How to Increase Collision Parts Sales: 5 Moves for Dealership Parts Departments
Total losses are up and repairable claims are down. Learn how to increase collision parts sales with five moves dealership parts departments can start this week.
Your body shop customers are still buying parts, but the question worth asking is, “how many of those parts are coming from someone else?”
Between rising total loss frequency and fewer repairable claims hitting the market, the pool of collision work is shrinking. At the same time, your competition has gotten very good at selling online, and shops have gotten comfortable ordering parts that way. In fact, on average, there are $552 in aftermarket parts on every estimate.
Parts department staffing issues make these challenges even harder to manage. Your dealership wholesale business is competing with savvy competitors over a smaller piece of the pie with fewer people on hand to help than in years prior. That is the real problem. It's not that the work has – poof! – disappeared. It's that a meaningful share of every estimate is being written for parts that you never got a shot at.
Below are five moves dealership parts departments are making to win that share back:
1. Meet shops where they’re buying parts: online
There were some good things about the 1980s. "Parts department, please hold" was not one of them. The uncomfortable truth is that many parts departments still operate this way. A shop calls, waits, gets a callback an hour later, and by then the estimator has already sourced the part from a supplier who let them click a button online.
Shops now expect to be able to research parts, view a catalogue, place an order, and pay – all without picking up a phone. That’s just where the business has moved, and across most industries, not just automotive aftersales. If your department isn't reachable through the channels shops use to order parts, you aren't losing on price. You're not even in position to lose on price – you're losing on availability.
While this first move is not the most glamorous, it is logical. Make sure shops can order from your parts department online. That also means providing accurate pricing, up-to-date inventory visibility, and availability during the hours your customers are writing estimates.
2. See the complete estimate (not just the order)
Most parts platforms show you only the parts a shop already chose to buy from you. You never see what they sourced somewhere else, and by the time the order lands, the decision is already made.
What changes the outcome is seeing every line, including the lines written for your competitor's parts. That visibility turns a passive order queue into a list of specific, named conversion opportunities. You can see the aftermarket line on a bumper cover, respond with an OEM price the shop can defend to the insurer, and win that line before the order is placed.
It's the difference between taking orders and selling parts. If your current platform only shows you what was already won, you're operating without the information that determines whether you win the next one.
3. Stay in front of shops between orders
Most parts departments market to shops only twice: when they open the account and when the volume drops off.
The shops sending you business today are getting pitched by suppliers all the time. Staying visible between orders with something that looks like it came from your dealership, not a vendor, is how you keep the business when a competitor drops price. It also gives your team a reason to call beyond "just checking in."
No parts manager has an afternoon to build a campaign, which is why this rarely happens. So, the practical version of this move is finding a way to run consistent outreach that takes nearly none of your team's time, targeted at the specific shops and roles most likely to order.
4. Use the data already sitting in your DMS
Your DMS knows which shops slowed down last quarter, which parts categories are growing, which accounts order once and never return, and where your fill rate is costing you repeat business. Most parts departments never see any of that in a usable form.
Getting that data out of the DMS and into a view your team can act on weekly changes how the department operates. Instead of reacting to whoever calls, your team works a prioritised list: these five accounts are trending down, this category is up, this shop hasn't ordered in 45 days.
None of this requires new data. It's already in your system, waiting to be pulled into a format someone can use.
5. Treat parts selling as a skill worth coaching
Wholesale parts is a sales job, but it's rarely staffed, trained, or managed like one. Ongoing coaching beats one-time training for a simple reason: It works in small increments, with someone outside the store helping your counter team on process, outreach, and conversion a little at a time. Think of it like this, a full process overhaul is hard for parts teams to absorb when the phones are ringing. One new habit a month (learned from ongoing coaching) is much more manageable.
Where to start
You don't need to act on all five at once. If you only take one thing from this list, make it No. 2: Visibility into the full estimate is what makes every other move measurable. Here are two options for getting started on #2: CollisionLink and TraxCollision give parts departments the entire estimate, not just the order, so your team can convert aftermarket lines to OEM parts before the sale is lost.
From there, when your team is ready, consider adding PSXLink and turn your DMS data into trends your team can act on. Or get on board with OEC eMarketing to keep your dealership in front of shops without adding to anyone's workload. Lastly, OEC Performance Coaching provides expert coaches who can work with your counter team on building habits that drive results.