Tyree Brown, C'19, quoted in Times-Dispatch 'car wash boom' article

Tyree Brown, C’19, was quoted in a Richmond Times-Dispatch report “A Car Wash Boom: Options for Getting Your Wheels Washed Continue to Grow in the Richmond Area” as chief operating officer of Car Pool Car Washes in Richmond.

Brown, who also served as president of the Southeastern Car Wash Association from 2019-2020, differentiated the Car Pool car wash experience from express, automated car washes that are expanding in the Richmond region.

“Every vehicle that comes through one of our sites is finished by a person,” Brown said. “That is the big difference. All the other car washes that have come into the market are all for the most part automated, and the customer for the most part washes their own car.”

The article focuses on Brown’s experience as leader of Car Pool Car Washes to distinguish the demand for on-demand automated car washes from a desire for a more traditional wash. As the article notes, “car wash operators are counting on people to still look for car washes done the old fashioned way, with teams of people doing detailed work by hand.” It’s the in-person experience that Brown counts on customers demanding.

“There is no doubt that [automated] car washes do a nice job at what they do,” Brown said. “But what we offer when people come to us is that they get a great cleaning inside as well as outside of the vehicle. When you go to an express car wash, you get out of the car and you vacuum it yourself. That depends a lot on the person’s capacity to do that themselves.”

Brown earned a bachelor of science in professional studies degree with a major in human resource management through SPCS in 2019. During the 2019 SPCS Night awards ceremony celebrating accomplishments of graduating students, Brown received the Steve Neal Book Award for Outstanding Undergraduate Achievement in HR Management.