Due to hours of service rules for truck drivers, it makes sense for truckers to keep all stops to a minimum. So, if they need to use the restroom, buy fuel, eat, take a shower, get coffee, sleep, send emails, clean the windows, or wash the truck it makes sense to get it all done at one location with one Service Industry Types stop or the fewest possible. This has been a bundling bonanza for truck stops catering to the drivers, and most travel and truck centers have all that and more, including a general or convenience store. Okay so, let’s talk about this, and the challenges of a single location “truck wash” shall we?
Now then, one of the best places you can advertise and market would be at a truck and travel center, and you should choose the truck stops on any major routes leading by your business, within a 250 – 300 mile radius. Some truck stops do have truck washes on their property, or across the street. If this happens it might be difficult to advertise your truck wash at those locations.
However, often there are competing truck stops across the freeway from each other, one with a truck wash, and one without. The one without may wish to help you advertise to make up for the fact that they don’t have a wash on the property as their nearest competitor does. Likewise, overall, most truck stops don’t have a wash, and therefore you are not in competition with them, and therefore you should ask them if you can put up your flyers, business cards, or leave newsletters in their break room.
Indeed, I can remember one time I was at a truck stop in my mobile command center, and some cute gals came up to me and they asked me if I needed my truck cleaned, then they handed me a flyer, and on the back of the flyer was a map of exactly how to get to the truck cleaning Production Planning And Control facility. I smiled, because as a businessperson I knew exactly what they were doing, and I thought that the owner of the truck cleaning company was quite wise to send cute gals to the truck stop to hand out flyers, and invite truck owners and truck drivers to their location.
Unfortunately, in my case it was in the opposite direction in which I was traveling, but I must have kept that flyer for six months. When I came back through the area again, I actually did stop there and get my truck cleaned. It’s amazing what you can do to increase the volume and number of trucks coming through your automated truck wash if you will just use a little bit of grassroots marketing, and think about how you can sell to truck drivers while they are parked. Indeed I hope you will please consider all this and think on it.…
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