The Full Story
From washing cars to clay bars..
Like many of those in the ceramic industry, we didn't start right off into the paint correction and coatings.. Our roots stemmed from running the family carwash. Which led into the realm of details.. And eventually graduated into the understanding of how to truly care for your vehicle with things like clay bars, paint correction, and ceramic coatings. Getting to see first hand why they are so important for the care of your vehicle.
Can I just get a quick buff and wax?
How many of you can remember a time when you got a little scuff on the bumper? You know, a little love mark, a beauty stamp, a happy accident.. whatever you want to call it. But luckily your dad knows a guy who can buff it out at the old body shop in town by the donut shop..(the good one that is only closed from 2am-3am and makes them fresh everyday) and he said he'd knock it out for $200! Now thats a deal. Then you get it back from him and yea that scratch is gone but the whole section he fixed paint looks like a trippy wave of uncertainty.. Like it wants to be fixed, but its not?
But then the other day, you had the local detail guy you've seen on instagram ads send you a quote for a wash and a "paint correction" and something about a 5yr coating or as he called it "the silver package." And he gave me an estimate for $1200?! You know this ceramic is supposed to be good, but you just don't understand why its that much more for a ceramic coating near you.
Swirls..
What's really unfortunate is, as someone who spent their entire youth and young adult life around carwashes, whether you scratched that persons car or not, you're going to try and fix it without the insurance company getting involved. MOST of the time, the yellow paint scratch on Linda's front bumper didn't come from the carwash.. I'm happy to take them in the tunnel with a tape measure to measure the height of the scratches on the car vs the wraps in the tunnel. But that's not to say that washes don't scratch your car..
Now who else has bought a new car that came with a year full of washes from the new wash in town? Yea you did! And you wore that wash out too.. 2-3 times a week! You made sure you were getting your money out of that free year of washes, I mean c'mon you bought a whole car!
But somehow after just a few months you start to notice the shine on the car is just different.. Were those swirls there before? I didn't look that close but whatever Im sure its fine.. And so you continue washing. And washing.. And washing,. Then some guy online says he can fix those scratches and rub some kind of clay on it, then he's giving me some ceramic? What is that pottery?! Whatever weirdo.
A.I. can't fix swirls..
The truth is, any kind of friction is going to cause "scratches" or "swirls," or "surface irritation." So whether its because you ran through that carwash so many times they know you by first name, or because you've washed it in your driveway with the same mitt your dad used that still has leaves on it from last fall.. fixing the surface swirls is one of the biggest parts of getting a ceramic coating. We in the industry like to call it getting a "paint correction."
You see, when that local guy quoted you $1200 for a 5yr coating, he wasn't just doing a "quick buff and wax" with virtually zero preparation, and a wax that will only fill in scratches and wash away with the rain. No sir, he was telling you that he is going to spend 8-20 hours staring at your car under intense lighting. He is on a mission to find and fix as many scratches and swirls as he possibly can on your car. That's only after he gave it the best wash its ever seen, and clay barred the entire surface to pull off uncle Ron's fence paint over spray or whatever else that has settled on the surface. Then he's going to cover the entire surface with a product (that mind you takes hours to apply with a delicate precision that will eventually drive him mad) that is protecting it from the harshness of our lives.
He cares about your car because its more than just another vehicle. It's your investment. Its a part of who you are, people look at it and don't just see wheels, they see what your lifestyle looks like. Is he an off-road enthusiast that camps the backcountry on the weekends? Is he a business executive that drives around with the who's who of your little town? To him, it matters. He cares, because YOU care. That, is why you get a ceramic coating.
