Lifestyle
Stephanie and Sarah with grandfather, Jim Wendler, Brad Hass, their dad, Rod, and cousin Jeff Dave.
Meet the Wendlers
BY BENITA HART
Spring 2010 |
Back in 1969 when Jim Wendler bought a gas station in the South End of Sudbury, he wasn't building a dynasty, didn't even dream about what might lie beyond Jim's Texaco.
"I just wanted to make a living for my family," he says.
Wendler was brought up with strong family values. He believed in the value of hard work, that it was the key to success. As it turned out, he had a good head for business, too, was spotted early on by head office as a high achiever. He was even featured in a national training film.
Wendler's oldest son liked to hang around after school at the service station, watching his father work, soaking up everything there was to know about cars.
"Roddy was a natural," remembers Wendler with a fond smile. When Rod turned 11, his father finally gave him a job, sweeping the shop floor.
But as service station revenues went up—more gas pumped, more cars repaired—so did the rent. By 1974, it seemed like the company was profiting more from Wendler's hard work than he was. That didn't seem fair. And Jim Wendler was just as certain about the importance of fairness as he was about the value of hard work. So he quit Texaco.
He had a piece of land, put a building on it, and opened an alignment shop, which expanded six months later to Jim's Automotive Service. Jim's became a Sudbury success story.
One fall, Wendler flew up north for the goose hunt and came back to find that 16-year-old Rod had quit high school and was working full-time. From then on they were a team, putting in long hours together, father and son.
When Wendler started in business, cars were a man's thing. Men bought the cars, drove them, and brought them in to be serviced. Today the owner of a car is just as likely to be a woman as a man. And a granddaughter is as likely as a grandson to be the mechanic.
Rod's daughter, Stephanie, 25, went to college, explored fashion and design, but in the end decided to become a mechanic.
Some people still raise an eyebrow—or offer a skeptical "oh really?"—when she reveals her non-traditional occupation, but she loves it. Just like her father and grandfather.
A long line of family members and extended family have worked at Jim's Automotive. In the early years Wendler's wife, Marion, kept the books, working while their four children were at school. Son Dan worked there, too, got his mechanic's papers, but then opted to become a fireman with the City of Sudbury, instead.
Rod, still working 50-hour weeks, reports with a rueful grin, "My kid brother is now semi-retired with a good pension."
Rod's sister, Colleen, worked in the office for a short time. His sister Lori worked there for years before retiring. Today her son, Jeff Davis, 28, works in the automotive shop.
With a college degree and an impressive list of advanced automotive technical qualifications , Jeff still sees his grandfather as a role model. "I look up to him greatly," he says. "He's a very strong individual and his business morals are impeccable."
Rod's daughter, Sarah, 23, took courses in business and economics at college, worked in other offices, but joined the family business because of it's good reputation in the community.
"I'm proud to be working here," she says. "We respect people and treat them the way we want to be treated ourselves."
The grandchildren insist that being family gets them no special privileges. "You probably get treated harder than everyone else," says Stephanie, but tempers that. "It can be tough, but I think I learn more. My Dad's knowledge of mechanics is astounding and because he's my father, I'm not afraid to ask questions."
All three can see a future at Jim's: Stephanie in the service end; Sarah in the business end; and Jeff hoping to manage one of the spin-off operations. That's right, the family business has grown into a small friendly cluster of automotive specialty shops: Jim's OK Tires; Enterprise Radiators.
But the point wasn't just to get bigger. "We decided we couldn't take as good care of our customers if we got too big," Rod says. It was as simple as that. Because customers are family, too.
When you walk in the front door, the atmosphere at Jim's is friendly, often funny, and always professional. In the waiting area, there are coffee and sweets, the usual magazines, and on the bottom shelf a dusty binder full of thank-you letters. One from an out-of-province address reads, "Thank you for making our disaster of a trip almost bearable."
Customer letters like that are as much a testimonial to employees as they are to management.
"I don't want you to think it's just my family that's running this company," Rod says firmly. "Because it's not. If I didn't have Elaine, Brad, and Brian - and John in the tire shop, there's no way this company would run as smoothly as it does. I have employees here, friends and employees, who've been here 20, 25 years, and they're closer to me than many of my family members. This place is built on great relationships."
Wendler is retired now, and Rod's business card reads "owner-manager." Yet, he still goes into the office every day, and the (possibly) old-fashioned values that he never lost sight of have every bit as much to do today with the success of this thriving family business as does the modern computer technology on the automotive service floor. And since three of his five grandchildren have chosen to work in the family business in large part because of those values, it appears that the future of Jim's Automotive is in good hands.
