When Johnny Hernandez joined his father at JJH Auto Body & Paint in 2011, he stepped into a family business grounded in tradition but fueled by a forward-looking vision.
“My dad is kind of generational,” said Hernandez. “He’s been a painter technician and sheet metal tech most of his life, and so he’s always worked for another body shop. Then he decided, he wanted to open his own body shop, and he wanted a partner to help from the administrative side.”
JJH Auto Body & Paint
Salt Lake City, UT
801-355-3411
www.jjhautobodypaint.com
Facebook: @jjhautobodypaint
Instagram: @jjh_autobodypaint
Company At A Glance...
Type: Collision Repair
Facility Employees: Nine
In Business Since: 2009
Number of Locations: One
Production Space: 13,000 square feet
Together, they grew JJH Auto Body & Paint from a modest shop into a thriving I-CAR Gold Class certified operation in Salt Lake City, UT. By 2020, the team had outgrown its original facility and moved into a brand-new shop — a space they designed and built from the ground up.
“We had about 7,000 square feet of working space at the old shop,” Hernandez said. “Now we have almost 13,000 square feet of working space and two acres of land.”
The move allowed JJH Auto Body & Paint to bring previously sublet services, like alignment, in house and created the foundation for future expansion, including ADAS calibration and heavy truck repair. But for Hernandez, the biggest change came in the shop’s mindset.
“We really honed in on doing the right OEM repairs, following the repair procedures,” he said. “And that’s where Car-O-Liner came into play.”
To pursue OEM certifications, a major goal for the shop, Hernandez and his team needed to upgrade their equipment. Car-O-Liner® equipment met manufacturer approval lists and delivered measurable efficiency. Still, the transition was daunting.
Daniel, sheet metal technician at JJH Auto Body & Paint, uses the Car-O-Liner® CTR®9 Spot Welder during repairs.
“We never had a spot welder at the shop,” Hernandez said. “We didn’t know how to use it.”
They turned to their local Car-O-Liner® distributor, who helped them select the right mix of equipment, including the CTR®9 Spot Welder and CMI™300 TRIO MIG Welder, which combines aluminum, silicon bronze and steel welding into one digital unit.
“I guess it was a little bit overwhelming because the machines just looked a lot more sophisticated compared to what we’d been using,” he said. “But our local equipment sales team was really great at providing service and staff support for the equipment.”
That support included multiple on-site training sessions.
“They came at least three times on different occasions,” Hernandez said. “When they came for the training, it was a whole-day thing, almost like six hours both times, and we had about five of my guys that were part of it for that class to help get certified from Car-O-Liner.”
The first session focused on setup and operation, while the second helped the staff fine-tune technique.
“The second time was better,” he said. “Everyone had questions. What about this? Why do we do it that way? And that was the value we got from it.”
That training quickly translated to real-world results.
“You used to do it with the old stick welder and you’d have to grind down your spot weld,” Hernandez said. “Now you’re ready to go — you’re going to start to paint a day early. It’s great.”
For JJH Auto Body & Paint, the shift wasn’t just about cycle time. It was about creating space, literally and figuratively, to focus on quality.
Jeronimo Hernandez, owner of JJH Auto Body & Paint, during a Car-O-Liner® training session.
“If we’re doing them efficiently and we have that extra time, we’re going to take the time to make sure everything is right the first time,” he said. “One of the I-CAR classes had a quote I love, ‘You don’t have time to do a repair twice, but you don’t have time to do it right once?’ No, you have to do it one time and focus on the right procedure.”
Even so, the adoption of new machines required tough decisions. Some of the longer-tenured staff, despite their experience and value to the shop, were the most resistant to change, making the transition more challenging. By contrast, newer team members embraced the updates quickly, showing a willingness to adapt and learn what helped push the implementation forward.
Today, JJH Auto Body & Paint relies on its Car-O-Liner® equipment to support everything from structural repairs to insurance relationships and customer referrals. The clean, factory-style welds produced by the CTR®9 help the team achieve true pre-accident condition — something that matters deeply to Hernandez.
“If you ever open the door jamb, that’s where you can see the most — those little circles where the metal bonds to each other,” said Hernandez. “Now, it looks just like the factory. You can’t tell that you did any work to it and you’re like, that’s the whole point. That’s the magic.”
For Hernandez, that factory level finish reflects a bigger philosophy.
“I think I don’t do it for the business, you do it for the customer,” he said. “But then when customers realize that you’re putting their safety above all that, they just refer their friends and family.”
When choosing between multiple OEM-approved vendors, Hernandez stood out for its rep support and reputation at industry events like the SEMA Show.
With space to grow and a culture focused on doing things right the first time, JJH is leaning into the future, with Car-O-Liner® equipment at the center of it all.
Car-O-Liner® North America
800-521-9696
info@car-o-liner.com
car-o-liner.com
LinkedIn: @car-o-liner
To read more auto body shop profiles from the October 2025 Shop and Product Showcase, click here.
