Changing Gears

Women are the driving force behind Ms. Lube

By Adriana Rolston

Mathilda’s sitting on the hoist and she needs fixing. One of her headlights burned out, her washer fluid won’t spray and her driver’s side window doesn’t close all the way.

“Okay, so she’s a nightmare,” announces Maud Sailland, a licensed auto mechanic from France, as she walks into the office of auto shop Ms. Lube in downtown Toronto.

“Yeah, it sounds like it,” says Jessica Gilbank, the shop’s owner, sitting in stained jeans and a black T-shirt. Both women erupt into laughter. Mathilda, a grey van, will be alright. She’s waiting on a part and once it arrives, she’ll drive off the lot.

Gilbank has 13 years of experience as an auto mechanic and has put in time at car manufacturers Volvo and Mercedes-Benz. She was frustrated by the lack of women working in the auto shops she frequented and by the condescending attitude she sometimes got from male mechanics. “Like I’m a complete moron because I’m a girl and they’re just going to tell me whatever they feel like and I’m going to buy it,” she says. So she opened Ms. Lube, which is staffed solely by female mechanics—the first in North America—and hopes to open a second location one day.

Ms. Lube upholds a user-friendly environment by having clients deal directly with one of the five mechanics, not a secretary. Both women and men enjoy dealing with a female technician, says Gilbank, because they feel women will be more honest, communicative and careful in following instructions. She knows her staff won’t charge customers for unnecessary repairs and will only take care of what’s needed.

Safety is the top priority at Ms. Lube. “We look at it and say, ‘Okay, if this person is driving down the street and a little kid’s ball goes out in front of the car, are they going to be able to stop?’” says Gilbank.

When you walk into Ms. Lube, you’ll meet the cars since some clients name their rides. When Gilbank opened at College and Bathurst streets in March 2009, she knew that vehicles are often an extension of a customer’s personality.
The shop’s persona is reflected in the 1950s-era motif, with teal and orange stripes running around the walls and a cheeky pin-up style mechanic as the logo. But Ms. Lube hopes to offer more than auto service with a smile to customers. The second floor is being renovated into a lounge to display local art. It’ll have wireless internet along with yoga, self-defence and auto-maintenance classes.

Erica Reed, an apprentice from Centennial College, enjoys working in the mellow atmosphere at Ms. Lube, knowing that in a typical shop, men far outnumber women. In her high school shop class, she got razzed for being the only girl but she knew her ambitions to become a certified auto mechanic were more important than jabs about her gender.

Although entering a male-dominated profession can be intimidating, Gilbank sees that this is starting to change as more single women own cars and want to know how they work. Wrench Wenches is a group she recently started with female clients to show off their rides at car shows. They plan on getting matching jackets.

Gilbank believes society perpetuates the idea that fixing cars is “a guy thing” and many women think, “‘I’m a girl. I don’t really need to know anything about a car.’ I think that’s stopping.”

*featured in McClungs Winter 2010 issue