Levin the dream for 35 years

Having a talent for business and a thirst for a challenge has bought success for Marty Jarrett’s panel and paint business in Levin.

He’s self-taught in the art of panel, paint and interior finishing and puts his motivation down to a comment his dad made to him as a lad.

“I have had little businesses all my life,” Marty says.

“When I was at college, I built slot cars and sold them to Palmers Sports World in Levin and my motivation came from my dad, he used to say, ‘Never think it can’t be done, there is always a way’.”

Indeed, there was always a way, and come June this year Marty will celebrate 35 years in a business he started from his home garage.

A pivotal part of getting started in business was a 1977 custom Escort van he built in the ’80s. It was so well-finished it won him the New Zealand Supervan trophy in 1987, beating 130 other entrants from around the country. And the 2,500 hours he put into it paid off - a Weetbix collectable card was created, and the title bought customers to his door and his business grew.

“I taught myself how to spray paint and gas weld and made a chain steering wheel for the panel van; I did all the modifications to the van apart from the stainless-steel fuel tank cover and the stainless pipe work for the turbo charger.” so I widened it and raised it and soon I got too big for it and had to employee someone.”

A couple of complaints from the neighbours to the local council forced him to look for another location and that’s when the business moved 12 kilometres down the road to Levin.

He’d been doing some work for trucking business Central Automotive Services Levin, who offered a dismantled spray booth along with space for him to work, and a plan was put together to reassemble the booth.

Marty spent 15 years there until deciding to upgrade the business.

“There was a property next door that they owned, and I asked if I could buy it, they said no but said they would build what I wanted and here we are,” Marty says. He installed a massive Zenhan Truck Low-Bake Oven and the market opened up even further.

Amway and apples

Every part of the van was either chromed, polished or painted while he was working at Levin company Redpath International building cool stores and manufacturing panels, until he was refused a union pay rise and Marty decided it was time to move on.

“I went picking apples in the morning and sold Amway at night and while I was doing this guys kept ringing me up asking to work on their cars and customise them,” Marty says.

“When I started at home, I had a single garage shed, you couldn’t open the doors on it,

MEMBER PROFILE: MARTY’ S PANEL & PAINT

Planes, boats and automobiles

Over the years Marty’s taken on some challenging jobs including aeroplanes, boats and machinery.

“We used to do a full paint job on a truck every week and then we painted buses for Mana Coach Services, and about 17 buses for NZ Bus.”

Always keeping an eye on the future, Marty could see it was weighted too much towards buses and trucks. That’s when RVs and campers started to take over.

He went to a campervan expo in Hamilton, saw there was potential for the business and joined The New Zealand Motor Caravan Association. A new line of work was found.

“At the moment we have around 72 RVs in the queue waiting to be worked on,” Marty says.

His son Michael is also part of the team at the business and he’s keen on cars as well; he races a Toyota Starlet drift car and is in his third year of his apprenticeship. For Marty it couldn’t get any better - he loves being able to spend time with him although he’s not his boss.

“Paddy my foreman has been with me for 19 years and he’s the boss on the workshop floor and they get along really well,” Marty says.

Death trap

It’s not all RVs and big jobs they tackle though. Some are just for love, not money. There’s a Fiat Ducato camper that had so many rust issues he advised the owner to sell it rather than fix, but they had a sentimental attachment to it and rather than pass the problems on, wanted it fixed.

“We got started on it for them and discovered all the front section right back to behind the driver’s seat was rotten.

“It was a death trap and I told them the only way we would fix it is if they got another cab and front section for it so the decided to import one from England.”

Working on it is skilled and specialist work, Marty says, and it has given his apprentices an opportunity to learn things they never would have.

MEMBER PROFILE: MARTY’ S PANEL & PAINT

With more than three decades as a business owner, he’s rightly proud of the reputation the business has and where it has come from.

Eventually he hopes to be able to take a day off a week to work on his own car, an FJ Holden, and has big plans to turn it into a one-off-special hot rod. “I went from building slot cars and selling them to selling Amway as a side job and on to the business I have today,” Marty says.

In June this year Marty will celebrate 35 years in the business he started from his home garage.

Century Yuasa Batteries is excited to announce its Nelson branch has relocated. Due to continued growth in the region the branch has moved into its new premises located at Unit 6, 38 Estuary Place, Richmond.

Outgrowing the previous location, Century Yuasa has invested significantly in building the new facility to cater to higher distribution demands from the region. The new larger facility features custom racking to hold more stock, improved loading facilities for faster stock flow, easier access, more parking for large vehicles and better staff amenities.

Century Yuasa’s General Manager of Automotive Stu Stanners said the newly built branch will allow us to provide our customers with an even higher level of service. We can now store more stock and react faster to the local needs.

“Safety is one of our core values and has been at the forefront of every consideration in the new build. The branch has been designed to incorporate Century Yuasa’s 6S safety standard model ensuring all areas of the business comply. This includes an improved loading area to ensure safe loading and unloading of product and accommodates large vehicles, ease of access and parking for large trucks and purpose-built racking for accessing product efficiently and safely.

“In addition, the warehouse complies with Century Yuasa’s philosophy of managing inventory from cradle to grave, environmentally aware and responsible business approach.”

For more information on the new branch or Century Yuasa’s range of products and services, please contact your Century Yuasa representative on 0800 93 93 93.

What’s next?

To begin this month, may I congratulate new columnist Mercedes Mulder, who began last month. I congratulate her on three counts. Firstly, as an obviously capable and intelligent young person, she has resisted the usual pressures to study for a degree (which may or may not lead to a fulfilling career), in favour of pursuing something she has discovered she loves: the automotive trade. Secondly, she has chosen to be an apprentice in a male-dominated industry, a position with lower pay in the training years than someone working in another field might earn. Thirdly, Mercedes has invested in her future, not just in her chosen career, but also with her partner in buying their first home, a feat very few 19-yearolds have ever achieved in New Zealand. Well done! I wish the two of you every success in your careers and in your life together.

In my February column, which the editor titled ‘No rest for new PM’ (wow, what an understatement!), I commented on some of the challenges facing the Government. The new PM had hardly got the Governor General’s appointment letter when the skies opened. The worst weather ever recorded deluged several parts of New Zealand with huge damage to homes, farms, infrastructure