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Dollar coin experiment

G

getnbusy

Active member
Ok so i tried em at one location where other business' were wiping out my quarters every week. I gave it a year. I only bought $8000 in dollar coins in a years time. I never deposited dollar coins and I still have $976 in dollar coins so $7000 in dollar coin walked away and never came back. Too many people asked questions. The customers didnt know what they were and didnt spend them. My guess is they took them home to their grandson or something. I can say they were alot easier to handle than quarters but it was very discouraging to open the vaults and there was almost nothing there. Id have to look at my notes to get a percentage but there were always more quarters in there than dollar coins. That means that the customers had to bring the quarters themselves. It was close to 40% dollar coins and 60% quarters. Bills and cards both went up. Overall my year over year was $5000 less but some of that could be the timing on deposits. I dont blame it all on the dollar coins but there was definitely no increase in revenue. I went back to quarters and the vaults were back to normal on the first collection. Within 2 weeks they were wiping out my quarters again. I still try to stop it when i see it but im picking my battles now.
 
Timely thread since I just changed to $1 Tokens and aside from a tense transition period (see other recent thread on this forum) it has been a really good business for me so far. If you were to go to tokens and they walk out, you make 50-75 cents on each one so you would have profited $4-6k on the 8k coins that left. Time will tell over the whole year but I’m already 4x from 2023 and 2x from 2024. But that is due to updating the site and adding foam guns throughout 2024.
Another bonus to tokens is you get to profit from the quarter abusers when they don’t read the signs and throw 2 x $20 in each change machine for the laundromat. Ask me how I know.
 
thank you for the feedback. good point. My holdup with tokens is that we give a free vac token with automatic wash purchase. That makes the token worth $2. Id have to have a different token for the bays. I think that would confuse everybody. Havent figured that one out yet but I hear ya on makin money on what walks away.
 
We switched to dollar coins in 2001 and never regretted it. Sure, some customers get confused because they are not common but when we explain the advantage of getting 5 coins for a $5 bill instead of 20 and how much easier it is to start a bay with 3 or 4 coins instead of 12 or 16, they get on board with the idea really fast. We also accept bills in the bay so they can skip getting change if they don't like the dollar coins.

IMO, if you are charging more than $3 to start, dispensing quarters is not customer friendly. Don't let a few loud complainers dictate how you operate your car wash.
 
to piggy back off of DavidM, I also switched to dollar coins about 2001. The customers get used to it. My price in the bays in now $5 for 5 minutes. That obviously means that a quarter is worth 20 seconds. Imagine a customer dropping in a quarter for more time and turning back towards the car to continue washing and the alert horn starts going off AGAIN. “I just put more money in this machine and it’s asking for more money already!!!”. I’m probably at 70% plus for credit card and a large portion of cash are bills. Customers still bring in their own quarters but they’ve come to embrace the dollar coins. Coin users can drop in 5 dollar coins or 20 quarters. Which would you prefer?
 
getnbusy said:
Ok so i tried em at one location where other business' were wiping out my quarters every week. I gave it a year. I only bought $8000 in dollar coins in a years time. I never deposited dollar coins and I still have $976 in dollar coins so $7000 in dollar coin walked away and never came back. Too many people asked questions. The customers didnt know what they were and didnt spend them. My guess is they took them home to their grandson or something. I can say they were alot easier to handle than quarters but it was very discouraging to open the vaults and there was almost nothing there. Id have to look at my notes to get a percentage but there were always more quarters in there than dollar coins. That means that the customers had to bring the quarters themselves. It was close to 40% dollar coins and 60% quarters. Bills and cards both went up. Overall my year over year was $5000 less but some of that could be the timing on deposits. I dont blame it all on the dollar coins but there was definitely no increase in revenue. I went back to quarters and the vaults were back to normal on the first collection. Within 2 weeks they were wiping out my quarters again. I still try to stop it when i see it but im picking my battles now.
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I can say from experience that those number can match how many tokens walk away from the wash annually too.
(They pay a dollar for the token, you pay 44 cents. 56¢ X 7,000 = $3,920 in your pocket)
5 tokens to start is easier on the accepter and vault than 20 quarters imho.
Dealing with quarters is so-not-fun that I'm this close to not taking them anymore (my thumb and index finger are separated by the thickness of a credit card).
I would love to know where that threshold was for dimes back in the day. The guy I got one of my washes from had "35¢ to start" sunburned into the street sign before we changed it.
 
getnbusy said:
thank you for the feedback. good point. My holdup with tokens is that we give a free vac token with automatic wash purchase. That makes the token worth $2. Id have to have a different token for the bays. I think that would confuse everybody. Havent figured that one out yet but I hear ya on makin money on what walks away.
Click to expand...
Can change the token value to $1 and dispense two from your paystation?
 
Confusing. I assume you guys are actually referring to tokens valued at one dollar and not actual "dollar coins" (Golden dollar).

I see no point in vending tokens while also still accepting quarters. You still have to sort and deposit quarters which is a pain.

If you go tokens, then go all in and do not accept quarters. This turns your car wash into a dollar-based facility and not a quarter-based one. This isn't 1987 anymore.

Also, the tokens that customers buy for $1 and then "walk away" are the best % revenue on your site. I love having to buy new tokens because it means thousands have walked away!

If you do this this then they only thing you have to count and take to the bank are bills. Much nicer!

I'm assuming you already accept credit card too because that cranks your revenue way up.
 
Ditto to what David m said. Switch to 2001 never looked back golden US dollar coins. Somebody puts a 20 in my coin machine can you imagine what they get in quarters? Not only a convenience for the customer but speeds up people's time tying up your equipment not pumping multiple quarters into a machine. Plus the only value is the dollar coin not a quarter. I'm a small wash I buy $500 a month in dollar coins to replenish the walkaways. We also accept bills and credit cards in the bays.
 
Axxlrod said:
If you go tokens, then go all in and do not accept quarters. This turns your car wash into a dollar-based facility and not a quarter-based one. This isn't 1987 anymore.

Also, the tokens that customers buy for $1 and then "walk away" are the best % revenue on your site. I love having to buy new tokens because it means thousands have walked away!
Click to expand...

I’m with you here and this was the main reason to go to tokens. I don’t want to see another quarter. Although people still throw quarters in there so fast it jams the acceptor and somehow they overflow into the vault. I’ve unfortunately “stolen” $80 in quarters that way but I added extra signs and made it so the quarter shoots out and rolls on the floor versus sitting in the reject chute and that seems to have fixed that.
 
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