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Street Wars Between Mobile Car Washers and Mobile Auto Detailers

There is much competition in the mobile auto detailing business. There are two different lines of reasoning emerging as to how the business should be run. One is go for volume and discount and wash the world. The other is go after the high end customer which is 10% of the market, do exceptional work and charge as much as the market will give. These two principles are the reason for a war between mobile auto detailers and mobile car washes. Mobile car wash companies are often seen washing the Honda car for the single mom in an office complex. While the auto detailers would not touch the car unless she was a total babe and they thought they might get a date out of it.

Sometimes there is much animosity in parking lots and words spoken when the two types of businesses are at the same location. Sometimes you hear the mobile car washer say something like; “We don’t do detailing, we wash cars.”

This puts the mobile auto detailer at ease; unless they also sometimes wash cars. Sometimes the mobile car washers will tell them that they will refer customers to them who want detailing because you don’t do that; even ask for a stack of business cards. During the next week the mobile car washer might refer eight to ten people to them. If they hear back that people are pleased, refer two people per week from then on; meanwhile the mobile car washer ends up stealing all the mobile detailers weekly wash customers because the prices are so much different. As soon as this starts happening the mobile detailer starts to bad mouth the mobile car washers quality.

Mobile car wash operators think; “Why would someone bad mouth you when you just referred business to them?” Good question, it is hard to understand why people shoot themselves in the foot. Here is their logic:

They do detailing, they spend more time on a car, therefore, they are better

They believe that since they charge more they are better

Since they are so much better, they are helping the customer by warning them about you

‘You get what you pay for’ so the customer should pay more

You have taken all their wash business so they are getting back at you

They made a lot of money where you sent them on a referral and would like to keep going back

What the mobile detailers don’t understand is that if they were really that great and that smart, they indeed would be making as much as the mobile car washers who derive their income on volume and do not limit their customer bases in doing so to the top 10% instead they go after the 90% and accept the 10% on their level if they choose to purchase services. The mobile auto detailers also fail to understand the driving force of the free market system:

Supply and demand

Quality and service

Image and marketing

Location

Consider this. If the mobile auto detailers would lower their price, they would get more work and more people would tell more friends and they would have an out of control snowball effect - enough work to last a life time. Sort of like the franchises in mobile car washing. Oh well; they say you can’t teach an old dog a new trick. If a competitor mobile detailer doesn’t want to play fair and wants to bad mouth, in the end the customer will probably switch. But since the customer is always right, both parties of the war on business methods and concepts of mobile auto cleaning ought start thinking and stop fighting.

By Lance Winslow

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