By Carol Mowdy Bond
Contributing Writer
In late December, Charles Richards, founder of Richards Car Care, will celebrate 20 years in business at his current location, 14827 N. May Ave. in Oklahoma City.
As an essential business, the car repair shop is open during the COVID-19 pandemic. But Richards says the situation has impacted his bottom line. “We normally have about 25 invoices a day,” says Richards. “Our invoices are down 35%. We’re not as busy now because people aren’t driving as much due to COVID-19. When people come in now, they don’t stay. They just drop off their cars.”
“We normally try to have a really clean shop. But during COVID-19, instead of once-a-day cleaning, we clean each time people come and go, using Clorox wipes, and disinfectants,” Richards says.
The 16,000 square foot store has a 16-car bay, and about 12 employees including Richards and his family members. Both his sons Brian, who lives in Jones, and Brandon, who lives in Piedmont, as well as his wife Pam, work in the store. “It’s a family business,” says Richards, “with me and my wife and our sons.” Richards and his wife live in Edmond.
Walking through the front door into the lobby, two large cases of model cars greet you. Through the years, Richards has collected hundreds of model cars.
“We would get die cast cars. In 1980, a vendor gave me four,” says Richards. “Then I started collecting them.” Besides the case in the front lobby, he now has 3 massive cases in his office, stuffed with hundreds of model cars.
As well, since 1973, Richards has photographed classic and unusual cars that he and his crew worked on. He has over 100 photographs displayed on two walls in the store.
SON OF A
SHARECROPPER
One of four children, Richards says, “I was born in Cherokee in 1954, and I grew up there. We had nothing. But I only have wonderful memories of growing up. I graduated from Cherokee schools, and I never left Cherokee until I went to college. My parents were sharecroppers.”
Richards’ dad, Lawrence, who served in the military during World War II, needed a job. “Charles Muck owned a dairy farm in Cherokee,” says Richards. “And in the 1950s, my dad went to work for Muck. Muck had no family, so he willed his 240 acre farm to Dad. Muck died about 1959, and his wife died about 1970 or 1971. And then the farm went to Dad. But it wasn’t enough to support our family. So, Dad was a sharecropper on land owned by other people, so he could support us. A lot of people were sharecroppers back then.”
At age 12, Richards began working on farms for other farmers. At 14, his best friend’s dad fell ill. Richards then farmed their entire operation.
“Dad told all four of us kids he had no money and couldn’t help us,” says Richards. “So, after high school, he told us to go out and find something to do. And we all did.”
“In 1973, I went to the University of Oklahoma,” says Richards. “To pay my way through school, I started working as a grease monkey at a Goodyear store. They said I needed to stop going to OU full time. They wanted me to work for them, and go to night school. Goodyear said they’d pay for me to go to OU, if I would come up to the front at the Goodyear Store. It took me 5 1/2 years to get my business management degree, but they paid for it.”
“Then, in 1981, I had the opportunity to be an independent dealer. There were three of us who went in together. We opened a Goodyear store at Hefner and May,” says Richards. “We were there 19 years.”
Richards decided to go it alone, and started building the store at his current location. And on Dec. 27, 2000, he moved in and opened for business.
