Why is car detailing so expensive?

Recently we had a client who was amazed at the end result we were able to produce on his new vehicle. He told us after the detail, “You know I was initially pretty skeptical of your pricing when I booked you guys, but after seeing everything that went into it and the results, I totally get it now.” This is a pretty common reaction. It stems really just from a place of ignorance. People simply do not understand the materials and work required to complete a high level detail. That is what we hope to tackle a little bit in this article.

Can’t I just get the same thing at a car wash?

This is probably the biggest obstacle for most people. When someone hears the word detail the most common assumption is, “oh car wash.” Then when they find out the price is 10x higher they are very confused. They think, “why would I pay 10x more for something I can get someone else cheaper?” This is absolutely right! You should not pay 10x more for the exact same thing. The problem lies in we need to compare apples to apples. Are you really getting the exact same thing? Here is an offering from a local car wash.

Now lets compare this to our lowest exterior package our bronze package.

As you can see the price difference comes out to $182. Now the question becomes is our bronze package delivering $182 more value than your typical car wash? Of course, we are biased but obviously we think so. Let us explain.

So right off the bat we do not recommend taking your vehicle at all to an automatic car wash. You can learn why here, but nevertheless let’s set those arguments aside. Break down what you are actually receiving in the car wash. Everything comes out to spray on, rinse off. Everything that the car wash is offering can be encapsulated in our foam wash step. Why don’t we offer a $17 foam wash? Because it is not beneficial for the customer nor for us. A foam wash on its own will not yield a clean car. As you can see our bronze package has a lot of steps. However, it is the minimum amount of work that we believe a vehicle needs to bring it up to an acceptable professional standard. We have no interest in offering a service where your vehicle is not going to look great. The other line item to point out are the different kinds of wax that the car wash is putting on your vehicle. A triple conditioning wax as well as something called a hot lava wax. Perhaps you are wiser than us, but we have done a lot of research in this industry and have no idea what either of those mean. At Fort Worth Auto Detail we only use the best products. You can even ask us what kind of products we use and check out what we recommend here. We can educate you and how to use certain products if you choose to maintain your vehicle yourself. The car wash also offers a 72 hour clean car promise. It is difficult to understand what they mean by this. You can take a car that has been run through a car wash and straight into a mud pit and it will not be clean anymore. If we had to give them benefit of the doubt, they could be referring to the wax that they put on your vehicle. Here again though note the difference. Our bronze package protection will last anywhere from 6 to 12 months depending on how you maintain your vehicle. Lets do some math then. Lets say you always want protection on your vehicle so every few days you return to this car wash since the wax only lasts a few days. To make it simple lets say you go every week.

So 52 weeks in a year x $17 a car wash equals $884.

At that point you are about $100 away from our diamond package that is going to get a minimum of 5 years of protection. Speaking of length of time note the time difference in length of service. This car wash says it takes 3 minutes to complete. Our bronze package on average takes anywhere from 4 to 5 hours. Look at this from an hourly rate perspective.

So (60 minutes in an hour/ 3 minutes of service) * $17 a service

equals an effective hourly rate of $340

Please note we do not wish to demean this particular carwash or any carwash for that matter. The point being though be careful if you are just shopping price. Cheap work is not good and good work is not cheap. The extra steps add to the cost of the detail.

So what are you getting with a detail?

Well there is quite a lot that goes into a detail. Let’s try to unpack a little starting with products. The auto detailing world is filled with products to choose from. Take detailing.com for example a website that sells detailing supplies. They have over 24 categories alone in chemicals each with over 100 choices to choose from. Why so many? Well your car, more than likely depending on make and model, has many different surfaces. Each of these surfaces may require a different chemical in order to clean it and protect it properly. You have tires, rims, plastic trim, glass, clearcoat, leather, carpet, upholstery, and more. Now some products can be used a variety of surfaces, but the point being is it takes specialized products if you are going to clean and protect all of these surfaces properly without damage. The highly specialized chemicals add to the cost of the detail.

Equipment

It is not only products that produce an excellent finish on a vehicle but there are necessary tools that are required as well. You need a pressure washer, a steam cleaner, a wet/dry vacuum, a dual action polisher perhaps more than one for hard to reach places, an extractor, an ozone machine, an air blower a small one for inside the vehicle and a leaf blower for exterior use, and more. All of these tools add to the cost of the detail.

Another tool we want to talk about is microfiber towels. Many of you may be familiar with microfiber towels as general all-purpose towels around the house. Microfiber towels are rated by GSM which stands for grams per square meter. Higher the GSM usually the microfiber towel will weigh more and be a litter thicker and plusher. Most microfiber towels will fall in a range of 200 to 500 GSM. Why does this matter? Well because a low GSM microfiber has the potential to scratch your vehicle’s paint. At Fort Worth Auto Detail, we will not use anything lower than a 350 GSM on a vehicle’s paint. Most of the towels we use will be 500 GSM. As you probably guessed the higher GSM count microfiber towels are much more expensive. However, to get that end result they are certainly worth it. It is just another expense that most people do not see that goes into making your vehicle perfect. Higher GSM microfiber towels add to the cost of the detail.

Insurance, marketing, and taxes

Of course these are expenses for all business so we will not dwell here for long. Something of note though is not only do you want your detailer to carry a general liability insurance, which we at Fort Worth Auto Detail do, you also want to make sure they have something called garage keepers insurance. Garage keepers is going to cover if there is ever an accident when the detailer is driving the vehicle. Perhaps it started raining and the detailer needed to pull the vehicle into the garage and accident occurs. That particular incident is going to be covered not under general liability but rather garage keeper’s policy. You guessed it though that adds to the cost of the detail.

Hard manual labor

When I was sixteen, I worked for my uncle’s construction company. It taught me I definitely did not want to do that for a living. Why? It was back breaking work. Was it particularly complicated? No, my job was not, but it was incredibly strenuous. Detailing is very similar. It is not particularly complicated. We can teach you all you need to know in a matter of a few weeks. However it can be very hard on your body. That is why you typically do not see many older detailers. They typically transition to the management side of the business because the body just can not hold up polishing a car for hours on end day after day. It is not uncommon for us to finish a vehicle and have accumulated 5 miles of walking simply from going around the vehicle. The amount of hard manual labor adds to the cost of the detail.

Convenience

One of the great perks for our customers at Fort Worth Auto Detail is we operate as a mobile unit. In today’s modern society we are becoming more accustomed to goods and services being delivered directly to us rather than us the consumer having to go to the business. You have Netflix and on-demand movies for entertainment, Uber Eats and Doordash for food delivery, auto dealers such as CarMax and Vroom now offer vehicle delivery, and on and on the list goes. At Fort Worth Auto Detail, we come to you on your schedule. Our clients never even have to leave their couch. Our service agreement and payment can all be taken care of online. Like anything else extra convenient it adds to the cost of the detail.

Skill based industry not commodity based

The last factor we will talk about is that detailing is a skill-based industry. It is not a product. Say you want the latest iPhone. Well you find the model you want and then try and find the lowest price. Because it is all the same product across multiple vendors it makes sense to take the lowest price. However the same cannot be said across skill-based industries such as detailing. We mentioned earlier that we could teach anyone to detail and that is true, but say you have two detailers performing the exact same task with the same products and tools and yet they produce two different results. How is this possible? It is possible because there is an element of skill involved that only comes from experience and research. Here at Fort Worth Auto Detail we are not the lowest price in the industry. That title can only belong to one company and more than likely that will constantly be changing. So if you are shopping on price alone we are probably not the service for you. On the other hand we are far from the most expensive detailer in the area. If you are shopping on the basis of value on how much bang do I get for my buck. Well then we believe Fort Worth Auto Detail is the place for you and we look forward to building a lasting business relationship with you. So stay on your couch and go ahead and book today!