Van Wyk Auto opens new shop location in Sheboygan

Chris Rugowski

Contributor

November 17, 2025

SHEBOYGAN – Van Wyk Auto has shifted into high gear with the opening of its new 21,000-square-foot facility at 4040 Enterprise Drive in Sheboygan.

Owner Ben Van Wyk said the move marks a major milestone for the Van Wyk Auto team – and for the community they are proud to serve.

Now the largest independent garage in Sheboygan County, Ben said the new shop isn’t just bigger – it’s better designed, more efficient and built with customers in mind.

A look under the hood

With deep Sheboygan roots, Ben said the family-owned shop has been part of the community for nearly five decades, when Doug Wrench first opened Doug’s Auto Service in 1977.

In 2012, Ben said Scott Fahser took the helm, continuing the tradition of quality and customer care.

Ben said his automotive career began in 2008 at the Universal Technical Institute in Illinois, followed by hands-on experience in multiple repair roles.

He said his story with Doug’s Auto began in 2014 – working at the shop for five years before deciding to purchase it in 2019.

Ben said he first met the previous owner years earlier while working together at a Ford dealership, and the two stayed in touch. 

When he took the job at Dave’s Auto, he said it was under the premise that he would buy the business when the previous owner was ready to retire.

“It came sooner than expected, but fine by me,” he said.

When he purchased American Pride Auto in 2020, Ben said he unified both operations under the Van Wyk Auto name.

It was time for a tune-up

Ben – who had always dreamed of owning a business – said when he took over operations, the original shop had just two bays.

Space, he said, was tight – noting that customers often had to wait a month just for an oil change.

A year and a half later, he said he moved into a second location, doubling the shop’s footprint.

“We were highly sought after to fix a lot of cars, and that’s why I bought the second location, which was double the size,” he said.

That setup, Ben said, worked well until around 2022.

“That got filled up, too,” he said. “With nowhere to park and street parking beginning to cause issues, we needed a better solution.”

With space quickly maxed out, Ben said he began scouting other options – as he envisioned a larger, more efficient space to streamline operations, speed up service and expand his customer base.

Quickly realizing that retrofitting an existing building would cost about the same as building a brand-new facility, Ben said building a new shop became the clear choice.

The idea gained traction, he said, and by March 2025, ground was broken on a new, state-of-the-art facility.

In October, Ben said that vision became reality with the opening of the new  Enterprise Drive shop.

“Everyone was fairly excited and anxious about the new shop over the last couple of months,” he said. “Everyone really wanted to get in here, but move dates kept getting pushed. Eventually, we wanted to get in so badly that we moved everything on a weekend. We finished working Friday night and opened Monday morning at the new location.”

Ben said it wasn’t just Van Wyk Auto employees who were excited about the move – the community has embraced the new location, too.

“I think the first week, I spent about half my time just walking customers around showing them [the new space],” he said. “It was a pride-filled moment when I got to do tours. I can tell they’re excited for us.”

Ben said the grand opening celebration earlier this month gave the Van Wyk team another chance to show the community the new facility up close.

A firm believer in supporting his community, Ben said he worked with local contractors for every part of the project – from construction and electrical work to plumbing and finishing work.

“It was important to me, and it helps that half of them were customers we were already doing fleet work on, too,” he said. “There was already a built-in trust and respect for what we both respectively did.”

Shifting gears

When designing the facility, Ben said the goal was simple: “create a facility that makes life easier for our customers and our technicians alike.”

With that goal in mind, he said they worked closely with Quasius Construction to design a facility that emphasizes efficiency, safety and comfort.

“Every square foot was planned to help our team work smarter – not just harder,” he said.

The expanded space, advanced diagnostics and upgraded amenities – which include a comfortable customer lounge with a coffee bar – Ben said, mean faster turnarounds, easier scheduling and the same trusted service customers expect. 

“We have a nice waiting room with chairs, TV and a coffee bar,” he said. “We’re trying to make the customer experience better overall. We want to be a step above what everybody else has to offer and stick out – that also helps us get business.”

In terms of infrastructure, Ben said the new facility has 13 bays, 11 regular hoists, one heavy-duty truck hoist and one alignment bay.

As technology advances in vehicles, so, too, he said, does the technology to fix them – which also served as a key focus in designing the new shop.

Among the upgrades accompanying the new location, he said, is technology for Advanced Driver Assistance Systems, or ADAS.

Recalibrating vehicles with these systems, Ben said, isn’t simple – as each camera and sensor must be carefully “relearned” using precise procedures and specialized tools.

Though a “big investment” as the system is integrated with the shop’s alignment machine, Ben said, looking ahead at the future of automotive technology, he knew it was smarter to invest in tools that would future-proof the business rather than just get by.

“Whether you get in a little fender bender, and sometimes even with an alignment, you have to do a calibration,” he said. “Your normal alignment is $100-150, with the new cars, that is $300-400, depending on what kind of car you drive.”

As an independent shop, Ben said keeping up with technology isn’t optional – “because that’s the way of the future.”

That, he said, also means staying up to date on vehicle cameras, which are quickly becoming standard on cars – whether for blind-spot detection, front-facing sensors or emergency braking systems.

Furthermore, Ben said the new shop has dedicated areas for commercial vehicles, diesels, alignment and diagnostic work as well.

Not only has the new space been a welcome change for existing customers, Ben said Van Wyk Auto has seen an uptick in new clientele as well.

“One thing we’ve noticed moving into this place is we are being sought after by some fleet companies – the landscape, plumbing and electrical types,” he said. “This is a market I’d like to push more into, while continuing to service anyone who needs it.”

To learn more about Van Wyk Auto, visit vanwykautowi.com.