Starting a new business selling car wax

[Vic Cardenas]

Originally Posted by Chrispy

Vic, after my sealant cures I top with various waxes depending on color and finish Im looking for. Some of my favorites are Wolfgang Fuzion, Pinnacle Souveran and XMT 180. Dodo Juice Blue velvet, diamond white, and hard candy, and Blackfire black ice. I have some Blackfire midnight sun that I havent tried yet.

That said, each of those waxes will create different depths depending on the base paint. I will say it gets VERY expensive having to keep all these different waxes on the shelf for different finishes. Id be VERY interested in a single go to wax that will give me the finish I want every time, without having to keep multiple waxes around for each different finish Im looking for. But that can be really difficult. Im real interested in what you come up with and I will give any of your stuff a try and give you honest feedback.

Excellent... I'd love to hear your thoughts on it. I have yet to test it on all shades of paint but it seems to be performing quite well on the ones I have tested it on. I've been impressed with the depth and gloss but it will be good to hear some more feedback from somebody who has a lot of experience with these products. I'll send you a sample. PM sent.

Originally Posted by Dreams94coupe

What color does this wax look best on? My car is midnight blue and I almost pissed myself after I put the blackfire black ice on my car. It left my paint nice and glossy. I'm always looking to try new stuff so I'm curious as to how well yours is.

Not sure if you know but autogeek festival meet is coming up soon. That maybe a good way to get your foot in the door.

I have tested it on Nighthawk Black Pearl, Canterbury Green, Frost White and some sort of Hyundai blue-green-purple metallic paint. I would say it performs really well on the black and the dark colors really well. The metallic flakes just pop like crazy on the dark colors, the canterbury seemed to darken a hue and give it more of a blueish color. I really liked it on the canterbury. It really brings out the metallic in it and brings out the flakes. Same with the NBP, the flakes were very dull before but after the wax they really start to show especially the purple flakes. It give really good gloss, IMO, on all the colors. I haven't had too much time to test it on my white cars but from what I have seen it really enhanced the gloss on those too but both my frost white cars are seriously neglected. I'll do more testing with those. On the Hyundai it was the same... really good flake "pop" and good gloss. I think it's safe to say that it would work really well on your blue car. If I add it to the product description, I will say that it works really well with darker colored metallic paints but I think it's safe to say it works well on all colored paints at this point in my testing.

I did read about the festival on their forum. I'm afraid that I am still waiting on business licensing so that is not really an option for me yet. Thanks for the heads up! Once I am licensed I will be ready to start selling though. One of the next things on my list was to contact them to inquire about carrying my products on their website. We'll see how that goes.

[Vic Cardenas]

I really need some public input here. I need some ideas for a name of my first car wax I will release. I have hired a graphic designer that is designing my brand logo and my labeling and one of the questions he asked was what was the name of my first car wax. I do have a (IMO stupid) name. But really it is just an internal name at this point and without a good name, I guess, in a way I am jeopardizing my entire company branding. I want to go about this the most professional way that I can and in a timely manner because I am starting to work on another professional's timeframe. This guy is good and I can see I have to step up to the plate for him and offer him something better than what I have at the moment so we both can have clear focus on the rest of the branding and keep it all cohesive.

If somebody can come up with a good name for my car wax and I decide on using it, I will send them a free 250ml pot of wax worth $60!

There are some things to consider before blindly naming off hundreds of names. This will take some thought on your part as I have been racking my brain the past two months trying to name my product. Hopefully someone here is more talented than me in this respect.

Name of the business is Auto Alchemist.

I am trying to convey my product as "green" but I do not want to brand it as a super hippie, whole foods crowd with blond dreadlocks attached. I don't think that brand image will work well with the detailing and automotive enthusiast crowd. Plus, I think that type of branding is very played out in 2015.

But again remember, I am trying to brand it as "green" because my product does contain No VOC's which is unusual with car waxes. The ingredients are high quality and mainly natural. No harsh solvents are used. The process I am using is innovative for a small wax maker. The ingredients I use to replace the solvents are VOC law exempt.

My target demographic is gravitating towards "technology" and state-of-the-art chemical sounding names lately. Those brands are gaining traction, it seems.

I want to incorporate this "techy" branding somehow but the "green" branding is difficult to commingle with that. If I can get an idea for a "green tech" style name for my first premium carnauba wax then that would be ideal.

So, who will win the pot of wax?????????????

[bboarder711]

Subscribed and looking to try some stuff out. I need a full color correction on my new c30

[Vic Cardenas]

Nice! Can't wait to start getting some wax on cars. I've got to correct the paint on my RL too and am just starting to learn about DAs and polishing pads and compounds and what not.

[Quaraxkad]

Since the company name is Auto Alchemist, why not use some Alchemy related names? Names of historic alchemists, metals, elixirs, etc. Only problem is that many of those are unpronounceable! I had to look these up, so nobody assume I'm an alchemy nerd... There are four main "processes" to alchemy, and two of them seem to be a very good fit for a wax product. The third is called Citrinitas, and its name relates to transforming silver into gold. And the fourth is Rubedo, which is the last step to finalize and perfect the item/product/process. Any of these "real" alchemy terms may have symbols associated with them that you can use as the product logos.

[Vic Cardenas]

Originally Posted by Quaraxkad

Since the company name is Auto Alchemist, why not use some Alchemy related names? Names of historic alchemists, metals, elixirs, etc. Only problem is that many of those are unpronounceable! I had to look these up, so nobody assume I'm an alchemy nerd... There are four main "processes" to alchemy, and two of them seem to be a very good fit for a wax product. The third is called Citrinitas, and its name relates to transforming silver into gold. And the fourth is Rubedo, which is the last step to finalize and perfect the item/product/process. Any of these "real" alchemy terms may have symbols associated with them that you can use as the product logos.

That is actually really good input and a great idea for a cohesive branding strategy. I really like it! I did develop some formulas that utilize D-Limonine (or "Citrus Solvent" as it is commonly known), as a type of solvent. I scrapped that formula for the time being but was planning on developing a D-Limonine formula as my second wax I release, since I have become familiar with that ingredient. The trouble with it is, it tends to be greasy and hard to spread evenly and very slow curing. But I'm sure I can formulate a way around those very easy to overcome traits...

"Citrinitas" would be a perfect name for that!!!!

Thank you, Jason! I am really going to ruminate on this one.

EDIT: Actually, there is a very, very small amount of limonene in my first formula, the one I am trying to name and of course it does have a bit of a citrusy scent although not very pronounced and the main scent like my other "orange oil" or "tangeringe oil" formulations that really do smell very citrusy and would be more suited to the "citrinitas" label (although citrinitas has nothing to do with "citrus" it definitely conveys that in our language as far as my limited understanding of word is concerned.) The top notes in my current formula are lemongrass/coconut
and of course lemongrass, also known as citronella, does smell very citrusy to a lot of people. Me, I think orange, lemon, lime, tangerine is a citrus smell and lemongrass however smells like asian food and less like citrus. But of course I am a cook so that may be where I have that smell association from. I'm sure nearly everyone would disagree with me and say that lemongrass does in fact smell very citrusy.

[Vic Cardenas]

Going along with that alchemy branding theme I found some artwork that really intrigues me. But then again I've always had a fascination with occult style artwork.

[Quaraxkad]

I had another idea as an extension to that... On the back label of each container you could have a little description of what the word meant in alchemy, and how that correlates to the product inside. It would tie it all together for the customers, they'll see how there's a common theme to naming everything and it's not just random words you pulled from a scrabble tile bag.

[Vic Cardenas]

For sure. If I were to name my product citrinitas, I would describe that it is the process of changing silver to gold. Which, that all does make sense in the marketing of a car wax anyway. Also, I am looking more into the symbolism in alchemy and have gotten some pretty good new ideas I can give my graphic designer for the company logo which tie into some of my other older ideas that were already taken or not original enough. All good ideas and I am leaning more towards branding myself in this manner. I owe you big time either way!

[Vic Cardenas]

Tease...