Increase the Price or Decrease the time? That is the question!!

[diycarwash]

Fellow Self Service Operators.
I have 3 self service car washes in the Houston area. My washes are $1 for 3 minutes, but I am getting the itch for a price increase. Which do you guys feel is a better option?
$2 for 5 minutes or $1 for 2:30? I use dollar tokens, so I feel I should keep it at dollar increments.

Thanks for your replies.

 

[MEP001]

You've already received some responses here:

http://forum.autocareforum.net/showthread.php?p=9922#post9922

 

[Kevin James]

When I bought my wash the very first thing I did was raised the price. I raised the vacuum?s to $1.00 for 3 minutes from .50 for 5 minutes. The bays I raised from $1.00 for 5 minutes to $2.00 for 4 minutes. No one bitched or complained. Revenue went up a lot. In my travels across the US I?ve noticed that most car washes are under priced. Raise your price and don?t look back.

 

[diycarwash]

Thanks for the replies

Kevin I like your style. How far is your nearest competion and what are they priced at? I have at least 1 car wash with in 1 mile from all 3 of my washes. They are all priced at 1.25 for 4 minutes. Do you think I would lose customer to them if I was at $2 for 5?

 

[blurdgman]

After 24 years in the business I've come to the conclusion that coins and warning buzzers have been a detriment to the SS business. Yes we offer $1 tokens from our bill changers and from our American Changer Credit Card Token machines and require a startup of 2 tokens for 190 seconds, recently down from 210 seconds. Yes and the buzzer goes off one minute before the cycle ends causing stress to our customer's well being as he/she hurries to keep from putting the next coin in.
After operating Washgear credit card terminals in all our bays for the past three year we found that 25% of our customers have used the Washgear with average spending from $4.60 to $6.70 per wash depending on location. They take their time and wash their cars without buzzers, without stress and consequently spend more time and money.
After our recent decrease in time per coin we are offering a 10% bonus time if the customer uses the in bay terminal e.g. 210 seconds for the $2 startup. As soon as this catches on we expect leisurely washes via in bay CC use to increase beyond the 29% that we've already achieved. Some day we hopefully will eliminate coin use altogether.