Why the menu is the sale
A driver comparing garages has one number in their head, the one they fear paying, and no way to judge the work. A garage website with no prices confirms the fear: this is a place that will tell you afterwards. A site that states the price of an interim service, a full service, an MOT, front pads and discs, and a set of tyres fitted, in a table the driver can read on a phone in the car park, removes the biggest objection before the phone rings.
Here is how to build the menu so it is honest, complete, and yours to edit when parts prices move.
What goes on the menu
Only the jobs you can price without seeing the car. For most independent garages that is:
- Servicing: interim, full and major, priced by engine size or by band (small, medium, large, van). Say what each includes and what is extra (brake fluid, spark plugs on a petrol at a certain interval).
- Tests: the MOT or inspection fee, any discount when booked with a service, the retest terms. Where the maximum fee is regulated, drivers know the number; state yours plainly.
- Brakes: pads, and pads and discs, per axle, by vehicle band, with the parts grade named.
- Tyres: either a tyre search by registration with fitted prices, or the fitting cost per tyre and a "from" price by size, with valve, balance and disposal included.
- Common extras: air-con service, diagnostics fee, battery fitted, wheel alignment.
Everything else, clutches, timing belts, exhausts, suspension, faults, is a quote. The menu says so, and points to the fault form.
Structure it as records
A service menu typed into a page as paragraphs is out of date within a quarter and nobody dares touch it. Build each menu item as a record with fields:
| Field | Purpose | |---|---| | Name | "Full service" | | Category | Servicing, Testing, Brakes, Tyres, Extras | | Price bands | One price per vehicle band or engine size | | Includes | Checklist in customer language | | Excludes | The honest small print, briefly | | Duration | "About two hours" or "While you wait" | | Bookable | Whether it maps to a service in Autoflow, Garage Hive, Shopmonkey or Tekmetric | | Booking ID | The service code in your garage software | | Tax note | Whether VAT is included |
The Services and prices page renders a table per category from those records. The MOT and testing page and the Tyres page render their own categories. Changing a price is editing one field, by whoever runs the front desk, in a minute.
Match it to the garage software
Autoflow, Garage Hive, Shopmonkey, Tekmetric and Workshop Software each hold a list of bookable services with durations and, in most cases, prices. The website menu should mirror that list, not compete with it. Where the software's online booking is embedded, the driver picks the same "Full service" they saw on the menu, and the price on the confirmation matches the price on the page. Two lists that drift apart are how a garage ends up with a review about a price "not what the website said".
The practical rule: the software is the source of truth for anything bookable; the website records carry the description, the includes and the presentation, and store the software's service ID so the Book button opens the right service.
The words around the numbers
Under every table, the same three lines:
- "Prices include VAT and parts to the grade stated. If we find something else, we call you before doing anything."
- "Not sure which service you need? Enter your registration on the booking page and we will show the right options."
- "Something not listed? Send us the fault with photos and we will call you back."
That third line carries the driver from the menu to the fault form, so the menu never feels like a wall.
What not to do
- "From £99" with nothing else. A "from" price with no bands is read as a bait.
- Prices only as a downloadable PDF.
- A menu that lists forty items including jobs you would never fix without seeing the car.
- Prices excluding VAT for private drivers, without saying so.
- A price for pads that does not say whether it is per axle.
- Prices left from two years ago because nobody knows how to edit the page.
Sub-types
A tyre shop leads with fitted prices and a size search. A test centre leads with the fee and the retest rules. A detailer prices packages by vehicle size in a table with maintenance wash, full valet, correction and coating as columns. A mobile mechanic states totals with travel included, because the driver is comparing against a garage. The record structure is the same; the categories and bands change.
Keeping it current
Parts prices move. Once a quarter, whoever orders parts checks the menu against recent invoices and edits the bands that have drifted.
Where this sits
A fixed-price menu built as editable records, mirrored to the garage software and framed by a plain line on how quotes and authorisation work, is one of the six things every automotive business website we build must do. It is on the Services and prices, MOT and testing and Tyres pages from launch, and it is included in the fixed-price packages rather than an extra. Drivers assume they will be overcharged; the menu is how you answer that before they ask.