Car Dealership! How much !?! $$$

[RealCleaningSolutions]

I have a car dealership that is interested in having around 500 cars rinsed on a weekly basis. They will be rinsed with soft water and only be washed with soap if absolutely neccesary. How much should i charge per car and or as a whole pkg. I have a rough idea but I wanted to get a general idea what you guys thought?

Thanks,
Daniel

[PressurePros]

$1 may be a stretch. Thats how much a dealership offered me

[MMI Enterprises]

You got the DI water (deionized)filter setup?..I'de like to see some DIY setups of folks on here. Haven't seen any in awhile..

[DAVID V]

I get 1.75 a car at three lots and 2.25 at one.
I rinse and 2 or 3 guys towel dry. No soap, just water.
Tuesday we did 167 cars in 2.5 hrs.
Hope this helps.

[homer]

if you do it right!

For years I chaged .99 per car. No soap - just a high pressure rinse and the only time I would wash was after they closed at night.

You will be amazed at how many you can wash once you get your system down. 100 per hour easy and this is just one person.

The best day was always Thursday/Friday. This is when their ads break.

Good luck.

[Biodude]

I don't know how you guys do it! That seems like a lot of work for not much profit. I don't think I could do that for 8 hours!

[Tmrrptr]

Originally Posted by Biodude

I don't know how you guys do it! That seems like a lot of work for not much profit. I don't think I could do that for 8 hours!

Hey Bio,

I don't think there's too many lots around that would take 8hrs...
But it's all 'holes & 'bows, quick fast and in a hurry.
It's fun to power out and blast through a task.

If they got more than a hundred units it's probably better to take along a helper, or two anyway... then you can race!

No, there's not much profit in it, but you can make a good living !
r

[Barry M]

Originally Posted by RealCleaningSolutions

I have a car dealership that is interested in having around 500 cars rinsed on a weekly basis. They will be rinsed with soft water and only be washed with soap if absolutely neccesary. How much should i charge per car and or as a whole pkg. I have a rough idea but I wanted to get a general idea what you guys thought?

Thanks,
Daniel

Daniel

I would charge per car because they will never have the same amount of cars from one week to the next. Are you using DI water and how much is it costing you? Reason I ask is because this will have a substantial factor on what you need to charge.

For example: To go with DI tanks through company A is going to cost me $225 for the tanks. Their estimate, depending on how hard the water source is, is that I will filter 1500 gallons of water before my tanks are depleted. At that point I would need to have the tanks recharged for another $225. So how far does 1500 gallons of water get me? Well if I do each car in 45 seconds using a 4gpm machine, that's 3 gallons of water per car. So I would be able to do 500 cars before needing my tanks recharged. Do the math and your DI water is going to cost you 45 cents per car. I need to clear $2 per car to be profitable, otherwise it just isn't worth it. So I would probably charge $2.50 per car.

How long is it going to take to do 500 cars? Well here is my philosophy. I'm going to expose David V in this example since we are buds. David does cars much faster than me even though we both have 4gpm units. He doesn't use DI water but instead he uses 3 or so helpers. They go behind him and towel dry the cars by hand. Now because they are towel drying David can really blast through the cars knowing that his crew will wipe any missed spots. There is nothing wrong with this method because the end result to the customer is the same......a clean car. David's cost's are paying his helpers rather than paying for DI water. Now I use DI on a lot and I spend about 45 sec to a minute on each car. I have to hit them a little better because nobody is going behind me so if I miss something than the customer will complain. So it takes me 3 hours to do 150 cars this way. That's after doing them for a year now and finding ways to do it faster. It use to take me 4 hours so my best estimate is it would take you almost 10 hours once you got good, to do 500 cars. That's no soap, no reclaim, and you doing them by yourself using a 4gpm unit.

You'll have to keep to 45 seconds per car to keep your DI costs to $225 per visit (or 45cents per car). So after that cost your making $2.05 per car if you charge $2.50 per car. In 10 hours of work you'll be just over $100 per hour. Don't forget to figure in your cost for gas, insurance, wear and tear, and so on. Still decent money and consistent money every week but you just have to charge enough or you'll hate yourself in the long run. This is only an example but run your numbers like this and you'll know what you need to charge to be profitable, don't short change yourself.

[Biodude]

You guys make good points. Your overhead costs are decreased, so that helps the profit margin. Now to find employees that don't walk around like their pants are full of bricks......

[YVPW]

The last time I did them for a local dealership was $4.50 a car and I still won't do it again. If you just use water and dry all you're doing is scratching the paint with dirt and sand in a towel. The cars aren't clean that way. I had my machine setup so that I could soap and rinse with the same nozzle set at 1200psi, switching from soap to water with the twist of a 3-way ball valve. I had a DEMA injector at my gun for the high pressure soap. I would soap about 3 cars at a time(depending on outside temp.'s) and then hit them with a soft brush and rinse with regular water. If you use a brush and soap you really don't have to worry that much about drying the cars down. Cause the dirt is gone and the cars look better. There were people offering to do the cars I did for $1.25 each, but the dealership wouldn't use them because of the difference in what I did compared to them. Cleaning car dealerships is so low-balled now good luck on making any money. There are a lot more profitable things to do with a pressure washer.

[Mark McMaster]

Sorry guys. This is off topic. Biodude.........that's a sweet sled there bro. Sledhead myself. Dealerships around me won't pay a nickel!!!

[Biodude]

Originally Posted by Mark McMaster

Sorry guys. This is off topic. Biodude.........that's a sweet sled there bro. Sledhead myself. Dealerships around me won't pay a nickel!!!

I'm a Yamaha man myself. I suppose you're a Ski-Dooer, aye? I've got friends in Toronto and Allenford that go riding with us out in the mountains of Montana, Wyoming, and Utah, but they also like the fast trails of Canada as well. Is that where you go riding?

[RealCleaningSolutions]

Ok first of all I know that without soft water and with two guys it takes me around 5.5 minutes to wash, scrub, and hand dry a 15 passenger van. However I do not plan on ever scrubbing a vehicle period. No matter how "soft" the brush or "clean" the car is you are putting light scratches in the vehicle when you touch it with anything but soft water and chems. i used to own a truck wash so I know my chems, soft water ($25 per 2,000 gallons) but I just didnt know what the market was like. I have a trailer setup with 2 units one is a 5@3500 hot and the other is a 4@3000 Cold. I have one employee and serveral other guys that I can use on large projects. I would probably just rinse being as we live in wyoming and things hardly get dirty here. So I was thinking around 1.40-1.60 for each car to rinse. and mebbe a little less if it goes really fast. But I need to average $100 per hour or it's not worth taking my equipment out. Most of the time unless the car is black and it is really hot out I can wash any car in the sun without any spotting issues. Thanks a ton for all of the comments and suggestions I really have a better idea of what I am looking at so that is going to help a ton.

Thanks,
Daniel

[Bears Pressure Washing_]

I currently have 23 car lot accounts. I have been doing car lots for 3 years now. Hear in southern oregon the lots will only pay about $1.25 per car. My company uses DI water. For us the best setup is a 8gpm cold water pressure washer with 2 wands. We can do around 100 cars per our with that setup. Not great money but it is steedy money and i dont have to do much baby sitting of the employes.

[Tom DeFrancesco]

Originally Posted by Barry M

Daniel

I would charge per car because they will never have the same amount of cars from one week to the next. Are you using DI water and how much is it costing you? Reason I ask is because this will have a substantial factor on what you need to charge.

For example: To go with DI tanks through company A is going to cost me $225 for the tanks. Their estimate, depending on how hard the water source is, is that I will filter 1500 gallons of water before my tanks are depleted. At that point I would need to have the tanks recharged for another $225. So how far does 1500 gallons of water get me? Well if I do each car in 45 seconds using a 4gpm machine, that's 3 gallons of water per car. So I would be able to do 500 cars before needing my tanks recharged. Do the math and your DI water is going to cost you 45 cents per car. I need to clear $2 per car to be profitable, otherwise it just isn't worth it. So I would probably charge $2.50 per car.

How long is it going to take to do 500 cars? Well here is my philosophy. I'm going to expose David V in this example since we are buds. David does cars much faster than me even though we both have 4gpm units. He doesn't use DI water but instead he uses 3 or so helpers. They go behind him and towel dry the cars by hand. Now because they are towel drying David can really blast through the cars knowing that his crew will wipe any missed spots. There is nothing wrong with this method because the end result to the customer is the same......a clean car. David's cost's are paying his helpers rather than paying for DI water. Now I use DI on a lot and I spend about 45 sec to a minute on each car. I have to hit them a little better because nobody is going behind me so if I miss something than the customer will complain. So it takes me 3 hours to do 150 cars this way. That's after doing them for a year now and finding ways to do it faster. It use to take me 4 hours so my best estimate is it would take you almost 10 hours once you got good, to do 500 cars. That's no soap, no reclaim, and you doing them by yourself using a 4gpm unit.

You'll have to keep to 45 seconds per car to keep your DI costs to $225 per visit (or 45cents per car). So after that cost your making $2.05 per car if you charge $2.50 per car. In 10 hours of work you'll be just over $100 per hour. Don't forget to figure in your cost for gas, insurance, wear and tear, and so on. Still decent money and consistent money every week but you just have to charge enough or you'll hate yourself in the long run. This is only an example but run your numbers like this and you'll know what you need to charge to be profitable, don't short change yourself.

Just curious, how many towels are you going thru ?? How long is it taking them to properly dry dark colored vehicles and chrome so there are no streaks or water marks ?? What does it cost you to wash all the towels when you are done ?? I applaude the companies that are able to profit from this work. I just do not see it. At least not when drying or scrubbing is involved.