Doug Jenkins Garage

I contacted Doug Jenkins about constructing custom wide metal fender flairs front and rear on my 1989 Mazda RX7. He was also commissioned to paint the car. The fenders were to cost 10k and the paint was to cost 8k. There ended up being other stuff that took the final total to around $ 23,000.00
I think I was suckered in by Doug’s seeming interest in me and my project. He can be rather charismatic. But I started feeling his disingenuousness about the time he made this statement to me. «The guys in the shop work on the cars, I am the one that pretends to be interested in the customers». I think this pretty much sums up Doug Jenkins. Also the most repeated sentence I got from Doug was, «Oh Christopher, I am so sorry»…Sorry indeed.
1. I was told 2 – 3 months to complete the job. We did change something with the front fenders. So let’s just add another two months just to be generous. He took 2 years. Let me repeat this… he took two years!
2. The $ 8,000.00 paint job has flaws all over the place. There were a couple of runs, some 80 grit sand paper scratches showing through the paint and many other paint blemishes. This car has to be repainted.
3. There was a $ 2000.00 accounting error. I said I had sent a payment and Doug disagreed. When he got back to me he said that Jason, his shop guy had accidentally credited the payment to someone else’s account. I wonder if Jason knows anything about this…
4. There were two front spoiler for this car. When I checked them out one actually had touch up paint with a brush applied to it. This is an $ 8K paint job. Someone took both lips and just placed them in the car on top of each other unprotected. This caused one to scratch the other while being transported to Ohio.
5. I told Doug where he could get the metal surround for the windshield replacement. He told me he had it handled. When I first saw the car the first thing I noticed was the universal rubber windshield surround across the top of the windshield. While the sides and bottom of the windshield had the correct metal surround. How could anyone think this is acceptable in any way.
6. The car also was delivered with a totally unacceptable amount of wet sand dust in all of the crack and crevices of the car.
7. The body side mouldings were barely attached to the car. They would have fallen off if the car had been driven.
8. Many parts of the car seemed to be painted inconsistently on the edges. The edges of the doors and side moulding were all rough.
10. We were making custom fender flares so I had custom offset wheels made. Doug charged me 600.00 to spec out new wheels. I thought that was high but I agreed. When the wheels arrived it turns out the rears were too wide. So they charged me $ 360.00 to modify the rear suspension. When I complained basically all Doug said was that he was very sorry but he could not do anything about it… BS.
11. There is a crack in the paint where the fender flare modification work was done on the driver side rear fender. We can’t tell how big of an issue this is until the paint is removed and we see the body work under the paint.
12. Black adhesive running out from under the rear spoiler onto the side of the rear fenders.
13. There is a seal that runs across the front of the car between the front bumper cover and the headlights and hood. Many cheap paint shops will just paint the black rubber seal. Doug just took it out and never replaced it. So now there is a large gap running across the front of the car.
14. Various other little annoyances.
The car was delivered to my engine builder and I did not get to inspect the car on delivery… bad decision on my part. But I have moved across the country from Fayetteville Arkansas to California.
I have now had the car inspect by a paint shop that has been in business for 35 years. What they found was some of the work is quality but they must of taken every short cut to finish the paint job. Remember I paid $ 8k for this paint job. It will cost at least $ 4,800 to have it repainted. Possibly more depending on what we find under the paint.
You can review my complaint to the Better Business Bureau here.

To sum up the BBB complaint, Doug said the guy misdiagnosed the paint issues and if I brought it back he would make it right in 6 weeks or less. I will never let this guy touch my car after his high jacking of my dream car project. Yeah, don’t believe your eyes, believe me… Doug Jenkins.
I would advised anyone considering Doug Jenkins Garage to explore other options. There are too many qualified car customizers out there to have to deal with this sort of individual.
I don’t feel my words are adequate to convey what a complete disappointment this guy was in any and every way.

The 3^rd, and final chapter. (read 2 previous reviews to make sense)
We left off at the truck being for sale on EBay.
After a month of no bids on EBay without the title, we decided to go register the truck and obtain a title, figuring that would help. It did. The truck sold at just the starting bid, but it at least sold.
After waiting a couple weeks, I called the DMV to track the status of the title. I was told the title was red-​flagged? WHAT-​WHY? You can imagine my shock when the agent said «Who is Doug Jenkins?» Can you believe this… he tried to pull title on this truck, knowing full well who it belonged to, and who had the paperwork on this truck. NOW, in order to get the title on track to being completed, Doug Jenkins had to get a notarized statement that he was releasing any claim to title. This of course took many calls with lengthy wait times, and emails back and forth from us, to the BBB, to Doug Jenkins.
The truck is now gone. It was picked up and shipped back to Texas. That is where we bought it, and had it shipped here. LOL
I can only hope this concludes our dealings with Doug Jenkins, but in any good horror flick, the creepy guy always *POPS BACK UP* moohahah (fades to black)