Our History

1959

Trusted Auto Repairs for Over 50 Years

My grandfather, Phin Johnson, was a Standard Oil Company employee for many years in Seattle along with his brother Paul. In 1957 Phin decided to purchase his own gas station, so he moved to San Diego and opened Johnson’s Chevron in Mission Valley.

Back then, he was surrounded by dairy farms even though the gas station was situated in a place that would eventually be paved over by Interstate 8 and at the same time under the shadow of the Interstate 15 overpass.

In 1974, Phin began his move to retirement, handing over the reins to his son, Jerry. In 1979, Jerry’s son Mark came to help as a teenager, followed along with all his younger brothers and sisters in various roles. Mark later moved into management roles and when Jerry began his retirement path in the early 90’s, Mark purchased the station.

In 1999, the writing was on the wall, the oil companies were pulling out of Franchise Agreements with dealers in all but a tiny handful of cases and were changing their business models in ways that made franchise ownership much more challenging. With fuel sales and profits so volatile, Mark sold the gasoline business and prepared to open in a new format, auto repair only, sadly leaving the gas station and Del Cerro behind.

In 2001 AutoHaven opened on Knoxville Street (in what is now the Coronado Brewery Building) near Mission Bay. Steady growth ensued and six years later we had to move again, to our current location, right around the corner on Morena Blvd. Auto the Great Dane became our Customer Greeter in 2011. When Auto retired in 2015, Suki, our Lab/Dobie mix became our new Greeter.

Rafael joined us as shop manager in 2014, bringing his warm and caring personality and fantastic diagnostic skills.