just techs in general? The people we talk to across the country there is a huge lack and we want to encourage more people. Is any one side more affected than the other? TJ: We have students on both sides of the fence. There are more jobs open for body men and paint prepper. Students know that becoming a painter is not the job you get first. You have to be a prepper for a long time first. There is an equal amount of both and some students start out wanting to be a painter than switch to wanting to be a body man and vice versa. TJ: Who is a member of ABAT? Texas Association. Everyone except Kelly: No, we aren’t TJ: I will look into that and get back to you on it. We are wanting to partner with the general Texas area to see what we can be trying to do as well. Kelly: Shared information on ABAT and how her and Benjamin company are with them but haven’t done anything with them at present but will be. TJ: Thanks everyone for coming! Everyone: Thank you for having us!