Atlanta Auto Haus

Your Source for Atlanta's Best Cars

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We got a lot of hate speech feedback last time. Some of it encouraging our no-hate-speech policy. Some of it calling us snowflakes. Most of it in incoherent spelling, grammar, and sentence structure.

Let me be clear – we are a successful enough garage that refusing service to the few foul-mouthed assholes who come through will not hurt us. We respect the diversity of our community members, customers and staff enough to respect their comfort and safety over that of prospective clients.

Furthermore – working in a jumpsuit in a garage with dirty fingernails does not preclude me from having an education, a heart, and a general understanding of acceptable behavior.

Smart Car

A man pulled in with a smart car – you know the car I’m talking about: it’s half a parking space, no back seat, no trunk. It’s a lego car. Now, I totally understand the fuel efficiency, ease of parking, appeal of these cars especially for people living in the city. But this guy didn’t seem to understand the other side of the coin – that the car is ridiculous looking!  

Some very practical items just live at the mercy at their own ridiculous appearance!  

He pulled into our garage after booking an appointment for some “body work” and when he hopped out he was not tickled at the reaction of our mechanics. They were sniggering, but like barely. And he clearly was self-conscious about his car. He was misleadingly macho and alpha considering the car he had chosen. He looked around the garage, saw our smirks and exclaimed “You faggots never seen a smart car before?!”  

We all immediately stopped smirking and I stepped over: “Hey man, I see that you have an appointment and we’d love to honor that but I’m afraid we don’t serve customers who come in here using hate speech. Please take that and your lego car elsewhere.” It was totally worth the negative Yelp review.  

In fact, the negative Yelp review brought us more business as we had a couple of folks in the following few weeks who said that our kicking out a homophobe demonstrated that we were a business they would want to patronize.  

I shouldn’t have to say this in my garage, on Yelp, or on this blog: using “faggot” in that way is unacceptable.  And if you use it here, we are not afraid to take legal action.

Range Rover

I don’t work on Sport Utility Vehicles simply because they intimidate me and I can’t focus. But Arnie in our shop fucking loves them. Whether it’s a 1977 Landcruiser, a 2003 Hummer, or a modern hybrid SUV – he loves them, he loves working on them, and he get giddy when a fancy one rolls in. So in 2017, when Atlanta rapper Ludacris strolled in – casual, with a beautiful brand new white Range Rover, Arnie basically ran over to tend to him. To be clear, he was excited about the vehicle. Luda was just its escort.  

“I’m here for some …. ahhhh … creative vehicular enhancements, my man.” Luda announced. He was apparently planning to gift this vehicle to his teenage daughter and was afraid that it was too plan. Arnie giggled at this – suddenly he was presented with an opportunity to do his literal dream job.  

I actually didn’t follow along the whole job, but I was there for pick-up day. The enhancements were priced well, subtle but blingy, and made Luda as giddy as Arnie. The interior was teen-girl-pimped-out with hidden safety features. The exterior was beautiful, subtle, and well done so that she’d stand out but not ostentatiously. And the upholstery was designer, babbbyyyyyy.  

Ludacris was happy, gave us a shout-out on social media, and has been using our services ever since. We’re happy to do jobs that make dads and their daughters safe and happy!  

Grandma’s Camry

Ohmigod everyone’s grandmother bought a Camry in 2000, kept it but never drove it for fifteen years, until eventually a grandchild inherits it and wants to pour a bunch of money into this new (free) ride. I can’t even count the number of souped up Camrys that have rolled out of our garage. Usually, we don’t really mind putting some ridiculous rims and tinted windows on a Camry, there is something inherently fun and funny about a car that is worth more in add-ons than engine.  

Once about three years ago a young woman, probably about 22 years old, showed up to the shop with one such Camry. It was a 1999 Camry, dingy grey, and utterly unremarkable, but with only like 4000 miles on it. She said she wanted to “completely trick it out” and to “spare no expense.” She basically gave us free reign to…. pimp her ride. We wanted a budget and she told us, truly, to spare no expense and that she was ready to spend up to $25,000 on this silly trickery. We even told her she might as well just buy a fancy new car, she declined. 

So we kept that car for about six weeks – we put a tint on the windows, painted it matte black with rose gold features, a spoiler, rose gold rims, a lowered kit, a beautiful interior with millennial pink leather seats, rose gold and black features, an in-dash navigation system with Bluetooth speakers. 

It was beautiful work. We were all in awe of how gorgeous it was, how poor of an investment it was, and we were hopeful that this woman would return and be giddy about her instagrammable new whip. She came back to get it and she did, truly, find it beautiful. She was cute about it, grateful, and excited to drive it.  

It was a really fun experience. I’ve never seen the car on the road and it’s barely drivable. But I always keep an eye out when in the neighborhood hoping I’ll see it driving past me. 

Prius

A woman in a white Prius drove up, no appointment, pulled into the garage, left the keys in the ignition, walked into the waiting room and took a seat. She didn’t talk to anybody, she didn’t make eye contact with anyone, she was wearing a floor length white coat, sunglasses, and high heels. She looked … out of place. Our staff all assumed she knew what she was doing, based on her behavior – that of a woman who knows exactly what she’s doing.  

After about twenty minutes, she started dinging the little bell at the check-out in the waiting room. She dinged it about thirty-five times within ten seconds and I popped up from three feet away in plain sight and asked if she needed something. 

She said, “OBVIOUSLY.” 

I asked what, exactly, she needed. 

She said, “A FUCKING OIL CHANGE WHY DO YOU THINK I’M HERE?” 

I told her that we’re not really that kind of shop, we’re not really used to walk-in service requests, and that we’ve never really had anyone jut pull in and post up before so please try to understand our confusion. We didn’t mean to keep you waiting. I’m sorry. We just don’t really do walk-in oil changes.  

She asked, ragefully, “THEN WHY THE FUCK YOU GOT ME WAITING HERE FOR THIS LONG?” 

I reminded her that she hadn’t really asked anyone anything, she walked in like she owned the place, and refrained from ever approaching the customer service window in the twenty minutes she’d been sitting there scrolling her phone.  

She asked me, incredulously, why I wouldn’t honor her appointment for the oil change. This is when I realized that she thought she had pulled into the next garage over – the Jiffy Lube. I sent her that way, she left, we never saw her again. 

The next day, our yelp page went fucking insane. Her review was not specific to the lack of attention he’d received in our shop – which I would have understood and felt genuinely bad about that day. But it was about how our facility was oily (it’s an auto shop), how the staff she did see wandering around were poorly dressed (they’re mechanics) and how the customer service representative (me, the one writing this recap) could barely speak or understand English. 

What I still cannot understand is how she confused the Jiffy Lube with our garage in plain sight, but managed to find our site on Yelp!?

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