One thing I always told my autodetailing franchisees was that they needed to give the customer what they
wanted, and if they found that customers wanted a service that they were not
yet providing, then they needed to get their crews trained and start offering
those add-on services. Let's talk about this shall we - I'd like to discuss
paint and dent repair, and scratch repair services on auto paint because it's
not as difficult as it appears, even if in the future, those services may not
entirely be needed anymore.
There was an interesting article
in GizMag on April 15, 2014 titled; "Self-healing polymer restores itself
in minutes," by Dario Borghino. The article stated the German researchers
have a new coating material, a 'self-repairing sealant which is a
scratch-resistant paint' and although this technology is still in its infancy
and probably will not hit the market for 4-5 years, a car manufacturer might
expedite it to market, as that would be a great selling feature, a car that
never gets scratches from shopping carts, keys, etc., just think about how
revolutionary that would be for a moment.
The article is quoted as saying;
"Self-healing polymers are extremely attractive materials, but creating
the "ideal" polymer is far from easy, and compromises are in order.
So far, scientists have mainly approached the problem from two angles: they've
either used a network of embedded microcapsules containing a healing agent
(which can only heal the material a limited number of times), or materials that
can heal indefinitely because they are bound together by reversible chemical
reactions (but need a large amount of energy as a catalyst)."
Today, in the auto detailing
profession there are a number of franchises, distributorships and Biz Ops
offering paintless dent removal, and scratch repairs. It's become such a great
business model and so respected by the auto dealers, customers and industry
that someone with the right set-up could do just that and not even ever
actually wax or polish a car. Yes, generally speaking the services do fall in
the same category, but today there is enough business for either as a
stand-alone small mobile business.
Okay so, in the future that might
not be the case at all. Self-cleaning surfaces may keep the cars clean longer
and with a perpetual shine, meanwhile, if for some reasons something scratches
the car, the cars surface coating will remove the scratch at the molecular
level, and you'll never be able to tell it was ever touched. Please consider
all this and think on it.