Entrepreneurialism
Car Wash Guys; A Franchising Case Study
The Car Wash Guys is a franchise system, which had never been done before in the Industry of Car Washing, as it was a mobile car wash. It started out in California with independent contractors and quickly grew to 53 units in 39 cities within a 4-year period and then the company decided to franchise the concept.
No such variation in this business structure or variation of franchising had ever been tried. The company had so many new and innovative ideas, that it was really hard to define in current business terms exactly what we are doing. For instance the Car Wash Guys corporate HQ was actually on wheels.
http://www.carwashguys.com/blitz.html
The Car Wash Guys franchise system was also run with no employees to cut down on cost and allow them to deliver a higher level of service using the new digital age. It was not until the end of the first three years that the corporate HQ of The Car Wash Guys even had one salaried employee, as every one else was either a consultant or independent contractor.
Another interesting fact about The Car Wash Guys was the founder, did not draw a salary; all interesting in that this was not your typical franchise model. It is hard to say, if any other company besides the Car Wash Guys has ever used such methods or franchise variation model. They model proved to be successful in allowing the company to rapidly expand in the market place. It was believed by the Car Wash Guys that the virtual aspects allowed them to move fast, change directions and attack market sectors faster that their competitors. So who runs the company? Well, the team, franchisees, vendors, consultants, regional team managers (future master franchises), two employees and founder. Here is his resume;
http://www.carwashguys.com/history/founder.html
The Car Wash Guys was later broken into many parts to allow them to wash things other than cars, but still allow them to use the operational costs of the franchise system to run many other co-brands simultaneously with little outlay of administrative costs. The best way to improve the fierceness of their franchisee team members is to lower their costs, stated the founder. In other words eliminate the Franchisor and run it virtual. When they divided their system into many parts the costs associated are divided against all those parts and the fixed costs to run a franchise system are nearly eliminated. Thus they were able to do more for less. With computers they networked the team together, sharing data, customers, vendor support, consultants, etc.
The Car Wash Guys had many market sectors, they competed in. A Young , dynamic and aggressive company, the kind of company you do not see come along that often in the franchising realm. The customers loved them and the competition hates them. And the government did not know what to do with them, as they appeared to be between definitions of law and regulation. Amazing what new things entrepreneurial companies think of isn?t it. Think on this in 2006.
Lance Winslow
Lance Winslow
Tags: Car Wash Guys, Franchising Case StudySimilar articles
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