A Green Garage

Thak and I have been discussing ideas for our shop for a while now, really ever since we decided that in a few years, we plan to open a shop. We've been through how many bays we need, decided that we want to also have a towing service and a storage lot on premises, and even decided on a rockabilly theme for the office portion of it. We know that being a veteran-owned business, and being military-friendly will give us an edge if we end up in a military area (and that's a possibility).

Just the other day, though, we thought of a new idea. What if we also made our shop a "Green Garage"? Everyone's on board with the eco-friendliness these days, but we've never seen a green garage before! It would be something new, and possibly another selling point that could get customers through the door. Right now, our ideas are rather limited, but we've got a while to come up with more, and I'm sure we will.

First off, we'd like to power it with solar panels. This is totally possible in a sunny area (and the areas we're currently considering are very sunny). We actually got this idea from the birth center Orren was born at. It's run 100% on solar power, and their solar panels actually generate more power than the center itself needs, so that surplus power goes out into the grid, and helps power other homes and businesses in Savannah. They get a check every month from the power company for the surplus power they generate, too. Not only is solar power a great way to reduce our business' carbon footprint, but it can even reduce overhead in the long run, and generate a small profit after the solar panels have paid for themselves. Solar power is an important part of being a green garage.

We also wanted to possibly emphasize alternative fuel and hybrid work. Thak is being certified in these areas already, so this would not require anything more from us. It would just be one existing thing that we could emphasize that goes along with the green theme. We are even considering a hybrid and alternative fuel vehicle discount of some variety, probably on a par with the military discount.

We also are looking into the logistics of making bio-diesel, and becoming a bio-diesel fueling station. This one, we need to do a lot more research on, but my whole thing is that somebody's got to make bio-diesel, so why not us? I know that most cities do not have a place to easily buy alternative fuels, especially bio-diesel, so that would be another draw for us, a way to get our name out just that much more, and fuel sales would bring a little more profit as well.

Of course, there will be the usual things that most businesses do these days as well. We'll be recycling, meeting or exceeding EPA standards as far as dealing with used fluids, using compact florescent bulbs, and using as many reclaimed materials as possible for any building we do.

I think we're onto something with our green garage idea! There is still a lot of research to be done, and I'm sure we will come up with many new ideas for ways to make our garage greener as we go along, but we have a starting point as of now.

Thaksin's Automotive and Towing is currently set to open in 2015, and we will be leaders in greening the automotive repair industry!