Australian Car Washes

Introduction

If you’re someone who’s been at all plugged into the carwash industry for more than a couple years,  Bill Pitzer really needs no introduction.  But newbies are always with us and so for their benefit we’ll just say that Bill is a retired self serve carwash  owner/operator from Pasco, Washington.  And some 10+ years ago he was among the very first who saw what most of us missed early on — namely,  the huge potential of the internet! 

So Bill, clearly seeing the future in a crystal ball in the form of his computer monitor, created the first substantive website resource and forum for the carwash industry — Auto Care Forum, which evolved into the more comprehensive Auto Care Forum (www.autocareforum.com).   If ever there were a “People’s Choice Award” for THE one website carwash operators (especially self serve) could not live without, it would have to be Bill’s Forum!  It’s hugely popular ... if not a flat out addiction for many in this industry.
  
When we heard of Bill’s plans to go to Australia and recon the carwash industry there, we asked him to take notes, shoot photos, and share it all via the SSCWN.  Which he did ... in a big way.  He covered a lot of ground — spanning about 2,000 miles of Australia’s Eastern and Southeastern coastal areas!  Given the large number of washes he visited and all that ground covered, the individual washes are not covered in detail.   But the many “snippets” of info and the accompanying photos should give our readers “Up-Over” here in the USA a pretty good sense of how the Aussies are washing cars “Down-Under”.  Anyway, if this article piques your interest and you’d like to see more, you can go to the Car Care Forum and find plenty more pictures.  Anyway, and without further ado, here’s Bill story —
(Oh, wait a minute ... just one more “ado” — yes, that really is Bill’s actual mug parked under Croc Dundee’s cowboy/bush hat in our movie poster parody on the first page.)   

Pg 2Next