Selecting A Repair Shop

Under California law, you – the consumer – have the right to select the collision repair shop where your car will be repaired.

In the City of El Cajon, there are over twenty-five (25) licensed auto body repair businesses. Each business is different. Most of the shops are small, employing five or fewer people. There are three large shops in El Cajon – Gene Townsend Auto Body and Paint is the largest. Some shops – such as Gene Townsend’s – work with insurance repairs on a daily basis.

Our customer service desk and waiting room.

Some shops focus on specialty services. There are shops that do custom painting, but do not perform major repairs. Others may primarily do salvage repair work for independent auto sales businesses. This type shop obtains wrecked cars and patches them together for resale.

Most shops do not have enough employees to perform all facets of collision repair “in house.” In a small shop a “body and fender” man may be the one doing your mechanical repair work.

Keeping highly trained, certified mechanics on staff is expensive. There is rarely enough mechanical work in a body shop to justify employment of a full time ASE Certified Master Automotive Technician. This is why most shops farm out, or sublet work to others. Gene Townsend, for example, sends its mechanical work to a business partner located across the street.  The partner – Superstition Motors Ltd – employs ASE certified technicians to perform customer work.

The equipment used in collision repair is also expensive. Modern paint booths cost upward of $100,000. At Gene Townsend’s we have three of them. Computerized racks designed for accurately measuring and straightening bent vehicle frames cost tens of thousands of dollars each. We have four available. We have a room dedicated to housing specialized paint mixing equipment and a pro spot welder designed to replicate factory welding techniques when reassembling your car.

When selecting a collision repair facility it is important to know what work will be done, who will perform the work, and whether the shop has the equipment to complete the work to give you a high quality product.

If you only want custom pin striping applied to your older car or truck, you may want to choose a small specialty shop. If you have a paint chip or a “ding” in a fender, many small shops can easily repair the damage for you. If you have a late model or high value vehicle and want custom paint matching and comprehensive collision repair services, you need to choose a full service collision repair shop.

Gene Townsend Auto Body and Paint is a full service collision repair shop. We pride ourselves on offering collision repair services to our individual and insurance customers for over fifty years. Our business is family owned. It has a reputation for high quality repairs, personal service, reasonable prices and timely completion of work.

Our specialty work – including show quality custom paint jobs and precision fiberglass repair – have won awards for excellence. Without this track record, we could not have earned the trust and respect of hundreds of repeat customers.

If you are thinking about choosing us for vehicle painting or collision repair, please stop by our shop and talk to one of our friendly staff members. Or ask to talk to Gene. We are happy to answer your questions, show you our portfolio of customer commendations, or walk you around the shop.