Meet the Prague auto shop built from a lifelong car hobby

The second instalment of our “People” section is about Raulan Zhubanov. This man can’t imagine life without cars – since his teenage years he’s never been able to look away from a beautiful car. At first he just admired them, but then decided he wanted to know what was hiding under the hood. After moving to Prague with his parents in 2001, he ran into the fact that the Czech capital had no decent auto service, so he set out to fix that.



We met Raulan at his “home” – the Drive Club auto complex, located in the Holešovice district.

Around Prague: Hello!

Raulan: Hi!

AP: Tell us, please, how did it all start? Did you set it all up yourself, and how did the idea of opening an auto shop in Prague come about?

R: I started it all alone, but then, of course, I brought people in: Lyonya, Chris, and a few other guys. That’s how we gradually put the team together. How did the idea come about? It’s very simple – for a long time we couldn’t find a good auto shop in Prague.

You could say our story began in April last year, when we opened our first small shop. We had no connections, no advertising, nothing at all. We tried to do quality work, then noticed our friends were recommending our shop to their friends, and those friends told others, and it just took off from there. And one fine day we decided it was time to expand.

AP: Why did you choose this particular location for the auto shop?

R: We won a tender in May this year, and that’s how we ended up here.



AP: Is your team made up of friends, or did you specifically look for people through ads?

R: So far it’s only people I know. All experienced guys who worked in auto shops before or were somehow connected to cars. There are no strangers here, which is both a plus and a minus.



AP: Doesn’t disagreement at work get in the way of your friendships?

R: No, that doesn’t happen. We manage to keep work and personal life separate. If I say something and someone’s not happy about it, we sort it out right away, on the spot, so there’s no bad blood left over. We always try to come to an agreement and find common ground. The main thing is that everyone is responsible for their own duties. I don’t interfere in the mechanic’s work, and he doesn’t get in my way. If someone needs something, we always turn to each other for advice. We’ve never had any real disagreements.

AP: Of course, one can’t help but notice the cars parked at your complex. You don’t see this many beautiful, expensive cars at just any shop.

R: We started out working with the simplest, most budget-friendly cars. But even now we’re focused on the mid-range segment, since our prices are very low. We work with luxury-class cars as well as inexpensive ones. Our clients know we’ll always do the job well and at a fair price, no matter what class of car they drive.

This is our hobby, not a job. We’re not aiming to make millions, we just love what we do and that’s it. Actually, we’d like to host various events at our complex. There are still a few technical matters we need to sort out, and after that we’ll devote ourselves to organizing parties and other fun events for car enthusiasts.

AP: You have a huge complex located almost right in the centre of Prague. What services can you offer your clients? Are you currently targeting a Russian-speaking audience, or the Czechs as well?

R: Our first clients were friends and acquaintances, and of course they were all Russian, but now we’re seeing more and more Czech customers.

As for our services, the main one is the auto shop itself, which handles absolutely any car. We have a very good mechanic, electrician and welder, so we can do absolutely anything with a car.

Our second specialty is hand washing. Soon we’ll be upgrading the “bay” and placing more emphasis there on higher-end products, on a top-quality service. We also decided to add a wash because many other car washes scratch cars, while we use individual cloths for every single vehicle.

Our next area is detailing – washing, cleaning and restoring a car down to the smallest detail.

Another one of our specialties is styling. We change the look of a car according to the client’s wishes. In the end the customer gets an individual look and style for their car.

AP: And how many people does it take to keep all this running?

R: Our whole team is seven people, but we don’t always manage to keep up, and right now we’re looking for someone who could take orders and handle clients.

AP: Tell us, what car do you drive yourself?

R: That blue Jaguar over there – that’s mine. In this line of work you need a “show car.” In a way it’s proof of our craftsmanship, since it used to be an ordinary black Jaguar that our team completely transformed. The engine will be worked on further soon too.

I’d love to enter it in some competitions and win, but it’s too early to make plans like that. We completely rebuilt the Jaguar, I could talk about it forever, but even now the car still isn’t fully finished.

AP: Do you like driving fast?

R: I don’t speed, but I try not to crawl along with traffic either. I know that even if I’m going fast, I’ll be able to stop in time. Besides, who among us doesn’t love beautiful cars and a fast ride?

AP: What are your plans for the future?

R: Within a month we want to finish off a few minor details and set up car sales at our complex. Our plans include tuning, selling rims, and much, much more, but all in good time. I’m glad we managed to go from a small shop to our own complex, so now we’ll keep aiming for even better.

It’s a hobby, and we’ve turned it into a place that can service absolutely any car.



We’d like to thank Ilya Maltsev for the photos for this article!