Professional Carwashing & Detailing - Feb 2012
THE Busines CENTER Joes Car Wash I think the only reason that were doing the business that we do is the location and the cost of the real estate And nobody can compete against us Richard Watson co owner of Joes Car Wash Continued from page 46 48 Joes is the only self serve carwash in the downtown area of Houston Professional Carwashing Detailing February 2012 ing their yards and shrubbery during the drought Price points and expanding One challenge Joes faces in the future is preserving the 1 price point Watson recalled that 1 originally paid for five minutes of wash time Currently the wash charges 1 for two minutes and 25 or 30 seconds I never did want to get rid of the 1 he said Eventually well probably end up having to go down to where its 1 for one minute at some point and time Though Joes currently offers only selfserve washes Watson and his son are toying with the idea of adding hand washing and detailing Theres not a question I think wed do a tremendous business with the hand washing Im just not quite sure that I want to deal with having to have a bunch of employees he said The future of self serve When it comes to the future of self serve carwashes Watson is not very optimistic I think the only reason that were doing the business that we do is the location and the cost of the real estate And nobody can compete against us But my mindset tells me that these are dinosaurs on their way out Watson stated that automatics and short tunnels are the future of the business and theres some serious money to be made With the short tunnels owners can afford to pay high dollar prices for property Still finding the perfect carwash real estate will be a challenge Its a two edged sword because if you find a very very good location that you can afford to buy usually its in the marginal areas of the city Watson said You build a high dollar carwash thats doing a lot of business and youve got 15 competitors in about a year or two within five miles of you o affected Houston and central Texas last summer We didnt have any rain for five months Watson remembered To my mindset Id like for it to rain every week especially at night The drought proved challenging for the wash because when theres no rain there are no dirty cars Watson said there are regular customers that visit the property once a week but over the summer they were coming in every other week because their cars were not getting dirty The city left carwashes alone during the drought and allowed them to operate unimpeded Even so enacted water restrictions prevented Joes employees from following their regular cleaning routine Also the city stopped all businesses from water Police cooperation When it comes to security Joes has cameras from one end of the carwash to the other Yet Watson said he is not sure that the cameras do much to actually secure the business Instead Joes increases security by offering free carwashes to police vehicles Watson estimated that Joes washes 200 Houston police cars per week Weve got cops in there all the time and our cop friends tell us that the only time theyre going to ever follow up on somebody they see on that camera is going to be accidental he said Police officers have told Watson that Houston averages 1500 to 2000 calls a night reporting crime and the police department simply does not have the resources to respond and pursue suspects from every call If we get the license plate and then if they stop them for something else then theyll pull them up Watson stated Luckily Joes currently experiences little vandalism Watson said about once a year someone will come in and string some of the vending machines When this happens the wash puts timers on the machines so that they all cut off at 10 p m Enduring a drought One washing challenge that Joes recently endured was a severe drought that The credit card friendly bays offer a large selection of services Joes washes up to 2500 cars a week during its busy spring washing season
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