Kmart Tyre & Auto Service : Review & Giveaway

I don't want to sound all dramatic or anything, but I crossed the threshold into Manland and returned to tell the tale.

Such was my perception of that manly terrain that is an Auto Repairer / Vehicle Mechanic / grease encrusted day spa for cars.

Not Manland hell as I'd expected

Turns out, Kmart Tyre & Auto Service outlets are cleaner than as clean and grease-free as my house.  In fact, they even had a sofa sans suspicious toddler stains, and magazines that hadn’t been chewed around the edges and drawn on.  And I'm not talking dodgy old faded Auto Trader magazines circa 2003.

Magazines? Comfy lounge? Time for a siesta!

Add a coffee machine, mini bar and a Snuggie and I'll take up residence.

The best part about KTAS outlets, aside from the catchy acronym?

They are attached to a Kmart.  Hello shopping!

Thanks to Edelman and Kmart Tyre & Auto Service, my wheels - AKA Not a Mini Van - and I were given the opportunity to covertly shop while #1Hubby assumed I was stuck in a vehicle service centre waiting room test drive their car servicing.

What can I tell you?

Not much.

For the first time in my life, I uttered a sentence I never ever thought I’d say to a service provider of any sort, much less a vehicle repairer….

No rush…take your time!

as I hightailed it next door to the shopping centre (complete with Gospel choir singing Hallelujah in my head as the doors opened).

I received a phone call within 30 minutes of exiting the building, advising me of their initial inspection and recommendations.

Then I received another phone call around an hour later, to say the work was almost done.

Seriously…that's not a typo…just under an hour and a half later, and Not a Mini Van’s brakes were as good as new.

So it was with some disappointment that I bid adieu to the shopping centre that I hadn’t even made a dent in, and reluctantly dragged myself back next door to KTAS.  There, waiting for me, was Not a Mini Van, all re-braked (yep, I’m going with that terminology), refreshed and revitalised in all the ways you'd expect of the car equivalent of a Day Spa.

Apprehension set in while I waited for the bill (which normally sees me totalling up exactly how long I'm going to be relegated to cask wine in order to afford it).  But I needed not fear.  While I was settling my oh so reasonable, non-heart-attack-inducing, anti-cask-wine-consumption-relegating invoice, Steve the Store Manager gave me the stats.  Around 50% of his customers are women.  Clearly I'm not the only one to cotton on to the shopping aspect of having your car serviced by KTAS.

Then Steve impressed me with his powers of deduction, when another lady customer walked in and he knew who she was before she even spoke, and exactly what she wanted.  How cool is that?  He’s a total mind reader! 

I could bang on and on about the lovely sofa, the shiny tiled floors, the minimalist interior in general – because that is the extent of my experience with KTAS.   It was quick, it was easy.

                                            

What it wasn’t is stereotypical greasy, loud, dirty, delayed, or reminiscent of a man cave – no Miss December smiling seductively at me from a girly calendar on the wall.

To be fair, I have run into some horror service centres in the past, so perhaps my expectations as a female walking into an auto repair centre AKA Manland were low.  All I can tell you is that I felt no dread.  It wasn’t difficult.  I didn’t have to suffer through crap jokes, technical car words that made my head hurty, or put on an Oscar worthy performance of nodding at the right time, and inserting correctly placed hmm…ahuh, yes, of course responses, in an attempt to make it sound like I had even the slightest clue what they were talking about.

They were friendly, they were welcoming.  They had magazines I wouldn’t mind reading, if it wasn’t for the shopping centre next door calling my name.

My only criticism?  Next time could you please take a bit longer, so I can make it around the shopping centre once, and fit in a flat white?

They even gave Not A Mini Van something to aspire to...because I totally see myself as more of a cool SUV type than an ageing Station wagon type

Now to the best part of all….

Thanks to Kmart Tyre & Auto Service centres, I have vouchers so you too have a legitimate excuse to go shopping for you to test drive their vehicle servicing too!

2 x $100 gift vouchers

4 x $50 gift vouchers

Valid for vehicle servicing at any Kmart Tyre & Auto Service store in Australia.

For your chance to win, behold, the great and powerful Rafflecopter :
a Rafflecopter giveaway



Those of you not familiar with Rafflecopter, you sign in (with your email address or Facebook) and then the entry options come up.  The great and powerful Rafflecopter peeps chose today to change their formatting, so you won't see the entry options or be able to check them off until you've signed in.