Jeremy's says $150 http://www.btldetailing.com/services.htm
this was $155

I see nothing on his site about multiple grades of polish, the other one says:

"machine polish"
"machine wax"
"hand polish chrome"

Jeremy doesn't include Steam cleaning

At $150 vs $155, yes it is in line considering experience.

I'm sure they could have steam cleaned the engine (or whatever) and clayed and maybe the price would have been a bit more, but consider the established business reputation versus the rookie.

Again, I dont want to discourage him at all. I hope he makes this all work

 

I just want to throw it out there that after replies here and on autopia, I updated my services page with prices that are about $15-$25 higher then they were when this thread began.

 

I looks like Jeremy has already raised his prices. I still have an instance of his site open in my browser from earlier today, and the "Premium In-And-Out" package was $125 less than an hour ago. - good for him!

Regarding the multiple grades of polish, if you look at Jeremy's "Intermediate" packages, he only mentions polish once, to "add gloss and depth". In his premium package, he mentions two polishing steps, once to remove swirl marks and defects, and again for the gloss and depth. That sounds to me like he's going over the car once with a medium polish and again with a finer polish before the wax application.

And as far as "steam cleaning" the interior goes, stain removal is stain removal - if the stain is 100% gone, it doesn't matter if it was with steam or not. I can't think of the last stain I removed that took anything other than Woolite, Spot-Shot, or Griot's Interior Cleaner.

 

Just because I base my rates on making about $30-$50/hour DOES NOT mean I make $100k a year.

I don't really understand where you are coming from saying no one would pay that much for their car to be detailed? I have no problem whatsoever charging $150 for a full detail (not including polish). Perhaps take a look at autopia.org and you will find that the majority of detailers on there, after all costs considered, make atleast $30/hour.

Keep in mind, this is NOT a 9-5 job where one gets paid by the hour, clocking in and out. It is a labor intensive job with lots of downtime and lots of reliance on other things (customers, weather, ect.)



???????????

I completely DISAGREE with this. To classify people into those three categories is ridiculous in my opinion. I have several WEEKLY clients who I work for. People who pay me to come wash their cars for them every week. These are people who care about their cars, but do not have the time or energy to maintain their vehicles themselves.

I don't know, perhaps the detailing market is different where I live, compared to where you live. Perhaps there is not a large market of people interested in keeping their cars clean where you live, but I find it to be quite the opposite down here in Texas.

 

I'm up in Columbia and have been looking to get some deatiling done.... I love detailing my cars but the process is painful and most times frustrating. How far do you go for mobile detailing?

 

Actually, the deal is the $95 package. Clay, polish wax, and all trim is more than most ppl ever do

Good for you! You must live near the rich folks

Obviously, I can see when ppl wash their cars in their driveways. You can also see when ppl take the car to the car washes. I do see some ppl wash their cars ... maybe once a month at most. The vast majority ... I never see wash their cars in their driveways. Do they ever? I dunno.

Car washes? After a snowstorm and the salt, yup the carwashes are backed up. Other times, on weekends they may have a few customers.

OCD type detailing ... never. I have never, literally never, saw anyone other than myself get out clay, polish, wax, trimming, interior, etc. and NEVER other than myself, seen anyone with a PC. Once I saw someone vacuuming their interior in 30 years. I have seen people vacuuming at car washes. I see people washing with soap and water ... thats it. For the vast, and I mean vast majority of people, I never see this obsession with washing and waxing. Maybe its a regional thing, maybe its just what I see.

Do people go to detailing places? Clearly they do. But I can find dozens opening the phone book. Once a week? Well I just dont see it here or don't know about it. I never, ever hear anyone talking about it ... anywhere. Even all the "mania" about not having car dealers wash their car after service. Virtually everyone loves that idea. In real life, whenever I'm at any dealer, people love the idea the car is washed for free. Maybe its regional, maybe I live in the slums, maybe I don't see people with the hose out washing their cars, maybe they dont. Maybe they wash their cars when I'm no outside or out? Its just no biggie. It's not exactly a big topic of discussion. In fact, it never comes up.

And sorry but I do see three buckets ...

1. Those obssessed
2. Those who just clean it when its really dirty
3. Those with money to burn on luxaries.

We can disagree ... thats cool, but its what I see.

In fact, when I think about this, I can say that there are some houses around where I have, literally, NEVER seen the people wash their cars, nevermind add wax. Maybe they do it when I'm not around.

 

Well honestly, detailing in itself (having someone else do it, anyway) is a luxury. If you do it yourself, you've got excess income to spend on the products. Same if you pay someone else to do it; the only difference is you don't have something the detailer has (time, skill, patience, a desire to do it yourself), so you pay them to make up for it.

No one who's stretching to pay the grocery bill is shopping online for a detailer, hemming and hawing over who's $20 cheaper. Most people who can afford a detail and car enough about their car to pay the considerable $$$ one costs are going to want good results, and in the end, that's what's going to make Jeremy successful.

And J, I know I told you already, but congrats again I hope you get rolling quickly!

 

wat's with all this mumbo jumbo?

where's the updated picts?

 

So, all you people that bashed Jeremy till he finally raised his prices can start a collection and transfer him the money for 1 detailing which I'm now NOT gonna pay for anymore. Bravo

 

Yea, I think we should agree to disagree . I would bet that the differences we see has to do with our regions. If I am guessing correctly, you are in the East Coast? Perhaps the lack of snow and, salt, and ice in Texas has something to do this? Who know...

Is that really necessary? A $20 raise in price, and now you refuse to give a very highly regarded forum member some business? Jeez, if that's the case, then that is truely a shame...


Jeremy, best of luck to you in your business venture. Like I said before, I have been through all of this before, so I am here to help.

 

One more thing, Jeremy...another "free" advertising method is craiglist. You will have to weed through a lot of price shoppers, and you also need to make your ads attractive enough to distract customers from the high volume ships on Craigslist, but free advertising is great. Plus, I found one my best clients through Craigslist about a year ago.

 

Jeez - someone's sore!

Tell you what - e-mail me a receipt showing that you had Jeremy detail your car at the new higher price, and I'll PayPal you the $20. How's that sound?

 

I actually had asked Jeremy to detail for me. He hasn't responded yet though.
It wouldn't have been a $100 job either as I usually pay over rate for good work and as I'm roughly 4 hours away from him, his service will also need to include travelcosts and maybe even cost for a hotelroom.
I don't know him good enough to consider him a friend (yet) but I simply appreciate his ambition with which he tries to make his hobby into a job/business.
At this point it doesn't matter if he charges 100 or 150. On both prices he won't make an hourly rate that is anywhere close to compensate for the effort he will need to put in to turn an obsession into something that can support a family.
It is nice that everybody is concerned about him selling himself under value but thats besides the point as nobody that suggested it will actually be in need for his services.
I'm just wondering if a lower rate plus word-of-mouth would have gotten it to a faster start.
With higher prices come higher expectations.
Before seeing the pictures of Richards work I would have never considered to pay >$400 for a detail.
But even Richard started slow and even did details just for fun (and maybe with the intention of spreading the word).
So if Jeremy can do 3 good jobs for $100 instead of 1 for $150 it might help to spread the word and can easily be seen as an investment that might pay out shortly after.

Jeremy, my offer still stands. If you wanna discuss, drop me a PM.

 

All of this is totally besides the point I was trying to make. I was solely responding to the post you made a few posts ago. I just found it kind of ridiculous to say you were longer interested because of a $20 price raise, and then you try and throw the blame on all of us who suggested him to raise the prices a bit.

However, I guess I do tend to agree with you. Perhaps a few very high quality details below the going rate would help grow the business. I actually did start my prices much lower than they are now, and raised them over time as I could. I guess when I made my original post about raising prices, I was thinking about it from the current standpoint of detailing business, rather than from a standpoint of a detailing business just getting its feet wet, like Jeremy's.

 

All I wanted to achieve with my NOT post was to lay the foundation for a post that would point out the opportunity that a lower price can have.
I had that post almost finished when I saw the response it had caused.

To make my point of view clear:
Obviously there are established detailers out there, charging around the price that Jeremy now does as well.
His problem is that these have already a reputation.
And if both charge the same price, the customer might not be willing to switch or even simply try something new.

And all this has in the beginning nothing to do with quality of work, it is simply a pre-selection process.

Sorry for the ruckus my post caused... guess the raspberry isn't not meant to be used jokingly ...

 

I've been trying to decide where I should jump in, or maybe just stay out!

Lots of very good points have been mentioned, but I'll share a few things that I haven't seen anyone bring forth yet.

You should charge what the market will bear. That is, regardless of whether I charge $600 to detail a car and you charge $100, with all things equal, it still comes down to your particular market and what people will pay.

Now of course there are things you can do to put the "market in your favor". First you need to give people a reason to call you instead of Joe down the street. Price is the easiest and most common way to do this, but it also completely devalues your worth. Let's say you charged people an outrageous $1,000 to detail a car. Most people in your market may think you're insane. But someone will bite eventually IF you can show the value of it. And when that person bites, others will follow. It's like the rationale that if a customer sees a bunch of expensive sports cars at the local car wash, that MUST mean they are the best.

But how do you convince someone of your value? Well for me, I did this by doing a few pro bono i.e. free or nearly free paint restores. My famous examples being the Camaro and the Mustang. When people see those restores, they are blown away. But another thing happens. People become a little more educated. If they used to frown at a $600 detail, seeing that I could potentially save them $5,000- $10,000 or more from a repaint, suddenly seems like a pretty darn good value.

By charging more for your work, you can actually work less, and focus on always doing the best quality work possible because you are devoting an entire day or possibly days to one car--not trying to cram 4 or 5 cars in a single day.

Now let me give you another example. While most of my non MINI customers don't have a problem paying my rates, even with a 50% rate reduction for MINI owners $250--I still don't detail many MINI's. Back when I was starting and charging $125 or $150 for a detail, I had a lot more MINIs to work on. But these days, one or two MINIs every few months is about all I do. That's not a bad thing though. I mean, I've always charged less to MINI owners because it was something I did for the community. A lot of people think that the MINI is smaller so that's why I charge less, but in reality, the amount of paint on a MINI isn't that much different than on a Porsche Cayman--yet I will still spend 12 hours on either car. Actually I put in close to 17 hours on the last MINI I worked on, over a two day period.

Finally as Chow mentioned, you're never going to convince someone that they need to pay YOU to wash their car if they don't value it. If they are comparing you to the local car wash guys, the way you can upsell them is to show how much better you and what precautions you take that the car wash places don't. But marketing yourself this way is wrong IMO, because there is no growth here, anyone who expects to pay $20 for a wash, isn't going to pay you top dollar for polishing their paint.

Finally, for my last comment. Detailing/Paint Polishing is hard work and not something that I plan to completely devote my life to. I'm already feeling the consequences and I haven't been doing this for the 15 to 20 years like some of my friends. Of course sitting at a desk eating donuts and drinking coffee all day and using a mouse isn't all that great for your body either.

I love to create products, and come up with unique solutions. I'd love to become a sort of Richard Griot or David Bynon type of company in the future of course with the difference of always striving for the highest end of paint polishing because it's one of those things that you find yourself always trying to improve upon, which keeps detailing from becoming too stagnant.

Ok time for some sleep for me, lol.

 

damn it, noone's hiring if there are quality issues with the work.

where's the pictures? jk hehehe

 

I think the fact that he will come to your place to do the detail is what might attract customers to his business- thats the edge he might have over the guys down the street. Someone could be bored as hell at work (as I am right now), and be looking online for detail places and find out that this one guy will come to the office to do it. Now I don't have to do as much work- as in scope the place out and see who else goes there.

The fact that he will come to you is good in that he won't have to worry about people wandering over to a shop and see what kind of cars go there. But the downside is that his reputation and cars that he does will have to be advertised on his site, which people will have to visit. I would start seeking people out, like friends of friends, etc. I did one real estate agents car last week and said he wants his wife's done too. I made sure had an appt set up quickly.

My question to Jeremy is- is this something you're going to rely on or is it for extra money? The prices would be different in each case IMO and the business would obviously be run differently.

 

Just extra money for now, but if things take off big time (not getting my hopes up for that) I might try to make it a full-time job.

 

If its for extra $$ then I think the prices you have now are fine! It sounds like you're doing it because you like it, and to get a little more money in your pocket. $150 for that premium package is a nice deal.

 

I'm in the same state as Jeremy. In the winter after snow/sleet, anytime the salt trucks are out, people do go to the car washes. Some don't. You still see cars filthy with salt driving around until it rains.

However, you may have hit on something far more significant in regional differences. Not sure about TX but certainly Octane in LA area. LA has the car culture. Here, nowhere nears so much. LA you need a car. East coast, lots of cities have metro trains.

If you do it yourself, the product can last a very long time unless your totally OCD waxing twice a month for functional reason. Virtually anyone can polish and wax a car. People have been doing it since the chemicals have existed without using power equipment. Its just a matter of time.

I think these are some key points and are tied back into regional differences. Being in CA, with a well known car culture and high end cars are easy to find, might be totally different than Baltimore (and, in fact, is). If you never see snow or cold weather, its a different way of life than the snow belt.

To be successful showing value for money is very important. How to do it? Excellent question.

I am going to be very conscious of car washing and anytime I'm out and about, see if I see anybody, anywhere I'm driving actually washing a car!