Auto Detailing.

[Mr.Glock]

Name of detail and contact or is it private only?
Looks great!

Yes sir! And I can tell you he is a honest and very punctual as well. I had called and scheduled two others local around here and both were no shows and tried calling the next day after the appointed time to run excuses. This guy below set the time, called the night before and and called when he was enroute, as well was 15 minutes early! He also works in the Paint & Body work as well, so he knows paint!

 

[Mr.Glock]

I went down to Weatherford TX and worked for my buddy who owns a mobile detaining business for a few months during covid. Man, that was definitely some hard work, we would work from 5am-8pm every day, most of those hours in the sun. Satisfying stuff though, we cleaned a lot of farm trucks and farm semi's, as well as some real nice cars.

I offered to let him do the two trucks in one of my shops, he elected to do them under a carport and one under a large RV Covered building. He likes outside! He is mobile.

Be a great side gig hustle if a guy knew how! Start one on the side holeshit!

 

[turkeyrun]

He done a good job. Those that do good work seem to love doing that sort of labor. I am more of a drive through the automatic car wash and done.

The good ones can make it showroom clean.

 

[HoLeChit]

I offered to let him do the two trucks in one of my shops, he elected to do them under a carport and one under a large RV Covered building. He likes outside! He is mobile.

Be a great side gig hustle if a guy knew how! Start one on the side holeshit!

Tempting, I really thought about it. But its pretty high buy in costs if you wanna do it right (water filters, tanks, heated pressure washer, chemicals, trailer, towels, etc) and the market is just so flooded with a bunch of guys who washed their wifes car with their armorall gift set from fathers day and thought "man, I'm gonna go charge people $40 to wash their car and get rich quick!".

 

[Mr.Glock]

Tempting, I really thought about it. But its pretty high buy in costs if you wanna do it right (water filters, tanks, heated pressure washer, chemicals, trailer, towels, etc) and the market is just so flooded with a bunch of guys who washed their wifes car with their armorall gift set from fathers day and thought "man, I'm gonna go charge people $40 to wash their car and get rich quick!".

This gent is in a F150, but is purchasing a small Ford Van, he stated to keep all his tools outta sight. I agreed, wife and I used two big Dodge Vans turned into trailers for all our Home Building/Remodeling Tools back in the day. Keeps **** locked up good and tight and outta of sight!

Did not look like a whole lot of money, but I know nothing of it. Would you say less than $5 grand?

I paid him $300 for the exterior on the 4 door 4x4 Tundra, $175 for the interior of the 4 door 4x4 1 ton.

 

[HoLeChit]

This gent is in a F150, but is purchasing a small Ford Van, he stated to keep all his tools outta sight. I agreed, wife and I used two big Dodge Vans turned into trailers for all our Home Building/Remodeling Tools back in the day. Keeps **** locked up good and tight and outta of sight!

Did not look like a whole lot of money, but I know nothing of it. Would you say less than $5 grand?

I paid him $300 for the exterior on the 4 door 4x4 Tundra, $175 for the interior of the 4 door 4x4 1 ton.

The big money is really in the pressure washer and the filtration systems.

A Hotsy 1200 series (arguably the best in the industry) diesel fired, gas motor heated pressure washer will run you $12000-$14,000 and has a honda engine. A Northern Tool house brand skid that is comparable will run you $9k and has a kohler engine.

Water filtration/deionizing filter system will run you between $400-5000 depending on what route you take.

Here's a good chemical company, to give you an idea of consumables.

Your #1 Source for Quality Detailing Supplies

Shine Supply is your number one source for quality detail products at a fair price headquartered in Ventura, California.

shinesupply.com

My buddy had a 8x14ish trailer with his pressure washer skid, 300 and 500 gallon water tanks prefilled with filtered and treated water, a generator for the blower and vacuums, hoses, boxes for tools/fuel/dirty towels, etc etc. Bed of his F350 was filled with cleaning products and things like the sprayer for acid washing aluminum, brushes, etc.

It really doesn't seem like much, but once you start ticking off the list, it gets expensive real quick to have everything you need. You can't reuse towels, ideally you need 4-5 different brushes just for the interior of a truck. 3-4 for the outside. 4-5 chemicals for the inside of a car depending on the job, 3-4 for the outside. Vacuums, buckets, spray bottles, etc etc. I did the math on starting up on my own, assuming I just wanted to start off with everything rather than working on differentiating myself from everyone else that was starting out with 2 buckets and a vacuum. It would have cost me about $20,000 to get everything going, to include insurance and business stuff.

But it was fun, and rewarding. It paid pretty well, but a lot of work. We detailed everything, acid washed and polished livestock trailers, Alcoas, semi flatbeds, etc. Clean out the inside of livestock trailers, spray driveways, and vacuum up cheerios from between the cushions on the wife's escalade. It was a lot of work, and you had to be meticulous, but it was always something new. I remember going and before lunch we did a F450 platinum, a Navigator, a Lexus IS350, a beat up kawasaki mule, and a $300k Tige Wake boat. at lunch sitting underneath my buddies truck because there wasn't any shade, and we didn't want to sit on these folks patio. (thankfully my buddy has about 3.5ft of clearance under his truck). After lunch we hit some guys place and cleaned his bass boat, before going to a ranch and cleaning 4 ranchhand trucks, a semi, and cleaning/acid washing a 50ish foot livestock trailer with living quarters. Next day we went back and polished the Alcoa wheels on the semi, cleaned another smaller livestock trailer, and the owner's 3 trucks before lunch.

 

[Mr.Glock]

@HoLeChit This guy must be starting out. No steam washer, he has a tank of water and buckets and can rinse under power. He had a small Gen set to run the buffers, pressure washer and needs. Then hands on deck he goes with his two arms! 3 hours $300. He had 3 to do the day he did my Tundra.

 

[HoLeChit]

@HoLeChit This guy must be starting out. No steam washer, he has a tank of water and buckets and can rinse under power. He had a small Gen set to run the buffers, pressure washer and needs. Then hands on deck he goes with his two arms! 3 hours $300. He had 3 to do the day he did my Tundra.

Nothing wrong with that! The extra cash invested initially just means extra vehicles done per day really. It’s good money either way for sure.