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closeGreat Car Care Center celebrates a decade in GH
Susan Schell
of the Gateway
The Great Car Care Center in Gig Harbor, active in community charity with a continued effort of environmental preservation, recently celebrated 10 years of service on Kimball Drive.
The business wrapped up its successful “Round-Up” campaign last month, during which it encouraged customers to “round up” the cost of their car wash to the nearest dollar to donate to the Gig Harbor Peninsula FISH Food Bank. The car wash matched each donation.
“We’ve been doing the Round-Up campaign for about nine years,” said Jim Hanson, who owns the business with his wife, Jill. “We raised $800 for the food bank this year.
“For the first couple of years, we collected non-perishable food items, but since car washing mainly tends to be a spur-of-the-moment decision, it didn’t work because people weren’t carrying food around in their cars.”
The Hansons also help non-profit organizations. Since “parking lot” car washes have been banned in many counties because the runoff can be harmful to the environment, organizations like the Boy Scouts of American can sell coupons for car washes, and the Hansons will honor them.
The center does its part to remain “green” by recycling water. The runoff is stored in underground tanks that collects solid material, filters the water, then reuses it. The final rinse cycle in the “tunnel” wash uses fresh water.
When a car enters the wash, it goes through several stages, Hanson said. First, the car is rinsed to lubricate it and remove loose dirt. Then a solution is applied that deals with organic matter. A second solution is then applied to remove non-organic material. A micro fiber cloth is used that does not retain grit and does a better job at cleaning, Hanson said.
A final solution is then applied to bead the water into pools designed to carry the water off the car.
Hanson said the solutions used in the winter differ from those used in the summer, in order to deal with different road conditions.
To make sure they work, Hanson tries out solutions on his own car.
“I use it as the test car,” he said. “It’s probably been through the wash about 500 times.”
Hanson said that doesn’t jeopardize the integrity of a car’s finish, as long as it’s waxed.
“A car needs to be waxed every six months,” he said. “There is no wax that lasts a year, no matter what the manufacturers claim.
“A car’s finish is porous, and wax seals the pores. It’s really important to maintain the finish. When a car comes in, we can tell if it’s been waxed or not.”
The center is located in two separate buildings adjacent to each other on either side of Kimball Drive. One houses the tunnel wash and an oil change facility. The other building features a self-serve car wash system and a detail shop that offers paintless dent repair, glass repair, minor upholstery repair and detailing.
Hanson said the business can depend on the weather, but it has thrived due to good service and an excellent staff, many of whom have been at the center for five years or more.
“With a lot of car wash operators, their turnover is awful,” Hanson said. “Our oil store manager has been with us since we opened.”