Business/Office Park Question

M

Mr. Zazaboo

New member
So I'm considering starting a wash/detailing biz and marketing it specifically to business/office/commercial buildings in an urban area. Maybe you haven't done the same, but if you have ever detailed cars at locations like these did you get a contract with the building/company? Did the building/company work with you or allow you to try & reach their tenants? TIA ...
 
I am in the same boat. I just got a huge list of surrounding industrial parks in my area and would love to get in them. Almost all of them stress no soliciting so I wonder how its possible to get your name around there.
 
I did this a little when I was starting out. It takes a lot of time and you have to be ready to do the car on the spot since a lot of them are impulse buyers and will never actually contact you later. Space to work can be a big consideration and customers are not always available to come inspect the work after so be clear on what you will do for their vehicle for the price or risk an unhappy customer. Smaller businesses are harder to do when they say "no soliciting". With larger businesses I would walk in, talk to the receptionist, and offer to do their car for free if they could get X number of others to buy or offer a 10%-15% discount if a certain number scheduled together. No need to try to reach every employee. Let someone else do the convincing for you. Make sure the company or property owner doesn't object.



I found the best method was not advertising in the business, but finding customers elsewhere and doing their car at their work. I always made sure to be visible and noticeable as employees were on their way to/from lunch or out of work. When they looked at their friend's/coworker's car the next day they often became very interested.
 
I'm just thinking out loud here so forgive me if I ramble or don't make any sense, but ...



The part of town I'm researching is an upscale urban area with multi-level parking garages, not huge parking lots like an industrial park. There are a few buildings I would like to target. Some are condominiums/lofts and some commercial buildings that are home to the city's top law firms & finance/investment firms that I'd like to pitch my services to in hopes of striking a contract to provide my services exclusively to their tenants. That would allow me to market & reach those that live/work in the building or the property owner/management could simply inform their tenants that the building now offers a car wash/detailing service as an amenity if they didn't want me directly contacting people. I could operate as a mobile service with a van or maybe even utilize a closet/storage space on the property to store my equipment. Either way, I feel the potential is huge.



Obviously the big road block here is walking into a massive building & being able to talk with the person handling decisions like these. If I can figure that part out, without soliciting, I feel like my pitch would be pretty reasonable. From their point of view, as long as I'm fully insured and contracted, they can offer a convenient amenity to their tenants at no cost or risk.



If anybody has any experience striking contracts w/ building owners I would appreciate their feedback.
 
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