As always, we love sharing success stories from our customers. In this case, it’s a vending success story. We visited Stan Goedderz at Grand Avenue Car Wash in Bloomington, MN and were extremely impressed by the number of vending machines he has and the great selection of products he offers. Stan is a great example of how being open to trying new things and adapting your approach to vending can pay off nicely.
Grand Avenue Car Wash started with 9 machines when they began running the wash in 2005. They have since tripled their vending footprint, now boasting a whopping 31 machines. Goedderz loves keeping an eye out for new products, so he has added a few machines at a time as he’s discovered what products sell at his wash. Even as his fleet of machines has grown significantly, sales have remained efficient and none of them are just taking up space.
Learning About Your Customers Leads to Vending Success
One reason Stan’s vending is successful is that his customer base is very attentive to cleaning their vehicles by hand. It’s not unusual for washes to become a family affair with one person cleaning the tires, somebody else drying, and yet another person getting in all the nooks and crannies. Their car is one of their largest assets, and in some cases their largest asset, so they are proud of it and want to take excellent care of it.
What that means is that having products readily available is crucial. Keeping well-stocked machines makes customers happy and encourages more sales. Stan said, “Don’t let your machines go empty. Customers expect them to be stocked. If a customer is able to get the Armor All pad they want, there’s nothing stopping them from getting more items. But if it’s empty or they see an out-of-order sign, they might get turned off right away and never buy anything.” He added, “I keep an eye out for the sales that Kleen-Rite has, and I use those to buy new items and stock up.”
Finding New Products
Stan’s enthusiasm for finding new products is incredibly helpful to his success. For example, he tried Little Tree’s Hemp fragrance even though it wasn’t something he would personally choose for his vehicle. His customers spoke with their dollars, and he now stocks Hemp in multiple spots at Grand Avenue. Of course, that experimentation doesn’t come without some failures, but it doesn’t deter him. “If I’m not selling something, I’ll just let it run out and then I’ll change out the decal and move on. Just because you buy it, doesn’t mean you have to keep it.”
Stan owns a second car wash, and he told us, “We’re carrying that (vending) concept over to our Burnsville location and slowly adding machines there.”
Obviously, vending success is not always as simple as just adding numerous vending machines to increase sales. Although adding a large number of machines worked for Stan, even he added them in chunks and didn’t just buy them all at once. The important thing is that he paid attention to his customers’ behavior and was open to adapting his approach to get an advantage.
Take a look at this impressive list of products that Stan offers in his vending machines:
- Multiple varieties of Little Trees
- Multiple varieties of Armor All
- Quick Dry Cloth Towels, Waffle Weave, and Interior Cleaner
- Blu-Sham Towels
- Original Shammy
- Wet Towels Window Cleaning Towels
- All-Purpose Towels
- Just for Leather
- Black Jack Tire Cleaner
- Blue Magic Headlight Lens Sealer
Kleen-Rite offers all of these in bulk at the best prices on the market. Shop today and start building your selection to find the right recipe for vending success!
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Grand Ave Car Wash Operator Spotlight