New wash Owner ??

[Vortex]

Hello
I am a new car wash owner with a quick lube oil change . I currently purchased a
3-self-serve bay with a 1-in bay automatic Mark seven soft touch. I purchased this knowing that there is a tunnel that is going to break ground in the next couple months down the road, but what I have learned from all these forms was to get a jump on it and get the wash updated and with great technology ..

Business plan as follows : First thing I’m doing is replacing the 2015-Mark V11 softbtouch with a Touchless. (Either the typhoon or 360i). Then I will start by cleaning it up ,changing siding color to give it pop , new parking lot , adding PVC panels to the walls new booms , brushes , parking lot , Modular Pet wash, New arch vacs , new bay meters with cc / Tap , bill acceptor, coin acceptor. with more functions and options.
My questions are:

What other options are recommended for the bays ? Currently they just have wax , brush, soap, hot water rinse

What add on is the cheapest to add with a higher ROI?

What phone app / loyalty is best or recommend for self serves?
Example: I want to be able to do mass mailers with QR codes coupled with the oil change.
-I don’t want unlimited washes but would like customers to earn points- Like for every 5 washes you get one free or etc

What vending item has best ROI ?

Thanks

 

[Waxman]

blowers and 3x foam are my favorite xtras in the bays. blowers are likely highest roi but that is a guess.

i'm a big fan of the washworld razor for touchfree cleaning. mine has been great.

not sure about wash clubs etc. i looked into it but felt in my small market i'd just be rewarding the regulars who come anyway

 

[OurTown]

It's not just about the best ROI but also keeping customers coming back because you have something they want that no other wash has. Consider adding presoak and spot free rinse. What is your water quality there? Is there a water softener? If this wash is open now how well is it doing? Does your market have lots of touchless options? If so then maybe you should keep the friction wash for now. If ran right it has the potential to out clean most tunnels. If replacing the friction machine with touchless just keep in mind that that is going to be a different customer and your old ones coming back to that new machine might not be as happy with the cleaning results. I'm not telling you to not replace it but just look at all angles. You are talking about putting in quite a lot of money into the place so just make sure it's the right choices. Have you used all the autos and self serve washes in your market? Also look into the dog wash carefully. There are some on here that seem to do well with them but it may require more labor than you think because of customers leaving it a mess. Go visit some and see how they are ran. There is one several towns over from us that doesn't get cleaned often because there's no attendant on duty. Because of that it smells awful and I would never want to use it as a customer.

 

[Vortex]

It's not just about the best ROI but also keeping customers coming back because you have something they want that no other wash has. Consider adding presoak and spot free rinse. What is your water quality there? Is there a water softener? If this wash is open now how well is it doing? Does your market have lots of touchless options? If so then maybe you should keep the friction wash for now. If ran right it has the potential to out clean most tunnels. If replacing the friction machine with touchless just keep in mind that that is going to be a different customer and your old ones coming back to that new machine might not be as happy with the cleaning results. I'm not telling you to not replace it but just look at all angles. You are talking about putting in quite a lot of money into the place so just make sure it's the right choices. Have you used all the autos and self serve washes in your market? Also look into the dog wash carefully. There are some on here that seem to do well with them but it may require more labor than you think because of customers leaving it a mess. Go visit some and see how they are ran. There is one several towns over from us that doesn't get cleaned often because there's no attendant on duty. Because of that it smells awful and I would never want to use it as a customer.

The wash is run down and only Grosses 80k
but First Off let me say . That I know I over paid for a run down wash but I had my reasons 1 being that the land value is great we are small town growing very rapidly and the other is that I own two other business down the street so labor wont be a issue in managing the site / especially the dog wash. We have nothing around like this.
Water Quality is on Well with Softener very High Iron but a spot free RO is there.
Their is no touchless systems in a 7 mile radius
but
You bring up a very Valid Point about possibly pushing away customers , by changing out soft touch machine that works Very Well I know of many customers that use this wash for the Mark V11 they say it does better than the one that it 5 miles away. But after reading all these forums for me to compete against a new state of the art tunnel 2 miles away i think touchless is the way to go. Definitely something to think about thanks for the input I could always order it , its 10 months out for a new touchless any ways and see what happens.