Girls Auto Club is part auto clinic, part salon, all genius. Unless you’re part of the badass Speed Sisters collective (an all-female racing team in the Middle East) getting your oil changed probably falls somewhere on your so-mundane-I’ll-just-put-it-off to-do list. Enter, Girls Auto Club — the only place where you can reward yourself for checking car tune up off the list with a mani pedi.
Without playing into gender-based stereotypes, the truth is, a lot of women don’t know a spark plug from a SiliSponge, which is totally fine, but it can also mean some annoying trips to the auto shop, where the male mechanic with his big man brain talks down to you, the poor damsel behind the wheel. That’s exactly how founder Patrice Banks got the idea for Girls Auto Clinic Repair Center and Clutch Beauty Bar, reports Racked.
The Philly-based body shop is brilliantly simple. After leaving her job as an engineer, Banks studied automotive technology and started hosting clinics to train other women to become more auto-savvy. She decided to open her own auto shop run by women, for women.
That means two things. Number one, the shop is totally staffed by female mechanics (“SheCanics”) who can relate to their customers. The goal of Girls Auto Clinic Repair shop isn’t just to swap out break pads and change oil in a female-friendly environment, but to actually educate women about the maintenance being done on their cars, making for a more empowered customer.
An auto shop for women also means a full-service salon, in Banks’ book (and ours), so women can get a blowout or mani-pedi while they wait for their tune up. The resulting body shop and beauty bar, which officially opened its doors in January, is pure genius.
“I’m not an automotive company. I’m a female empowerment company,” Banks told Racked. A blowout with a side of women rock empowerment? We’re there.
This article originally appeared on allure.com
