Out Back Customs, an automotive vehicle paint and restoration business, opened recently on Abbey Lane, Hallieford.

Owner Billy Thomas of Mathews said his six-bay shop handles new vehicles and older models, small boats and farm tractors, with his paint booth custom-matching color paints from 1949 to the present. Thomas opened his business at the site of the former Charlie South auto business.

Thomas said he and two full-time employees are handling job orders from throughout the Middle Peninsula, Peninsula and even South Hampton Roads. They specialize in collision work, he said, but also offer some minor automotive work such as oil changes. The shop is stocked with special apparatus to do collision work, he said. Thomas has approximately 25 years’ auto collision and repair experience. He owned another auto body shop at Gloucester Point about 20 years ago, worked for several Middle Peninsula and Peninsula auto repair shops, and also once owned a construction business in Gloucester...