NAICS 811192Canadian industry · 6-digitlocal market2 market records

Car washes

SoftwareCar Wash Management & Membership Software · Independent Auto Repair Shop Software 8111

This Canadian industry comprises establishments primarily engaged in washing and cleaning motor vehicles. — Statistics Canada, NAICS 2022A

Establishments · CanadaA: 1,685
Under 10 employeesA: 83%
Establishments · USA: 19,463
Employment · USA: 166,368
Payroll · USA: $4.6B

Size and shape

How many businesses there are and how small they are. Fragmentation is the first thing an entrant — or anyone selling software into this industry — needs to know, and it is one of the few things that is actually measured.

Canadian establishments by number of employeesA

1–497658%

5–942425%

10–1919712%

20–49795%

50–9980%

100–19910%

200–4990—

500+0—

Of 1,685 Canadian establishments with employees, 83% have fewer than ten — an industry of very small operators.

Where they areA

Ontario51130%

Quebec43026%

Alberta34721%

British Columbia20712%

Largest four provinces by establishment count. Establishments with employees only — sole operators with no payroll are not in this table, so in trades and personal services the true number of businesses is higher.

How many new establishments are still tradingA

Other Services (except Public Administration), US · opened 2020

85.2%

1 year

71.8%

3 years

60%

5 years

42.1%

10 years

opened 2015

Measured, not forecast: the share of US establishments opening in one year that were still active later. It counts good operators and bad ones together, which is exactly why it is the honest answer to “what are the odds”. It is for the whole sector rather than this market, and the ten-year figure comes from an older cohort because no younger one has reached ten years.

How businesses here compete

The structural profile of subsector 811, which every industry beneath it inherits. This is analyst judgment from how the subsector is organised — not research into this industry, and not a measurement.

local competitionmedium capitalUNVERIFIEDinherited from 811 Repair and maintenance

Technician supply is the business. Auto repair is being consolidated; commercial and industrial equipment repair is steadier and sold on uptime rather than price.

Who sets the price: Posted labour rates and the customer's alternative of replacing rather than repairing.
The software it runs on: Shop management with parts catalogues and labour guides; field service for commercial equipment.

Market screens and studies

Market-entry records filed along this branch of the hierarchy. A record at or beneath this code is about this industry; one above it is about something wider that contains it.

Operating businessScreened

Express Car Wash Site OperationStructure decides

binding constraint: capital intensity

The economics are a subscription business bolted to a $3–6M construction project: Mister Car Wash crossed $1B of revenue in 2025 on roughly 2.3 million Unlimited Wash Club members, and that membership base is the whole model. A single-site entrant carries the full build cost before the first membership, in metros where the same thesis has already been funded several times over and tunnels sit within sight of each other. Land, water recycling and equipment are the business; the wash is the marketing.

NAICS 8111922 vendors named6 sourced figuresOpen →

Software serving this industry

The vertical software markets filed along the same branch — who sells to these businesses and who they would have to displace — and then the generic categories every business buys whatever it does.

Vertical softwareScreened

Car Wash Management & Membership SoftwareOne thing must be true

binding constraint: incumbent vulnerability

Incumbent DRB Systems (Vontier, NYSE: VNT) — SiteWatch / Patheon / Washify POS, TunnelWatch controller, pay stations

The incumbent is a listed conglomerate's $965M purchase, and it sits in the tunnel, not just on the counter. DRB Systems (Akron, Ohio; founded 1984) sells the point of sale (SiteWatch, Patheon, Washify, Sierra for in-bay), the tunnel controller (TunnelWatch), pay stations and queuing cameras. Vontier (NYSE: VNT) bought it from New Mountain Capital in 2021 for about $965M in cash, on expected 2021 revenue of about $170M, ~40% recurring, at mid-20% operating margins [A]. DRB had already bought Washify, the cloud POS challenger, in March 2021 [B]. Its home page says it is trusted by "more top 50 conveyor car wash chains than all other technology providers combined" [C, vendor]. Vontier no longer breaks DRB out: it sits inside Mobility Technologies ($1,123.9M FY2025 sales), where management said car wash growth "accelerated" in Q4 2025 [A]. The other seats belong to the equipment makers. Sonny's (conveyor equipment, controls, pay stations and the Quivio management suite; Genstar Capital since August 2020, 6,000+ active customers at the time) [B] bought GoToKiosk in 2020 and WashMetrix in 2025 [B]. ICS went to Dover's OPW in a deal announced January 2021 [B]. Hamilton Manufacturing (pay stations, LPR and RFID, since 1921) and Micrologic Associates (a New Jersey POS and controller vendor, now selling WashCentral) are long-standing independents [C]. When an operator buys a tunnel, the controller and pay station tend to come with it. The venture money went on top of the POS, not into it. Rinsed, a membership CRM, has raised $35M (Series B $20M led by VMG Technology, April 2023; earlier Bedrock Capital, Founders Fund, Y Combinator) [B]. It now claims 3,000+ washes and 10M+ active members [C, vendor] and integrates with the POS rather than replacing it. EverWash (Philadelphia) runs a membership network across partner washes on $11M disclosed, including $5M of debt [B]. FlexWash sells a cloud POS + CRM + LPR that integrates with existing controllers "so you can switch… without rewiring your tunnel" [C, vendor]. That is the only replacement wedge we saw, and its funding is not reported by any outlet we could open. The buyer is consolidating and levered. Mister Car Wash (548 locations, about 2.3M Unlimited Wash Club members, 76% of wash sales from members [A]) was taken private by Leonard Green & Partners at about $3.1B enterprise value, completed May 2026 [B]. Whistle Express (Oaktree) bought about 380 sites from Driven Brands for $385M in April 2025, which took it to about 530 [B]. In the same period Zips filed Chapter 11 with $654M of debt [B]. Chains of that size pick one POS for hundreds of sites and negotiate hard; the long tail is served by the equipment vendor that built its tunnel. Incumbent vulnerability decides it. DRB is well capitalised, owns the controller layer and already bought its main cloud challenger, and the membership-CRM wedge is already funded and taken by Rinsed.

NAICS 81119210 vendors named6 sourced figuresOpen →

Sold across the wider branch

Vertical softwareScreenedfiled at 8111 Automotive repair and maintenance

Independent Auto Repair Shop SoftwareOne thing must be true

binding constraint: incumbent vulnerability

Incumbent Tekmetric and Shop-Ware, against Mitchell 1 inside Snap-on

Recently and thoroughly consolidated, with parts-catalogue and labour-guide data licensing acting as a real barrier. The adjacent dealership market (441110) has a far sharper opening — see that study. Sourced update 2026-09-18: the "nothing is disclosed" note on this record was too strong. Mitchell 1 sits inside Snap-on's Repair Systems & Information Group, which reported $1,877.1M of 2025 net sales (+4.4%) at a 26.7% operating margin [A]. That is not a software figure — the segment is mostly diagnostics hardware, undercar equipment and information services — but it is a hard ceiling and a hard statement about the incumbent's balance sheet. The cut stands.

NAICS 81114 vendors named5 sourced figuresOpen →

And what every business buys · 25 generic categories

Sold to every industry rather than this one, so they are filed against the software industry's own code. The same few vendors recur across most of them.

Companies in this industry · 11

Every company this research names that is filed here or beneath — the operators, and the vendors that sell to them — largest disclosed revenue first. The rank is within the company’s own six-digit industry.

Company	Filed under	Revenue	Rank
Mister Car WashPrivate	Car washes811192	$1.0B	1/11
DRB SystemsPrivate	Car washes811192	—	2/11
EverWashPrivate	Car washes811192	—	3/11
FlexWash TechnologiesPrivate	Car washes811192	—	4/11
Hamilton Manufacturing Corp.Private	Car washes811192	—	5/11
ICSPrivate	Car washes811192	—	6/11
Micrologic AssociatesPrivate	Car washes811192	—	7/11
RinsedPrivate	Car washes811192	—	8/11
Sonny's EnterprisesPrivate	Car washes811192	—	9/11
Washify ServicesPrivate	Car washes811192	—	10/11
WashTecLON:0GJK	Car washes811192	—	11/11

Who works here

The occupations employed in Other services (except public administration), most concentrated in it first. The share is measured against the whole sector, not this industry — the published cross-tabulation stops there.

Concentrated in this sectorA

Hairstylists and estheticians One industry 88.3%

Support occupations in personal services Mostly one sector 64.5%

Automotive service technicians Mostly one sector 56.8%

Home care provider occupations One industry 23.3%

Social and community service professionals Mostly one sector 21.7%

Managers in social, community and correctional services Mostly one sector 18.4%

Machining, metal forming, shaping and erecting trades Mostly one sector 12.9%

Practitioners of natural healing One industry 11.1%

Specialized occupations in services Mostly one sector 8.8%

Program leaders and instructors in recreation, sport and fitness Mostly one sector 6.8%

These jobs are mostly done here. An operator in this industry is competing for them against others in the same industry, not against the whole economy.

And the jobs every business has

Shoe repairers, shoemakers and upholsterers Across the economy 27.9%

Technical occupations in electronics and electrical engineering Across the economy 7.8%

Legislative and senior managers Across the economy 6.6%

Other technical trades Across the economy 5.7%

Office administrative assistants - general, legal and medical Across the economy 5.2%

Administrative, property and payroll officers Across the economy 4.7%

Accounting, insurance and related business administrative occupations Across the economy 4.3%

Building maintenance installers, servicers and repairers Across the economy 3.7%

Financial, insurance and related administrative support workers Across the economy 3.3%

Customer and information services representatives Across the economy 3.2%

Found across at least fourteen of the twenty sectors. But note the shape of this industry: 83% of establishments have fewer than ten employees, and at that size most of these roles are one person wearing several hats, or bought in from outside.

All 162 occupations →

Alongside this industry

This is the most specific level NAICS defines. The other industries under 81119 are its nearest neighbours.

Code	Industry	Establishments · CA	What is known
811199	All other automotive repair and maintenance	1,216	screened at 81119