How to stay busy detailing cars for profit in bad weather?

[barry]

How to stay busy detailing cars for profit in bad weather?

I have a part time mobile wash and detailing business, I do really well when the weather is good but when it rains or is real cloudy out, I really can't work. I would love to go full time doing this, but weather is such a factor. What do others do?

I go from 300.00 to 400.00 a week to 300.00 to 400.00 a month in the rainy months! I work a full time job at night and do my mobile auto wash and detail during the day (about 20 to 24 hours a week). I'm from Tennessee; any one else have this problem?

[Mike Phillips]

That's a tough problem in geographical locations where it rains for a segment of the year. Even here in sunny California, when it rains, business slows way down. Hopefully some of our regular professional detailers will chime in and offer some suggestions.

Besides washing and detailing, do you offer window tinting or applying clear bras? Perhaps look at adding some other services to your business that are not affected by rain as much.

[Details3]

Detailing in bad weather

When it is raining outside, I can still detail if the customer has a garage. I take a rain coat with me so I can wash the car outside and then pull it in the garage to finish the detail. It is a pain, but it keeps you from a total washout day. Now if the customer does not have a garage then reschedule. I have a rain container that I keep backup supplies in so I can take that stuff in the garage to finish the detail. Remember the old saying "Work smarter not harder" Hope this helps.

Details3

[RSF]

Clear bras

Mike,

You mentioned clear bras. I've heard there are some good ones available out there. Do you know which ones work best and what are aprox. costs?

I appreciate any imput anyone can give on this subject.

RSF

[Mike Phillips]

Re: Clear bras

Originally posted by RSF
Mike,

You mentioned clear bras. I've heard there are some good ones available out there. Do you know which ones work best and what are aprox. costs?

I appreciate any imput anyone can give on this subject.

RSF

Hi RSF,

Welcome to Meguiar's Online!

I'll PM DETLMAN, a professional detailer who installs clear bras and see if he can share his experience.

Mike

[barry]

clear bra's please tell me more

Please tell me more about clear bra's where to get them and are they easy to install,I can do light pin stripping and but on bug shields

[mirrorfinishman]

Hey Barry,

I am going to try to answer your original question about detailing and dealing with the weather.

First of all, there are really not that many businesses that are busy all of the time. If you look around you will quickly see that almost any business has their busy time and also their slow time. Just look at the retail stores. They probably do a majority of their yearly sales during the holidays. How many farmer do you know stay busy right through the winter? How many theme parks stay busy during the school year? How many summer resort areas stay open all year?

The point of all this is that there are very few businesses that can stay busy all of the time. Hey, in most businesses, it's usually feast or famine.

Of course, you could always add additional services. Sure, that will help to keep you busy. However, I would highly recommend using those rainy days to go out and get more customers. Especially the type of customers who are willing to pay top dollar for your detailing services.

The key to staying profitable in the detailing business is to constantly look towards how you can increase your income per vehicle and at the same time, still keep your schedule full. Use those rainy days to get out there and maximize your earnings. Stay focused on getting the most profit out of every hour you are able to work.

[DETLMAN]

Let me throw my .02 in the pot.

Weather is one thing you cant predict or change so you have to work around it best you can, Frank made a good statement about using your downtime to find new customers who are willing to pay for your service and apreciate the quality of the work you do.

I live in So Cal so weather is a non issue for me when it rains I stay home and do whatever I want. Since it doesnt rain that much it doesnt really affent my financial situation too much.

Clear bras, they are not easy to install and require a learned technique and ons of patience as well as a huge ( and sometimes expensive ) learning curve.

We have dropped the sales and istallation of clear bras because they are time consuming and we ran into a few situations where the film would start to lift a tiny bit on some edges. While it is still protecting its ugly and the customer is going to want to have it redone. After one re-do there isnt really any profit left in the deal and if for some odd reason you had to do it 3 times you would be paying to install them. Its a great product and some companies have a great program but for me it came down to doing the math and we werent making enoughfrom clear bra to continue offering it.

Best I can tell you regarding detailing is market your business to higher end clientel and make more money when you can and save for the rainy day.

Good luck

[Jason Rose]

I ran a mobile detail business for 12 years in Southern California. Contrary to the once popular song...it does rain in California! Recently, it rained a lot.

When I had my business, I made good use of rainy days. Best advice = plan & prepare for the rainy day. On a bright warm sunny day I discussed rainy days with my best customers, the ones with multiple cars. Several agreed to give me a car to detail when the rain came. I detailed the car in their garage. They appreciated a freshly detailed car to drive when the sun came out. And I appreciated the work on a bad weather day.

When I didn't have work pre-arranged on a rainy day...or the plan fell thru for some reason, I used the time to do some very productive things. I worked in my own garage trying out new products or techniques. I cleaned, repaired, or did preventative maintenance on tools and equipment. I created new sales/marketing tools. Or, simply went out selling my services.

Hope this helps,

Jason "Waxman" Rose
Senior Area Sales Manager
Meguiar's, Inc.

[Chubs]

Very good right up Frank, along with points from DETLMAN, and WAXMAN.
I am also trying to get started in a detailing business part time over my full time job with hope of making a full time job out of it. I've been doing it on the side for about 8 years now and have a good following. one of the BIG things that has been bothering me was the down time with rain and the 6 months of snow that we seem to get in Erie, PA. i"m thinking of plowing snow and trying to find some show cars and boats stored in garages for the winter to help those long winter days go by. I've been trying to think of profitable things for the rain days and you guys have helped me out greatly with it. Either in this thread or other threads. I never really gave it a thought that everyone pretty much has down time, I just thought about detailers, landscapers, home contractors and remodelers. Guess every one has one downfall or two. I just depends on how well you use those days to determine if your business will survive.

Chubs
one more Q.
Is it sick in the head to want to start my own business even more and more the more I'm looking into it and what a challenge it will be?
I guess that's why my wife says I'm anal about the cars I do! haha

[Superior Shine]

Ever heard of putting money away for a rainy day? I budget for the rainy season all year long and when the rain gets here I take a little vacation.

[Scottwax]

I would be busy non stop year 'round if it wasn't for the weather. It really doesn't help when the weather guessers mess up as bad as they usually do. Take yesterday for example. When I left to go detail in the morning, the only rain in the 7 day forecast was Tuesday night. Great news, cars are in garages at night and no one usually cancels in that situation. I get home last night, and they have rain in the forecast Tuesday night, Wednesday and Friday. A couple of my Tuesday wash customers cancelled but I had a horribly nasty Escalade waiting for me in a warehouse which I knew would be a 8+ hour job, so I started on it today. I'll finish it tomorrow and if the rain ends early, my afternoon customers will still get their cars done.

It can hurt though when you have a week straight of rain. I got creamed in February and November of last year, two of the worst months I've had in years. 2004 ended up being the 5th wettest year on record in the Dallas area and I ended up doing nearly 5% less cars. I did raise my prices last year, so I was actually up 2%.

The main problem is rescheduling. I am usually booked a week in advance and also have regular wash customers. My regulars understand if they get rained out, I may not be able to work them in that week and they are fine with it. The hard part is when the details start stacking up. Usually customers realize how the weather can put me behind, especially those whose cars I've detailed in the past. New customers don't always understand though. I've yet to find a solution that makes everyone happy.

[gemini101]

Over this side of the pond our regular clients hardly ever cancel when it rains...It has snowed for the past couple of days and we have not had a single cancellation...I guess we are lucky...

[Mike Phillips]

Because of the super high quality information submitted by some of the best detailers around, I'm going to place a copy of this into the Hot Topics forum.

[barry]

thanks to all

Thanks for all the good info,this a
is a great board