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Jay Durango
Jay Durango

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I Built a $99 Mitchell1 Alternative That Auto Shop Owners Actually Want

#saas #webdev #showdev #startup

Auto shop owners are getting ripped off by software subscriptions. Mitchell1 ProDemand charges $300+/month. Tekmetric wants $200+/month. RepairShopr takes $60+/month. For what? Work orders, a CRM, and parts tracking.

I built JRD Garage — a complete auto shop management system for $99 one-time. No monthly fees. No per-user charges. No surprise price increases.

Here's how it stacks up.

The Problem: Subscription Trap

If you run an independent auto repair shop, your software costs look something like this:

Software Monthly Cost Annual Cost
Mitchell1 ProDemand $300+ $3,600+
Tekmetric $200+ $2,400+
RepairShopr $60+ $720+
ShopBoss $200+ $2,400+

That's $720-$3,600/year just to manage work orders and customer info. For a small independent shop doing $30-50K/month in revenue, that's a significant line item.

And here's the kicker: you never own anything. Miss a payment? Your data is held hostage. They raise prices? You eat it or migrate.

What JRD Garage Does

Everything a small-to-mid shop needs, nothing it doesn't:

Work Orders

  • Create, track, and close repair orders
  • Labor + parts line items with automatic totaling
  • Print-ready invoices
  • Status tracking (pending > in progress > complete > invoiced)

Customer CRM

  • Full customer database with vehicle history
  • Service reminders and follow-up tracking
  • Notes and communication log per customer
  • Search by name, phone, plate, or VIN

Parts Tracking

  • Inventory management with cost/markup
  • Vendor tracking
  • Low-stock alerts
  • Parts-to-work-order linking

AI Call Scripts

  • Pre-built scripts for common customer calls
  • Estimate follow-ups, service reminders, upsell prompts
  • Customizable per shop

The Architecture (For the Nerds)

JRD Garage runs on Cloudflare Workers — serverless JavaScript at the edge. Here's why that matters:

User (any browser) → Cloudflare Workers (serverless) → KV/D1 (storage)
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  • Zero hosting costs: Cloudflare's free tier handles 100K requests/day
  • Global edge deployment: Your shop management loads fast from anywhere
  • No server maintenance: No updates, no patches, no "server is down" calls
  • Scales to zero: When you're not using it, you're not paying for it

The frontend is vanilla HTML/CSS/JS — no React, no build step, no npm install nightmare. It just works. On any device. Any browser.

// Work order creation — it's really this simple
export default {
  async fetch(request, env) {
    const url = new URL(request.url);

    if (url.pathname === '/api/work-orders' && request.method === 'POST') {
      const order = await request.json();
      order.id = crypto.randomUUID();
      order.created_at = new Date().toISOString();
      order.status = 'pending';

      await env.SHOP_DB.prepare(
        'INSERT INTO work_orders (id, customer_id, vehicle, status, created_at, items) VALUES (?, ?, ?, ?, ?, ?)'
      ).bind(order.id, order.customer_id, order.vehicle, order.status, order.created_at, JSON.stringify(order.items)).run();

      return Response.json({ ok: true, order });
    }
  }
};
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No Express. No middleware chain. No ORM. Just a Worker that handles requests and talks to D1 (Cloudflare's SQLite-at-the-edge database).

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Mitchell1 ($300+/mo) JRD Garage ($99 once)
Work Orders Yes Yes
Customer CRM Yes Yes
Parts Tracking Yes Yes
Invoicing Yes Yes
Multi-device Yes Yes (web-based)
AI Features No Yes (call scripts)
Hosting Cost Included (you pay) $0 (serverless)
Data Ownership Their servers Your instance
Price After Year 1 $3,600+ $99 (still)
Price After Year 3 $10,800+ $99 (still)

After 3 years with Mitchell1, you've spent $10,800+ and own nothing.

After 3 years with JRD Garage, you've spent $99 and own the software forever.

Who It's For

JRD Garage is built for independent shops doing 5-30 cars/day. If you're a 1-3 bay operation, a mobile mechanic, or a specialty shop (transmission, diesel, performance), this is your sweet spot.

It's NOT for:

  • Multi-location dealership service departments (use CDK or Reynolds)
  • Shops that need integrated parts ordering from specific distributors
  • Shops that require insurance/warranty claim processing

For everyone else? $99 beats $300/month every single time.

Try It

JRD Garage is available now at jrdconnect.com.

$99 one-time. No account required to browse. No credit card to "try free." Just pay once and it's yours.

If you're tired of renting your shop software, come check it out.

I'm Jay — I build one-time purchase software tools. No subscriptions, no monthly fees, no BS. Check out more at jrdconnect.com.

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