When Your Shop is Family

share on:
Showtime Audio Chicago

Showtime Audio in Chicago works on Lamborghinis, Teslas and more but it caters to all car audio jobs big or small.

If you want something to aspire to, read the reviews of Showtime Audio (Chicago) on Yelp. It maintains a 5-out-of-5 star rating with over 100 reviews that attests to a company that has mastered the art of customer service.

On top of that, the shop is a family affair.

Owner Jerry Villa opened the shop with his wife (of exactly one week, at the time) about 15 years ago.  From there, he hired a friend, then a cousin, and then his wife’s sister.  His wife’s sister married the fabricator at the shop, Alex.  And so, he works in a family environment.

“It’s good because we’re family and bad because we’re family,” said Villa.  Good because everyone has each other’s back and trusts each other.  Bad, because sometime you can’t help taking a little advantage of that trust.

A few years ago customers started coming into the shop saying, “I saw you on Yelp.”  Villa didn’t know what Yelp was. “I didn’t want to seem like an idiot, so I Googled it one day.”  He only had 5 reviews at the time, but the 5 star ratings   kept coming.

Showtime Audio Chicago

 

Like ABT, an iconic store in the region, Showtime focuses on old fashioned customer service and it doesn’t back away from the hard stuff.

About 15 years ago, a Ferrari pulled into the shop and the owner said no one else in the area would work on his car.  He wanted a radio upgrade.  Villa said why not.  The shop now works on about 3 exotic cars a week in addition to other jobs.

Showtime Audio Chicago
Showtime Audio Chicago

The phone is answered every time it rings…quickly.  It’s an extravagance for many shops, but Showtime does it well.

Advertising is limited to going to local car shows, which is how the shop built its business. It won the regional Dub Show three years in a row with different cars.

Villa has a background in modifying vehicles as well as installing. And he’s always tinkering.

Showtime recently built from scratch a drift trike with a go kart engine,  “because we wanted one.” He took it to a car show and then put it on the showroom floor.

Word of mouth travels fast on the exotic car forums and in the car clubs, which keeps the shop busy.

Showtime has about 10,000 square feet in total with a 1,000 square foot showroom.  The bay can handle about 22 cars.   There are 5 installers in all.

It doesn’t always go smoothly working on high end cars.  The shop recently cracked the window on a brand new Ferrari, while installing a full radar system.   It cost a lot of money to replace but the shop takes care of his customers and that’s part of the job.  “Unfortunately, if you are not breaking something, you are not trying hard enough,” he said.

Villa says the waiting room is comfortable but “not insane.”  He built charging stations for phones and laptops after seeing them in an airport.  And there’s a desk with WiFi, a chair and a lamp.

“Every once in awhile we’ll drive a customer to work and drop him off. Nothing super out of the ordinary. Just customer service,” he said.

Brands carried include Alpine, Focal, Audison, Viper, Kenwood, Pioneer and Hertz.

 

 

 

 

Want to receive industry news? Sign up here
share on:

2 Comments

  1. The Show Time Audio crew is the best ! Awesome team of people to deal with . I will never trust anyone else to touch my vehicles besides the Show Time Audio Crew!

Comments are closed.