The Ghattas family has been a major part of the development of Hagerstown over the years, with a portfolio of properties ranging from shopping centers, to residential properties, retail properties, and more.

Son Trent Ghattas heads up the two car washes that are part of their portfolio in the Hagerstown region. The Maugans Avenue wash has been in the family for nearly three decades, having taken it over in 1994 as a small, six-bay, self-serve-only operation. In 2014, the family felt it was time to expand, and opened up the big, new AMG Car and Pet Wash on Dual Highway.

A high-traffic area surrounded by retail, banks, and other businesses, the wash stands out as a big, clean, modern, well-maintained property with excellent visibility from the road. This makes it easily accessible from around the region, and certainly draws eyeballs from passing traffic.

Growing Up in the Business

When the family bought the Maugans Avenue wash, Trent was still young – so he’s grown up in and around the business. This means he never really needed to do formal training, he was getting his hands dirty at a young age – “All hands on, man. When something would break, I’d fix it, and just learned over the years. We bought that car wash in 1994, so I grew up learning as I’d do it, I never had any formal training.”

Like many operators, Trent has taken on the majority of maintenance as time has passed. “We’ve had service people come and go over the years. But I ended up just learning how to fix the stuff myself, so now everything I pretty much just fix myself.” He still has help at the washes, with team members being part of the cleaning and maintenance teams, but when it comes down to keeping the washes up and running the buck stops with him.

AMG Car and Pet Wash Success

A big part of the success of both the Maugans Avenue and AMG Car and Pet Wash has been the pet wash. Early on at Maugans Avenue, they converted a bay to a Pet Wash to take advantage of the income potential, even expanding the wash footprint to retain the original six bays while adding the pet wash and automatic wash.

So when it came time to build AMG, they knew from the start that they wanted to include pet washes. Says Trent, “It did so well over there (at Maugans) that we decided to put two in out here, and they do real well out here.” Set in the middle of their self-serve bays, the pet wash bays are clean and well-lit, easy to access, while providing privacy for the dogs and their owners.

A Route to Success

A big part of AMG’s continued business is working with local business and organizations that run fleets. This reliable, recurring business is a great foundation for a car wash, and provides AMG Car and Pet Wash with regular business, says Trent – “We have a lot of commercial accounts… we do the local police, they’ll wash their cars here, we’ll give them a code and they get a discount. We do a lot of promotions for fleets, we do a lot of government vehicles, fleet accounts, stuff like that.”

Aside from that, they don’t focus too much on advertising, instead relying on word-of-mouth and visibility. They still engage with the local community however – “We do specials on holidays and things, we’ll run specials,” says Trent, “People will call me and wanting donations and stuff, I’ll put together a wash package for them with a wash bucket and some supplies and some soap and brushes, and I’ll put a VIP card in with twenty dollars on it.”

Teaming Up with Kleen-Rite

When they started up, the Maugans Avenue wash previously bought from a local distributor who was themselves a wash owner. He would custom-blend soaps for other washes, and distribute to them. However, as time passed, he gradually tapered his business off, and Trent was searching for a new distributor.

“I got online to see what I could find, asked around a little bit, and Kleen-Rite came up. It was convenient ordering from you guys, because if we ordered so many pallets we could get free shipping, and it was close enough where if I needed something I could take the drive up and grab it from your Mount Joy location.”

So what does the future hold for the Ghattas family and car washes? Says Trent, “I think, if the opportunity comes about… right now I pretty much have my hands full, but if we have another area that would benefit from a car wash, we’ll probably put one up, but right now, between the two, we’re just so busy.”

Finally, for new wash owners and prospective car wash owners, his advice is “Have a good location and learn how to fix things! Because the machines, they’ll break down.”