Approaching Businesses

R

RoadRunner

New member
Hi all,
I'm really learning a lot by hanging around here reading! But I got a couple of questions for all you master minds

1) I was wondering how I would go about approaching businesses about letting me setup outside there shop and do there cars, and thier customers cars. Theres one place inpaticular, It's a beauty shop below my house that let a friend of mine setup this summer, and he would do quick wash and vac jobs for there customers for about $25 a pop (averaged about 6 cars a day). Also another problem I have is a water supply, he used 50 gallon drums, but I don't have any way of hauling them. Any suggestions?

2) Also I was wondering if any one here had ever tried direct mail, what kind of response you got?

Thanks In advance
Wes
 
Raod Runner

Go talk to the biz owner and see what their thoughts are on doing the cars on site. Also see if they have a hose hookup that you can use. You might have some problems with city as well from waste water, so check into that as well.

Direct mail its a 2% return at best. I have done many mass mails with compaines and its really not worth the maony out of hand for the return. Word of mouth in this biz is about as good as it gets.
 
Your direct mail response rate will not justify the investment. Try making some coupons or flyers yourself. Kinkos is a great place, and it would be money better spent.

There's a small beauty shop next to our radio station's main office. Once a week a local mobile wash sets-up shop in the parking lot for a few hours. Uses a water source across the lot... and makes BANK!!! Does both employee and customer cars. I wouldn't let him touch mine, but that's another story.....

Bigger office complexes, and especially something like larger insurance support centers, are where I would focus... those people are stuck there all day. The only limit to your income potential would be how many cars you can do in a day.
 
Try sales realator offices too or for that matter companies that have a lot of sales people. Especially if sales people write off expenses :)
 
I really appreciate all the feedback guys, yall are really great!

One more thing about the direct mail, I can get about 1,000 postcards for $35 and postage for $230, the local postmaster told me that I could actually place the cards in the boxes of houses that are more "upscale" as long as they have postage, you guys think this would be worth it?

Also where are good places to distribute flyers?

I'm 17 and live on my own, and really need to get enough business coming in to make this work full time by May (when I graduate high school) as I will be losing a major portion of my income then. I'm open to all ideas and will try about anything.

Thanks many times over for your responses!!

Wes
 
I would hate to be 17 and on my own. My wife got stuck in teh same boat you are, and was able to do quite well for herself after she graduated from High school.

Now, some basics.
You will need to find the traffic areas that you can do this service at. You will definitely want an upscale area to work out of. There will need to be a level of profesionalism to make it look like people are getting their money's worth. This means company t-shirts, etc. Remember a profesional image is what will retain customers. The type of customer that pay do not want some guy in a ratty t-shirt, and cut-offs washing their car, even if you are only 17. You will need to inspire confidence. It is unfortunately harder to inspire that confidence at 17 than it is at 35.
So, how do you inspire the confidence. This will take a little bit of money. A Good easy up, a table with your chemicals neatly arranged, and neatly stacked or stored fresh and used towels. Keep the are neat and clean. You know what looks good, and this is what people like.
The next thing is to make a sign to put up at the location, with a price on it for a VERY basic wash. Of course Dressings, interiors and wax jobs are an additional charge. That is where you will make more money. There are a ton of other things that you can do, but I think that this will get you started in the right direction.

Scooter
 
RoadRunner said:
I really appreciate all the feedback guys, yall are really great!

One more thing about the direct mail, I can get about 1,000 postcards for $35 and postage for $230, the local postmaster told me that I could actually place the cards in the boxes of houses that are more "upscale" as long as they have postage, you guys think this would be worth it?

Also where are good places to distribute flyers?

I'm 17 and live on my own, and really need to get enough business coming in to make this work full time by May (when I graduate high school) as I will be losing a major portion of my income then. I'm open to all ideas and will try about anything.

Thanks many times over for your responses!!

Wes
Click to expand...

Hey Wes! Good to see you back. As far as the direct mail goes...If you think you can quickly recover the expense of doing it, then I say go for it. It would only take a couple of details out of the 1000 postcards. that's not a bad ratio. How close are you to the Redstone Arsenal up there? If you know anyone that works there, you could get them to put up some of your flyers on the boards throughout the place. My mom works for the government in a similar setting and that type of advertisement works pretty well I think. I would also say to stay away from putting flyers up on people's car windshields. Not only do I find this tacky, but that is all the reason to make me NOT use whatever service is advertised. Maybe you could hand them out at a mall or something. Doing this would give you some "face time" with potential customers. I really hope you get this thing off the ground. Good luck!!
 
Scooter said:
Now, some basics.
You will need to find the traffic areas that you can do this service at. You will definitely want an upscale area to work out of. There will need to be a level of profesionalism to make it look like people are getting their money's worth. This means company t-shirts, etc. Remember a profesional image is what will retain customers. The type of customer that pay do not want some guy in a ratty t-shirt, and cut-offs washing their car, even if you are only 17. You will need to inspire confidence. It is unfortunately harder to inspire that confidence at 17 than it is at 35.
So, how do you inspire the confidence. This will take a little bit of money. A Good easy up, a table with your chemicals neatly arranged, and neatly stacked or stored fresh and used towels. Keep the are neat and clean. You know what looks good, and this is what people like.
The next thing is to make a sign to put up at the location, with a price on it for a VERY basic wash. Of course Dressings, interiors and wax jobs are an additional charge. That is where you will make more money. There are a ton of other things that you can do, but I think that this will get you started in the right direction.

Scooter
Click to expand...

You won't find much better advice then that. I'll lend my experience to the advertising side of things... its my profession. Stay far away from direct mail. The deal may sound appealing (maybe even affordable :dunno) but the response rates are so low you will not see an effective return on your investment. The only way to get an effective return on direct mail is to run it time and time again... and for most advertisers it just buries them deeper every time.

JaredPointer also makes a very important point... if you put a flyer on my car, I'd be pi$$ed too :angry!! Go to your local Kinkos, or hook-up with some marketing students at the local college, and use their help with putting together some quick but nice flyers. Even a simple word processor can knock-out nice flyers. Adding a discount coupon makes it even more effective. Format it so you get 4 flyers per sheet of paper to maximize your budget, and then get out there and introduce yourself to people!

Go to the Chamber of Commerce, target business offices (look for large sales staffs), or pick some busy retail streets and walk a mile up one side and back on the other, handing out flyers to everyone that seems remotely interested. Try your local auto dealers, gas stations, body & paint shops, or anything associated with cars. Make contact with local car clubs, and use their refferals to get your name out even faster. Do it all with the mind-set that people are very interested in what you have to offer... unless they tell you otherwise... and if they do, don't take it personally, just move on to the next potential client!

You're on the right track, and you WILL be successful... just keep moving the ball forward, and keep smiling while you do it! :bigups
 
Guys I really appreciate it, and it's good to be back, and plan on staying around a long time, maybe just reading, but I'll be here.

Unfortunately I live about 50 miles from the redstone arsenal and don't know anybody who works there, but it's a great idea jared.

I'm going to go get some flyers copied, and might go ahead and try the direct mail route.

One problem I have is that I'm still in high school (a senior), and being able to get things done in the afternoons, I get out of school around 2:00 and it gets dark about 6:30 and in the debt of winter about 5:30, this I think is the main problem I'll have with setting up at shops, offices, etc...

What I've been doing since I got started in this has been picking up peoples cars, cleaning them up then carrying them back. I've got one dealer (only one who will let me work for him because of problems with insurance and my age) who gives me about 3 cars a week, and I do about 1 personal car per week as of right now. Also I haven't been doing full details for the most part, only done about 3 for customers, and my own car and girlfriends about 2 times each.

Here's what I've been doing for $35 for the dealer, and $45 for personal cars, also I charge $10 more for SUV'S, Large Trucks (f-250 size and up), and vans. As I said right now it's just a small portion of income, but I really need it to become my largest income by may.

Exterior:
Tire And Wheel Scrub
Hand Wash
Hand Wax
Tire and Trim glaze
Moderate Bug and tar removal

Interior:
Clean and glaze dash, console (pretty much all vynyl and leather)
Vacum carpets, all cloth
Clean Door Jambs
Clean Windows.

I'm not really even sure what I'm asking or why I typed all that so I'm just going to say any more suggestions? Please.
 
Thanks e43sport I really appreciate it, and will put it into effect, is it ok to just photocopy flyers in black and white? I think it's only about 10 cents a sheet for that and alot cheaper than having them proffesionaly done.

Thanks,
Wes
 
You bet... B&W flyers are fine, and if you run over 100 copies you should be able to get them for .06 -.07 per copy. If you have a large flyer, you can also use a copier to reduce it down. Get 4 reduced size flyers, do a little cut n' paste to make a master with 4 flyers on one sheet, and start copying. The use a paper cutter to cut your flyers down... 100 copies = 400 flyers!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top