Friday, July 1, 2011

Does It Make Sense to Start a Waterless Car Wash Business in the Middle East?

Before retirement, I had founded a mobile car washing franchising company, and I had franchised it in 23 states, serving some 450 cities in four countries. Some of our staunchest competitors were those folks that went out and did dry-washing using a waterless carwash solution. At the time, I didn't have much respect for these types of products, because I wouldn't want someone to smear a solution on my sports car, smear in the dirt, and wipe it off. Yes, I realize that it was a bit of water saver, especially considering the amount of water people use in their driveway when they wash their car.

Perhaps you didn't know this, but the average person spends something like 50 to 100 gallons of water washing their car in their driveway. And even car washes which recycle all their water, well, they still use about 16 to 20 gallons of fresh water for every car that they clean. I know using a pressure washer on a mobile car wash rig you can wash a car with about 3 to 5 gallons water without too much problem, if you are careful how you use it, and the car will be perfectly clean.

Now then, the other day someone in Lebanon suggested that he should start an aircraft cleaning company. He had considered using a waterless car wash solution created by a chemist in Jordan. Later that same month someone called me from Israel who wanted to start a mobile car wash there also using a dry-wash type product. And then I read something interesting in Bloomberg BusinessWeek in the June 20 - June 26, 2011 magazine.

The article was in the small business innovator section and titled "Waterless Car Wash" and the article made it sound like this was some type of new innovation that no one had thought of before. However, these products have been around for about 25 years that I can remember, the name of his product is "Keenwash" which claims to be a non-toxic and a bio degradable car wash fluid. Now then, does using such a product like this in the Middle East make sense?

Yes, actually it does, and remember, I'm not even a fan of these type of products. However I do understand the severe challenges of fresh water, and the cost of desalination in that part of the world. It may take a little longer to clean the car, but this franchisor Mr. Atmeshs, might be just what the Middle East needs to provide more jobs. Think of all the people he can help out of poverty? Indeed I hope you will please consider all this and think on it.

Lance Winslow is a retired Founder of a Nationwide Franchise Chain, and now runs the Online Think Tank. Lance Winslow believes writing 23,850 articles by July 4, 2011 is going to be difficult because all the letters on his keyboard are now worn off now..


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