The Wow Factor: Ryan Essenburg: President of Tommy’s Express Car Wash

Ryan Essenburg: President of Tommy’s Express Car Wash | Helping Others Be Successful

Nov 17, 2021

Ryan Essenburg is the third generation owner of Tommy Car Wash Systems, a 50 year old car wash equipment manufacturer with multiple patents on buildings and equipment products based in Holland, MI with customers in Europe, Australia, the Middle East, and North America. They have 80+ Tommy’s Express Car Wash franchise locations in the USA with 200+ more currently under development to serve the world with professional car wash services.

Ryan joins me on the Wow Factor Podcast this week to discuss how he became fascinated by the equipment line side of the family business because of limitless opportunity to scale globally and help serve others, and build businesses. He also gives insights into why consistency is an important core value when providing a service or product, and why that consistent experience is what people are looking for today. Ryan also gives the low down on how Tommy’s Express Car Wash supports the Water Mission program, a nonprofit organization that builds water filtration and treatment systems to provide safe, clean drinking water for developing communities and disaster relief areas.

“I look at life like a relay race, each generation runs a distance and then passes the baton … And I look at it as my goal to run the race a little further and hand it off to the next generation in a better spot, and hopefully, each generation appreciates the previous journey.” - Ryan Essenburg

“When you come in just to wash your car, we want to be easy to do business with, simple and infinitely scalable so that we can serve every market and every community around the world.” - Ryan Essenburg

“That's what's really been fascinating about the Tommy's Express carwash is that anybody can participate in it.” - Ryan Essenburg

This Week on The Wow Factor:

How Ryan first started off in the car washing business and why he loved it so much
Why the family was so keen to develop and push forward into new technologies and processes to be as efficient and productive as possible
The culture at Tommy’s Express Car Wash and their value of planting seeds and never giving up on your goals
Why Ryan is so committed to caring for their communities locally and nationally
Why they decide to name the car wash after the creative visionary of the company
Ryan’s approach to the franchising model and whether the business got more complicated as they scaled
The processes for joining the Tommy's Express Car Wash family and why Ryan is excited to expand across the country
Some of the current challenges they face and the company’s plans for the future

Ryan Essenburg’s Words of Wisdom:

Help others be successful first, and then somehow success will come to you. If you focus on helping other people sustain wealth or build an ongoing legacy, you'll find that you'll be rewarded along the way.

Connect with Ryan Essenburg:

Connect with The WOW Factor: