Wandering off now into the “aftermarket” world (aka “after sales”). These terms broadly refer to everything you can do to a car after the initial new sale, from maintenance (making sure nothing breaks), to repair (fixing something that broke), to accessorization (adding a roof rack), to collision repair (straightening the bent frame), to resale (as a used car), and then on to recycling and scrapping.
One constant theme of discussion about the aftermarket is that the professionals are taking over. That is, DIFM (do it for me) entities, such as repair garages, quick lubes, dealership service departments, tire stores, and more will sooner or later drive the DIY (do it yourself) mechanic out of existence. This expectation is based in large part on the increasing complexity of the car, which now has more lines of code in it than your average commercial airliner. Listening for engine knock or inspecting a muffler for holes are manual “analog” repair tasks being replaced by “digital” tasks such as diagnostic scans and error code readouts. And the home or shade-tree1 mechanic just can’t afford the equipment and the investment in skill to keep up.
But as always at Car Charts, we are interested in the facts, not just the assertions. So, is it true that DIY car work is as dead as that Geo Metro parked under a tarp in your back yard (you know who you are…)?
Well, no.
I am no aftermarket expert, but the people at the Auto Care Association are. They produce an avalanche of data for their thousands of aftermarket members. They track both DIY and DIFM sales over time. It gets a bit tricky to compare the two since DIY in terms of visible economic activity consists mostly of parts sales (the DIYer is not being sold any labor), whereas DIFM includes both parts and labor sales. But we can track the relative robustness of the DIY market by computing DIY’s share of the total of DIY + DIFM sales over time, although the sum is a bit apples-and-oranges.
So, the share of DIY in the total (DIY+DIFM) market should be falling, right? All those shade tree mechanics have put away their Craftsman wrenches for the last time, and settled on the couch with the rebooted Crazy Taxi game2, right?
Well, not exactly:
DIY seems to be hanging in there pretty well3.
So why is this? Again, I am far from an aftermarket expert, but my asking informed people yields these hypotheses as to how DIY keeps on keeping on:
The internet. DIYers can go online and see instructional YouTube videos on all sorts of repairs, consult subreddits for advice, join forums for their particular model of car, etc. All this builds their skills and gives them confidence to tackle the job.
Advanced diagnostic tools. Yes, professional grade diagnostic computers still cost thousands, but I can order from Amazon cheap OBD-II readers which can unlock whole bunches of error codes. Then, armed with the code, I can go back on the internet and ask for help.
Persistence of the mechanical. Some, maybe many, repairs are still pretty “analog.” All the over-the-air downloads in the world won’t fix a worn-out wheel bearing, and you can diagnose that pretty easily. Thus many DIYers do the analog work themselves, and then head to the DIFM garage for the more complex digital stuff.
Money as motivator. Some DIYers work on their car as a hobby, but many do it to save money, and all appreciate being spared the $100 or more per-hour technician labor rates that are common across America.
Frankly, this one surprised me. I was betting that there would be a DIY decline, but a very slow one. DIY holding its own is impressive. And another reminder to forecasters to privilege facts over assertions.
It will be interesting, however, to see how DIYers handle electric vehicles. I won’t be betting against them just yet…
Anyone actually ever work on a car underneath a tree? Beats me. But informally, in the industry, this term refers to a tech who on her or his own does work on the side, usually for cash, for a car owner. As in “I know a guy who can fix that, bring your car over to his house.” In this post we are treating true DIY (“I did it myself”) and shade-tree work (“My cousin Fred did it”) both as DIY.
Okay, I know, it is not out yet, but it looks awesome.
I will guess that the bump up in 2020 and 2021 is related mostly to pandemic/chip-related shortages of new cars, which resulted in many drivers holding on to their cars longer (thus boosting repair activities), and possibly to the fact that many of those drivers were spending more time at home due to pandemic restrictions, and therefore just had more opportunity to pick up a wrench.