Owned my wash for 15 months...

[Tpoppa]

I bought my car wash about 15 months ago. It’s a 4 bay self serve in a low to mid income urban area. Even though there have been 3 or 4 days where I’ve second guessed buying it, it’s been a good experience.

The previous owner had lost interest in the wash and the business was down 50% from its peak. The wash has some cosmetic issues and had earned a reputation for not reliably working in the last few years. Even at low volumes, it was profitable. I took this all into consideration and purchased the business and land for a price I was comfortable with.

In the last 15 months, I have put a lot of time and effort and $$ into making the wash function as close to 100% as possible. Since I took over:

• I replaced an outdated foam brush system with a new LP system. The previous owner would disconnect the brushes below 32 degrees.
• I installed new modern coin accepters.
• I had all the changer components serviced. Uptime is 99% compared to less than 80%
• I keep new guns, brushes, and hoses in the bays
• I keep the bays and lot CLEAN

2009 was 25% better than 2008. So far, 2010 is up close to 30% over 2009. It is rewarding to see my effort pay off. I am seeing a good number of repeat customers.

I have yet to address the cosmetic issues, but am planning to this summer. This is what I have planned so far:

• New coin boxes with digital timers (yep, existing boxes have no digital readout)
• New comprehensive bay signage
• New exterior siding and paint

Background:
The wash is pretty basic. Soap, Foam Brush, Rinse, & Wax, with 2 Vacs, and 3 Vending Machines.
It is in an urban area near many apartments.
It has been operating for over 30 years.
My nearest competition is several miles away.

For you veteran operators, what improvements would give me the most bang for my buck?
What level of growth can I expect from cosmetic updates?

 

[Elliott]

Wow I am riding your coat tails on this one. I have just jump into the same boat as you almost. Please post up any great tips or sources you may have that helped you get running initially. Sounds like your hard work has really made you proud. Great Job!

 

[MikeV]

Probably the next thing I would add is water softener and spot free rinse. Maybe a tankless water heater or two. Spot free gets a lot of usage.

 

[Earl Weiss]

Depending on how deap your pocket is, If you are going the new coin box route Bill acceptors and credit card acceptance as well as 10 functions. Even if you can't afford all the hardware I would suggest that whatever you put in can accomodate this at a later date.

That way, if you choose you will have room for more toys like Dryers, triple foam, Seperate Tire/wheel brushes.

 

[Tpoppa]

Probably the next thing I would add is water softener and spot free rinse. Maybe a tankless water heater or two. Spot free gets a lot of usage.

My two constraints are money (of course) and space, my equipment room is very small and space is already an issue.

Given the choice, I'm sure many of my customers would opt for spot free rinse over normal rinse.

• What is the ballpark cost to add spot free? and to maintain it?
• Can customers actually tell the difference?
• Are customers just choosing spot free over normal rinse or are they adding more quarters to use spot free longer? Is the ROI there?

The wash came with a Bosch tankless heater. It was in poor condition. I rebuilt the water inlet valve and now it works well.

I am fortunate enough to be miles away from any competitors and I am in an area where new constuction is unlikely.

 

[Tpoppa]

Wow I am riding your coat tails on this one. I have just jump into the same boat as you almost. Please post up any great tips or sources you may have that helped you get running initially. Sounds like your hard work has really made you proud. Great Job!

The best resources so far have been this forum, and other owners that are in my area. I have been pleasantly surprised to see how helpful car wash owners are.

 

[Tpoppa]

Depending on how deap your pocket is, If you are going the new coin box route Bill acceptors and credit card acceptance as well as 10 functions. Even if you can't afford all the hardware I would suggest that whatever you put in can accomodate this at a later date.

That way, if you choose you will have room for more toys like Dryers, triple foam, Seperate Tire/wheel brushes.

My pockets are not necessarily deep. But, I will make funds available in the ROI is there. Of these options, what do you see as the best bang for the buck?

At this point, my goal is to grow the business as much as possible over the next 18 months and then sell (hopefully for more than I paid). Plan B would be to buy 1 or 2 more washes and quit my day job.

 

[MikeV]

I find that customers do use the spot free rinse....a lot.
The cost for a water softener and spot free will vary by manufacturer. I suggest that you contact your local water softener company (maybe Culligan) and get prices from them. Then contact your local distributors and get prices from them and compare (cost, service, maintenance etc.) All in all, you will probably spend around $10,000. for the whole setup.

 

[Greg Pack]

My experience with low income customers is they didn't use much SFR. They preferred to towel dry. Many never even rinsed the CCP off.
Middle income customer could grasp the concept and didn't want to hang around all day drying their car off.
I didn't see tire cleaner- you're missing out if you don't have tire cleaner. While you're at it, I'd add presoak. not a huge money producer but not a huge cost to add, either.

How's your lighting?

pics of the place and the meter doors now would be helpful.

 

[Tpoppa]

My experience with low income customers is they didn't use much SFR. They preferred to towel dry. Many never even rinsed the CCP off.
Middle income customer could grasp the concept and didn't want to hang around all day drying their car off.
I didn't see tire cleaner- you're missing out if you don't have tire cleaner. While you're at it, I'd add presoak. not a huge money producer but not a huge cost to add, either.

How's your lighting?

pics of the place and the meter doors now would be helpful.

Good info!

I like the tire cleaner idea. Would this be another LP option, another set of booms, brushes, etc? What would be the best route to addon?

Lighting is good.

The coin boxes look old. I am gutting them in the spring. New doors, switches, labels, etc. I already have the digital timers in my garage. I am expecting this to have a good impact on the business.

Would you expect a "Under New Ownership" banner or Red/White/Blue streamers to increase volume?

 

[MEP001]

If money is part of what's holding you back on doing other improvements, I would definitely start with tire cleaner and presoak. Those would be the cheapest add-ons and would help turn a profit quicker because of low installation costs. It's also pretty easy to build a compact system. I know someone who uses Dosatron pumps so he has no tanks, so all you'd have is a bucket of chemical, a small pump and some solenoids on the wall. There's no special boom involved; it just tee's in at the high-pressure boom. The key to getting customers to use it is to use a chemical that not only works well but puts on a good show. I also like to run the presoak extra wet (There is air mixed to make it foam on application) so customers can cover their car quickly and not feel like they're getting ripped off if they can't cover the car in a reasonable time.

There used to be a few compact spot-free systems on the market, and they were very basic in design but very reliable. One was a stainless box with the charcoal filter inside (Very neat and compact, but it sucked when it came time to change the carbon in the filter). One was just a custom framework made of Unistrut bolted to the wall with all the components attached to it.

 

[Tpoppa]

MEP,
That sounds like the way to go. So can Tire Cleaner and Presoak basically be added on as a LP feed that is T'd into the existing HP line?

If anyone could point me to a system design doc, I would greatly appreciate it.

 

[MEP001]

So can Tire Cleaner and Presoak basically be added on as a LP feed that is T'd into the existing HP line?

Yes; you only need three lines to each boom (Tire cleaner liquid, presoak liquid and a common air) with one check valve.

There's not much to a system like that - it's usually a tank and Hydrominder, pump, two solenoids and needle valves per bay per system. Block-style solenoids with integrated needle valves would simplify it even more. Depending on the pump used, you may need a controller; I use a FloJet that just dead-heads against the solenoids. A Dosatron like I mentioned before can be used the same way.

I saw a "system" someone purchased from one of the bigger catalog houses - it was a Flojet and solenoids screwed to a piece of laminated shelf material from Home Depot, and a way-too-big poly vat that sat on the floor and had a Hydrominder sticking through the lid. The first time the board got wet the whole thing fell apart, and every cricket season the tank got really nasty.

 

[Tpoppa]

That seems relatively easy to implement.

Since the presoak and tire cleaner lines are going to the bays, how do you manage freezing in cold temps?

 

[MEP001]

Right now I just let it freeze, but I intend to build a metal box to run the length of the roof, insulate and heat it to keep everything working in freezing temps. The tubing is nylon and freezing doesn't harm it.

 

[Tpoppa]

Right now I just let it freeze, but I intend to build a metal box to run the length of the roof, insulate and heat it to keep everything working in freezing temps. The tubing is nylon and freezing doesn't harm it.

• So, for now, are these warm weather functions only?
• I'm guessing it's not cost effective to use methanol.
• Could these be T'd inside the equipment room to avoild the freezing issue all together? There would be a delay in product reaching the gun.
• Would the flow from the Weepmiser cause problems with Presoak and Tirecleaner

?

 

[I.B. Washincars]

Since the presoak and tire cleaner lines are going to the bays, how do you manage freezing in cold temps?

Just bundle them with the HP hose and wrap it with pipe insulation and it won't freeze. I weep warm water during the colder months, but I'm not totally sure that it is nesessary. I've had a couple of 2-3 day power failures when the temps hit single digits and still didn't freeze with just cold weep full-on.

 

[MEP001]

I.B. is right, that will work. Doesn't work for me because the lines are just strewn across the roof. The main reason I want to build a box for the lines is to protect them from sunlight, but I figured I might as well insulate it. The winters here are really mild, with three or four overnight freezes a year; very rarely does it stay below freezing for more than 36 hours, and when it does no one washes anyway. I do mix up a batch of antifreeze foam brush and purge the lines with it the night before a freeze is forecast, but that's all.

No, I wouldn't "T" the lines in the equipment room. It will take a very long time to reach the gun even in the bays closest to the room, and customers won't like that. I've seen washes that are set up like that, and customers will wait only a very short time for product to reach the gun before they assume it's not working and switch to high-pressure.

If the weep pressure is at least 20 PSI below the low-pressure function's pressure, it will completely stop the weep by itself. You would only need to add a regulator to the weep line.

 

[JMMUSTANG]

I would buy a little tree multi vender from KR . They have a deal that pays for itself plus some for Feb. Pay back for me was quick and everyone I know seems to sell a lot of little trees.
If the neighborhood is a little questionable I would look at a separate bill acceptor from Etowah in each bay that sits/connects to your existing coin acceptor instead of a coin/dollar bill combo. That way if someone breaks into the bill acceptor it won't totally close you down.
If your competition doesn't have dryers I would think about installing dryers in each bay in your summer rehab project.
If you think your neighborhood would support c.c. acceptors it would also be something to consider. About 18% of my customers were using c.c. within the first year.

 

[Tpoppa]

I run cold weep water and have not had a freeze up this year (yet), and there has been 5 or 6 days in single digit temps. Heating weep water seems like it would kill my margins.

Is anyone doing anything else to keep the presoak & tire cleaner lines from freezing? Heat tape?