ASA Michigan held its second Great Lakes Event at Lansing Community College West Campus in Lansing, Mich., on Sept. 28.
“We were blessed to have Bob Cooper and Doris Barnes from Elite Worldwide present two great classes for the Great Lakes Event,” said Ray Fisher, president of the Automotive Service Association of Michigan (ASA Michigan). “When we called Bob, the first thing he asked was ‘when will it be and what can I do to help?’ before we even discussed any other details."
Fisher added that attendees raved about the sessions and the venue.
“Bob and Doris did a fantastic job with our group – and the various role-playing episodes they performed within their presentations I think really brought home to reality for a lot of the folks,” he said.
Fisher went on to say, “The surveys came back with great enthusiasm and comments were all extremely positive. I’m biased, but our results weren’t – according to the feedback we received in the surveys it was the best that many had attended, the venue was very conducive and the professionalism was first class – much like what was stated last year!”
Elite Worldwide conducted abridged sessions of their classes, "High Impact Sales II" and "8 Steps to a More Profitable Shop." At a very affordable cost, attendees were exposed to two great classes, a morning breakfast break, a “Tour of Italy” luncheon and a “Touch of Autumn” at their afternoon break, including pumpkin bread, hot and cold apple cider and more.
ASA Michigan also updated the group on some of the things the regional association has been doing in the past 12 months, including creating a "Members Only" community website with important document libraries for the industry, a virtual library for any webinars that remain relevant and more.
“We’ve accomplished a great deal when meeting with our committees, some key State Representatives and Senators, various state department directors and we are seeing those efforts coming to fruition” Fisher said. “For example, the Director of the Bureau of Licensing and Regulatory Division, which issues the licenses to the automotive repair industry shared some of the things they have accomplished from our efforts of over a year ago. Along with my board, we’ve been very busy behind the scenes but unfortunately sometimes that goes without knowledge. The challenge is that our sponsorship dollars are gone in this tough economy and our primary revenue is from membership, so each year we have to carefully budget activity based on the membership revenue and it has been tough for all of us; hence the reason we have taken many things virtual. The old saying ‘many hands makes for light work’ applies to membership as well – more members and more revenue streams helps us remain effective.
“We are here representing the entire collision and mechanical repair industry here in Michigan, the results of our work help raise the professionalism here in our state for all of the licensed repair facilities not just our members. The question to ask , who will do it if we weren’t here?” Fisher concluded.
ASA Michigan announced that next year the Great Lakes Event (GLE) will be held on Friday, Sept. 26th and Saturday, Sept. 27th, 2014, at the Lansing Community College West Campus again. In addition to the GLE, ASA Michigan will be supporting the Lansing Community College Automotive Program at the same time, which will be hosting its NATEF training in parallel to the GLE.