Back in the Habit

Before you go any further, STOP, go to aaspnjnortheast.com and register for the NORTHEAST® 2023 Automotive Services Show, taking place March 17-19 at the Meadowlands Exposition Center in Secaucus, NJ.

Thank you.

Now…this month, I decided to write about habits. We all have them. Hopefully, more good than bad. So, how do you determine what is a habit? Beats the hell out of me. Even though I don’t smoke or drink (the two most obvious habits, I think), I’m pretty sure I have a list a mile long (just ask my wife), many of which I have written about in this space.

Oh, there’s my junk food habit. My Disney/Orlando habit (although they have basically priced me out these days). I have a Paul Newman lemonade habit. I have a habit of staying up all night. You must be saying “Geez, does this guy have any good ones?”

Ummmmmm…

Every day when I go downstairs to put my shoes on, I play with my dogs. Does that count? I generally don’t badmouth anyone (in public at least lol). That’s a good one.

Speaking of habits, you know what one of the best habits in our industry is? The NORTHEAST Automotive Services Show.

That’s right: NORTHEAST.

I never really thought of it that way until COVID hit. Once we were forced to cancel our 2020 show and then hold one in September 2021, the following March, one attendee told me that coming to the show had been his habit for over 40 years. He knew that when winter was ending and spring was on its way, NORTHEAST must be right around the corner. But after we lost that year, things got so mixed up and confusing that he had been knocked out of all his habits and rituals. He was so happy that we were back.

I thought about those words a lot, and he was right. NORTHEAST has been a habit for many automotive service professionals for so long. It was also true that COVID threw everything off. But COVID is over. It’s time to get back into the habit of learning. The habit of seeing, trying things out handson and buying the equipment you are going to need to survive as technology and the industry keeps changing. The majority of shops have been

by THOMAS GRECO, PUBLISHER

full over the last two years, but it won’t stay like that forever. The best way to prepare for the future is to get back into the habit of NORTHEAST.

We have EVERYTHING there. Stop by and say hello. I’ll gladly buy you some Paul Newman lemonade.