 Cars are for boys. Women are not as knowledgeable about cars as men are. The shop is too dirty of a place for a woman. Oh, is it you and your husband? Who do you work for? Did your dad give it to you? Are you the secretary? This kind of work is just too hard for women. I'm a master automotive technician and the founder of Girl Gang Garage. This shop that I have in Phoenix is really created to allow women to have a safe space, to explore, to learn, to grow, to fail. Women will come into the space and there's this moment I see it on their faces where they're like, this is a whole room full of women building a car and it's this like amazement that they have. I'm the owner of Gojo Auto which is an independent car dealership in Denver, Colorado. I'm the first black woman in Colorado to own a car dealership. At my shop, we go into schools and we teach financial literacy. We've teamed up with our local high schools and JC colleges to get in and say, here's how you successfully purchase an automobile and here's everything that's entailed from service to insurance. Here's what credit looks like. Here's why it's important. I'm the CEO of AskPatty.com. AskPatty was the solution for the industry for the challenge of meeting the needs of women consumers and hiring and developing more women in careers in automotive. I'm curious why businesses don't believe that women have the influence that we do. Studies show that we make 80% of the buying decisions when it comes to automotive. We have billions of dollars in spending power. Why are they not more interested in our voice? I think most businesses acknowledge that women are a large part of their customer base, right? However, there's a discrepancy between intellectually knowing something and acting on it. It is a profitable business imperative to address this because studies show that having more women on your board and your leadership team produce two things, higher profitability and better employee retention. Companies like Volvo are taking the initiative and saying, hey, we have these powerful women within automotive. Let's show that there is more than meets the eye in this industry and let's give them a voice with a megaphone. It's not what it was 40 years ago, right? Our cars today are rolling computers. There's more control modules in our cars today than the first space shuttle. We need technicians, and women can fill that trade gap just as well as men can. And there's opportunity there. There's space. Yes. The technology, the electrification of vehicles, they open up a huge space for technicians who are willing and eager to learn. I've seen so much happen, much of it organically. Not under any official banner of women who just said, I'm going to do this. It's my obligation to let women know that this is not only an opportunity, it's a phenomenal opportunity. It's vast. It's robust. I had no idea. All the different sectors and facets, someone creates the colors for the cars. How cool is that? I mean, look at us three women sitting here. They're from three completely different markets within automotive that are thriving. You know, if a woman sees a woman in a leadership position at a company, she is more apt to go to work there because she can see her career path. Change happens in one little interaction at a time, changing hearts and minds on a slow and steady basis. When I tell a 50-year-old man that I'm an auto mechanic, they say, really, let me see your hands. But when I tell a 10-year-old boy that I'm a mechanic, he goes, cool. Yeah. I actually had a young lady who was in my showroom. She was about 10 years old. She was with her parents and they were purchasing a car. And she said, when I grow up, I want to be a car dealer like you. And it's hard for me not to get emotional telling that story because that's the future. If they can see it, they can be it. If they can't see it, they can't be it, right? I became what I couldn't see because I didn't let the obstacles stop me. It was clear that there was underrepresentation of women in the industry. And I thought that I could do something about it. I knew that there was a generation coming after me that needed to see that. And why not me?