By Elaine Foxwell

Carwash customers have several minutes to kill while their vehicles are being cleaned. Savvy operators can convert this time into dollars for the wash while customers entertain themselves shopping through hundreds of retail items on display in the lobby. When it comes time to pay for the wash, chances are the customer will have one or two impulse items in his hand to buy. But operators need to know what to stock, how often and how much.

“Seventy five percent of everything sold in a carwash lobby is impulse,” says Rami Lalena, president of R.R. Lalena Corp. in Maspeth, N.Y. “You can drive your car without Betty Boop car mats or without an air freshener. You don’t really need these things.”

Lalena estimates that 70 percent of carwash customers buy lobby items for themselves because they are the drivers.

Novelty items are incremental sales that are in addition to the service the customer came in to buy, says Ben Hickman, owner of HP Industries in Kirksville, Mo., an importer and manufacturer of general merchandise. Hickman says most customers are shopping for themselves except during the holidays, when items may be picked up as stocking stuffers or small gifts.

Depending on the season, certain items sell better than others, Hickman says. For example, sales of NASCAR items are hot from the season’s start in March, slowing slightly in the summer, then increasing in November and during the holidays.

HP’s line of NFL novelty items includes key chains, polyresin items and pewter items, all of which sell well. In the fall and winter, NFL items are very hot.

“We are doing very well with NFL pewter key chains that run from $4.99 to $5.99 retail,” he says.

Although HP’s sales of NFL novelties are always good, baseball items only sell well in locations near baseball stadiums. Orange County Choppers is another line of novelty merchandise that is selling well, with the added plus that its sales are not dependent on the time of the year.

Customers are also buying top-quality steering-wheel covers, Lalena says. They used to buy inexpensive steering-wheel covers for around $6.99, but now cheap steering-wheel covers are out, he says. Customers are paying about $15 for high-end steering-wheel covers made of quality leather.

“They’re going to use it every day in their car, so why not buy quality? They are thinking, ‘I can’t afford a BMW or a Lexus, but I can buy this steering-wheel cover and it’s going to make my car look a lot better and make me feel better about driving.’”

Another fast-selling product carried by R.R. Lalena is the Fun Friends collectible cell-phone covers for $7.99. The covers are shaped like a stuffed animal. Lalena also distributes several higher-priced items, including Dub City Cars. These collectible cars are made of painted, diecast metal. Some collectible cars are going for $49.99 and up. One remote-control car, which retails for $109.99, is inflatable so it won’t break if it hits a wall. Another high-priced but successful seller is a portable cooler that heats and cools. The cooler, which retails for $49.99, plugs into a vehicle’s cigarette lighter.

Other popular items are cell phone holders, automotive Fabreeze, microfiber towels in a retail pack, different style novelty lighter accessories that illuminate, stress-relief balls and mini compasses, says Eric Wachtel, vice president of sales for T & E Sales Inc., Edison, N.J.

Holders and organizers are also popular. One new type of product stores CDs on one side and is a visor organizer on the other side. The Smart Pouch is another hot storage item. It can be used to hold a cell phone, water bottle or several other small items that need to be stored in the car, he says. A car-seat organizer that fits on the headrest of the front seat lets kids store their toys and games, making it an ideal accessory for families.

“We are also doing really well with healthy snack foods,” Wachtel says. “People coming to the carwash during their lunch hour don’t have time for lunch, so they grab a quick, healthy snack,” he says. His company is selling Skinner Salted Nuts and Mister Snacks. These foods include tropical fruit mixes and nuts such as pistachios, cashews and mixed nuts in a retail pack.

While customers will probably always buy hanging air fresheners, unobtrusive air fresheners that don’t hang from the rearview mirror are selling well, Lalena says. He says more and more customers are looking for other options. Vent Fresh by Medo, which attaches to a vehicle’s air vents, allows users to control the level of fragrance from maximum to minimum fragrance. The scent lasts for 60 days. Currently, there are three fragrances and three more will be introduced in the near future. Vent Fresh retails for $3.99. Carwash operators are obviously much happier to sell an air freshener for $3.99 than 99 cents,” Lalena says.

Car Freshner recently introduced two new paper air fresheners, Summer Surf and Pink Grapefruit. Lalena says these air fresheners are selling like crazy. Another Little Tree product, Black Ice, is a soothing scent that is popular among men and women, Lalena says.

Having the right items on the shelves is only part of the lobby sales equation. The other part is the price point, which is getting higher and higher, according to Lalena. The profit margin on items less than $25 needs to be 100 percent, he says. If you pay $1.99 for an item, it should retail for $3.99. The profit margin will be less on items costing more than $25.

The best-selling carwash lobby items are priced from $1.99 to $9.99, Hickman says. Operators may buy 24 $1.99 items and do well, but they don’t necessarily want to buy 24 $9.99 items, he says, adding that operators should only buy two or three $19.99 items.

“Remember, lobby sales are impulse buys. The products are not destination items. A carwash operator should look to make anywhere from 40 percent to 50 percent on lobby sales,” Hickman says. “Only if there is something that is unusual could the price be $19.99, but the $59 or $99 merchandise is not worth putting in your lobby.”

Wachtel advises owners not stock anything retailing more than $9.99, since merchandise priced higher is no longer an impulse buy.

“The $6.99 to $7.99 priced items do really well,” he says. Operators should look at making $1 to $1.50 profit per car margin. Whatever you buy, plan on making 50 percent profit from each item,” he says.

How much merchandise to buy is another question operators must answer. Lalena says it is critical to have a good selection of merchandise. The bigger the variety of items, the more you will sell. The problem is that operators buy too little, Lalena says. Carwashes should be getting deliveries at least every seven to 10 days. If they’re not getting new merchandise this often, they are not making any money, he says.

“A good test is to check your inventory every Monday,” Lalena says. The busiest carwash days are Friday, Saturday and Sunday, with 60 percent of total business done on those three days. If you see empty hooks on Monday morning, then you’re not buying enough product. If there are empty hooks at any time, that means you’re losing sales, he says.

Make sure your product supplier is professional and up-to-date with the latest items. The supplier also needs to understand carwash sales, Lalena says.

“You don’t want a supplier who is going to write up your order and then disappear. They should be there to help you with displays, product selection, etc. The service should be excellent. The verification of this will be in the sales numbers,” he says.

Although most operators don’t have enough space in the carwash to store lots of merchandise, they want to buy what they can display, Hickman says. He suggests operators have a guaranteed sales agreement with the supplier. With guaranteed sales, a store buys 24 items but if after a pre-determined length of time there are some left, the rep takes those items and replaces them with 12 new products.

If a product doesn’t sell well, the carwash owner has the option of rotating the product. Rotation with a guarantee takes the guesswork out of deciding what sells and what doesn’t, Hickman says. Once an owner is able to rotate items, he will discover what sells best.

“The guarantee gives the owner a way to determine how much product to carry for his store,” he says. “You won’t be able to have every hot item in the carwash lobby, but if you can get somebody to rotate the product you will carry many more that are going to create sales.”

“Whatever you sold last week should be replaced this week,” says Wachtel.

A well-stocked store should have about $10,000 in merchandise. Most operators don’t have room on the site for a storage area for merchandise, so they want to buy only what they can display, Wachtel says.

The attitude of the person in charge of lobby sales is important to successful sales.

“The difference between a successful carwash lobby and a less successful store is caring,” Lalena says.

Management and staff must care how the lobby looks and how much money the carwash is making per car, or sales will be low.

“Many carwash owners don’t understand that to sell impulse items your store needs to be clean, and the environment needs to be soothing with pleasant music. The merchandise will be more appealing in this type of environment,” Lalena says.

If operators leave dust on shelves and don’t display items well, their sales will suffer.

Operators have to ask themselves if they’re happy making 80 cents per car in sales or $1.50 or more per car, Lalena says.

When new items are offered, Lalena advises operators work with the supplier on the display. It should be well-stocked, have a good selection and be clean and appealing to the customer.

As with any trend, there comes a time when some lobby items are no longer hot. At that point, it’s time to remove them from a wash’s inventory.

“Older automotive accessories are not popular,” Wachtel says. “For example, magnetic car key-holders don’t sell well now since many vehicles are designed with keyless entries. Or the 2-inch blind-spot mirror is no longer popular, since the blind spot has been engineered out of most cars today.”

“Everything is hot to a certain degree at some point,” Hickman says. “But operators have a tendency to forget what isn’t hot anymore, such as Cabbage-Patch dolls— which were very popular a few years ago. And not everything is a winner.”

With care, a knowledgeable and trustworthy supplier and attention to detail, an operator can see lobby sales contribute significantly to his wash’s bottom line and make the facility a winner.

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