Credit Cards at the Vacuums

[Bubbles Galore]

Are any of the self serve owners out there utilizing credit cards at your vacuums? I may have an opportunity to update my 8 vacuums with credit card capabilities and wanted to see if anyone actually saw a boost in sales with readers installed on their vacs. Assuming that you have credit cards in both your bays and vacuums, what percentage is vac sales in comparison to bay sales? Any and all discussion is appreciated.

Thanks!

John

 

[MEP001]

We're not accepting credit cards at the vacs, but I think it might become necessary. Every month the CC to cash ratio in the bays shifts more toward CC, and I feel that people might not be vacuuming as often because they don't carry cash. I could put CC acceptance on 11 vacs for about $4,000 - if it increased revenue just 5% (factoring in fees) it would pay off in just a few years.

 

[car washing systems inc]

We put CC in a site we service about 1 1/2 years ago the owner said it was slow to start but now its about 20%

 

[JustClean]

Are any of the self serve owners out there utilizing credit cards at your vacuums? I may have an opportunity to update my 8 vacuums with credit card capabilities and wanted to see if anyone actually saw a boost in sales with readers installed on their vacs. Assuming that you have credit cards in both your bays and vacuums, what percentage is vac sales in comparison to bay sales? Any and all discussion is appreciated.

Thanks!

John

Hi John,
automatic 70%, self serve 21%, vacs 4% & dogwash 5% of all credit card sales. Overall our C/C is ~11% of turnover, increasing. Unfortunately, customers need to buy a ticket with their card. If Cryptopay will ever get their thing out for other countries I will change over.

 

[Bubbles Galore]

Hi John,
automatic 70%, self serve 21%, vacs 4% & dogwash 5% of all credit card sales. Overall our C/C is ~11% of turnover, increasing. Unfortunately, customers need to buy a ticket with their card. If Cryptopay will ever get their thing out for other countries I will change over.

What do you mean other countries?

 

[thoffmanjr]

Opened 12/26/2011 with 14 Industrial's (GINSAN) vacuums with Micrologic cc readers. 574 credit card transactions averaging $2.63 each so far. We are using Micrologic in the tunnel, bays, vacuums and dog wash. They can all accept gift cards too. The vacuums are "count up" with a stop button to end the transaction. We are using Dixmor's LED7 "serial version" timers. At the end of the transaction the timer can display what will be charged to the customer's card.

Last month the bays ran 37% credit cards, Dog wash is 47%, and the vacuums were 57%. We did mail out 47,000 $10 gift cards that snapped out of a post card though. Those are redeeming like crazy. I don't expect the cc usage at the vacuums to be at 57% too much longer. Maybe it's easier than walking to the changer? We accept bills, $1 coins or quarters at the vacuums too.

Speaking of credit cards we are still seeing average bay transactions at least $2 higher than cash transactions. Last month they were at $7.08 per credit card in the bays and $10.03 in the dog wash. Counting up is the way to go. We have a Micrologic gift card dispenser and would like to sell $10 gift cards with $12 on them and $20 cards with $25 on them. Try to encourage everyone to use gift cards will get an extra $2 or more per visit plus there would be thousands of dollars of value on the cards for who knows how many months walking around town waiting to be used. Brings them back to your wash too.

 

[Earl Weiss]

Opened 12/26/2011 with 14 Industrial's (GINSAN) vacuums with Micrologic cc readers. 574 credit card transactions averaging $2.63 each so far.

Last month the bays ran 37% credit cards, Dog wash is 47%, and the vacuums were 57%. .

Am I figuring right. Vac 57% CC = 570 transactions +/- means about 1000 vac transactions total in 15 weeks comes out to 67 per week with 14 vacs = just under 5 total uses per vac per week?

 

[thoffmanjr]

No. I forgot to mention that we got the readers installed and running I think in late February. So just March was 294 @ $2.66 each or 8.5 per day. I had ran my initial report from 12/26 and didn't think about the delay in having them running. Good catch. Remember this place has only been open a little more than 100 days so there's a ways to go in building the business.

 

[JustClean]

What do you mean other countries?

I am not in the US and can't use their C/C providers

 

[thoffmanjr]

Micrologic's credit card clearing can use just about any credit card processor. You have countless choices. They are not locked in to any processor and it is PCI compliant.

 

[Bubbles Galore]

My biggest issue at this point is that I am looking at new faceplates, which leads me to replace my D/H timers and go with an LED-7 (which is compatible for the Cryptopay system) from Dixmor and update my coin acceptors (new X-10's)...extends the ROI out a bit farther than 12 months which is the maximum length I like to go.

I don't know...just thinking out loud I guess...

 

[Mel(NC)]

I installed a credit card reader on one of the four vacs I have. So far, I have been disappointed with the amount of sales. I would estimate less than 2% of vacs sales are CC for me.

 

[Bubbles Galore]

I installed a credit card reader on one of the four vacs I have. So far, I have been disappointed with the amount of sales. I would estimate less than 2% of vacs sales are CC for me.

I did the same thing with one vacuum and have seen numbers that are slightly better, but nothing to ride home about. I also didn't market that one vacuum to the levels at which I've marketed the 2 self serve bays that I have. I'm thinking that if I do my 4 self serve bays with cc and the 4 vacuums in front of the bays with cc, I will see a significant bump and that will also make it easier to market.