Today was a banner day at Clark Marine as we were officially recognized as both a Mercury Outboard and Mercruiser Stern Drive Premier Service Level Dealer. This is a standard we have worked 5 years + to achieve.
1/25/11 we had a visit from our Territory Area Technical Manager. At the conclusion of his inspection our service department ranking was increased from a level 2 Service standing to a level 4 Premier Status.
“Premier” is the term Brunswick (Mercury/Mercruiser parent company) uses to designate its top level servicing dealerships.
The most time consuming hurdle to overcome was to complete the extensive amount of technical training that is involved in reaching this rank. Continuing education is a given here. If you are going to work here, you are going to attend schooling.
I have never been one to educate just a single technician at a time like so many companies do. For example, we have 3 technicians at the Mercury Training Center in Laconia NH. They are taking an Outboard Systems week long class right now. It’s just how I do it.
A second and likewise difficult task was in actually passing the Certified Tests at the end of the formal training sequence. Today we have 3 certified Mercury Outboard technicians on staff along with 2 Mercruiser Certified Tech’s. Because of our training methods we currently have a dozen technicians on staff at varying levels of formal education.
There a number of facility requirements that needed to be met and will need to be maintained. We have been strong in this area for quite a while now.
Today’s inspection along with a light special tool purchase capped the goal.
