People often ask me where the name came from. The honest answer is that I didn’t come up with it. A TV narrator did, by accident.
It’s a story I enjoy telling, so here it is.
A friend, a TV series and a full workshop
I’ve got a friend, Yianni, who was doing a TV series for Sky. He started around the same time I started Brunswick, my garage, and he was bringing a lot of high-wealth clientele to me: cars he was wrapping for footballers and stars on TV.
My premises at Brunswick was like a shrine as a garage, so it fitted what he was trying to achieve. And it helped me a lot, because at the beginning it filled my workshop up.
He said to me, “Whatever happens, I want you to be on the show.” I said I didn’t really want to be on the show. He said, “You’re going to be on the show, even if I bring the camera crews to you.”
“What do you actually do?”
The film crew, the narrator and the editors were asking me what I did. And it was a bit difficult, because it’s not like I’m a plumber or an accountant or a bricklayer. There wasn’t a job title for it.
So I just turned round and said: Gordon Ramsay. I do exactly what he does, but in garages. I go in there, I eff and blind, and I put things right.
That was my description. You can hear me tell it here.
The light bulb moment
When they were filming, I drove up in my car for Yianni to do a few bits on, and the narrator said:
This is Andy, one of Yianni’s old friends, an ex-garage owner, now Garage Inspector.
The show’s narrator, as Andy remembers it
Oh my goodness. When I heard that, that was it. Light bulb. I thought, I need that.
That’s how it all began, and I’ve gone from strength to strength since. Remember, I’m just one person. There’s no one else. The Garage Inspector name was found by chance.
Why there was no name for it
Looking back, the reason I had nothing to call myself is the same reason the work needed doing. There was no recognised job for helping garage owners with the business side, because nobody was teaching it.
If you want to know more about what I do now, there’s more about me here.
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