More Cool Things

Bob Kopko

I've been fortunate to see a lot of creative ideas in carwashing over the years; one of the more recent involves Jim Mulholland and his Busy Bee chain in Miami, Florida. Jim wanted to expand the market for one of his flex-serve locations, so he installed a SiteWatch Xpress Pay Terminal (XPT) to provide an exterior express lane.

Just as Jim thought, the express lane is helping his exterior business, but he's also enjoyed some unexpected benefits from this move. His full-service traffic has gone up by 3.4% in part because the XPT is attracting a new group of customers, some of whom also want to buy full-service washes on occasion. Jim was also surprised by the fact that his average exterior ticket increased by over 8% since he installed the XPT. A key reason for this is that exterior customers now feel less rushed, so they're more likely to consider upgrades.

However, the really cool thing at Busy Bee happens on Sunday afternoons. Since selling exterior washes with the XPT involves very little labor, Jim decided to keep his self-pay lane open for three hours after the full-service wash closes on Sundays. He's cleaning an extra 150 cars during that period every week. As far as Jim's concerned, this is all plus business that will help him realize a return on his XPT investment that much faster.