CLARION, Pa. (EYT) – When Seidle Chevrolet closed in 2019, the need for another body shop in Clarion was apparent to Mike Minich, an employee who worked there until its closure.
(Pictured above: Mike Minich, Ginger, and Tim Gizzo)
“There was a need for another shop in the area,” he told exploreClarion.com. “We fixed a lot of cars at Seidle’s (Body Shop). When we left, there weren’t enough shops to take over.”
That need is now filled by Nick’s Auto Body, which opened on October 4, 2021.
A New Castle-based business, Nick’s occupies the building previously occupied by Seidle’s Body Shop at 35 Alpha Lane in front of the old dealership.
“My last day here when it was Seidle’s was September 13 of 2019, and my first official day back was September 14, 2021, so almost two years to the day,” said Minich. “We didn’t even have a paperclip here.”
The owner of Nick’s, Shane Caldararro, explained he was looking to expand to a second location from his shop in New Castle. He emphasized that he was not looking for a closed-down shop like Seidle’s, but his mind changed when he got in touch with Minich and Seidle’s old manager, Tim Guzzo.
“We were looking for a shop that is running and a guy from Nationwide called me and said, ‘I know the old manager at Seidle’s. They are closed.’ He knew I wasn’t looking for a closed shop because, in this day and age, it’s too hard to open something that’s not running,” Caldararro said. “He got me in contact with Tim. After talking to Tim, he said he would help us out and kind of made the decision to buy.”
Caldararro said Nick’s is a family-owned business founded by his grandfather in 1958.
“Granddad used to work at the Cadillac garage,” he said. “He worked there for seven years and decided to open up his own shop. He rented a building. This would have been in 1958. In 1962, he actually bought the building, and he expanded. Then, in ‘97, my father bought my grandfather out. My dad turned it into almost 40 stalls, 33 employees. My dad just retired a little over a year ago, and we expanded to here.”
Nick’s Auto Body is augmented with high-tech machines such as a resistance welder and a paint mixing room.
The resistance welder gives a perfect weld every time and instructions for the welder are sent over a computer program.
Color matching is one of the most important and detailed-oriented jobs at a body shop. Technicians at Nick’s use a special light to ensure the perfect color match.
“We have a special handheld light, and it will help us color match,” said Minich. “Color matching is huge. You might have twenty different variants of a single color.”
As much as technology helps, Minich explained working on cars is much more of an art than a science. It requires trained technicians.
(Photo above by Dave Cyphert of ProPoint Media Photography)
Nick’s has been busy since its opening, and Minich credits their popularity to both their tradition and their high-quality customer service.
“Tim Guzzo taught me years ago, ‘If you’re going to give something away, give it to the customers.’ They’re the ones,” he said. “If we see an extra little ding on it, we’ll fix it. Trying to help out to make our customer service the best that it can be, because at Seidle’s we were pretty good.”
Nick’s Auto Body: 35 Alpha Lane (Former Seidles’s Collision Center)
Phone: 814-297-1600
Website: https://www.nicksautobody.com/
(Photo above by Dave Cyphert of ProPoint Media Photography)
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