We were lucky to catch up with Mary Yang recently and have shared our conversation below.

Mary, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Naming anything – including a business – is so hard. Right? What’s the story behind how you came up with the name of your brand?

Coming up with Speed Tuners was pretty hard to come up with. You have to have had a big thought process of a permanent business name that no one had. I had many choices but I wanted it to be unique, something that didn’t already exist. I chose that because we as car people and car lovers LOVE the feeling behind being the one driving the car! It’s the thrill, the adrenaline and feel of the car we love so “speed“ came into the name.
As for tuners, we love jdm. Who doesn’t love jdm or tuners car? Toyota, Subaru, Honda, Acura, Lexus, Nissan, Mazda. Those are examples of tuners! Tuners are usd versions of jdm cars. Due to us being American, I turned it into “tuners”. I put two and two together and came up with Speed Tuners. Making the brand was somewhat hard but easy at the same time. I fell in love with the brand before the name!

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

At the age of 18, I fell into depression during Covid 2020. I questioned life, I questioned myself and everything I wanted to do. I’m a college drop out. I didn’t know exactly what I wanted to do. All I knew was that I didn’t want to go to college. I wanted to make something out of myself, I wanted to be different. I was always a crafty artsy kid growing up. I fantasized the idea of making something big of myself, I just didn’t know exactly what. I loved doing DIY’s, painting, drawing and would always take those classes as an high schooler. I would always look for ways to improve what I could do.
I eventually learned about machines, during late Covid of 2020. I started doing more research, pushing in more time, and then after 3 years of research — I finally invested in machines, myself, my business “Speed Tuners” and invested my time.
Disciplining myself would not always work, it was very time consuming, and it took a lot of work, time and dedication. Till this day, it still does. When you invest in yourself, you sacrifice your time with friends / family & you sometimes even lose people who don’t have the same mindset as you due to outgrowing them in what you want.
Speed Tuners has a great team! I’ll tell you that! If it weren’t for the people we had in Speed Tuners, it wouldn’t have gotten as big as it is now. It’s not that big, but I am very grateful for where it is now. We as a team of Speed Tuners started off from scratch and look at where we’re at today! We try to learn and improve on what we could do better everyday.
Also, being a female owning a business in the automotive industry was very hard. It wasn’t easy, but I’m not saying it was “impossible”. I thought it was hard since I was a quiet person, and I don’t really talk to people. I didn’t know people, and I didn’t know how to get my brand out there. If it weren’t for the team I had today, it wouldn’t have worked out. Being a female, you have to know people, you have to find the right crowd, and know exactly what you’re doing and how to push out what you want to work! I’m forever grateful for the amazing team!

Can you tell us the story behind how you met your business partner?

Back in 2020, we were friends and met through a social media called “Facebook”. We hit it off pretty quickly and became a “thing”. Things didn’t work out due to Covid and never being able to see each other so we called it quits, but kept our friendship very tight over the years and remained best friends. 2022 rolled around, we hit it back off again but — hanging out in person this time. We became even greater friends & the best of the best. I would always ask him for what the best idea was and told him what my dream was. We shared the same strong passion for cars. So because of time, it inspired me to do something about. Back in 2020, he was the one that taught me how to drive manual when I was 18. Because of that, I took initiative of what I had, and turned it into something I love. I kept him updated on everything I did, what I wanted to do, and gave him every aspect and idea I had. He listened, gave me the best advice and wanted my business to work out because of our strong firey passion for the love of cars!
As we started dating in December of 2022, Speed Tuners became a thing, and he & I loved the name. I had him become the co founder because we had the same passion, not only that but he was the one that listened to what I wanted, and I had his full support completely on what I wanted to do. What better way than to have the person you love, and the person that loves you — both have the same strong passion love for cars! Speed Tuners founded by Mary Yang, and co founder, Lungly Her.

How did you build your audience on social media?

Represent your brand. Be the business owner you want to see in your business. If you want it to succeed, you have to push for it even if that means you have to make a sacrifice at the end of the day. Wanting to succeed comes at a cost, everything does. On social media, I share as much as possible. I post about our next monthly meets, share it into other car groups, share it with friends and family, and into group chats. Building your brand and sharing it to the world, you have to know what you’re working for. You also have to have the mindset of success. Knowing people who have the same passion, it works out best in favor! Social media posts goes out faster than anything. We share and post events, people that know about Speed Tuners, and know of us as owners, and personally. They share our post and repost it everywhere then it grows, and spreads. It’s in a way, kind of like a rumor but in a good way!
Investing into social media is your best friend!

Contact Info:

• [email protected]
• Website: https://www.speed-tuners.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jdmspeed.tuners?igsh=NzJ1b2dleGVyYnM0
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jdmspeed.tuners?mibextid=LQQJ4d