Make the Most of Car Wash’s Captive Audiences

This article is brought to you by Mark VII. 

Themed washes. Light shows. Colored and scented foams.

All elements that customers might be experiencing in a modern car wash. Multimedia experiences have become part of the evolving trip to the car wash, according to Travis Cook, marketing manager at Mark VII.

“Car wash operators are trying to give people an experience as they go through the wash,” he said. “There are certain customers that don't care, and then there are other customers that really love that experience. I hear it a lot from people who say, ‘My kids love going through the car wash.’”

And Mark VII is working on a new upgrade that can add those elements of fun and help drive customers from the car wash inside the store.

The company is testing LED panels on both sides of the car wash that can display video and images, Cook said. “You have a captive audience for four to five minutes and they're inside of a dark room,” he said. “You can visually do whatever you want with this thing to advertise products in your store.”

Tentatively called V-Doors, the tall LED panels would replace the pillars that currently tell drivers when to drive and stop. Cook said the V-Doors are being tested with the target of launching by the end of the year. Mark VII plans to show off the doors this October at the NACS Show in Las Vegas.

User-friendly software will allow retailers to change what’s displayed on the V-Doors as frequently as they want to, according to Cook.

“You could do 30 different promos in a month if you really wanted to—doing that with printed signage would just have crazy costs,” Cook said. 

Operators could display promotions to drive customers inside the convenience store or even advertising for another local business, creating another potential revenue stream, according to Cook. 

He said bigger product suppliers might even pay to have advertisements for their products being sold inside the convenience store.

In addition to advertising and promotions, the displays could be used to promote the activities of community partners like charities and schools. “If someone approaches you with an opportunity, rather than waiting on that printed signage, you can just say, ‘Yeah, we'll do it next Thursday,’” Cook said. “It gives you a lot more ability to change on the fly.”

Another advantage is that the doors will be visible to the next car in line. Operators could display how long is left on the current wash, he said.

This could keep customers from leaving the line because they don’t know how long they’ll have to wait, saving the wash from losing potential revenue, according to Cook.

He said waiting customers might also see the kind of wash the car in front of them is getting and then decide to go with a more expensive service. 

Then, of course, there’s the chance to include graphics and animations that connect to a retailer’s themes.

“You could really lean into that with your graphics,” Cook said. “This is just going to be one more way that the operators can kind of entertain people, essentially, as they're going through the wash.”

This is the first article in a two-part series from Mark VII. Look out for part two, which explores active monitoring tools that can reduce car wash downtime.

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