As the service manager for Napleton Palatine Subaru in Illinois, Luke Goerlitz is committed to using video inspections and is gaining his team's buy-in as they notice the appeal of working more efficiently.
Driving the news: Goerlitz, who became the service manager at the Subaru store at the beginning of this year, joined Daily Dealer Live’s Fixed Ops Friday and told host Sam D’Arc about his approach to MPIs.
To start, he pointed out how the MPIs give the technician the ability to talk directly with the customer and tell them what’s going on with their vehicle.
“It stops any questions that might come in for the advisor. It’ll get their bay working way more efficiently,” Goerlitz pointed out.
An early skeptic: Goerlitz said he viewed it the same way as when multi-point inspection moved from paper to digital, and the initial backlash too.
“All new technologies and new ways to do things are going to get backlash, and you’re going to hear the most if you have to tell a technician that they have to do it,” Goerlitz said.
He also admitted his first approach was pushing it because the manufacturer was pushing for it, and he didn’t really have confidence in making his technicians do it.
What changed: That changed, Goerlitz said, when a technician on a repair order sent in his inspection 25 minutes after the car was received.
The service advisor was backed up and couldn’t go meet the customers with the recommendations, frustrating the technician.
“I thought to myself for a minute, I was like, you know what, it’s these technician videos, they put the technician in front of the customer, and it allows them to explain what’s [going on] with their video, and it’s actually very valuable,” Goerlitz said. “...What if the advisor really quick just reviewed his recommendations, sent out the video, and then dealt with what they were dealing with.”
From there, Goerlitz said it sped up the process with customers accepting and deferring recommended work, as well as the technician knowing how to move forward.
How it works: The dealership uses Tekion’s video inspection tool, which sends the customer a text message with directions.
He stresses the importance of sending an MPI on every repair order.
But Goerlitz points out that continued coaching, training, and motivation are key.
He added that some of the technicians who pushed back at first are ones he never has to “bother anymore.”
“They’ll always have their videos in, and they also put some of the most hours in the shop,” Goerlitz said. “They bring in the most revenue for the shop.”
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Unapplied labor: Another focus has been cutting down on unapplied labor charges for light bulbs and smaller repair orders.
It’s an area that popped on his radar when becoming a service manager, and he looked back on how he dispatched jobs before.
“A lot of dispatchers, they try to rather than strategically put it into the shop where it will perform its best for the shop, they give it to their main shop technicians to try to fill their hours for the week to hit their goal,” Goerlitz explained. “Which is great. You got to help everybody out, but I’d rather my main shop techs have bigger jobs, diagnostics, and be working on higher ROs. You try to get your express guys, maybe your semi-skilled, to do all these smaller jobs, and those smaller jobs really do add up at the end of the month.”
Closing thoughts: As he looks to close out 2026, Goerlitz said the biggest challenge is the amount of technology being thrown at all dealerships.
He points out that they are great resources and provide great information. Conversely, he said several platforms make it difficult for advisors to move between them.
“Trying to juggle these and coach your team to be as successful as they can, it’s a difficult thing,” Goerlitz said. “It takes patience, but you just have to be on top of it. You’ve got to have an optimistic outlook, and you just got to keep moving forward.”
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