Let's Open Up This Can of Worms.......Again

[Bubbles Galore]

Where to start. I finally figured out a way to set up my POS vend master to take the new one dollar coins. I have been wanting to dispense dollar coins for quite a while now and the vend master has been the only thing holding me up. I head home to tell my wife the good news and she burst my bubble pretty quick. Her argument was that if people only needed 30 seconds to finish washing their car, wouldn't they be ****ed if they had to put a dollar coin in to finish washing? She also doesn't think that we should adjust our vacuum pricing (we are $.75/4 min.). I was just going to make it such that the price would remain the same and if you deposited a dollar coin, you would get some type of bonus time. I need some help convincing her that this is the best way to go.

Please Help!

 

[jimbeaux]

Bubbles, I have been dispensing golden dollars since they were first offered. Two washes and both have dual change machines. One dispenses quarters & the other golden dollar coins. The quarter machine probably dispenses a little bit more than the dollar machine, BUT the laundromat & the prison in town accounts for that. If the dollar machine goes down I get constant complaints, not so for the quarter machine. I am also priced in dollar increments for everything. It sure simplifies life.
I also dispense golden dollars at the automatic for change. Never a complaint! Of course, I take quarters & golden dollars in everything.
This is real life, not someone's theory!

 

[I.B. Washincars]

More real world info,

Most people run the clock all the way out and then buy another cycle.

The customers that do add quarters usually plunk in two or more before the time runs out, seldom just one quarter.

When I dispensed only quarters nearly all customers just bought a cycle at a time, seldom adding more because the time was running while they were fiddling with the handful of quarters. With dollar coins it is nothing unusual to see 5-10 put in at once.

When I started dispensing dollars (8 years ago) I raised the vacs to $1/4 min. No issues at all, didn't hear a peep.

I think the customer being pist for having to put in a buck will not be much of an issue. It's never been for me. I also love the fact that it eliminated the most frequent complaint "I didn't want all these f%@&ing quarters!" It also cuts down the need to break larger bills. Mine dropped over 90%. Some days I don't break a single ten or twenty. The only down side to the dollars is on the operator side, ya gotta go get em and ya gotta sort em. It's virtually all positives on the customer side.

Oh yeah, definitely dispense them from the auto as Jimbeaux does. This is probably more important than dispensing them for the SS bays since the auto customer has to stuff them in a pocket or purse and deal with them later.

 

[dclark3344]

I can count four times as much money in the same amout of time when I am counting dollar coins instead of quarters. LOL They take up less space for the money and a lot o people buy them for a variety of reasons (allowances, collectors, gifts) I am always taking quarters to the bank and buying gold dollars.

 

[pitzerwm]

I guess my question is why are we asking advice from the wife in the first place. If she isn't a down there hands on helper just take the money home and hand it to her, saying that it was a good week and be done with it.

 

[Eric H]

I want to echo everything that was said above. The customers really do like them after a few months of use.
In response to the "I just need a quarters worth of more time" excuse: It takes nearly 20 seconds to respond to the last minute alert, walk to the meter, fish around in your pocket while holding the HP hose, and get the quarter in the machine. By the time the customer turns around to start washing again the last minute alert is going off again. Putting in a dollar gives them enough time to actually finish with out the alert constantly going off.

Now get me out of here before the guy who has never tried dollar coins tells us all about the huge failure the dollar coin is.

 

[PaulLovesJamie]

I dispense $1 tokens from my bill changers. I've had 1 complaint from a customer who only wanted $2.50 worth of time - in the last 3 years. (Maybe 2 or 3 a year before that). I politely explain that they can bring quarters from home, but sorry, I dont sell quarters. Funny thing - he started screaming at me, so I told him he could either leave now or I'd call the police. He stormed back into the bay, and promptly spent $6 washing his car. People are idiots. Use the dollar coins (or tokens) and raise your vac price to a buck.

 

[ScottV]

Bill,
You took the words right out of my mouth...., and that probably explains why I'm still single.
ScottV

 

[pitzerwm]

Well, Scott that might be an issue but I doubt it. Other than emergency "help" I don't know why you would involve the wife in running the wash. I know girls, I'm a MCP, but I'm always proud of all of you that are running the wash. And for you girls that are running the wash, unless your husband has an MBA, I don't think you need to ask him anything either other than to clean out the vacs or the pits.

 

[Waxman]

Ditto to dollar tokens and dollars in general vs. quarters.

I'm surprised at your wife's advice. My wife is involved with my own bill paying (she's super at it!) and she would never tell me NOT to raise prices!!! Quite the opposite!

Dollar vacs are very reasonable. Get that price up asap!

 

[MEP001]

I also used to be a bit nervous about pricing increases, dropping time or using payment methods that prevent the customer from adding that "last quarter" to finish up, but I've heard from many people now both that I know and who post here that the positives FAR outweigh any negatives. I'm seriously considering now that we should have one side of the changer dispensing dollar tokens and give bonus payouts to $10 and $20 bills. I should even be able to rig up a Hamilton DTI unit to the changer and have it pay out $5 or $10 in tokens with a single credit card swipe.

As far as dollar coins in the auto cashier, I don't see it working for us. I see a lot of people paying for their wash with quarters, and without those replenishing the hopper we'd be buying dollar coins like crazy. Our bank charges for them, I think a buck per roll and $30 per bag. Now if they ever eliminate the dollar bill, I'm sure the switch would work.

 

[Earl Weiss]

OK, so you go all dollar coins. Vacs are a buck and Bays are Dollar multiple to start and Dollar increment.

What are you going to do when you want to raise prices? Raise the Vac to$2.00 from $1.00 ? Raise the start by an increment of $1.00? Don't you think thie big jump wioll meet with resistance?

I Can see if you use tokens, that they may be $1.00 each with volume discounts, 6 for $5.00 as some operators do. Perhaps later no discount or sell a minimum of 4 for $5.00. At least that gives you some flexibility for price increases.

 

[rzeavy]

We dispense dollar coins and quarters at the same time (row 1400)
$5.00 - 3 dollar coins, 8 quarters
$10.00 - 5 dollar coins, 20 quarters
$20.00 - 10 dollar coins, 40 quarters
any combination will work and you can sell in increments of a quarter.

 

[I.B. Washincars]

When I went from $1.50 to $2 in 2003 I raised my time from 4 min. to 5. This year I backed off the time to 4 1/2 min. The next time it will be backed off to 4 min. I dispense 4 quarters and the balance in dollars regardless of what bill is inserted. I could go with quarter increment increases if i wanted, but I don't really see it happening. The car wash business ceased being a quarter business loooonnng ago.

BTW, for those of you that don't have round dollar pricing, dispensing the dollar/quarter combo works great. Converting my dual Hamilton was a snap.

 

[captain cw]

I'm very cautious about sharing my marketing ideas with my wife. I get so excited and then she always busts my bubble (no pun intended). I usually now just try my ideas and see if they are successful. I believe in letting the customers vote with their money on my ideas.

Love my wife like crazy, but she drives me crazy when I discuss a business with her that she rarely helps me with.

 

[Bubbles Galore]

Sorry I have been absent since I started this mess again =)

I think my wife's main concern about the vacuums is that our competition is still at 75 cents/4 minutes. Her main concern is that we stay competitive with our competitors (make sense?).

If you price your vacs at a dollar, what are your competitors charging?

Can anyone tell me that their regular vacs are more than $1.00? I just don't see it. I could be wrong though.

Once I do the changeover, I will just market it such that everything starts for only a buck. I am not too worried about it, I just think my wife is a little nervous due to how tight money is for a lot of people. The last thing I want to do is price us right out of the market.

 

[I.B. Washincars]

If your wash is the best wash I would raise the vacs to a dollar. The $.25 difference is not going to make anyone go to a place that they don't like as well. If your wash is inferior to the comp maybe you could leave it at $.75 to pacify her, but have decals made up stating "$.75/4 min or $1/5 min"

You also stated "everything starts for only a buck." Do you mean that you will drop the bay start-up to $1? I definitely would not drop the bay price. I'm assuming that your price is over $1 now??? You will lose on every vehicle that buys only one cycle. There are other reasons that have been discussed elsewhere on the forum as well. Seldom does anyone state that a drop in price actually increased revenue.

 

[Bubbles Galore]

If I am not mistaken, I think waxman is the one I gleaned the idea from. In a different post, he stated that his bays will start with just a dollar, but how much washing can you really get done in just 2 minutes?

Maybe I just won't advertise a pricing structure and just have a sign up showing how much bonus time you get with whatever amount of cash you insert. I understand what you are saying, I just see it as a non issue. You can't really get anything done in just 2 minutes, maybe that is why I am not that worried about it.

 

[I.B. Washincars]

You can make a hell of a mess washing the bed of a pickup for just a dollar.

You can fill your bucket, wet your car down, wash by hand for 15-20 minutes, plunk in another buck and rinse, all for two bucks.

Check out this thread to see what I got done for 50 cents.

http://forum.autocareforum.net/showthread.php?t=2083

 

[MEP001]

If your wash is the best wash I would raise the vacs to a dollar.

Agreed. Our "competition" is 75? for 3 minutes on vacs, we're $1.00 for 4. The two nearby washes have cut back on chemicals so much, they've lost most of their business to us. I checked out their functions not long ago, and immediately lowered our time on the bays.