BODYSHOP NEWS: Rainbow Warrior Goes Up in Flames

No, it’s not time for west coast fisheries to rejoice in the end of the Greenpeace flagship, it’s NASCAR’s Hendrick Motorsports car that’s changed paint schemes.

The famous #24 car has sported the rainbow look since 1992, on its way to championship seasons with Jeff Gordon at the helm, but the team has now changed the paint scheme in order to showcase newer DuPont automotive paint products.

“NASCAR has been a tremendous showcase for our paint finishes,” said Lou Savelli, president of DuPont Coatings. “And this new paint scheme utilizes our latest undercoats and most productive basecoat and clearcoat, and features brilliant, exciting colors. We think it will generate even more recognition of the DuPont name among NASCAR fans throughout the world.”

Also for the first time, the No. 24 car’s quarter panels simply say “DuPont” and the deck lid features the corporate slogan, “The miracles of science.” Other DuPont businesses, such as Corian, Tyvek, Stainmaster, Nomex and Sontara, have taken the opportunity to use the No.24 car to market their “miracles” and entertain customers.

Sherwin-Williams Course Receives AMI Approval

Sherwin-Williams Automotive Finishes Corp. recently announced that its Estimating Solutions for Profit Course (ESP) received accreditation from the Automotive Manage-ment Institute (AMI).

With this approval, Sherwin-Williams now offers body shop professionals 84 of the 120 hours of management classes needed for completion of the Accredited Automotive Manager (AAM) designation. In addition, with the approval of ESP, every management course offered by Sherwin-Williams is now AMI accredited.

Designed for shop owners, managers, estimators and production managers, ESP is a day-long course which will improve the accuracy of the estimate. The training promotes “Best Practice” estimating, and maintains a theme that is based on honest, ethical and real repair costs.

“We have learned that successful shops view the estimate as the number one critical success factor for their businesses; therefore, it is imperative to train and provide hands-on estimating workshops,” said Ron Kuehn, Sherwin-Williams director of training.

Boyd Picked by Consumers

Boyd Autobody & Glass of Winnipeg, Alta., has announced that it has been chosen by Vancouver, B.C., consumers as this year’s winner of the Consumers’ Choice Award in the Body Shop category.

Award recipients were chosen through a comprehensive and objective survey conducted by Market Facts, a world leader in consumer research and customer satisfaction polling. Boyd has also been recognized for being the first multi-site autobody firm in North America to meet the stringent quality requirements for ISO 9002 registration by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) in Geneva, Switzerland.

The Boyd Group has also announced that it has purchased the shares of Car-Tech Holdings, Inc., which operates four Car-Tech Collision repair facilities in metro Atlanta, Georgia. The option to purchase a fifth Atlanta facility has also been provided to Boyd. The purchase price was undisclosed. Revenue from the four Car-Tech facilities is approximately $20 million for the current year. Boyd now estimates that 63 percent of annualized sales will be derived from U.S. operations. Boyd now operates 60 company-owned locations, and has seven third-party owned licensed locations.