Congrats to the Garsides

I have a deep appreciation and love for small businesses. My grandparents, Maynard and Isabelle Heinbuch, started Heiny’s TV and Furniture after World War II and ran it through their retirement in the mid-1990s. My sister and I grew up in their stores in Fontanelle and Greenfield and those are some of our fondest childhood memories. As they were easing out of their business, my husband and his brother were starting their own small business, Garside Auto Body. After 38 (Chad) and 42 years (Clint) working in auto body, including 30 years as business owners, they have now retired from auto body work.

When they started, there were five body shops in Greenfield; now there are none. This reminds me just how vital small businesses are to rural communities. But as anyone who owns a small business will tell you, it’s a lot of work. You’re on call 24/7; people always know how to find you, especially since the invention of cell phones. The last vacation we had was the month before they purchased the shop — yes, 30 years ago. If you aren’t working, you aren’t getting paid. There are no days off, you go to work when you’re sick, even if a family member passes, with no way to stay home with a sick child. It’s almost impossible for a small business owner nowadays to afford benefits such as healthcare.

But just like I grew up with those core memories, I hope our kids will have some good ones too. Our daughter and our niece were just 11 days apart in age; they would go to the body shop every day before school, and one of their dads would take them to school. Our nephew, as an adult, was there most lunch hours.

There are also the connections you make with your community. There was hardly a week or two that went by without someone stopping by for a donation for the school, the fair, youth organizations or church dinners — all important threads in the fabric of a close-knit community.

I can’t even count the number of guys from young to old who have enjoyed coffee and lunch breaks over the years, many of whom are no longer with us. As the non-paid bookkeeper spending most of my lunch hours there, I will have to say while I couldn’t hear a lot of the stories sitting in the office, I will miss the many belly laughs I heard. I’m sure more than one person would try and avoid that street at all costs over the lunch hour.

Small businesses are often described as the backbone of our economy, but lately, it feels as though that backbone is being strained to the breaking point. Small body shops, like many other businesses, will be a thing of the past. Dealing with insurance companies over the last 15 years has become almost impossible. Looking back, there has not been one single job in the last several years where an insurance check actually covered the job. They always cut parts, labor, paint — and anyone who knows the Garside brothers know they only put out the highest quality work, which means the shop would eat those costs to fix it right because these are our friends and neighbors.

Now AI has come, even into the body shop world. Instead of being able to deal with an actual insurance adjuster, you get an email from AI telling you what you can fix and how much they are deducting from your actual estimate. There is no one to call and no way to respond to the AI email. Even the insurance agents don’t know in many cases, but I want to say our local insurance agents are great!

Cars have more technology than ever. What a young prospective owner would need to start a body shop today would be cost prohibitive. With all the sensors cars now have, you need a special machine to recalibrate these or they must go back to the dealer. More special equipment is needed to fix anything from airbags to working on new electric vehicles.

I’d like to also thank the Adair County Free Press’ Caleb Nelson for wanting to write a story on the end of this era, which the guys respectfully declined. They aren’t much into fanfare, so you’re stuck with my mediocre writing.

Having grown up in a small business and being married to a small business owner makes me a little sad our grandchildren won’t have that same experience. It makes me want to start another small business because while it’s hard, the lessons learned and relationships made are something you can’t put a value on.

Mostly I just want to say thanks to Chad and Clint for their years of service to this community, and in return, for the support of the community. How many times have they just done the Iowa nice thing to do, fixing a door, popping out a dent, unlocking a car that had the keys locked in it or touching up some paint for no charge at all?

What can we all do? Continue to support our small businesses and thank the business owners for being here. It’s definitely a choice and a sacrifice when they could go somewhere else with better pay and benefits. I think we all agree they are what keeps our small towns strong and a place to call home.