There are only a handful of car wash franchises in the world. This might offer some insight on how car wash franchises come into existence. This is a crazy story. It is the history of our company and how we ended up in the Carwash Franchise business. One of our franchisees of our mobile car wash business; The Car Wash Guys, was in Idaho, was the son of a wheat farmer, the areas largest farm family land holder in Idahos banana belt. About a month before he called us I put up this web site called www.detailguys.com and said what the hell, I will put up a form in case someone wants to buy a franchise for only auto detailing and not mobile car washing we can make a sub franchise out of it. Previously I did a couple of trade shows. The Black Expo and a BizOp/franchise show, great results and really I did not need any leads. But what I learned was their were significant people wanting low-priced franchises. So I put up the website and put a form on it and the very next day I get a lead from Phil the farmer in Idaho, looking for a simple business. He wanted to start a business, but stick more with auto detailing on a mobile bases, which was slightly different than that of our mobile care wash franchise. So he wanted a franchise ID. But heck I was in CA and ID seemed like another World at the time. It was. Things went good, because we made it work and Phil then bought a car wash guys mobile truck and later an auto detailing trailer and hired on some more workets. Things again were getting even better. He could now detail and wash. He saved his money and decided to open a car wash. So he called me up one day and said Lance, Am I allowed to open a fixed site car wash? I thought, but I hate carwashes, because they hate mobile washers chipping away at their customer base. But then I thought the combo would be unstoppable. I said yes. Here is what we built: www.carwashguy.com This is over the river in WA State in Clarkston, Phil lives in Idaho in Lewiston. So then I had a franchisee operating three concepts in 2 states. He said to me. What do you know about carwashes? I thought, everything. I mean they are competition and I know my enemy better than the Navy Seal teams before entry. I had every industry magazine from the start of car washing magazines. I had every published book, manual written, and article, all in boxes. I have attended every trade show of the International Car Wash Association in the last six years, and collected literature at every table. It was a long project but we put the franchise together. Phil got his car wash opened and it became our prototype and then we started franchising fixed site car washes. It just proves you never know what you will learn or which market niches you will enter in the future as an entrepreneur. The important thing is to constantly scan the horizon for market niches and opportunities, which will work. Think on this concept today. |
