Nation's largest car wash company coming to Mankato

Mark Fischenich, The Free Press, Mankato, Minn.
·2 min read

Aug. 12—MANKATO — Maybe Mankato doesn't have what it takes to attract Trader Joe's, Shake Shack or IHOP, but the nation's largest car wash chain is about to bring a really big wash tunnel to Madison Avenue.

Mister Car Wash is preparing to build a 160-foot conveyor car wash — half the length of a football field — just west of Kwik Trip and Wendy's at 1541 Madison Ave.

Plans submitted with the city also show 26 vacuum stations for customers to clean the interior of their vehicles and three lanes with pay stations leading to the conveyor.

Based in Tuscon, Arizona, Mister Car Wash operates more than 400 car washes nationwide and has 25 years of experience in the business. The publicly traded company appears to be making a push in Minnesota. Just a week ago, it announced the acquisition of Top Wash, which operated in Anoka, Fridley and Champlin, bringing its total number of facilities in the metro to nearly 20. Mister also has three locations in Rochester and one in St. Cloud.

The car wash is to be built on a pair of lots stretching from Madison to Belle Avenue, with access from both streets. Demolition is planned for an existing building constructed in 1995 and once home to the Galilee religious books and gifts store and for a trio of warehouses dating to 1959 that were most recently used by ServiceMaster. The combined value of the properties is $1.1 million, according to Blue Earth County tax records.

The project requires a conditional-use permit because of potential concern about vehicles stacking up on adjacent streets as they await their turn on the car wash conveyor, said Community Development Director Paul Vogel.

The company already has commissioned a traffic study, and the consultant found no concerns, despite projections that the Mankato Mister Car Wash will generate 1,560 daily trips to and from the location. Stacking at a similar-sized Mister Car Wash in Columbia Heights didn't exceed seven vehicles.

"With the proposed site layout providing storage on-site for approximately 31 vehicles, the car wash queues are not anticipated to impact operations of adjacent land uses or public streets," Kimley-Horn and Associates concluded.

The documents filed with the city don't indicate when construction is expected to start, but Mister is growing at a rapid pace, according to the company's quarterly financial report, which was released Thursday.

In the second quarter of this year, Mister built four new car washes, opened six acquired locations and expects to add about 30 newly constructed facilities in all in 2022. There were 409 Mister Car Washes as of June 30 that produced $225 million in net revenue during the three months. The company added 59,000 subscriptions to its Unlimited Wash Club, which now has more than 1.84 million members.