Access Denied
By Stefan Budricks, Editor

I’m going to need some help with this one. Recently, a big-box store opened a new car wash across the street from a major shopping mall in a nearby neighborhood. The wash popped up on the International Carwash Association’s website during a search for participants in its WaterSavers campaign.

I therefore had two reasons to visit: I wanted to see how well the “big boys” got the job done, and I wanted to show support for an environmentally responsible operation. Alas, I accomplished neither. It wasn’t for a lack of trying. I was even prepared to be sneaky, ignoring a banner that read “Members Only” as I turned onto the wash site and approached one of four automated pay stations.

The problem with an automated system is that you cannot argue with it, and you cannot sweet-talk it into changing its mind. Feeding my credit card into the slot had zero effect. I figured a sale is a sale, right? Wrong. The system insisted on first seeing a membership card, which I don’t have because I’m not a big-box-store club member — I don’t use 24 jars of mayonnaise a month, or a year for that matter.

I had no option but to back up and out of the wash’s driveway. Fortunately, the wash was doing no business — not a single vehicle joined me at the two-across, two-deep pay stations (this, on a sunny Saturday morning).

This is a conveyorized express exterior wash housed in a rectangular concrete building surrounded by a vast expanse of blacktop. No windows, minimal landscaping, no menu board, no embellishments whatsoever. Utterly utilitarian. It’s functional, but it ain’t pretty.

The absence of a menu board is easy to explain. The wash offers a Henry-Ford-style choice: none. One wash package, one price. $7.99 (and a membership card) gets you in and clean. The wash is pretty basic, though it does include tire shine and a surface protectant. More difficult to fathom is the total absence of vacuums — not a paid or a free vacuum to be found anywhere.

I’m probably missing something (and this is where I need help). I understand the success of the express exterior business model to be predicated on three things: high volume, low base pricing with optional upgrades, and convenience (speed and free self-vacuuming). Assuming it entered the car wash business with a profit motive, the big-box store seems to be considerably off the mark.

From what I’ve observed, the wash satisfies only one of the requirements: speed. With access restricted to members only, it’s difficult to imagine the wash achieving the volume one associates with express exterior performance. Certainly, the site derives no benefit from its location proximate to a traffic-generating mall. As for pricing, it has zero revenue-generating potential beyond $7.99 per car.

I could, of course, be assuming too much. It’s entirely possible that the store merely wanted to add another convenient service for the benefit of its members. If so, it sure spent a lot of money in the process. Besides, professional car washes are not hard to find, and while eight bucks isn’t bad for an exterior wash, I wouldn’t call it cheap.

Whatever motivated the establishment of this wash, competitors can feel reassured that the greater the restrictions placed on public access, the smaller the impact will be on their own operations.