Are You Charging Enough For Services? Are Customers More Informed? Episode #937
Pints and Polishing Auto Detailing Podcast
Are You Charging Enough For Services? Are Customers More Informed? Episode #937
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Part
front bumper
The front bumper is the part of the car at the front that helps protect it in case of a crash. It can also hold things like lights and sensors.
Term
wet sand
Wet sanding is a method used to make a car's paint smooth. It involves using sandpaper with water to help avoid scratching the paint.
Term
MSRP
MSRP is the price that the car maker suggests you should pay for a new car. It's like a starting point for negotiations when buying a car.
Term
luxury SUV
A luxury SUV is a type of larger vehicle that is more expensive and has nicer features than regular SUVs. They often come with better materials and technology for a more comfortable ride.
Car
Cadillac Escalade
The Cadillac Escalade is a big, fancy SUV that many people see as a luxury vehicle. It's known for being comfortable and having a lot of features.
Part
fuel filter
The fuel filter cleans the fuel going into your engine. It should be tightened by hand, not with power tools, to prevent it from getting damaged.
LIVE
Welcome to the pints and polishing podcast, the most
influential and listen to podcast in auto detailing. Welcome to
the community. I got a question for everybody. And this is an
everybody question. How much should a car be cleaned before
it goes to a detailer? Right? Like, we want to take this into
all different aspects when we get into this discussion, because
it goes into a bunch of different theories, right?
Tomorrow, I'm going to the dentist. Nick, are you the type
of person that brushes their teeth before they go to the
dentist? Or are you the guy that goes when I'm going to the
dentist, they're going to brush my teeth?
That's a good question. Yeah, no, you got to go full you got to
get the you got to do the full thing. So you look as good as
you can look you don't want to be embarrassed.
Oh, so you were the embarrassed guy. I was the will I drink
coffee a breakfast? I don't want to know what I'm saying.
Sure. Sure. No, you thought that you could just get them
cleaned up just in time before the dentist comes. I think maybe
some detailers would appreciate if they get a trashed out
vehicle. Right? Let's think about it from that for like, I get a
trashed out vehicle. You know, could they scale off not being
embarrassed as much just the same as you talked about? Or they
go Well, hey, that's why I'm bringing it in.
Yeah, I mean, we this would probably be one of those things
that I think you'd get 100 different answers, right? Like
it all depends a lot on, you know, what the customer really
wants to get out of the details are like, if you look at the
dentist thing, you want to get the most out of the dentist,
let's just kind of knock off the let's knock off the rust a
little bit. Let's let's get let him get to the teeth cleaning
or whatever. But you go you go into this world. I mean, this is
a conversation we all have quite a bit, which is, you know, you
have a trash vehicle show up, you're spending a lot of time
on stuff that is really nothing more than just car washing,
right? Like just getting knocking mud and dirt and grime.
And, you know, if you have to clean out somebody's interior,
because they left all kinds of stuff around. So you have to
bag it up. And I mean, all that stuff goes into time that
they're paying for that isn't really that useful for them as
a consumer.
Okay, let's take it out of teeth cleaning, because some
people are going to be like, Listen, you can't buzz off months
of plaque, right? It doesn't happen with your oral B
toothbrush ain't gonna work that way. Yeah. But let's think of it
this way. You get your house cleaned. Right? Let's, you know,
are you you know, are you the people that kind of tidy up? You
know, your kids room kind of put the toys away? Or do you go
hey, that's for the housekeeper to do?
Yeah, I mean, you know, as someone that that's had somebody
for well over a decade in that, yeah, man, you want you want them
to be able to clean as much as they can, right? That would be
the theory. But this is kind of like the same old same old
thing that we talk about is, you know, we're in one of those
industries that I think is very still misunderstood by the
customer. And you can say it for a variety of reasons, you could,
you know, be one of those guys that blames everything on the
industry, you could blame it on your area, you could blame it on
customers, you can blame it on yourself, you know what I mean?
So what is right and wrong? I mean, we all know if the vehicle
comes in and it needs a lot of love, and you know, somebody has
it out in the mud and they go to a self serve wash and knock the
mud off. They didn't really clean anything, but they made it
so you could clean more deeply quicker and make better use of
your time or things like that. So I think we just have one of
those industries, which I'm sure like HVAC guys or people like
that that go into people's home would say the same thing is that
there's just a lot of misunderstandings of how to get
the best use of your appointment.
Oh, I mean, let's think about that for a second. Best use of
your appointment. Best use of your appointment. I mean, I'm
paying you to do it. So it kind of is like best used in my
appointment. I mean, that's why I've scheduled the service is
what some people are going to go through their mind, right?
There's we're going to go there and we're going to understand
that there's a different I think this is that word we use
class, or there's a different class of person and people think
of things differently. Some will think of it like you that the
lady is one of my worst customers, but is still a long
standing customer. She always gets her cars and goes down to
the car wash and sprays them off, runs them through the little
touchless. They do that before we come by. Right? Why? I don't
because I wonder if it's the embarrassed part, right? Like for
them, I really wonder if they were embarrassed that they let it
go so bad. And they knew that we would have to work so long or
maybe because I finally started charging them.
Yeah, there you go. Yeah, look, you know, this this conversation
kind of comes out of something that that that happened in my
business on Friday that I just don't deal with, right? Like I
just don't deal with trash vehicles. It's not part of our
business. It's not things that we do. And I know that that's not
everybody's situation, right? And you start to think about you
got to the charge part of it. And I think that's an interesting
spot to like think about because what when you have a trash
vehicle or whatever, if you just think about how long it would
take you to clean it up, right? If you're a person that just
doesn't do this professionally, and you're just thinking about
it, I think that's where the disconnect happens. I don't think
people have any idea how long it takes to clean up a car. I just
don't think they think of the nooks and crannies. I don't think
they think of, you know, now we all can, you know, breathe that
that that that exasperated feeling of all the bad carpets
that are in cars now. I mean, that's it's almost like
universal now to have bad carpets that are you can't get, you
know, little things out of you can't do stuff like that. I look
at this and I think you probably feel the same is that I think
the disconnect is exactly what you said for that woman the
minute she started to really get charged what she needed to be
charged, all of a sudden it was like, Oh, this is really
expensive to bring my car the way it looks, because they're
going to have to spend the time to do what I'm about to do.
Well, so so hers could have been, you know, price and could
have been price based on, you know, what she was paying for
the service is going to be the question. Does do people do this
based on a certain, like I said, class or demographic, or is it
based on the price of the vehicle? Because I know that
other or price of the service, I mean, because I know other
people that are way under not not nearly the class, in a sense
financial class that these people are. But I've known other
people that bring me vehicles for for coding. And they have
cleaned the car before because they were paying, quote unquote,
for the detailer to do the coding. So in their mind, they
weren't really thinking about it other than that, right? Like
certainly right. They just need to get it cleaned up, because
they were going to pay the detailer to put on the coding. So
it wasn't to them about whether I could afford it just it just
seemed to be what it made sense for them. So is it do you think
like the service like for a coding, do you think it's a
somebody that's going to call you for a detail and say, Hey, I'm
getting a full detail. The average person isn't really going
to go get it cleaned up before they get a full detail.
No, I think the average person no, no way. I don't. I don't think
most customers and most car owners think a lot about any of
it. I think they just say, I booked a service, I dropped my
car off or the person came to my house, and they'll handle
everything. I mean, and also I think that's kind of what the
economy tells them is going to happen, right? Like you've been
at restaurants of people that are like bad orders. You know,
they don't know like the flow of like ordering and timely manner
and it's just everywhere now, like everything's just going to
get handled for you. I mean, the economy's kind of set people
up with that thought process. And I think more than anything,
it's it's not a disregard for people. I think people take it
kind of personal sometimes. I just think it's just how people
do stuff like that. I don't think it's I just think they go,
I'm paying somebody 300 bucks, so they're going to give me the
works. It's like, well, in 2026, and that's where we are today,
$300 just doesn't go that far. And I don't think that's in the
mind of the general car owner, that $300 may have been a really
good thing in 2010. Hell, that may have been a good thing in
2015 for certain services. I'm not sure any service should
cost less than $300. If you're talking about going through
the entire car, like you you're probably double that price in
2026. And I think because pricing is so all over the map, and
because you have so many people that use full detail and
ceramic coating and all these terms interchangeably, I think
you just have a confused customer.
You do. And I was trying to think why you were talking was
like, it's a customer calls today in 2026 calls a detailer. And
you know, goes, I don't think so. Before, you know, years and
years ago, 1015 years ago, easy, that they used to go, I'll
just go to the car wash. Yes. Now, however, in 2026, the quote
unquote, car wash is not the same as it used to be. The
quote unquote, car wash was a full service car wash hand wash.
Well, and or it'd be a tunnel but they would just they would
still prep it. They would call it down. They'd call that a
hand wash. I mean, it would be a hybrid system. Yeah, hybrid
system or a flex was be what what the type of system that I put
in, where they would then pull their car around to a detail
shop. Okay, full service, you know, it doesn't have all those
vacuum sitting out there. It's the slow dinosaur where people
had to go sit and wait for 45 minutes with all the tree
fragrances and all the knickknack like the what was it
the license plates with your names on it? Everything. All of
it. So there's no longer in the system that you're going to go
to that, right? So who do they go to? Is it I'm going to call
another detailer? Because they want a better like if they're
thinking like, Hey, you know, I that call and 300 bucks sounds
too much. I just you said that I was like, man, who do they call
today? I don't know. There's no car wash anymore that can go do
these simple, simple services.
Yeah, it's a good question. I think it's I mean, people would
call it price shopping. I think that's probably something people
do. A lot of times what you see people do is they'll go to their
office the next day and, you know, on a Monday morning or
whatever, if they called you on the weekend, and they'll talk to
the five people around them at their desk, hey, you got anybody
that'll that'll do my car for cheap. I got this crazy price
or they'll send a text message out to people after they get your
price. And they'll inevitably I mean, everybody knows this,
they're going to find somebody to do it cheaper. I mean, that's
going to happen one way or the other. I mean, that that that is
going to happen. But the conversation that you have to
have is is there anything that should be 300 bucks when you're
talking about some of these vehicles, like they're actually
already getting an extremely low price from somebody doing it
for that price, right?
I would think there's people are listening to go wow, that's
and that's a lot though, Nick. It is rain of pucks and a lot of
money.
Yeah, I mean, I'll go I'll run through through the situation
that we had and you know, it just is what it is. And, you
know, a learning lesson and and it still happens this far into
your career. Nothing's perfect. Nobody has the perfect
business is, you know, I got a trash vehicle on Friday. And
just to get it back to what I would consider pretty good,
which certainly wasn't factory fresh, pretty good was a six or
seven hour day. Now, ask yourself this, and that's just a
full detail that wasn't paint correction and coating on top
of it. That was just getting this thing back to let's call it
healthy. Getting this thing back to something that was a healthy
car that you could have a little bit of I've taken somewhat
care of it, right? So that was what we would call back in the
day and maybe some of you still call it a full detail. It
didn't include coding. It didn't include paint correction or
anything like that. And when you start doing the math on six or
seven hours worth of work, 300 bucks is untenable in basically
any city you live in as a service provider. That's what we
have to talk about that the customer doesn't understand. But
now we have to talk about it from the other angle of how many
service providers don't understand that that is not
survivable. That is not and I know people are in this every
day in this exact situation, which is why we're talking about
it. We're talking about it from the consumer and from the
professional side. Everybody seems to be confused at what
really should that number look like? And what does that entail?
Well, I think we're confused about a lot of things. We all
understand that inflation is here. But we're all still
confused on why we're paying so much. I I'm trying a new
beverage today. I grabbed the can we can all know because well
when there's a giant peach and a thong you go, Hey, listen, I
got to try that. I'm gonna try it. I'm gonna try it. It says
crooked tea. You know, if I can ship stuff across the state
lines, I might send you some because they say the perfect
afternooner. Hey, that's a good that's a good line. You know,
after you've done those nooners, you come over to this one. Right
the guy that I was talking to he he goes, you know, I've seen
that. But he's just so expensive. I couldn't he couldn't
justify trying it. Now there's another beer that I got it right
there with it. And he like that beer. He goes, you know, that's
pricey too. But it's good. So I'll definitely make sure I you
know, these just you meet people and I just start telling you
they're like, yeah, cool, man. Thanks. But but inside the
discussion, it made sense. Right? There's always a level that
will spend to try something. Yep. And then there's always a
level of hey, I know this is good. So at that point of this
amount of money, I'll pay for whatever right fill in the blank.
So so you got that from the consumer side. Then you'll have
I want to throw something else in since we're talking about
both. You've mentioned before that it's being known right now
restaurants are not charging nearly enough for what they
provide. I want people to look around something that I love to
do go to your taco right little taco stands, little taco
trucks. We got one my favorite been my favorite for a long
time took you to it right your eight bucks for a burrito. Okay,
the second favorite that I've been talking about lately. It was
a guy who previously was a chef for the country club, right?
Southern Hills. He right. He $14 for talk to me into his
chorizo burrito that he makes the chorizo himself $14. What do
you think that $8 burrito is sort of like you go to Chipotle
right and they do a big old use his nice and well nice it was
petite. I was just better word. Small petite cut crafted little
potatoes and you go man, the chorizo, I could taste it the
next hour. Yeah, it was so good. Yep. Not everybody's gonna
spend 14 bucks. Plus I go on the company card. I need to start
that. Can I tell you on the podcast? That's a company
expense. There's a lot. There's a lot. No, I mean, look, we do
have this conversation. Now, you have a guy who worked in a
corporate environment at a country club where he had a
budget. And he had a general manager. General manager goes
hey food and beverage cost is what it is we need to charge our
people. So that guy that chef was a chef in a place where he
knew the numbers in parts of his life right working at a
country club. He knew the numbers because he was demanded to
know the numbers. But then you have the local taco taco truck
he's competing against. What's the odds that guy knows the
numbers? That's pretty slim because they think well, if my
burrito goes from eight to 10 people are going to stop coming.
Right. And he's just eating the cost and eating the cost because
I can tell you this. And people might think this is a snobby way
to look at it. And I promise that it's not. I get very leery
when food is cheap in today's world in 2026. Now I felt very
different in 2010 because the world was cheaper. I even felt
different in 2019. Yeah. Okay, pre Corona in 2026. When I feel
like I'm getting a good deal on food, I go, what's in this?
What's it? I mean, I've had to say to family and friends and
things when we've gone somewhere and I go, they're saying
it's chicken. But that's an awful cheap price for some
chicken. Because think about it, they're not getting that much
of a better deal than you would get at a warehouse store like
Sam's or Costco. They're not getting people think that yes,
not like you, like you're paying five bucks a pound for
chicken and they're paying a dollar a pound for chicken. That
ain't how it's a commodity. They may get a little bit of a
better deal. They may get you know, but if they got a better
deal was the chicken spoiled. Because if you think that ain't
happening, then you haven't talked to a lot of people in
restaurant business. You know, always be careful of the fish
special, so to speak. So you have a direct thing that we're
saying here, which is, and I know a lot of you guys as
professionals who are listening to us think about this is that a
deal is not always a deal. And what comes with that deal or is
that other taco stand or that other detail or just making so
little money that this whole thing is going to implode. But
the problem is, remember, the consumer still talking to those
other taco stands and those other detailers too. So you have a
real pressurized system where I think you have a consumer
completely clueless on what it should cost for somebody's time
to do something on their car. Forget if it's just detailing.
What does it cost to have somebody come to your house and do
a service? What does it come, you know, on anything? And I got
to tell you when you start running the math and you start
talking to a lot of business owners, that $100 an hour you
and I were talking about on this podcast seven years ago. Seven
years ago, you and I were talking about people should be
charging $100 an hour. That is now well into the $200 range. So
for a seven hour full detail, if you live in a city that has seen
rising cost as many have, not just large cities, by the way, a
seven hour full detail should cost $1,400. You're talking about
a weird number now. You're talking about a weird situation.
Like, like the amount of people that were at my my second
favorite taco truck the other day, zero, right? Because because
he's the same guy when I made the post bragging about him into
Facebook groups, other people are like, Wow, that's what
look what it's got to be in that to charge that much. Yeah.
Well, what's got to be in a detail to charge $1,400?
Yeah, with no with no real long term protection, no paint
correction. I'm just talking about the hours it takes to do
something. Now, I think some listeners are laughing and going
damn, Nick slow.
What do you mean?
I mean, it took you that long.
Yeah, man. I mean, I would say this.
It's been a while.
I guess it's been a while yet. Yeah, the trash vehicles in a
while. I'm kind of slow, but I can tell you this. I'm in enough
Facebook groups that I see what people spend on cars. I see
TikToks made. We were here for eight hours. We did this for
10 hours. We did this for six hours.
So could it be that I'm slow?
Cool. I see a lot of posts saying somebody spent that amount
of time on a car.
Call it fives.
Yeah, call it five. You're at 1000 bucks.
I think most people would say four to five hours on a detail,
a full detail is probably average. You know, so then you go
into a trash detail. Plus, you know, it's yeah, another couple
hours. Yeah, I mean, look, I'll be the first one to admit it
like it brought me back. And I was like, Oh my God.
But I'll say this to everybody like we're not having these
conversations publicly enough. And I'm not just talking about
detailing. I'm talking about HVAC people and housekeepers and
whoever you want as a service provider, you can't make money
long term and build a business at that 100 bucks an hour in most
cities. Like you that was seven years ago, you and I on this
podcast talking about 100 bucks an hour.
Well, you say you can't unless you're just a single man
operator. You don't really have an 18 members and you know, you
just kind of going after it, Nick. I mean, that's an okay
thing. 100 bucks an hour. I think there's plenty of people
there go man, if I worked eight hours a day and made 800 bucks,
they're they're like, Yeah, I don't I don't I think that's the
issue right there is that how many of us number one every day
of the year of a working day? Do we make the 800 bucks? Right?
Because you got travel time and all this other stuff and
everything has to go perfectly. The next thing is you don't
think about downtime, your truck or your van is broken down,
whatever you got to push appointments. So nothing comes
out perfect. And that's what people have these conversations
under these perfect environments. Everything went
perfect 365 days a year. Okay, the next thing is you have to fix
a truck, you have to fix a van, you had to fix stuff in your
shop, you got to put your insurance. What about rain? What
about this? What about that? So but again, when you start
thinking about business. And there's a lot of people that
are going to say, Well, in my area. Look, all of the data you
pull today about what's going on in most cities and towns
across America, it's not unlike what's happening in Vegas or
Tulsa or anywhere else. There are people that can't get to 150
or 200 bucks an hour. And I completely understand that I'm
not saying I'm not advocating that this is the exact number.
What I'm saying is, if you were 75 bucks an hour in 2019 and
you're 75 bucks an hour in 2026, that ain't working. That's just
not working. Okay, number one, the dollars were 30% less. This
is where you know, your eggs went up, this went up, gas went
up, this went up. But that's where people are. Now what
happens is not only we're talking about the cheap guy that
everybody talks about in the town or in the city. Now we see a
lot of businesses that are thinking they aren't the cheap
guy. And they actually are part of the cheap problem. And now the
consumer thinks you're the high price guy, but actually, you're
still cheap. You're not able to grow. You're not able to
actually, you know, put money in a bank account and save for a
rainy day, as you said. And and we are going to get to a
breaking point. You're already seeing this with restaurants,
by the way. I live in a city like Las Vegas. It's restaurant
haven here, just like you have in Tulsa. Okay. You are seeing
restaurant closures, and you're going to see them over the
night you saw in the previous 12 months, the next 12 months,
you're just going to see stuff gone. And they're going to
wonder why and everybody's gonna talk about the economy. But
the fact of the matter is, they sold those chicken wings for
40% less than they should have for the previous two, three
years. And that's what their demise was. It wasn't actually
that the economy slowed. They had no money for the rainy day.
They were already charging too little. They were telling
themselves they can't raise prices. And I get all of that. You
and I are business owners. I understand all of that. But when
you're in a service based business is based on the time
that you or an employee is is is putting into something. There's
some things you can't get around. And that's cost. This costs
something to do. And I got to tell you, man, it was a real eye
opener, because I don't do that stuff. And I go, I see this a lot
on the internet. And I can't imagine these people are charging
what they need to charge.
Well, rubber meets the road, you get to that moment of needing
to charge. Like you said, I think that's the moment that so
many of us just buckle. And we're okay, getting the minimum
we're okay, quote unquote, not considering ourselves cheap. But
but we're not going to raise our prices higher and have to like
have that discussion with people. We really don't want to most
of us don't want to have the price discussion. And we don't
want to be higher priced than other people. You know, because
then we're going to have to talk to customers and try and
explain to them or prospective customers and explain to them why
I am more expensive. And you know, this is what detail well, I
just tell them because that guy down the street is dot dot dot
wrong, not not not professional. Well, I just tell them it's
because I use the best wrong, that's not going to work. Right
like when the rubber meets the road, and we know we got to raise
our price or charge accordingly. This is where it becomes the
most difficult thing for us. If we're already going listen, we
already know our customers are going to the same problems we
had at the restaurants, going through the same problems with
how their eggs cost more than before, right? They're going
through all the same problems. And then I've got to get them to
pay me more.
Yeah, it's tough, man. This is a it's a really crazy situation
where, realistically, from 2020 through the end of 2025, as a
service based business, you could have arguably made the case
that everybody in this in a service based business like
this or PPF or whatever should have been raising their prices
10% a year for five years. So you'd be 50% higher than you
were in 2020. And that's good. That's just to kind of outpace
inflation, the things going on in the world.
It took years off. We didn't do it. We've only been in it for
four. So let's say we're three to four years into business. We
haven't raised our price, but now we're wanting to.
It gets tough. I mean, realistically, in business, just
to keep up with the normal inflation, you should be raising
your prices three to 5% a year every year you're in business.
That would be from 2010 to 2020. That would have been the
reality. Right? So let's say it was 3%. So in 10 years, you'd
be 30% higher. With what has gone on the last five years, you
could probably double if not triple that number and you'd be
somewhere in the neighborhood of 10% a year. And we have a
customer that is less inclined to understand it today than ever
before. Even though they see the news, see the TikToks, see the
Instagrams, see inflation, everyone's more political
today than they've ever been. They know how much stuff costs
are yelling at the president, they're yelling at their
governor, they're yelling at their state assembly. Yet when
when we go to raise prices, you're right. It people get very
touchy about it. But they again, we get to these places that
you and I get a very, very unique view. Not only do we talk to
so many of you, we see a lot of you in a specialist group, we
also get to see all the Facebook groups, we get to see all the
talk online about the industry. And I got news for you, man, if
you're doing trashed vehicles, and you're spending five, six,
seven hours plus, I think probably a lot of us find it
hard to charge six, seven, eight, nine, a thousand bucks for
that time on just something as simple as a full detail. And the
facts are, that's where you would have to be to run a
business.
So
imagine I just imagine that you almost felt a little bit of
disrespect for the way the car was brought to you. At the same
time. Yeah, at the same time, imagine, you know, you're the
customer in a different situation, not exactly your
situation. Well, let's say it was, you know, dropped off a car
and then you get a call. Right, which is what we tell. Hey,
you're gonna have to call these people. Like, yep, you get that
call. That guy goes, you want to charge me what the disrespect?
Are you kidding me?
That's a real touchy thing. This is where you kind of get
into what do you do? What is the right thing? I don't know if
there is a right thing number one. Do you do? Are you a
detailer? Are you a car washer? Hey, yeah, that's one of those
things, man. I go, if you're running a legitimate business,
you got to make the call. You have to. And you actually when
you pick up that phone, you have to be very cognizant of using
in your head more than using any words, you got to be okay with
that person coming and picking up that car.
Or when they're dropping it off and you go, whoa, whoa, you
didn't present it like this.
Yeah, which I know a lot of us have had that every one of us
probably. I think you're in a very awkward spot. If you don't
know how to communicate. Hey, man, you got to understand
something. I'm looking at this car. And there's three or four or
five extra hours worth of work that I was unaware of. And that
is the way only way I know how to combat it is to tell people,
look, we're going to put five more hours of work than I thought.
And that costs something. I get it. It sounds like a lot. I get
it. You don't understand. I get it. I'm happy to answer
questions, whatever you have to say. But there's a lot of people
that are are are damaging their body doing this work. It's not
easy work. It's not. It's not simple work, you know, all the
time. And if you just say, Hey, man, I got to eat it. And you
do that enough, you're going to be out of business. See, that's
the flip side. The flip side is, I've been in the position like
you starting a business and I had to take anything I had to
take. I needed everybody. But looking back, that also set you
back a certain amount in your business by doing that. You have
the hindsight to see that now. Right? Now that doesn't mean go
sit at home, right? That's not really what we're talking about.
But I think the most interesting part of this whole
conversation is how do we get here? And how do we get out of
it? Then it is sitting here dwelling on I've had some bad
experiences, right? Like how do we get out of this?
I think the get out of it is where you see a lot of
detailers with up charge, up charge, jump charge. Yeah, I
love that word. Hey, pet hair up charge, hey, carpet stain
up charge, right? Like, hey, they drove through the mud up
charge. That seemed to be the answer in Facebook groups as as
we seen more of it was, well, you know, the answer is just
charging more. Okay. But but it's still going to be are you
going to stay in business? Will that customer pay? I mean, on
Facebook, we understand most of the people inside of those
groups. Let's just say what it is without really saying it.
Okay, you know, like, are they really kind of running their
mouth as keyboard warriors, and don't actually upcharge all that
to all those people, right? Probably. They probably don't have
the the nut sack and probably don't have the skill set to sell
somebody that many up charges. I imagine they probably like you
said, eat as I did. Many times just ate the carpet stains, ate
the, you know, the hair, how I learned how to figure out ways
around, right? It's how you figure out how to. Well, when you
get this car, okay, I'm going to take me a little bit longer, I
can make it up over here. That's sort of the way I handled it.
And I would in a sense, I say, sharpen your skill set on the
dirty cars. I actually told you when we were talking about this,
when it got to me at being at the car wash, well, actually
really started to enjoy the dirty cars. Like, to me, they were
fun because those people were thrilled. You want to talk about
some of the most satisfied customers. Yeah, they loved their
car to come back after it was trashed. Boy, you go, well, not
all those carpet stains, you didn't they didn't have to. They
didn't have to come out. Like, not all those seeds came. They
didn't have to. It was so nasty that just a good cleanup, they
were thrilled.
Yeah. No, and that that's true. But when you're running a detail
business, instead of a car wash, you know, it's it's hard for
any of us to walk away and go good enough. It's really hard. I
mean, everybody battles with that. And I battled with that on
this car as I go, I actually made a call with about an hour and a
half left before pickup. And I go, Hey, man, just want to let
you know. It's going to let you know front bumper needs are
painted. Yeah, bug guts that are in there forever. I'd have to
wet sand. I mean, better off painting it. You know, this,
this, this and you got to understand I can spray the
pressure washer and one wheel well for 24 straight hours and
there'd still be mud coming out.
We've all seen those vehicles, right? We've all seen them. I
could just stood there with the pressure washer on one wheel
well and then I mean, the back of my my shop, you know, we were
able to wash outside here. I mean, it would just it was just
destroyed. Oh, good point. You know, imagine if you weren't
washing outside. Oh, yeah, it would have just been a complete
imagine just doing this at a customer's house. I mean, you'd
have been you in this instance, you would have been
pressure washing a driveway. I mean, there's just no way around
it. Now, if the customer already knows and you go, Hey, it is
what it is. I'm not going to pressure wash driveway. There's
going to be mud everywhere. And they're like, Hey, I understand.
Okay, that's one thing. But there's a lot of work. And I
know a lot of guys that are stuck in this, I'd say the
majority of this industry is stuck in this part of the
business, which is a very, very tough on you as a person
business. Not only that is tough on everything financially.
You know, you can't make money on these disaster details the way
people think because again, I would have had to be at $1400 to
make this worth it.
So sending a trash vehicle to a detailer. Is that you think
that's taken advantage of? Is that?
Yeah, I don't I don't I don't know, man, because I think we're
just at this place in the in the life cycle of the detailing
business where I still think the customer doesn't know. The
customer just doesn't know. And this is what I there's there's
a couple things I've gotten very angry as a business owner. And
I don't mean angry like yelling at somebody. I mean, something
that just bothers me year after year. And there's two things
I've said to you. And I've said it to other guys I've talked to
are probably listening. One of the most destructive things to
business that you got to definitely have been around
long enough to understand was in the 80s, basically, this theory
came about that the customer is always right. And that basically
has carried ever since that IBM General Electric BS got into
the system. All of you out there are dealing with that still.
Because that is that was the way that that that that the public
was talked to the customers always right. Well, if you deal
with customers enough, you know, that's just not true. It's not
humanly true. Forget about just business. None of us is 100%
right all the time. It is what it is. So it was a stupid thing to
put into the economy, but it still has lasting effects now.
The next thing is, we've seen this thing on business on the
internet, from, you know, people that make thousands of pieces
of BS business content, where they go, the customer's never
been more informed than today. I asked you this question, I asked
it to several other people, I'd ask anybody listening to this.
If you run a business, I could pull 100 business owners,
especially in service based businesses, and they'd say that
isn't even close to the truth. They're not informed. That's not
true. They wouldn't be mad about it. They wouldn't get they
would just be like, no, that's not true. And you'd get 100% of
people that actually deal with the consumer to go, no, that's not
true. And so what is the damage that's done to everything?
Because now as businesses were being told, everybody's informed,
the customer thinks they're informed. And yet every time we
talk to a customer, we go, well, they're not very informed. And
I talked to Brian, and I shared this with you. And he's right
because you and I were both there. In the 90s and early 2000s,
everybody knew what buffing a car was. Every customer knew what
it was. You never really had to explain buffing a car. Like you
never really had to explain it. Now, when you talk about
polishing a car, you know, I'm going to polish your car and I'm
going to coat it. The number one question they have is what's
a polish? That was never when detailing was less mainstream,
way less mainstream. You talked about buffing a car more in
early 2000s with customers than you do today. But I'm told in
the world's told the customers never been more informed. That's
not even close to the truth. And that's where all of this really
rests its head for everybody in this business or using this
business or trying to do it yourself. The level of confusion
in the marketplace is causing damage that may never be fixed.
Level of confusion. Who's confused? Right? Because are some
some service providers confused? And you know, they are out of
the ballpark? I mean, you gotta have some customers that are
gonna go, Listen, you guys aren't all above board here. Right?
We can we can all understand that if even inside of the
detailing world, we know that there's snake oil. And we say
that and it's a common joke. Well, that only happened because
there was customers who got bit. Yeah, a great good point. That's
a great point.
To crawl out of this, you know, it's not exactly 2026, the
detailers fault. A lot of it's society's fault just in your
overall growth of well, you mentioned, you know, buffing, we
can all think back to the the great movie with Marty McFly and
Biff, right? Biff is basically what most people viewed a
detailer. Like, that's how they reviewed that's why they cast
him in that way. And dressing the way he dressed and doing the
actions the way he dressed, should detailing actually ever
progressed to the point where you would even think about
charging $1400. Because I think a lot of people in society would
just go, Well, no, those those should be the guys that look
like Biff, that sit in the back of a dealership, clean the cars
back there, do that stuff that that's not for the big tickets.
Yeah, it's a good point. But I think it all comes down to we
now have cars that are so expensive, the average cars
over $50,000 now, which I mean, that was a luxury SUV not too
long ago. I mean, you were around when when the escalate I
think was what $40,000. I mean, now that's 111,000. But
of a difference. Yeah, those people are paying basically
triple what that car when it launched costs. And they don't
think the mechanic should cost triple. And they don't think
that the detailer should cost triple. And they don't think
that the tire should cost triple, which it does now well well
over that. And you just have a consumer that's constantly being
told they're right about everything, and that they've
never been more knowledgeable, and they've never been more
informed. And if I go on Reddit, or I go on TikTok, I can get
informed before I go buy this XYZ service. Mechanics deal with
it just like you and I deal with it. Right? I mean, this is the
other thing. I'm watching some of this, you know, the things
that are coming into mechanic shops through social media now.
And I go, holy shit. Yeah. We're just the tip. Yeah, like,
like I saw someone who did their own oil change. And with the
most insane power tools at a mechanic shop, they couldn't get
the fuel filter off that this guy put on this car. A fuel
filter, which by the way, supposed to be hand tightened.
They had air tools, Marty, chiseling this filter off the
car. I mean, this thing got so mangled. Before they could get
it off. But the customers never been more informed. Hand
tightening an oil filter has been known for decades. It was
settled science. This person has the internet at their
disposal to put the fuel to put the oil filter on properly.
The customers never been more informed. And we keep wondering
why we can't charge what we want. We can't educate to the level
that we want. And some of this is just two parties at an impasse
running into each other, where one doesn't quite understand it.
And the other one certainly doesn't understand what needs
to happen. And now you have a recipe for disaster. And like you
said, if snake oil wasn't in the system, then nobody would have
gotten bitten. But people do get bitten with 10 year and
lifetime coatings and you know, stack these coatings put this
five year and this 10 year and this 30 year and all of a sudden
you got a 60 year coding and everything's gonna work. Okay,
man. All of that misinforms the customer too. So this isn't to
pick on the professional. This isn't to pick on the consumer.
This is to have a start of 2026 reality check of I think a lot
of people are confused. And I understand it. I'm not judging
it. I'm not mad about it. But I go, do we talk enough about that
confusion? Because I got to tell you, man, it feels like that
confusions at a level. And a lot of people that I talked to and
presented this to they go, people have never been more confused.
So, so I want to ask this question then because you've said,
hey, you either want to be low or you want to be high, you
never want to be in the middle. And I go, hmm, I wonder about in
this moment, you know, to have a discussion, I'm sure you'll
prove me wrong. But jeez, I'm gonna try here. I think in this
moment, we're leaving out somebody. We're just talked
about the low guys and then then the high guys at the 1400. And
I really think we're we're leaving out somebody here and
there's going to be some listeners that probably will
chime in and really sink into this moment because I saw this
post and this was a this was an advertisement post and I won't
read the whole thing. But it basically shows this picture of
a guy yelling at another guy working at a dealership and
working on a car and you can see him buffing on it and he's
yelling lot lizard.
Right? So calling him a name.
Which by the way, for those who've never been in that world,
that's kind of a derogatory thing around people that go and do
lower quality work at car lots, basically, like, you know, do
quick cleanups and, you know, remove a scratch and do it kind
of quick. And it's not really like the best thing to be called
all the time.
It's definitely not it's not good to be called there. There are
you're right. There's some hocus pocus there. But I have in
which I know many others have said too, they've seen some of
these guys work some magic. Sure. Like, if you get a good lot
lizard, boy, they got their hands fingers are all taped up.
They've got tricks up their sleeve and they know every little
thing in the book to get something done. Well, you're
right. It's a derogatory statement. So this guy, he's
defending, you know, their their system that that basically
they've been saving people, they've been fixing an xyz dot
dot dot, you can understand. But he says, when people feel
threatened, they don't debate, they discredit. That's why you
see it won't last needs a full repaying hack, then lot lizard
right, the ultimate derogatory, right? So I just want to come
back when people feel threatened, they don't just debate,
they discredit that there's a group that that I know is hearing
it that goes, Listen, I don't, I don't, I don't feel discredited
of, you know, on this comment. I actually feel excited because
they probably are some of those middle people that I think the
middle grounds finding some good movement with, hey, I'm good
quality, great quality, but I'm not high high price. I can kind
of meet some people into some middles and and might be a
chance to win right now.
Yeah, and I don't I actually don't disagree with that. But
you also got to take into account your cost to do a job. Time
is the biggest cost when you're detailing. And so if you're in
the middle ground, and you do have a chance to kind of take
some business, I can understand that that's what you should do.
But you also got to figure out, how much time am I spending on
something? And am I truly the middle ground? Or actually am
I cheap? Because I think that's where people get lost, that
could be your taco truck analogy. That $8 burrito isn't the
lowest price you can find on a burrito, you can go to another
taco truck and get a $6 burrito. That guy is smack dab in the
middle, I can almost guarantee you, right? But the problem is,
the middle is going to eat him alive, because he probably does
just enough quality to be decent quality and meat, I've eaten
there, it's good quality stuff. And you go, this ain't eight
bucks. This is 12 bucks. Well, now he was in the middle telling
himself he's doing a good job. But the problem is his business
was sinking. Right. And that's why the middle always gets
squeezed. You see this with department stores now, there's
gonna be another bankruptcy, coming for some department
stores and they're the middle.
You're saying sinking. I want to use a different word. I want to
say treading really fast.
Yeah, that's true. That's true.
Right. We can understand you just start having to work a lot
faster. Work harder. Okay, I've got to go, go, go. And you're
just more, more, more. Whereas if you had another just a little
bit, you wouldn't have to pedal as much. And maybe you can, you
say he's sinking. Maybe it's where you can stay afloat instead
of keep going. No, let's use your analogy. The harder you
tread, sooner or later, you can't tread anymore, you drown.
Right? Like that's what's gonna happen. So we can all tread
water and we all have treaded water at some point in our
businesses, right? And just had to do what we had to do. The
problem is, if you're five years in, which I know a lot of
people are, and you're still having to do that, that's the
warning sign, the warning sign. If you're somebody listening to
us and you're in your first year of business, let me explain
nobody had an easy first year in business. Most people didn't
have an easy first two or three years in business. But in a
service based business like detailing, if you're in year five,
and you're still having to really tread, tread, tread, tread
to stay afloat, there's a fundamental problem in your
business. And that's any service. You know, like you said,
housekeeper, plumber, handyman, look, the beauty of these
businesses, you can get them off the ground really quick, and
you can get them off the ground for really cheap, and you can get
them off the ground. You're five years in, and you're still
having to tread, tread, tread, and you're noticing that it's
harder to make your bills at home, and it's harder to make,
make this ends meet. That's kind of the warning sign. And I
think that's you and I, let's take it out of the just a
detailer. In the product business that we're all in. There
were a lot of people for the last 18 months doing exactly that
treading water and treading water really fast. And it's
amazing around SEMA time, the conversations that started to
happen, talking to companies like ours, because guys, when
people and are in the in the in these product based businesses
start to have problems, they look for investors, they look for
people to buy the company, they look for a way out, because
they go, this thing's drowning me. And when you start to think
about some of the things that can drown you on this side, you're
talking about seven figure problems, you're not talking
about 50 grand, 20 grand, eight grand, I still own a truck,
you're talking about, I have equipment payments that are a
million and a half dollars. And so amazingly, in 2025 at SEMA,
the things that approached us were a lot different than they
were the previous two years. And why was that? Because people
got tired of treading water. And that's what we kind of want to
avoid with this conversation is guys, this is a very broad.
There are no answers type of conversation. There's no perfect
answer to tie this in a bow and say this is what you have to do.
It's more of a conversation to go. How many trashed vehicles
can you do for six and seven and eight hours and make 350, 450
bucks? Because I got news for you, that's the norm. That's what
most people are doing. And now that confuses the customer on
what it should really cost to have these things done. And I
know a lot of you heard me say 200 bucks an hour, and you're
like, that's outrageous. But to run a business. We're hearing of
companies charging $240 an hour now, not just in our business,
but in service based businesses, like detailing at someone's
home. And we recently called a plumber. I made a knucklehead
mistake and drop dropped a piece of plastic down one of my
toilets. Okay, all on me. We called. I just didn't have the
equipment to get it out. That's all. Guy came out with us with
a with a with a with a snake, you know, professional grade gets
it out. Seven total minutes. And that was $150. Seven total
minutes. By the way, I never complained about it. I mean, the
guys like, Hey, do you have anything else I can do? I said,
Hey, man, charge what you need to charge $150 for seven minutes
or some of you are charging 300 bucks for eight hours of work.
That guy didn't rip me off. That guy didn't get over on me. It
cost something to drive there. It cost something to do it. It
cost something for the knowledge. It cost something for the
equipment. And I know people are like, Well, that's not me. And
I hope it's not. You know, God bless, as they say, I hope it
isn't you. But I see the posts on the internet. I see the guys
and say, Well, that's good money. I couldn't make that money
working for somebody. That's bullshit. You can make it work.
Make better money working for somebody than that. That's just
nonsense. And to the customers that listen to us, what you pay
for someone's time in 2026 is a lot closer to 200 bucks an hour
than it is 100 bucks an hour. And that that is a crazy thing to
say, even for me, because seven years ago on this podcast, I
was telling people you have to be at 100 bucks an hour. And in
seven years, it took us to double that. That isn't a lot of
time when you think it took a previous 100 years to get to 100
bucks an hour in the economy, so to speak. Like this has changed
so rapidly. I don't think anybody's talking about this. I
really don't I don't see it. All I see is the BS customer has
never been more informed. That's BS customers never been more
misinformed. The customer's never been more confused. And
it's not their fault. It just isn't. It's it's you can't be
informed on everything in life. It's not possible. Just it's
just as impossible.
It was a great discussion. And I hope everybody goes over to the
specialist group. I really do and voices their opinion. You
know, what's this? Do you feel is being taken advantage of? Do
you feel there's misinformation? You know what? What do you
what do you have an opinion on when it comes to this? hyperclaim
specialist? Let's hear your opinion. We'll see everybody
there. See you guys.
About this episode
A deep dive into the complexities of pricing and customer expectations in the auto detailing industry. The hosts discuss the disconnect between the time and effort required for thorough detailing versus what customers are willing to pay. They explore whether customers should clean their vehicles before bringing them in for detailing, and how misconceptions about the industry can lead to misunderstandings about service costs. The episode features engaging analogies and personal anecdotes, highlighting the challenges of running a detailing business in today's economy.
Original notes
In this engaging discussion, Marshall and Nick explore the intricacies of the detailing industry, comparing it to other service sectors like dentistry and housekeeping. They delve into customer expectations, pricing challenges, and the evolving landscape of service-based businesses. The conversation highlights the disconnect between consumer perceptions and the realities of running a detailing business, emphasizing the need for transparent communication and fair pricing strategies.
Chapters
00:00 The Importance of Preparation Before Detailing
02:58 Understanding Customer Expectations and Misconceptions
06:06 The Disconnect Between Service Pricing and Customer Awareness
08:55 The Evolution of Car Wash Services
11:57 The Real Cost of Detailing Services
14:48 Consumer Perceptions of Value and Pricing
18:11 The Impact of Inflation on Service Pricing
21:08 The Need for Industry Conversations on Pricing
23:52 Navigating the Challenges of Service-Based Pricing
27:55 Navigating Price Increases in Service-Based Businesses
33:10 The Challenge of Customer Expectations
39:49 The Myth of the Informed Customer
46:02 Finding the Middle Ground in Pricing
52:13 The Reality of Treading Water in Business
Pints and Polishing Auto Detailing Podcast
Nick Walters and Marshall Hill
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57:33