dealerships

[PIP Detailing]

Going to be visiting a lot of dealerships this week to try and set up a few days work at one does anybody have any tips on how to sell my work? Also what my prices should be like for a dealership? Thanks

[Midnight1700]

PIP, You should prepare yourself for this. Dealerships want a detailer to jump through hoops of fire! They typically want their cars perfect and not pay much of anything for your hard work. My shop is located directly across the street from 4 major dealerships. All have approached us about detailing their cars and all of them "Say" they have a budget of only $100.00 per car, regardless of the work involved to make it sale worthy. It doesn`t matter if you spend 1 hour or 20 hours, you still get $100.00. You are providing a valuable service, so don`t give it away for free. After doing only a couple of cars for them, we decided that was enough. We do not do dealer work what so ever unless they want to pay our retail price. When they decide to give me an 80% discount on purchasing a car, I`ll return the favor to them.

[mrclean81]

$100 is pretty dead on for most areas. Some guys will say they make much more from them, but I would say they are high end dealerships that are actually looking for high end work. Be prepared for them to expect their stuff to be put before everything else, complain about everything, and play you against 3 others detailers who are all competing for their business. Also, most stealerships don`t bother talking to you if your not insured. For most detailing as a business, there are 2 types of work - Wholesale and Retail. Wholesale would be dealerships, auctions, wholesalers, that type of thing. Retail is mainly individuals. If you really want to pursue dealerships and make money from it, you need to find ways to cut the costs wherever you can. Many guys who do wholesale work will have cheaper products they will use on them, and save the good stuff for the retail jobs. Dealerships could care less if you use Blackfire or if you use Mean Green and Turtle Wax, just as long as its sellable. I worked for these places for years and know how they are. They are a good way to keep steady work and decent money can be made if you do it right, but they can really be a pita to deal with sometimes. Good luck to you either way.