How Much Does a Car Wash Make in a Week? Insights and Cash Management Tips
Are you looking to start a car wash business? Or curious to know how much it makes to compare your earnings?
In this article, we will answer the most common question that nobody would answer: How much does a car wash make in a week?
To answer that, we researched known car wash owners and explored the factors that can influence your income, along with tips on handling that heavy cash flow.
Weather, Location, and Traffic: Key Factors in Income
Your weekly income will depend heavily on a few factors:
- Location: Car washes near a high-traffic road generally make more than others. Do your research upfront.
- Weather: Generally, car washes in sunnier regions like California tend to do better year-round. But even businesses in snowy climates see decent returns, especially when the weather clears. Hence, everyone wants to remove the winter dirt from their cars.
- Facilities: The more bays, vacuums, vending machines, deals, washing options, and automatic options you offer, the more money you can make. Owners who upgrade their facilities tend to see significant revenue increases.
Are you interested in upgrading your car wash business? We already talked about 15 must-apply tips to make more money.
Counting the Cash: Tokens or Quarters?
When it does come to handling payments, car wash businesses generally deal with a large volume of cash—mostly smaller denominations like quarters and dollar bills. But did you know that some car washes use tokens alongside?
Take Car Wash Chronicles as an example, a popular YouTuber with several car washes under his belt (currently 5). He uses tokens at his locations because they create a cycle of customer fidelity. When someone buys tokens, they are committed to coming back.
However, not everyone uses this method. Another YouTuber, who goes by The Revestor, prefers to stick with just bills and quarters. His reasoning is simple: quarters are everywhere. Customers often bring them from home, their car cup holders, piggy banks, or nearby gas stations.
At the same time, people who use the change machine to get quarters do not spend it all in the car wash, if not just someone walking down the street or a gas station nearby.
So, it goes up and down several times, and after six months to a year, he is at the point of running at a surplus of quarters—after filling out the change machine.
Both methods have their benefits:
- The Revestor avoids wasting the time of separating tokens from quarters and counting those last ones.
- Car Wash Chronicles avoids break-ins and ensures customer retention.
Regardless of the method, one thing is clear: collecting and counting the cash should be done regularly, either weekly or bi-weekly.
How Much Can You Earn In a Car Wash Business?
So, let's get to the part you have been waiting for—how much can a car wash make in a week? Here are some figures from Car Wash Chronicles who have been open about their earnings:
(1) He reported making $2,377 in one week from his least busy car wash. Which included earnings from five self-service bays, three vacuums, and vending machines, even during winter—usually a slower time for car washes.
(2) In another location, Car Wash Chronicles pulled in $4,011 a week during winter (late January). This location had five bays, three vacuums, four vending machines, and an automatic car wash bay. Here is the breakdown:
- Cash: $1,802
- Quarters: $614
- Credit card payments: $1,215
- Automatic bay: $380
Expenses like rent, utilities, labor, and maintenance came to around $2,254 for that week, leaving him with a net income of $1,757. Not bad for a slow season, right?
(3) In another video, he shared that he made $3,831 in one week in November. His car wash had five self-service bays, four vacuums, and four vending machines. Out of that, $3,020 came from cash alone.
(4) Lastly, Car Wash Chronicles mentions in another video that he made $61,679.75 in 6 months since opening, with $52,000 cash (even for five months of winter), and it took him three weeks to get the credit card machine in, and it has done $7240, which reminds us of cash is king.
All of it was during a bad season (winter). But during summer, it would probably go over $80k to $100k until November with five bays, three vacuums, and vending machines.
It is clear that even during off-peak times, car wash businesses can generate significant income. However, more income raises the need to manage cash efficiently.
(5) Another one:
Whether you are collecting coins, quarters, or tokens, counting should not be a daunting but exciting task.
Why You Need a NuCoun Money Counter Machine?
With so much cash flowing in from various sources, investing in a reliable money counter can save countless hours of separating bills and counting. That is where the NuCoun Money Counter VS75 comes in.
Capable of counting up to 1,200 banknotes per minute, the NuCoun machine makes cash handling easy. It can handle mixed denominations, detect counterfeit bills (if they slip from the bill changer), and even sort by face or orientation.
With high accuracy, a big hopper capacity of 600 bills, and a reject capacity of 100 without flying bills.
As your car wash business grows, so does your cash. For a car wash business that deals with a large volume of cash weekly, investing in a money counter is a no-brainer.
Get the NuCoun Money Counter Machine today and make handling cash the exciting part of running your car wash.
Sources:
(1) https://youtu.be/mjGcwo0FCbY
(2) https://youtu.be/UljDDJDa8eI
(3) https://youtu.be/tQuYClztMeg