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VOL. 41, NO. 4, FALL 2014

Publisher Jackson VahalyEditor Kate CarrDesign Katy Barret-Alley

Editor Emeritus Jarret J. Jakubowski

Editor Emeritus Joseph J. Campbell

Editor Posthumous Julia E. Campbell

Self Serve Carwash News is published 4 times per year and is independently owned by Jackson Vahaly. Web address is www.sscwn.com. All inquiries should be directed to:

Self Serve Car Wash News110 Childs Ln., Franklin, TN 37067jacksonv@sscwn.com

Copyright 2014. 2 Dollar Enterprises/SSCWN. All Rights Reserved

Carrs Corner ..............................3

Letters to the Editor ..................4

Winter is Coming:Bonus Coverage of Heartland Show ........................16

Innovations .................................24

Wash Disney World:SECWA Expo Show ..................27

Industry Dirt ..............................35

Extra! Extra! ...............................38

Tricks of the Trade ..................42

NRCC Show Report .................49

Innovations .................................24

Cant Buy Me Love:Coverstory ..................................59

On The Road Again:SCWA Road Show .....................75

Darwin at the Carwash ..........88

Websites to Watch ....................90

CONTENTS Carrs CornerLETTER FROM THE EDITOR

Whew. Four issues out to the mailboxes and I nally feel like we can say SSCWN has been successfully revived.

And what uncanny timing! It would seem to me that 2014 is going to be the jumping off point for the self serve industry (and not just because this is the year we welcomed back our dear, precious SS-CWN). Finally, it seems we have the attention of the manufacturers. The innovations spurred by the express exterior explosion and quickly heralded in the automatic segment are now reaching our bays. We can offer tire shine and underbody cleaning. We can sell loyalty and gift cards by self serve kiosk. Credit card technology and surveillance systems are slowly, but surely, cutting down risk at our sites. Heck, weve been able to fi t a TUNNEL in 35-feet for the past ten years!

Friends, the time is now.And yet The dominant conversation among

our segment of the industry still seems to be fo-cused on the self serve car washs image problem. Im sure youve noticed: Take a 50-mile drive and youre bound to tick off as many run-down car wash sites as youve got fi ngers (and in some ar-eas, toes). These eyesore washes, a byproduct of the build it and they will come years, are a source of much frustration. Many operators wonder what ef-fect this has on their own business, and what can be done to repair the reputation and status of the self serve industry as a whole.

Ive thought about this issue quite a bit, but a conversation with Steve Sause, general manager of Personal Touch Car Wash in Cromwell, CT, put things in a new perspective for me. Speaking with Steve after Dale Reynolds excellent presentation at NRCC on reviving the self serve car wash, he put it rather bluntly:

Listening to some of these guys talk, I mean Who cares about bucket washers? Youve got to think bigger. Cmon.

Steves right: Its not an image problem. Its an attitude problem.

Within our own industry, self serve operators have the reputation of sweating the small stuff. We worry about mudders, about bucket washers, about Obamcare, about how our attendant is going to cheat us.

And when it comes time to invest in new equip-ment and technology, we quibble quite a bit. Does my customer really want to use a credit card? Will he even notice if Im on Facebook? Will a new roof or paint job really make a difference?

The answer, for operators like Steve and Dale, is pretty obvious: Yup.

The runner in me likes comparing this issue to a marathon.

Picture it this way: Your fi nish line is the sale of your wash. You have to stay inspired every step of the way until you tear that ribbon. And you have to

run fast enough that the pace car wont catch you and kick you off the course.

You cant be both-ered by a side stitch or a blister at mile 16. Youve got to have a plan that sees you to the end -- and a solution for these temporary aches and pains. You cant walk off the course at mile 23. The race is 26.2 miles, and that last .2 counts. Believe me.

The small stuff? It sucks. It does. Vandalism sucks. Installing a credit card machine and fi nding out it only accounts for 8 percent of your transactions sucks. Replacing the roof sucks. Having to write a press release sucks.

But it cant distract you from the fi nish line. Be-cause as Dale explained in his seminar, every car wash is going to reach that ribbon eventually. It might happen for a profi t. It might happen by the family estate. Or it might happen on the court-house steps.

The difference will be in how you set your pace and where you fi nd your motivation.

Speaking of fi nding motivation, youll fi nd plen-ty in this issue and particularly in our cover story about social media marketing.

The best part about SSCWN, is that we fi lter through all the noise to bring you what matters to self serve car washes. Youll notice marketing is a hot topic this season, everyone from PC&D to the ICAs Carwash Magazine is reporting about social media trends. But were the only publication thats focused on the self serve market. Whats good for the goose aint always so good for the gander. (Twit-ter for self serves? Not so much) We can make Facebook work for you, but it wont be the same formula as a tunnel wash will use. And thats why SSCWN remains so important to our industry.

Speaking of our commitment to our readers, a small housekeeping note: In order to keep our quarterly content relevant by following the region-al trade show schedule, weve pushed back publi-cation dates for 2015. The winter issue will arrive in February this coming year instead of January, fol-lowed by a new issue every three months after that.

Also -- Im looking for your feedback on topics for our 2015 editorial calendar. If you have an idea for an article, please shoot me an email at katec@sscwn.com. When Im not running -- Im reading!

Cheers,

Kate

Thats me at the nish line of the Shamrock Marathon in Virginia Beach this past March. Save enough energy so you can jump and shout at your nish line, too.

4 FALL 2014

LETTERS Reader Input & Feedback

I got several emails on July 30 asking me if I had seen the latest issue of the SSCWN that had just arrived. The emails suggested that I fi nd my copy and read it at once. I opened the magazine and frankly was very disappointed in the article sub-mitted by Mark Curtis, a current board member of the ICA who sits on the Executive Committee as the Immediate Past President of the Associa-tion. Mark went out of his way to make sure he used my name several times in the article, each time trying to belittle me and my views on the policies of the ICA since I disagree with him and the Board. I have no issue with him stating the facts, but to do so in such an obvious insulting and demeaning manner, I believe, was unprofessional and certainly not in the spirit of what I believe the Association is supposed to be all about. It is at-tacks like this one by a sitting Board member that discourage others from coming forward to openly share their ideas for fear of retribution especially a published attack that could in fact result in a loss of business to their companies causing them fi nan-cial harm. In this article I will try to present to you my opinions and support them with the facts, when possible. I will be answering Marks specifi c claims about me that he wrote in his article and commenting on them as I feel I have an obliga-tion to do. However, beyond that I will make my argument without stooping to insulting Mark, or any of the other Board members who I believe are acting in good faith and doing what they believe is in the best interest of the Industry.

Before I respond, Id like to thank SSCWN. SS-

CWN, by publishing Marks letter, has done what I have been trying to do for years. Theyve brought the issues regarding our industrys largest associa-tion, The International Car Wash Association, into the open for everyone to see. I fi rmly believe the ICA has implemented several programs and poli-cies that need to be reviewed. I believe that they have forgotten that we, paying members; both vendors and operators, are who they are supposed to represent and answer to. Lets begin.

First let me make it clear, the opinions I am going to share are mine and mine alone. I do not represent any other members of the association. I say that because I have been very vocal about my disagreements with the ICA direction and have reached out to many vendors and operators to gather their opinions to see if I am alone in my beliefs or, if indeed, my opinions are the same as what I will refer to as the silent majority. I fi rmly believe the ICA has implemented several pro-grams and policies that need to be reviewed. I believe they have forgotten that we, the paying member fi rms, are who they are supposed to rep-resent and answer to. This to me is the biggest issue needing clarifi cation. For if we cannot agree on that, there may be no reason to continue the discussion. With that in mind, please see below an excerpt of an email I sent to the Board of Di-rectors of the ICA on 5/19/2014:

I am writing you today to make sure it is clearly understood why I and I believe so many others are upset and frustrated with the direction of the ICA. I have no doubt that frustration will be evident in the language used in my letter that follows. Please un-derstand, I believe my association has been hijacked and is headed in completely the wrong direction. It is my goal to work with the leadership of the association to get it back in the direction that I believe the pay-ing membership, both exhibitor and operator, believe it should go. And speaking of paying membership, I guess I should start with Global vs. Member driven.

Global vs. MemberThis one to me is hard to even comprehend. We have

an association that by defi nition is an organization that represents the interests of the member rmsof an industry. If you disagree with that concept or defi nition, then there may be no reason for you to read further. The board decides to ignore the member fi rms and now focuses on the global industry without ever asking the membership how they feel about that. I believe the arrogance in that is shocking. However, I believe it is a refl ection of the arrogance we have come to expect from the leadership. Many of us believe the leadership has lost touch with the current and past membership. This is the most glaring example of exactly that. I did discuss and express this concern with Gary

{continued}

A water study for the ages:From Jarret J. Jakubowski, Editor Emeritus, SSCWN

Hey, your Summer issue was mighty lively --- good look and read!

I thought, however, that your "Spraywatch" cover ar-ticle would benefi t from an addendum. You traced the chronology of the industry's efforts to conserve water resources while making the case that pro carwashers are commendable stewards of that precious resource. Well, not to blow our own horns (okay, maybe just a token toot), but that chronology really should have begun more around 1988. You see, the late '80's was when the little ol' SSCWN helped get that ball rolling:

Joe Wolfi nger (a SS operator in Pennsylvania with "only just one wash") did his own exhaustive, scientifi c study quantifying just how much water was "lost to the sewer" during the wash/rinse process at his self serve wand and IBA wash. I adapted his work to a couple of SSCWN arti-

cles back in the day "Dollars Down The Drain. Hun-dreds (thousands?) of operators used our "DDD" to pursue rate reductions from their local water/sewer authorities. Many, many were very successful in getting downward ad-justments to their rates. (Ironically, Joe was not.)

Anyhoo, a couple few years behind the curve, the ICA also requested copies. And sonuvvagun, the Associa-tion's study (a few more years' later) not only emulated "our" study, but had bottom line stats/results that vali-dated the SSCWN's "white papers"! With breathtaking predictability, the Association never acknowledged this mag's ground breaking efforts in this arena. So it goes.

And soooo, for your edifi cation and/or whatever, I at-tached a copy of "DDD", which, due to VERY popular demand was reprinted in 2001. Thought you'd like to know. (BTW, Self Serve wand washing was, is, and prob-ably will forever be THE most water effi cient way to

wash a vehicle!)

Ya'll, keep on keeping on, JJJ

JJJ,Many, many thanks for this ad-

dendum! We are now in receipt of the DDD and can provide a PDF copy to any reader who requests it via e-mail to katec@sscwn.com. I also hope to save some room to reprint it in its entirety for our Winter or Spring issue. Unfortunately, we just didnt have the space for this issue as we went to press shortly after your email.

And, as always, I remain so grateful that the SS industry has had such a faithful and knowl-edgeable champion in you!

Crossword Answers

SSCWN

THE ICA: Just My Opinionfrom Paul Fazio, President and CEO, Sonnys Enterprises

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6 FALL 2014

FALL 2014 7

(the President of the ICA) and, as you would ex-pect, he believes we should be industry not member focused. It has left many expressing that we have no one representing and acting on behalf of the paying exhibitor and operator community here in North America. This point was driven home to the exhibitors in the meeting after the show in Chicago when it was stated that this new show is for the benefi t of the Euro-pean market and will go forward knowing full well that the overwhelming majority of exhibitors are against it as represented in that room and the survey I conducted. It was then clearly re-stated in that meeting that the Board is global industry driven and not membership driven hence the divide between paying members vs. global industry. It was again clearly re-stated to me in my conference call with Eric (the CEO of the associa-tion) that this is a done deal and will not be reopened for discussion along with the European show decision. Again, further arrogance in my opinion. Simply stated if the membership is against being Global driven and the show in Europe, who is he to say these is-sues will not be revisited? I thought the Board represents the membership and the staff is directed by the Board. Did I get that wrong, or did Eric? He said in his speech at the ICA show that, we havent forgotten who we are. That is not at all what I believe we are seeing.

I use the term arrogance because this is the term used over and over again in the emails I received back from the vendor and operator members that responded to my emails as they described how they believe the leadership is behaving toward member-ship. I believe a clear example of that arrogance is evident in the article I referenced from Mark earlier as he says:

Paul Fazio stated he confronted me a year ago about the European show and voiced his opposition to me. What he didnt say is that I told him that no decision has been made yet and wont be made until we have fully researched it using outside expertise. He stated he didnt care, he didnt think we should do it. I told him I disagreed with him and his comment was we will just have to agree to disagree. Admittedly, I didnt follow up with him, but then why should I need to? I knew his sentiments.

Marks recollection of the conversation is correct, but let me fi ll in the blanks. Yes, I told him I didnt care what the results from the consultant showed. I explained to Mark it was my belief that the mem-bership would be totally against this idea even if the consultant says there is a need for a show in Europe and, therefore, the results of the report were irrele-

vant in my mind. Why investigate a show in Europe if the membership wants no part of it? I further told him that I believed they should have hired the con-sultant to help fi x our stagnant current show, not to research a show in Europe. Although Mark disagreed with my argument, he told me he would follow up with me as to the progress of this initiative; and since he was the President of the Association at the time, I fully expected him to stay true to his commitment to do so. So you can imagine my shock to see in writ-ing he is proud to announce publicly that he broke his word to me. As he says, after all he knew I dis-

agreed with the direction they were now going to go in, so why bother following up with me as he said he would? Any of you that knew my dad would know he taught me that the measure of a man is that he will do what he said he would do. So simply stat-ed Mark, using your words, why should I need to? How about simply because you said you would? And yet the leadership wonders why they keep get-ting labeled as arrogant by the membership.

Quick note while we are on arrogance: There was a news release that was made on August 1 by the ICA (over a month and a half ago as I write this) announcing that the current President and Past Pres-ident will be remaining in their Board positions for an additional year. These are normally 1 year term positions. There was no explanation given, just an announcement. This is a very unusual practice. I have to assume there is a logical explanation for the Board and the nominations committee (of which the Past President is the chairman and the President sits on) to take such an unusual action. But appar-ently we, the membership, deserve no such explana-tion. The Board gets agitated with the membership when we take what we hear through the grapevine as fact and yet they provide us with little or no in-formation to stop such behavior from happening. If there was at least some communication and trans-parency on these issues, they could easily stop this from happening.

Continuing with the issues, here is more from that email I wrote to the Board:

European showThere may very well be a need for a show that is

carwash focused in Europe. I just dont see where we became primarily now a trade show company and have published that our strategy now is to produce world class trade events. We believe the strategy should be related to member-fi rm issues and devel-opment of value-based offerings for that paying mem-bership in North America. Yes, we put on a show that pays the bills one show our show. Not one that has been described by the leadership as a Eu-

ropean show for the benefi t of the European market. If the strategy is to produce world class trade events, I would suggest you start here with our stagnant show. Membership is up now for 4 years in a row, the in-dustry has also grown each year since 2009, and yet we cannot grow attendance at the main show in that same time frame. Doesnt that make you question the results? There seems to be issues every year with atten-tion to detail at the show. This year was no exception. And when they try new things there doesnt seem to be any follow through. For example, the second night of the show the ICA organized networking dinners. They

were a disaster. There was no one at the restaurants that knew what to do. There was no one there from the ICA helping to make sure things went well. My people were assigned to each venue. Each told horror stories, as was reported in one of the magazines, that said something to effect of; There were

4 of us there, me an attendee and two guys from Son-nys. I can give you many more examples of lack of detail, some of which will be reported to you by ESAC. And then you tell us you want to produce world class trade show events. You only have a certain number of assets. Our show will suffer even further from your de-cision to produce a show in Europe.

The leadership admitted to us, in the meeting that took place in Chicago after the show, that in-deed they did not survey the membership on this initiative. It has further been shown by some of the articles and interviews from the ICA leadership that they believe they not only didnt need to do a sur-vey, they further state that not doing a survey was not an oversight. It was by design and certainly not necessary. Again I quote Mark:

The ICA, like the United States, is not run by a majority vote of the membership. Its run by an elect-ed board of directors who volunteer their time and are guided by a dedicated staff, who, by the way, are now even more dedicated to the success of the ICA given their livelihoods now depend on its success.

I agree with Mark that the association is run by the Board on a day-to-day basis. But, I also believe that the Board is supposed to represent the paying member fi rms and do what is in that groups best interest, not in the best interest as they say of the global industry. When the Board is investigating

{continued}

LETTERS

If there was at least some communication and transparency on these issues, they could easily stop this from happening.

Photos that appeared in our Spring review of Car Wash Show depict a packed room for an early bird panel discussion in 2003, and its nearly empty counterpart at this years show.

8 FALL 2014

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an initiative that is way outside the normal bounds of what we do, or as the ICA President stated at the meeting in Chicago referring to the European show when he called it a big change, shouldnt the membership have some say before announcing it as a done deal? There was not one public article I can find discussing this was going on behind the scenes, and by the Boards account, this was at least 3 years in the making. I simply believe that the Boards fo-cus should be on the show we now have. It is good, but it has a lot of room for improvement.

This publication, I believe, did a good job in the Spring issue pointing out the good and bad of the Chicago show. One item mentioned in that article described the education offering, something that many of us have said needs improvement. In Marks article he speaks to the point of the loss of value now offered by the show as he states:

Historically, I used to bring more people to the show. It was a perk for my employees. But I know I speak for many operators who now view that as an expense that needed to be cut back.

So obviously Mark agrees that that the price to bring his team to the show is higher than the value they will get by attending the show and the educa-tion that is part of that show. Here he and I agree. The ICA did a study back in 2008. They hired a guy that is thought to be one of the best experts on trade shows. That experts report included the recommendation to lower the total cost of the show to both the vendors and the attendees. Then a com-mittee was formed to do a study based on the re-search and recommendations of that expert. Here are a few of the recommendations and findings sent to the Board based on that exercise:The cost to attend and exhibit at the show con-

tinues to increase faster than the increase in perceived value. Focus attention on reducing the cost to attend and exhibit at the show.

Timing and location of the show makes a dif-ference. Re-commit to holding the show in Las Vegas every year between April 1 and May 15

Make a renewed commitment to delivering world class education at the show

Unfortunately, these and several of the other recommendations in that report fell on deaf ears. Tell me, why bother hiring an expert if you refuse to then implement his recommendations? Why Nashville for 2015 when the expert recommends Las Vegas? There may be a newer report that I have not seen. If there isnt, then again, I would suggest forgetting about Europe and doing what is needed to make our show a world class event.

The third major issue I have with the ICA is the fact we now directly employ several members of the ICA staff, including the CEO. Please see again an excerpt from my letter to the Board:

Hiring staffFor those of you that have been in the industry for

more than 20 years, you will remember when we had the association run by Gus Trantham. The association was run into the ground and almost bankrupt. Once the members finally got together and removed him, we

swore we would never have employees or one group control us. We sent an RFP out to several companies that handle associations like ours. We also agreed that it would be routine that we would send an RFP out every few years as a matter of policy in order to make sure no one company ever became too strong or too comfortable and controlled our association again. Yet, here we are again with in-house employees. No one will deny that the show is the one thing that holds this as-sociation together. Yet, this management team has been unable to make any headway in increasing the show numbers for the last five years. In fact, they individually have told me they do not believe we will see numbers of attendees increase with any significance based on the changes taking place in the industry. To have people in charge that believe such a thing and have proven to us they cannot grow the show, to me, should be dealt with by the Board. Where is the accountability? If they continually miss goals, what are the consequences? Do you have a set review for Eric and staff that has been outlined and defined to make it clear if his performance is up to par or not? Simple KPIs and goals that are specific and must be met as you would do with any upper level employee. With a review each year that is then passed on to each incoming president to continue the process. If these people worked for you at your com-pany and told you they could not grow your company and /or produced no progress for 5 straight years, you would replace them. Well, they do work for you as di-rectors of the association. So, why do you do nothing in this case to hold them accountable or replace them with people that can get the job done? And, this is the staff that you now say is ready to do world class trade shows around the world?

The argument that I used about the staff telling me that the show numbers cannot increase is again echoed in the article Mark wrote:

You start by trying to frame the current years atten-dance as a negative without taking into consideration any of the external forces that might and in fact do im-pact our attendance. Most notably: the consolidation of our industry both on the vendor and operator sides. Couple that with the economic fall out of the last few years and it might explain why there are less people on the floor.

So again here we see exactly the same argument

being used as to the lack of grow at the show. I have to totally disagree. The consolidation is virtually insignificant. On the vendor side, it has affected a handful of exhibitors, yet we have fallen from, in round numbers, 400 exhibitors to now 300. And on the operator side, the numbers are insignificant if you are looking at the industry as a whole. For example, if we take the largest carwash company in the US at the time I am writing this, they have fewer than 150 locations. There are only a few companies according to the Top 50 survey done each year that have over 50 locations and several of them are not consolidators but family owned operations. Yes, the industry is changing and more operators own multiple sites than in the past, and yes, this has displaced some of the previous own-ers. But, if the ICAs numbers are correct and there are in excess of 80,000 carwash locations in Amer-

ica, then tell me again why consolidation and or dis-placement of a few hundred is the reason for a lack of growth at the show?

I believe the lack of growth goes back to the re-port I mentioned earlier. Cost vs. value. Guys, this isnt rocket science. We have lost a significant fol-lowing based on our inability to attract our base the smaller owner operator that is the backbone of our industry. This publication has made it clear that the Self-Serve market feels left behind by the asso-ciation. Trust me, you guys are not the only ones that feel left out. So the industry is in growth mode, but the show is stagnant. To me, it should cause great concern at the Board level. And now they will get competition with Automechanika starting to do shows here in the US starting in the Spring of 2015. I respectfully suggest to the Board they get this fig-ured out before they kill the golden goose that keeps

this association alive.The show numbers that were published in this

magazines Spring issue speak for themselves: In the last five years the activity in our industry has been positive, yet the numbers do not reflect that. I have not seen the projections for each year that the ICA staff was looking for, but I have to believe they missed their projections since I would hope they were striving for growth. Based on the numbers and

LETTERS

LOCATION YEAR ATTENDEES

CHICAGO 2014 5600

VEGAS 2013 5900

VEGAS 2012 5700

VEGAS 2011 5500

VEGAS 2010 5000

VEGAS 2004 10600

VEGAS 2003 9900

CHICAGO 2002 9160

{continued}

Tell me, why bother hiring an expert if you refuse to then implement his recommendations? Why Nashville for 2015 when the expert recommends Las Vegas?

10 FALL 2014

their continued statements that growth is impos-sible, at what point do we change management? Again to me a very simple business argument. If you (the staff and Board) believe you cant grow the numbers, then we need to find someone that can. By hiring the staff, these decisions are now much more complicated (and personally dif-ficult) for the Board. We are now in the exact position that we vowed we would never allow ourselves to be in.

Revenue Driven DecisionsFor those that were in attendance at the after

show meeting in Chicago, it became apparent that the European show decision was strictly a revenue driven decision. It was explained in that meeting that the goal is to take the profit from that show and use it to offer more benefits to the member-ship. So, as one of those in the audience of that meeting pointed out, the decision for a European show was not member, vendor or even industry driv-en, but apparently was profit driven based on the explanation given to us at this meeting. Yes, we will all agree that the Board has a fiduciary obligation to make sure the association stays financially viable. However, in looking at the reserves we now have, why do we find ourselves seeing several decisions that seem strictly profit driven and what appears to be against the memberships wishes?Show in EuropeCentury ClubCar Wash MagazinePartnership with the WCAAll have been described as revenue plays. All seem

to be against the memberships wishes and, when looked at closely, against the spirit of what the asso-ciation is supposed to be about. I have already spo-ken about the European show, so here I will give my opinion about the Century Club, the magazine, and the deal with the WCA.

The Century Club is, as described by the ICA web site, an exclusive opportunity for vendors to build their brand and reach new customers for a price of $7,500.00 per year. I would have no issue with the ICA creating yet another sponsorship opportunity, except until they created this opportunity, we as paying members of the vendor community, all re-ceived on a regular basis a copy of the new leads that came into and were captured by the ICA. Now, the only way to get those leads is to pay an additional $7500 a year. I believe this is an unfair practice as it puts a financial burden on the smaller vendor com-panies that cannot afford this additional price tag. It clearly gives an unfair advantage to the larger exhib-itor and, in my opinion, goes exactly against what an association is supposed to be about all in the name of additional revenue that it appears the as-sociation does not need at this time. I was surprised that the association would do something knowingly taking away a perk we were already paying for and now putting the smaller vendors at a disadvantage with this new charge. I presented my thoughts on this to the Board at the meeting in Chicago. Here are Marks comments on my argument:

And the rant about the Century Club oh my good-ness! Well, I think the solution there is to give everyone 10x10 booths so that its fair for everyone. Wouldnt you agree? I mean just because Paul and Bellanger can afford to pay for a lot of booth space shouldnt mean they should be able to, right?

Mark, first of all its B.E.L.A.N.G.E.R. That com-pany is one of the ICAs largest clients. After 8+ years on the Board, I would hope you would show them enough respect to at least spell the name right. Sec-ond, you missed the entire point of my argument. I would simply ask that in the future if you are going to attack my position, please make sure you under-stand what that position is before you comment.

The Car Wash Magazine - It is my belief that the association should not compete with its member firms. There are several trade magazines for our in-dustry, most if not all of which, are members of the association. Yet the ICA decided to create a maga-

zine to compete with these other members. Why? The ICA already had its electronic newsletter to communicate with membership. When I asked, I was told they did it for the revenue once again.

The partnership with the WCA - For those of you that dont know, this partnership came with a price tag. I would tell you the details if I knew them, but for some reason it is impossible to get the details of what exactly this partnership is all about. All I could get to date was that the WCA will not have a trade show starting in 2015 and going for the nine years that follow and in return the ICA will pay them some undisclosed amount of money for that concession. And where is that money coming from? The rates that the vendors now have to pay to the ICA for floor space at the show have gone up in my case by 12% - specif-ically because of this new partnership. Personally, I will miss the WCA show. I dont believe we will

see an increase in attendance to the ICA show from the Western states (especially in Nashville) to justify the 12% increase in fees. I think the Regional Associ-ations serve a purpose. I think this move by the ICA shows that they are losing value at the show they are producing and, therefore, felt threatened enough to buy out the WCA show.

So why are they so revenue driven now when their financial statements show a large amount of cash in reserves? I understand the Boards argu-ment that if the show in Europe is successful, they will have more money to spend on member benefits. But lets take a closer look and lets be honest with ourselves. We are a small association and will nev-er have enough funds to do a national advertising campaign promoting washing. The only way we can promote nationally is through a gorilla social media

REVENUE 2003 2013

Member dues 644,231 584,436 -59,795

Convention/exhibit fees 3,123,221 3,063,694 -59,527

Member services 12,620 63,795

Portal income 60,900

TOTAL REVENUE 3,840,972 3,711,925 -129,047

EXPENSES

Convention 1,684,119 1,650,034 -34,085

Member services 583,402 263,563 -319,839

General and Admin 954,613 1,539,059 +584,446

Portal Expense 110,100

Other 5,020 21,199

TOTAL EXPENSE 3,337,254 3,473,855 +136,601

INCOME FROM OPERATIONS 503,718 238,070 -265,648

{continued}

LETTERS

By hiring the staff, these decisions are now much more complicated (and personally difficult) for the Board. We are now in the exact position that we vowed we would never allow ourselves to be in.

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LETTERScampaign or possible charity drive that gets picked up by the national media. We have also been told that some of the proceeds from the show in Europe will remain there to pay for services for the Europe-an carwash community.

So lets look at the actual numbers as given to us by the association. They do publish for the member-ship a one page financial snapshot that at least gives us an idea of the numbers. This year for 2013 it was published in one of the issues of the Car Wash Mag-azine. I will compare some of todays numbers to those they published in 2003 for a ten year compar-ison keeping in mind the Board is telling us they need to do these initiatives to raise more money to provide more benefits.

So to me the numbers show that the overall rev-enue is essentially the same: 3.8 vs. 3.7The convention revenues and expenses are also

essentially the same: 3.1 vs. 3.0 / 1.68 vs. 1.65 The numbers that stand out are:The Member services expense. We are now

getting $319K less in member benefits/services than in 2003.

And the Income is now down by $265K.So where did that swing of $584K (319 + 265)

come from?The General and Adminis-

tration expense went from $950K to over $1.5MM.

Simple suggestion: Forget Eu-rope get your current house in order. Let me say this loud and clear: Yes I agree I dont have all the details. The association by design does not provide them to us. So I am making this suggestion with the limited numbers and information we as members have been given. But it certainly appears by the numbers that they do give us that if indeed they want to provide us with more services, we dont need more revenue. We need for someone to take a close look at what changed in the last ten years that made it cost us over a half million dollars more to operate on essen-tially the same revenue and other expenses as we had 10 years ago. Today we have better software and systems at our disposal. Why then would the G&A increase by more than 50%? I am not suggesting that anything underhanded is happening. By design, the Board members only serve one year as Treasur-er. It is hard enough to take on that position and understand the actual budget and workings of the association in that time frame. It is nearly impossible to take control enough to then make further sug-gestions for improvement on a moving target while still trying to run your own business. In looking at the ten years of reports provided to membership, it looks like a slow uptick of the G&A number that took place over that time period now resulting in the $584K difference. But considering the size of that number, it may be worth an in depth review.

The same report shows net assets at $4.7 million

with over $5 million in investments. Given these facts and the fact we as an association are still prof-itable, I dont see the need for profit initiatives that go against memberships wishes. We are not in an emergency situation trying to stay afloat. Mark men-tions I brought up the cash reserves at the meeting in Chicago. He stated:

As to the reserves: while there are substantial re-serves for the ICA, our by-laws (which were voted on by Paul Fazio when he was a director) require us to maintain one years revenues in reserve and are re-stricted from being used.

Mark is correct as to the requirement of one years revenue. And yes, I was on the board at that time and did vote for this policy as Mark suggests. I, then and still today, feel that was the right vote to insure the financial position of the ICA. My question and concern is why it appears we have now in excess of that amount in the fund and are still chasing reve-nue? And Mark, let me remind you, we take an oath not to discuss outside of the Board meetings any spe-cifics about how a Board member voted on any issue. Publishing something suggesting how I voted on an issue just to help you make a point to me is a clear violation of that oath. With that said, I am proud of

my time on the Board and stand by my vote.I could go on and write several more pages on

smaller issues that I believe should be revisited, but I think it would be counter-productive. Bottom line: I believe an association by definition is supposed to represent the interests of the member firms of an in-dustry. I cant help but find it troubling to see the President of the association state in a flyer he recent-ly sent out to the membership that the Board is in agreement with a task force study done in 2002 that states they will place greater emphasis on matters of importance to the car care industry and less on mat-ters of importance to the members of the Interna-tional Carwash Association. The Board keeps telling us they are global Industry focused now rather than member driven. I guess I just dont want to believe it. So of course we now question who represents us? They have made it clear that the ICA no longer does. They now represent the industry and believe whats good for the industry is, in fact, whats good for the members even if the paying members are over-whelmingly against their decision as I believe is the case with the show in Europe.

I believe programs and services that should be pro-vided in the foundation of the association include:Dealing with government agencies like with

drought conditionsDealing with the Auto Manufacturers on wash

ability, engineering and consumer relations as in the past

Networking within the industryProviding a Trade ShowHaving the best available industry based edu-

cationThe overall consensus I hear from those I speak

with will tell you it is the show that holds this whole thing together. The membership is hard pressed to tell you what else we are getting from the associa-tion that adds value for us, hence the small amount of paying members. I think the association has done a great job helping with the water issues. I am dis-appointed they stopped our relationship with the automakers. We had a great program that was bene-ficial to both the vendor and operator communities. I dont know about you but some of the new things the automakers are coming out with have me con-cerned like the new matte finishes.

I think the biggest problem we have with getting things moving in the right direction, or in any direc-tion, is the lack of involvement from membership (and from the operators that gave up and left the

association). I have been vocal about my discontent, in fact too vocal according to some. But like many of you, I love this industry. I have been washing cars professionally for over 30 years and plan to stick around for many years to come. I know I have stirred

the pot in the past and probably will in the future. I just hope you guys understand I, like the Board members I am arguing with, have the best interest of the association in mind. I dont expect you to agree with my opinion, but I would love to see you express yours. Thats how we move forward together.

Last item: As shown above, Mark refers in his ar-ticle to my rant at the Chicago meeting when I spoke about my feelings on the Century Club. Per-haps with the writing of this article it is now clear to him and others why I think it is a flawed sponsor-ship. Mark, you can call it a rant, I prefer to think of it as passion. Heck, I was just getting started but had to leave to catch a flight home. I have to believe the first reaction the Board will have to this rebuttal to Marks article is that I dont have all the facts. They are right, because for some reason they dont want to give membership the facts, or be transpar-ent in any fashion. So I can only comment on the snippets they think we are worthy of seeing. We will not all agree, but I would hope we can at least keep the dialogue positive, on the issues and refrain from the public personal attacks.

Thanks for listening,Paul Fazio

Your thoughts and comments can be e-mailed to Kate Carr at katec@sscwn.com

Simple suggestion: Forget Europe get your current house in order. Let me say this loud and clear: Yes I agree I dont have all the details.

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Last issue, we brought you the Self Serve panel discussion from this years record-setting HCA Show. Well, they

also had a good General Q & A session with a couple of industry veterans that we thought we should share:

BRACE YOURSELVES...

Winter is ComingBy: Jackson Vahaly

BONUS Coverage of Heartland Show

Pat: So most peoples business is up these days over last year. Whats the new trend out there? What have you guys done added to your washes whats working?

Audience member: Weve added credit cards to the self serve bays.

Pat: What system did you go with?

Audience member: Combination cant remember right now Im drawing a blank.

Pat: But its making you some money?

Audience member: Yeah, well were getting to be such a cashless society, young people especial-ly dont have any cash in their pockets. Weve had numerous people have to go across the street to the ATM because we didnt take credit cards. Weve taken credit cards in our IBAs for quite some time. Probably 65% of our business in the IBAs is with credit cards, so I think you need to do that just to capture that extra revenue thats available.

Pat: Out of your self serve bays, whats your mix

of the people who are still using quarters, and the people who are using credit cards?

Audience member: Oh, Id say probably 15% of its credit card.

Pat: Thats what Im seeing, too, at my locations. We added the credit cards, the CryptoPay system, and people like it because it operates just like your self serve bay where youve go the button, you can add a quarter if you want, but after 2 years were just at 15% right now. The quarters have stayed steady, and weve got 15% new business.

Audience member: And weve got another type of system at another wash and we can track it, and the people with the credit card are spend-ing more money per bay. You will get more reve-nue because theyre not watching the meter. When theyre done theyre hitting the button.

Pat: How many are using credit cards in their self serve bays, and how many are using a count-up, and how many are using a count-down?

{continued}

Allen Hansen: Owner, Spotfree Carwash, Des Moines, IAHes the out-going president of the HCA

Board of Directors, and currently owns 2 locations and is looking for an addi-tional location. Hes been in the industry since the 80s, and has been involved with equipment fabrication, installation, design and operation of self serve and touch-free automatic locations.

Pat Shannon: Owner, Big Johns Carwash, Bellev-ue, NEA 3 year HCA Board member, hes an owner

operator with self serve carwashes in the Omaha metro area. He is retired military and a combat disabled veteran. By trade, Pat is an accountant and Senior Partner of Bulldawg Tax & Accounting.

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Audience member: If you want the exact same experience for the customers that theyre used to with quarters, you do the count-down. You swipe the credit card, you do a pre-auth, you start with your 4 minutes, and you count it down. Some of the systems allow for that. The ip side to that is the count-up. Its sitting there going and the longer they go then the more you make. So, its a philosophical debate. You guys who are do-ing count-up, do you feel youre making more per customer that way?

Audience member: Absolutely. In my truck bays Ive got the pre-auth set at $30 and a lot of them max it out.

Allen: I think the revenue potential for count-up is greater. It depends on the equipment you have. Most all the manufacturers do both up and down, but Im a proponent of count-up myself. We are ap-proaching a 45% credit/debit card use. One thing we are seeing after the Target fi asco, Ive seen people that are not using their debit cards anymore and have gone back to using their cred-it cards. Thats because theyre worried about their bank ac-count being exposed with the debit card. The onus is back on the credit card company with re-gards to fraud. So the charges are a little bit higher with the credit card than with the debit.

Audience member: Did you experience any kind of problem getting your customers used to count-up with a credit card? Did they just g-ure it out when they read the signs? Nobody reads signs, but

Allen: My joke is that my signs are there to cover holes in the wall, but yeah theres an education there. The younger crowd seems to get it a little quicker than the older crowd theyre exposed to technology. Were in the process of doing some things with some QR codes and maybe doing a youtube video that they could view on their smart phone that they could use as an education tool. No huge issues though. It came to them after they used it once. I got a few phone calls its really pretty easy. All the manufacturers products are pretty user-friendly compared to 10 years ago. I think if you can incorporate it into your existing equipment as easily as possible thats best. If the experience is easy enough then theyll tell their friend. Thats probably been where weve seen our biggest growth is in the credit card use and the fact that the credit card customer is spending about 20% more than the cash customer.

Pat: From my perspective I looked at is as a cost-per-bay implement and what kind of customer ex-perience you were going to provide. Those are the 2 hot buttons.

Audience member: I was just wondering what everyones maximum numbersthe pre-auth?

Pat: Theres two different numbers. Youve got a pre-auth where they swipe it and check to make sure its a valid card and authorize it for a certain charge. So lets just check that how many people are using a $10 pre-auth? Everybody seems to be right around $10. In the truck bay youre doing $30? It pre-auths $10 each time and it rolls that way if the customer runs out of money it just shuts off. The customer can use ithe pre-auth ac-

cording to how you program your equipment. So, you can program it to start at $2 or you can pro-gram it to start at zero and count up, but you can set the pre-auth independent of what the charge is going to be. Some of the systems have now gotten to where manufacturers will allow you to consol-idate charges. You can use them in a bay. You can use them in the vacuum. Vending. And then it will consolidate all those into one charge so you only pay one transaction fee. Those are some of the fea-tures you want to look at because the transaction fees can eat you up and cost you on profi tability.

Allen: Were not experts on the matter and most of what Ive learned is from making mistakes, so I encourage you to ask the vendors exhibiting on

the fl oor whether theyre an equipment manufac-turer, whether theyre a processor. What we have now, as cars change the next 3-5 years, as we have encrypted cars the technologys going to have to change. So thats something you want to ask to, what will have to happen in the future to take an encrypted-type car because what we have now, more than likely, wont work because I dont think any standards have been fully adopted so ask those guys on the fl oor because they know more than we do.

Moderator: Allen, you did something unique to your wash where you had an existing facility and your retro-fi tted the fl oor zone heating for winter de-icing. Can you explain that process and how it is possible to retro-fi t an existing location?

Allen: About 4-5 years ago as we all started experiencing the downturn in the economy and looking at ways to save money and one of the things I looked at was the lighting. I didnt think LED lights were quite there yet so I dropped that. I looked at high effi ciency boilers which I thought was the fi rst step. I was able to run my washed in more inclimate weather. So what we looked was if you have an exist-ing carwash, and youve got your approaches on the north-side and the south-side of the building a lot of systems have one big pump and all of that is one zone

and one thermostat on the outside air. I looked at it where I would turn the system on when it was cold outside, but it was actually sensing the tem-perature of each particular concrete slab with a temperature probe within the slab. Some systems have done that for several years by turning the equipment off and on, but I wanted to take that one step farther, so we started one site, zoning it, so weve been doing that now for about 2 years and it is basically cutting our gas to that site, even in the coldest winter, probably by about 30 35% on average. Its not super expensive. There may be some vendors that are do it, but I basically kinda created myself with doing some research. What it boils down to is taking the existing zones and separating them on the individual valves or pumps and put a little controller with a temperature con-troller for each zones slab put power readers on it. Its kinda funny to see maybe on different tem-peratures so the side that faces the south is set at a certain temperature and the side that faces the north is a different temperature. Automatic bays are even a different temperature. Now our meters pretty much refl ect what I thought they would. In the past, when I had it all on one system, youre ra-

BONUS Coverage of Heartland Show

{continued}

20 FALL 2014

diating that heat out no matter whether you need it or not. Its equally spreading it out. So on the south side, where I really didnt need any heat I was just sending that energy out to everywhere. Where now, it only runs when that side gets so cold so that slab only runs about 25% as much as the one on the north side of the building. I pretty much new that based on the sun and shade and everything else. Automatic bays are the same way. The doors open and close my busiest bay does about twice as many cars my next slowest bay. There are some manufactures out there that of-fer some of this. One thing you have with existing sites thats a challenge is you may not know what goes where. So one of the things in the process of doing the next month or so is Ive found one of the places that actually rent infrared technology ? that gives you a visual analysis and you turn on your floor key when the floors are actually cold and show the pipes as being idle and trying to fig-ure out what goes where an older site where I had older pipes and nothings worked. And were going to try to isolating some of those. So, thats kind of the long explanation its fairly simple once you figure it out and something that were going to start doing as we remodel sites.

Moderator: Youre taking each individual bay then?

Allen: No, Ill probably group bays, like if I have 3 bays the same exposure Im probably going to do all 3 of those bays on one particular pump or one temperature sensor. The nice thing about it is some of the temperature controls will allow you to insert more than one probe and it will take an average between them. So you might have 3 bays with a probe in 2 of them an inside and an out-side facing the wall or something. I think the most gain that you will have is if you have any outside approaches - heated areas in front of ACWs, tell-ers, things like that. Its a way to get the heat where it needs to be gotten to and not wasted because its just going to radiate out into the atmosphere.

Moderator: Allen, do you use a slab set?

Allen: Yes, we went out and we did some boring? - we did some different things to the edges of con-crete and we kinda knew where some of the pipes were in the concrete so we just so be basically just drilled in 12 to 16 and inserted a probe into the concrete slab and theres a low voltage? wire that goes back to a temperature controller and we can set each individual area at a different temperature. The outer?hour meters were nice because I want-ed to know if I was wasting money. There wasnt any science behind some of the stuff I was looking into. The outer?hour meters prove where the heat goes to or doesnt go to.

Audience member: We have the same kin-da issue, did you think about just maybe moni-

toring the return temperature and that driving the VFD? on the pump?

Allen: Yes. In fact, we used to start the system on air temperature when it got to 34 and then we had a return stat coming back from the floors and you certainly do the same thing if youre running a pump through these particular areas and see what the return temperature was back from that partic-ular loop and controlling VFD is something that would be the next step to look at. My thinking is if Im going to pursue this any farther right now, its just a combination of several controllers that I can buy at a wholesale house and some relays. The next step would probably have an engineer write a program and using a PLC. There are some over-the-counter products out there. I think Watts makes a product and some of these things get fair-ly sophisticated where you can access them over the internet and on smart phones and change your temperatures. I didnt want to get quite that fancy, but I felt as though certain buildings I was wasting gas because of the way the system was built.

Moderator: While were talking about floor heat you mentioned renovating some properties, does anybody have any experience adding on addi-tional bays and connecting it to existing floor heat and adding loops if youve got the capacity with your boiler already?

Allen: If youre working with someone who sells boilers or sell equipment they typically should be able to do the math. Theres formulas out there with how many BTUs I thought it was some-thing like 150 BTUs per square foot here in the Midwest. You size your tubing and merge that into a bigger manifold. It gets fairly sophisticated. A lot of the carwashes used to be a one inch polyeth-ylene tube through one bay and thats all there was and a copper manifold. I would encourage you to find a vendor that works with carwashes that can size something for you. Trying to tie into an exist-ing loop is probably already 15% - 20% to being maxed out, so I would always encourage you to in-stall a new header and run some bigger lines back to the boiler and run those floors off of the new sets of loops. But if you know your existing boiler and you know the floor square footage, they can pretty much tell you if youre maxed out. Most of those things are typically sized, Ive been told that within 15% -20%, otherwise they get worried about short-cycling if they get too large.

Moderator: Are you still activating that floor heat by air temperature or floor?

Allen: Yeah, I think air temperature for me. There have been moisture sensors and snow sen-sors. Theres a variety of things that are out there, but some of those things arent as reliable in our wet, corrosive bay environment I guess, so Im ac-tivating mine personally off of air temperature, but

then were actually controlling off the actual tem-perature of the concrete itself once the fluid starts running through it. Its kind of ironic that on the day where its 28 degrees outside the floor heat is not running on any of our south-facing exposure it doesnt run all day because the sun is out. On the north side, its running at 75%. So in the past, that would be all on one loop and all that heat on the south-side was just being pushed out into the atmosphere.

I like that idea because we replaced our boiler with a high efficiency and now its capable of do-ing 3 zones but we didnt use it because we have one giant loop so Ill have to check that out.

Moderator: What else is out there?

Pat: One of the things we did in our wash was we went from single phase to 3 phase power which was a savings all by itself. The other thing we did was added what they call a power saver and its like a giant capacitor that will store power. So when the power and pumps and things start, you dont have that big spike demand for the electric-ity going. The capacitor absorbs that because we get billed on peak demand, so adding the power saver cut out power bills by 20% and it was a fairly inexpensive device to install.

Were gonna put cordova wax available in self serve bay, were going to use a Hydroflex system to propel that. Its going to be low pressure on a sepa-rate gun, and were struggling with how were go-ing to freeze-control that in the winter. Anybody know how to do this?

Allen: I tried air and I ended up thawing lines for 3 winters with air blowing out I just couldnt get it to work consistently. I was spending so much on electricity generating air to do it repeatedly. We finally just hooked ours up to our same weep sys-tem that our high pressure guide is on the same wall. Thats what Ive done for 5 years. I dont have doors on both ends of my bays, so if you have doors on both ends you dont have much of a cold issue, but thats the only way I can get it to work.

Pat: I know theres a company in northern Min-nesota that blows anti-freeze through the lines - I dont think theyve come to the show yet. Has anyone tried that with the blown anti-freeze systems? Thats one Im curious about because I know were all trying to save money on the utility bills but our waters killing us weeping.

Allen: We recirculate our weep water. Its the only advantage that I have is its piped into a pit and its basically a sump pump that recirculates it and refills with waste. Last year was one of the coldest winters that Ive ever experienced, and I only had to thaw one or two things because we some ice got on the tip or whatever on the foamy guns. Ive had foamy guns for 9 years, and weeping

BONUS Coverage of Heartland Show

{continued}

FALL 2014 21

22 FALL 2014

is the only thing Ive found to make work and un-fortunately, it takes a fair amount of water because most of those foamy guns have a big tip hole so we just put a meter valve on it and hooked it up to same pump that we circulate the water and it goes back into the pit and it pumps it out.

Moderator: Do any of the manufacturers make and anti-freeze product?

Allen: There are some things that have a heat-ed wire that go down through the hoses. Theres a company that makes brushes that go down through the foamy guns. Theres a process where you can buy a solution that after a timer it pumps an anti-freeze solution back in the hose.

Moderator:You had mentioned the power sav-er device, is that installed on each individual device?

Pat: Yes, the device itself installs on your elec-tric panel and all you have to do is hook into one breaker and it covers the demand for the entire location. The name of the company is Power Saver. John and I put it on our personal homes as well and weve had at least 30% savings.

Moderator: Can you explain how that peak

billing works as far as how were billed?

Pat: Im from Nebraska and we have whats called demand billing, so if you have all 6 motors come on at the same time and youve got a big spike, the public service commission is allowed to bill you at that spike level for an hour. The power factor is one of the factors in the billing calculation, and to achieve the savings, you have to get that lowered.

Allen: The power savers ideal on your power , but also look into BFD drives on some of the options you have. I looked at my self serve pump stands and it wasnt really worth changing - my motors were 10 years old and much utility for as much as they turn off and on. It really only works for something that runs continuously like an air handler or some industrial device. Were really banking on replacing all our lighting with LED now to save electricity, but I think the average self serve carwash would be hard-pressed on the motors to do much. On the automatics and the dryers, I think theres defi nitely some lee-way there with some others. Look at some of the rebate programs that are possibly out there on stuff that runs longer. Look at that instead of things that run short cycles.

Moderator: Pat, how much research did you do on the Power Savers before you commissioned a company to do this for you, and is there anybody else using that option?

Pat: I did as much as I could. Im not an electri-cian. Its not an expensive option. The 3 phase unit they sell for around $700 and an electrician puts it in it just connects to one breaker.

Allen: Think of it as a bladder tank. What its really doing is when those motors kick on, you have noticed your lights will dim, it stores energy and it takes the big boom out of it when all those things happen at once and levels them out. Its been around industrial processes for a long time, and fi nally fi ltered down to our industry.

Pat: If anyones going to work on your electrical system, you have to discharge it and let that power go. It keeps the whole thing live even through your main breaker off youre still live. Peak amperage is measured off the highest peak of the 3 phases. The best thing to do is to have 3 phase motors, but again, lighting, vacuums are single phase, so one thing thats cheap to do fi rst-off is to check and balance your loads. Thats free.

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From All Paws Pet Wash: Pet Wash Locator

All Paws Pet Wash, a company which manufactures pet wash systems for use in the self serve car wash industry, has created a website to help consumers fi nd pet wash systems around the country. Findapetwash.com has a zip code search engine to help customers fi nd the pet wash closest to them, with specifi cations for type of pet wash and zone radius. Listings are free for All Paws Pet Wash system owners.

From Blendco: The Chemical blending/monitoring system

The SuperSmart System is an interactive, infor-mation-based chemical blending and monitoring system.

SuperSmart utiliz-es super-concentrated alkaline and acid bas-es combined with su-per-concentrated sol-vents and surfactants to blend a fi nal de-tergent at your loca-tion thus saving you money. The system electronically mon-itors measurements through fl oats and fl ow meters which allows for up-to-the-minute usage and cost information.

With SuperSmart, you can:Remotely access real time information about

inventory.Access how much chemical was used and the

From Vehicle Wash Systems, Inc.:FASTRAC In-Bay Mini Tunnel

The FASTRAC mini-tunnel from Vehicle Wash Systems, Inc. will fi t in the same space as most in-bay automatics, yet processes four times more vehicles per hour. Plus, its simple mechani-cal design is easy to maintain and it is priced com-porable to an in-bay automatic system.

FASTRAC features the heavy-duty Over and Under Conveyor. This conveyor is engineered to provide years of trouble-free service under the toughest operating conditions.

Features:A. Roller Wheel CorrelatorB. Tunnel ControllerC. 45 Surface or Over n Under Conveyor With

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StationH. Side Washers(Cloth Washing Material)I. Flex Wrap Rounds (Foam Washing Material)J. Flashing Signs(Tri Foam/Sealer Wax)K. Dual Rinse Arch with Chemical StationL. Motor Control centerM. 45 Hp Blower Arch

INNOVATIONS

FALL 2014 25

HAMILTON TRANSACTION KIOSKADVANCED TECHNOLOGY. RUGGED CONSTRUCTION.

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number and type of washes for the day, month or since installation.

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From BumperSkinz: Bumper Protector for Car Wash Customers

Bumperskinz are pre-cut pieces of peel and stick clear fi lm that protect car bumpers from minor impacts caused by parallel parking, runaway shop-ping carts, careless garage attendants, and other

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BumperSkinz require no special tools, train-ing, heat or chemicals and can be applied by any-one (the car wash attendant or by the customer) in just about one minute. Theyre safe to use in the car wash environment, too! When its time for new Skinz, just pull up the corner of the old one and peel away from the painted surface.

From Turtle Wax Pro:Fire & Ice Wax and Shine

Turtle Wax Pro introduces its latest and most innovative products to date. FIRE & ICE work together to give carwash customers an unforget-table experience and an unprecedented wax and shine. FIRE & ICE includes three products:To start the show, FIRE WAX is applied as a

rich, red foam with carnauba base to maxi-mize protection and shine. It also provides a

customer-wowing cinnamon inferno scent. FIRE BATH is a dense red/yellow foam which

promotes a deeper clean with enhanced lu-bricity and a raspberry inferno scent.

Finally, ICE INSTANT SHINE ends the show. It is a total surface protectant for all vehicle surfaces which provides maximum water re-pellency on glass for improved visibility. ICE also protects and shines glass, chrome, plastic trim and paint and has a light foam signal with pleasant cool mango fragrance.

BRIGHT NEW IDEAS, PRODUCTS & SERVICES FOR SELF SERVE CARWASHESINNOVATIONS

26 FALL 2014

Whats New?Check out our latest offerings at Coleman Hanna

The Water Wizard FasTrak is a revolutionary touch-free in bay automatic. It provides reliable operation, consistent results, and increased uptime. The Water Wizard FasTrak has been engineered to maximize durability, reliability, and a low cost of ownership. The FasTrak directly responds to consumer demand for quality and speed in aesthetically pleasant environment. Increase profits and speed while ensuring customer satisfaction!

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FALL 2014 27

I saw something on the internet the other day about self-cleaning cars coming out.

Brad: Weve heard that for years, and it probably will be a reality some day, but me and my dad talk about it and I fi gure if they can apply it on an old car, than I can apply it as a detail on an old car, so theres a window of opportu-nity.

Tom: That was Nissan Im not too afraid of that.

Dale: I dont think that does anything for bugs. I think Rustoleum has a product you can spray on that does the same things, but were still gonna have bugs and were still gonna wash cars.

SSCWN: I know an executive at Nissan and asked him about it and he said theyve had that technolo-gy for years and its too expensive - he doesnt think anythings going to come of it.

Theres a self-serve that went out of business several years ago thats not far from our loca-tion and weve been trying to buy the piece of property. Its got basically the cement ev-erything else is gutted/gone. [We really want it] for the land because theyre almost right across the street from us. I dont think putting a [traditional] self serve there would be smart because Id still like to see it for the boats and I think self serve is going to go up because people arent building them anymore. So even-tually you still got motorcycles and boats, RVs,

that kind of vehicle. So Im more interested in whether I can get that property at a decent price. How is the gated/unlimited working Id like to hear more about that.

Marcus: I converted a carwash to a gated self serve about two years ago. Greg Pack and I were talking about it over lunch one day, and a friend of ours, Robert Greene, did it over in Savannah, GA. What I can tell about the gated self serve is you just have to have enough bays to make it work. I dont know if 3 or 4 bays would work because of the throughput.

I think theres 5 in this one.

And that might work we have seven and thats worked well. The fi rst year we did about $78,000, and this year were on pace to do about $120,000. So

that actual segment is grow-ing. In the last year we operat-ed it as a traditional self serve carwash we did $52,000. So its defi nitely trending up. Weve got a power point after lunch that will go over over all the numbers.

What about negotiating strategies?

Dale: Well, I guess I heard two things. Youre looking at a piece of property - whether or not thats a good invest-ment and whether or not thats a good investment for a carwash operation. If the property has the value of appreciating in that market then it might be worthwhile buying it for that purpose. Now do you need to actually

re-open that as a self serve carwash? What are the market needs? Thats what we always look at. You might already have a saturation point to a certain degree with whats out there currently, so make a business decision about whats going to give you the best return on your investment. Sometimes, thats taking the property and doing something else with it. Negotiating? Youve got to fi nd their weak point. The best thing there is to go fi nd out what the tax value is and what the last purchase price was go to the Register of Deeds for that. Then you negotiate from there.

Brad: Back when we were negotiating to buy self serves, we always looked at 3-5X gross. That was kind of the standard back then, so if you could get your hands on the numbers that might at least give

{continued}

For the SECWA Trade Show & Expo this past July, I decided to drive down from SSCWN

headquarters in Franklin, TN, with the fam and drop them off in Destin (on the gulf),

spending one night before driving over to Orlando the next day. Big mistake. I dont mean

attending the show, but driving instead of ying. Next year, the wifell drive down with the

kids and Ill y to Orlando and rent a car and drive over after the show. Oh well live and

learn. On to the show: There didnt seem to be as many self serve operators as at the HCA

show, but the panel discussion was exceptional (and not just because they asked me a few

questions about SSCWN)!

kids and Ill y to Orlando and rent a car and drive over after the show. Oh well live and

learn. On to the show: There didnt seem to be as many self serve operators as at the HCA

show, but the panel discussion was exceptional (and not just because they asked me a few

Brad Ray Owner/Operator of Coastal Car Wash, a chain of self serve and full serve carwashes located along the Gulf Coast, SECWA board member, and Vice President of Quality Systems and Services, Inc., a Mississippi-based carwash equipment supplier and service organization.

Tom Brister Owner/Operator of Mr. Toms Car Wash, a chain of self serve carwashes and express carwash in Louisiana.

Dale Reynolds President of Carolina Pride Carwash Systems and Solutions, SECWA Vice President.

Marcus Kittrell Owner, Marc-1 Express Car Wash, an Alabama chain of express and self serve carwash locations.

SELF SERVE & IBA PANEL DISCUSSION

28 FALL 2014

you a starting point. I dont know what the metric is now. Greg, do you any idea?

Greg: Its defi nitely gone down.

Brad: 2.5 to 3X? Okay.

Tom: You said theres a wash still on the property or just the concrete?

The concrete building is there in Florida theyre all block the roof is on.

Tom: Well if the property is permitted for car-wash, theres value in that.

Its got a perfect situation for gating in that theres a huge gutter on two or three sides and with two sides ones already got a fence on it, so itd be pretty simple to put a fence in the front for gated access. Its almost directly across the street from our express.

Tom: You may buy it for preservation. You know if you dont buy it somebody else might.

Brad: Thats where I was going. What if you wake up tomorrow and see an express sign in front of it? Id buy it to protect my market. We just did that. We bought two little red brick self serves. Who needs a self serve thats falling down? Well, I have an $800 4/1 down the street and I wouldnt let somebody else go in that market.

Marcus: Ive got an express and a gated self serve in the same market. Theyre about a mile apart. And then I just bought a 4-bay self serve last year thats right between them and I turned right around and sold it to a guy that wanted it more than I did. He fi xed it up and seems to be doing pretty good with it. His bays are pretty full now. I just sat on it and wasnt going to do anything with it.

Did you sell it with a no compete where he couldnt put an express on it?

Marcus: Its so tight you couldnt get an express on it. So, that can happen, but Im the one that sold it. Dale talked before about over-saturating an area, and I felt this was over-saturated and I think hell get some of the business that maybe we dont want at the gated self serve. Theres some business out there that you dont want. Hes in the 4-wheel drive business, so thats what he does and thats

the crowd hes catering to. So I encouraged him to buy it I was all about it. I liked the Facebook page and I was all over it.

Dale: If you can tie it in with your express busi-ness across the street thats a possibility.

Brad: There are way more benefi ts to being in the same market, and you can certainly use that when negotiating to get the price down.

Ive been working on it. They havent enter-tained our verbal offers.

Im sorry could you tell me brie y what is a gated self serve?

Marcus: Its basically where you gate around a carwash and then its a pay-one-price. So, we charge $6 and you go in there and you push a button, pay your money. It takes credit cards or cash. And then you go to the bay and you wash as long as you want or vacuum as long as you want.

So they can stay in there all day?

Marcus: If you want to, hey wear yourself out. And theres a few gated SS around. Ive got one, I know Robert Greene has one, and theres a couple of them down in Panama City. Nobody that has one has gone back the other way. I love mine.

What if you have six bays and the guys load them up in the morning and stay there all day?

Marcus: Thats not happening. Hopefully theyve got better things to do with their time then sit there all day long. You pay and the gate comes up and theres no piggybacking as far as that goes. Its not a club.

Im in the storage business and we have people that tailgate it opens up and two cars go in.

Marcus: We have an attendant there 35 hours a week, so that might happen some after hours, but the revenues still going up. And we have cameras down there and if its problem we really havent seen it. Price point is $6, getting ready to go to $7.

Dale: There are some slightly different versions of that not necessarily gated, but what hes really got is an unlimited wash price. Some other people have done this in the past: An unlimited wash and

the difference is you pull into the bay and pay the price and you have sensors that detect the vehicle in the bay. A lot of properties are not conducive to the traffi c fl ow to have a single entrance as you go through a gate.

Tom: I understand it takes a lot of room.

Marcus: It does. Its not for everybody. Mines about .6 of an acre but its narrow and long like a lot of your old sites are.

Where do you see the state of the automatic business? Not the mini-tunnel. The friction or touch-free automatic. Where do you see that industry right now is that an industry that in certain areas is thriving? Are people looking at pulling those out and maybe doing a tunnel?

Dale: There are a lot of changes taking place with the automatics. One, theres more of a move towards friction where it used to be a huge touch-free arena. And the biggest change weve seen with that since the downturn in the economy in 08 and we saw gas prices skyrocket. A lot of people just dont have the extra cash for washing their cars. So when they come into the automatics now their cars are dirtier and theyre more challenging to clean and thats where friction is becoming the better answer in many cases. That being said, at the same time in these conditions a lot of people havent reinvested in their automatics like they should. Used to be, people would replace them every 7 10 years, now theyre dragging it out to 12, 14, 15 years and they havent really fi xed them up like they should have. If you dont reinvest, you see the curve going down. You see after 7 years the automati