MAACO’s New Image Places the Customer First

When Jose R. Costa became president of MAACO about 18 months ago, the Charlotte, N.C.-based retailer was “very much a strong player, but very dormant in many aspects.”

Costa told Loyalty360 he was hired to help transform the brand from the 1970s (MAACO launched in 1972) to a more contemporary company. Since Costa came aboard, MAACO has received a “makeover” and grown to be the No. 1 franchise in its category.

MAACO is North America’s body shop, with close to 500 body shop locations across the continent. MAACO provides auto paint and auto body repair services for more than 12,000 vehicles a week, 600,000 a year−more than any other company in North America.

“We’ve revamped training, IT, and rolled out a new production management platform,” Costa said. “Now you can track your car online when it’s having body work done, detailing, or painting. One of the main components of the category is transparency and customers want to be informed about their repairs.”

When Costa joined MAACO, the MAACO message was positioned to talk about a very negative event−an accident.

“We repositioned everything around a positive perception and went completely away from the advertising you remember, ‘Uh Oh, Better Get MAACO!’’’ he explained. “We completely changed the image and relaunched the brand.”

In April 2013 MAACO, which is part of the Driven Brands family of automotive brands, launched a completely new image and branding campaign. The new image work is designed to reinvent the consumer relationship by adding the positive, emotional benefits of car ownership through the essence of transformation−the “MAACOVER”−to the brand’s strong value proposition. 

The campaign kicked off with the concept of a “#MAACOVER,” and is rooted in social interaction via Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, and Facebook to create a new type of conversation with MAACO customers. In a category traditionally known for pushing information out, MAACO wanted to turn industry communications on its ear by inviting the customer in with its use of the hashtag and a host of social initiatives that encourages dialogue directly with the brand.

“We wanted to show that MAACO can turn the car they drive back into the car they love,” Costa explained. “We gave a positive spin to a negative event.”

Costa explained that every key metric has moved in a positive direction since the rebranding. Having an in-house call center has greatly improved repair issues for customers.

“We rolled out a Customer First vision,” Costa said. “Every training activity we do revolves around satisfying customer concerns. We try and solve everything as smoothly as we can. We record some interactions for training and coaching purposes. We’ve transformed from an operations driven company to a customer driven company. I’m not saying we’re there, but we’re making a lot of progress.”

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