Tech company pairs on-site vehicle service with proactive maintenance–management program
By Ken Wysocky
Entrepreneur Walker Drewett clearly sees the future of vehicle maintenance; and it stands squarely in trucking-fleet yards and consumers’ driveways.
Drewett, age 27, founded NuBrakes because he believes taking vehicles in for service is a “painful and cumbersome experience” for consumers and fleet operators. At the same time, the COVID-19 pandemic, coupled with the ongoing Amazonification of consumer expectations, only whetted consumers’ appetite for convenient, affordable and highly personalized at-home services.
All of which prompted Drewett to ask a thought-provoking question: Why can’t technicians service vehicles at homes and businesses, too? “Consumers want service available at their fingertips,” he says. “Amazon and the pandemic have drastically altered customers’ expectations.”
Drewett also found the size of the vehicle-maintenance market–pegged at nearly $139 billion by Kentley Insights, a market-research organization, with annual growth of around 2 percent for the last three years–very intriguing. Plus it’s a market ripe for disruption, he says.
“It presents a very large opportunity,” he says. “The reality is that north of 95 to 98 percent of the business still is captured by traditional bricks-and-mortar stores. But the portion of the industry that will be captured by mobile providers is expected to significantly increase in the next five to 10 years.”
Drewett established NuBrakes as an on-site brake-repair business. But it has morphed into offering a full suite of services, including oil changes, tire rotations, suspension repairs and replacement of everything from windshield wipers to belts to headlights and taillights.
More Than Just Maintenance
But Drewett wants to provide more than just maintenance and repairs. He also is intent on changing the maintenance-industry paradigm by also offering customers a connected-vehicle service platform that predicts when their vehicles will need maintenance–and even send them notifications, to boot.
“In simplest terms, yes, we deliver on-site automotive maintenance and repairs to customers,” he says. “But to peel the onion back a little, we also have built technology that allows us to integrate directly with a vehicle… then algorithmically predict and manage the maintenance needs associated with that vehicle.”
Using a proprietary programming interface that in effect “talks” to so-called connected vehicles via a telemetrics modem, the company–with customer approval, of course–can collect data in real time, which allows NuBrakes to predict maintenance needs, Drewett says.
“For example, it might know your car needs an oil change every 7,500 miles,” he explains. “So when your vehicle is at, say, 7,200 miles, it will remind you that you need an oil change soon. It will ask if you’d like to schedule that, which you can confirm with one click.”
Boosting Fleet Up-Time
NuBrakes already deploys this technology for commercial fleets, primarily for trucks involved in the last-mile logistics, home service and delivery sectors, plus related industries. The technology also provides another benefit: up to a 25-percent reduction in maintenance expenses through early detection of repair issues that, if unnoticed, could become larger and more expensive to fix, Drewett says.
“This maximizes up-time for fleets, boosts their revenue output, increases driver safety and sets employees up for success by providing them with vehicles in good working order,” Drewett notes.
Some of that 25-percent cost reduction also stems from NuBrakes’ ability to charge 15 to 20 percent less than traditional repair shops because it’s not encumbered with the high overhead costs associated with bricks-and-mortar businesses, he adds.
When will NuBrakes offer this predictive technology to ordinary consumers? It may be a while: currently only about 50 percent of new vehicles have on-board telemetric modems that can transmit the maintenance information. And according to McKinsey & Co., a global management-consulting firm, it will take until 2030 for 95 percent of new cars to be “connected” with telemetric modems, Drewett says.
Man On the Move
Drewett is a serial entrepreneur. He started several “micro-businesses” while a high school student and started NuWash, an on-demand, mobile car-washing business in 2016 while attending the University of Texas. The business still operates, albeit on a smaller scale, only in the Austin area, he says.
NuBrakes has grown rapidly since Drewett founded the company in 2019. It employs 125 people, including 50 technicians that service vehicles in Florida, Georgia, Tennessee and Texas. Technicians work in Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, San Antonio, Atlanta, Nashville, Tampa and Orlando, Drewett says.
Technicians can service most kinds of vehicles, except for high-end, exotic foreign cars, he says.
Revenue is in the eight-figure range and the company has registered triple-digit growth ever year, Drewett says. Data from MOTOR helped grow the business, he adds. “We partnered with MOTOR to ultimately leverage their robust data to deliver an even better customer experience,” he explains.
Seasoned Technicians, Happy Customers
Technicians average five years of maintenance-and-repair experience. They’re all full-time employees, not micro-entrepreneurs or franchise operators, Drewett notes.
How does NuBrakes attract and retain technicians in such a tight labor market for mechanics? By paying them 10 to 15 percent more than they’d earn in dealership service departments and offering them stock options, benefits and paid time off, he says.
“We want them to feel like they’re part of building something better,” Drewett explains. “Plus they have the independence and autonomy to directly interface with customers. We believe in trusting technicians–there are no supervisors or manages breathing down their necks. They’re the face of our brand.”
So far, the approach is working; Drewett says the company’s net promoter score–essentially a measure of customer satisfaction and a good predictor of growth, with 100 as the highest score possible and -100 as the worst–is above 90. That’s significantly higher than the net promoter score for auto dealerships, studies show.
As for what the future holds, Drewett envisions NuBrakes becoming the connected-vehicle service platform that powers the future of automated service delivery. “Our mission is to become the most trusted car-care company,” he says.
This year, Drewett plans to double the number of cities where NuBrakes provides service and he foresees the company eventually become a nine-figure business. He’d also like to increase maintenance for trucking fleets–an attractive market since truck usage rates are much higher than the average car-owner’s usage, which means increased repair and maintenance needs. “It’s definitely doable,” he says of the financial goal. “A $140 billion industry offers tremendous opportunities to build a business.”
MOTOR’s Maintenance Schedule data lets you forecast the cost of maintenance and service expenses, create maintenance estimates and more.
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