Jim Lang, president of Lang Market, discusses what independent shop owners need to do in order to stay relevant.

Service bay trends linked to the foreign nameplate aftermarket, according to the recent Lang Aftermarket iReport.

Jim Lang, industry analyst and president of Lang Marketing, sat down with Ratchet+Wrench to further discuss his latest Lang Aftermarket iReport.

While the number of general service stations and bays are going down, Jim Lang, president of Lang Marketing, said shops are making up for it by being much more productive than they have been in the past.

While general repair shops have achieved marginal growth in the past six years, repair specialists are thriving. That’s because repair specialists have have an ability to focus activity on certain types of repairs, Jim Lang said, and can advertise those repairs both on a local and a regional, city wide basis.

The rapidly increasing foreign nameplate vehicle aftermarket has become a battleground in which the five major groups of brands are competing fiercely.

Early in April, Tenneco announced an agreement to acquire Federal-Mogul from Icahn Enterprises in a $5.4 billion deal. Jim Lang, president of Lang Marketing, says that Carl Icahn’s sale of Federal-Mogul answers a lot of questions on where he’s taking his enterprise going forward.

Jim Lang reported that more and more dealerships are adding quick service bays, which has repositioned their hold on the repair market. However, Lang says that independent shops still have a pricing advantage over most dealerships, and are able to work on a much wider array of nameplates.