Car Queen

Pam Oakes is swigging on a Coke on a recent afternoon: “Lunch,” she quips. In a few minutes, she's got to pass out badges at the Rotary Club. An hour earlier, she made an appearance on a radio show.

Welcome to Pam's Motor City in Fort Myers. Born on the east side of Detroit, Oakes learned to repair cars from her technician father and grandfather (her great-grandfather was one, too). She fixed her first car at age 5, setting the choke on a 1969 Plymouth she still owns today. She wrecked her dad's Pontiac when she was in high school, she admits.

When she took out a $40,000 Small Business Administration loan and opened her garage in 1995, she was the lone technician with seven bays. Her first job: fixing a 1987 silver Lincoln Continental. “From day one I was busy,” she says.

Fortunately, Oakes knew a lot of people when she started the business. Her family moved to North Fort Myers in 1974 and at first it seemed that Oakes wasn't going to follow in her family's footsteps.
She became a reporter and editor at the Punta Gorda Herald and Cape Coral Breeze newspapers, showing and fixing cars on the weekends.

“My first passion was automobiles,” Oakes says. “I was showing my cars whenever I could.”

So Oakes quit the newspaper business in 1993 and went to work for a repair shop in town. “I can do this a lot better,” she concluded.

Because of her large network of friends and acquaintances from auto shows and the newspaper business, Pam's Motor City grew quickly and she moved to a larger facility near the busy intersection of Metro and Daniels parkways in Fort Myers. “I saved my money to purchase property here in 2002,” she says. Now, Oakes has 12 employees, including her fiance Peter Sudak, the tire manager. Her customers are equally divided among men and women.

But Oakes is just getting started.

Last year, Oakes opened a do-it-yourself garage behind Pam's Motor City where people who are mechanically inclined can bring their cars and rent a bay with a lift. DIY Motor City charges $29 an hour for a bay with a lift. For additional fees, you can rent tools and diagnostic equipment. “This is for people who have classics,” she says, noting that many people use the facility on the weekends.

Oakes also is a published author. She's sold 10,000 copies of two books she's written: “Car Care for the Clueless” and “Used Car Buying 101.” A third title is due to be published this summer under the Clueless banner: “Never a Stupid Question.”

To promote her books, Oakes spends hours on radio shows around the country. “I'll be on the radio twice a day,” she says. She's hired Shannon Rose of Eclectic Media Productions in Tampa to be her agent and coordinate interviews on stations in cities like Boston, Pittsburgh and Seattle.

Oakes is serious about car repair, saying many car shows do a disservice to their listeners because the technology has gotten so complex. No goofy car-talk guys here: “We don't want you popping the hood,” she says. “You can electrocute yourself.”

Now that she's building a brand and expanding her scope of services, what's next? Oakes is mum on her plans, but she suggests they're big. “I almost spilled the beans a few months ago,” she chuckles, promising news later this year.

The biggest challenge to her business and other independent repair shops are the auto dealers. Dealers make money on their repair shops and generate loyal car buyers by providing free service. “The dealerships are going to kill the mom and pops,” Oakes predicts.

“Oh, and I invented something,” she exclaims. The only clue is that it's auto related and she invented it while watching another mechanic wrestle with an issue. “This will have a patent,” she says.
Stay tuned up.

Follow Jean Gruss on Twitter @JeanGruss