Account Based Beverages · 2025-10-01 · 5 min
Key moments - from our scoring
Substance score
45 / 100
Five dimensions, 20 points each
Braxton McKee, senior content marketing manager at Rinsed, draws on his experience building CRM and revenue operations at a 150-location car wash operator to deliver practical ABM advice for the car wash industry and beyond. The core insight: speak your customer's language, not your own. Car wash operators care about cars washed per hour, membership conversion rates, and profitability - not CAC or automation percentages. McKee emphasizes that selling a white-collar marketing tool to a blue-collar audience requires earning trust through empathy and relating features to real operational pain points: avoiding lost revenue on a 100-degree weekend, managing staffing headaches, equipment downtime. A standout takeaway comes from industry data showing 54% of churned members still wash at the same location, reframing churn not as customer exit but as the beginning of a win-back story. This episode is essential for SaaS operators in blue-collar industries (automotive, construction, service) looking to build credibility, improve customer enablement, and recognize that lost customers remain the most cost-effective segment to pursue.
Car wash operators focus on operational metrics like cars washed per hour, membership conversion rates over 20%, and profitability - not CAC or automation percentages. SaaS companies must relate product features to these real pain points and speak the operator's language rather than technology jargon.
Industry data shows 54% of churned car wash members still wash at the same location, meaning they haven't truly left the relationship. Winning back existing customers is more cost-effective than acquiring net new customers across most industries.
You must earn respect by relating to their daily field experience - understanding equipment downtime, staffing headaches, weather challenges - and frame every feature around preventing revenue loss or operational problems rather than abstract benefits.
Empathy changes how you enable customers by letting you relate features to actual pain points and customize approaches to specific accounts. Knowing an operator's markets, climate, competitors, and challenges allows you to tailor your support to their unique situation.
Our reviewer’s read on each dimension, with quotes from the episode.
The episode contains a handful of genuinely useful practitioner points (mapping features to operator pain points, reframing churn as a re-engagement opportunity) but the five-minute runtime limits depth, and advice like 'speak the operator's language' is repeated marketing common sense. The 54% churn-but-still-washing stat is the standout novel data point.
54% of all churned customer or churned members still wash at the same wash
instead of here's a feature, here's how you avoid losing 200 cars this weekend
The reframing of churn as the start of a new customer story rather than a closed door is a moderately fresh angle, and the 'white collar tool to blue collar crowd' tension is an honest industry-specific observation. However, the core ABM thesis - know your customer's pain points and speak their language - is thoroughly recycled.
We're selling a white collar marketing tool to a blue collar crowd
do you see a churn as a true exit to that relationship with that customer or do you see that as just the beginning of a new story
Braxton has genuine practitioner credibility - he operated inside a 150-location car wash group and was a Rinsed customer for 4.5 years before joining - which is more grounded than a typical thought-leader guest. However, his current role is senior content marketing manager, not a senior operator or executive, which caps the depth and authority of insights he can offer.
He grew to lead CRM and incremental revenue for that 150 car wash location operator
he was a customer of Rinsed for about four and a half years before he eventually joined the team
For a five-minute episode the guest lands several concrete numbers - membership conversion benchmarks, churn rates, a cars-per-hour throughput figure, and an industry association statistic - which is above average for this format. The industry association behind the 54% stat is unnamed, and all examples are narrowly car-wash-specific with limited transferable evidence.
54% of all churned customer or churned members still wash at the same wash
wash four cars this week in 120 cars per hour. Membership conversion rate over 20% if the term is under 5%
The host's sole substantive prompt is a fully open 'what piece of ABM advice do you have for us today?' with no structured follow-up pressure, no numbers challenged, and no productive disagreement. The win-back question is a light softball that lets the guest riff rather than probing for specifics, and the episode closes with a sponsor read and a beverage question.
Braxton, what piece of ABM advice do you have for us today?
Awesome. And the one that I would add on there
Computed from the transcript - who did the talking, and the words that came up most.
Car washing is a century-old business, but memberships are just a decade in the making. That shift has created new opportunities - and new challenges - for operators. In this episode of Account-Based Beverages, host Jim Gilkey sits down with Braxton McKee, Senior Content Marketing Manager at Rinsed . Braxton brings a unique perspective: he grew up in the car wash industry, led CRM and incremental revenue for a 150-location operator, and was a Rinsed customer for years before joining the team. From speaking the operator’s language to connecting white-collar tools with blue-collar realities, Braxton shares how empathy, strategy, and winbacks fuel account-based growth. Guest Bio Braxton McKee is Senior Content Marketing Manager at Rinsed , helping turn 3,500+ car washes into subscription and loyalty machines. With deep roots in the car wash industry, he grew from the pit to leading CRM and incremental revenue for a 150-location operator before joining Rinsed. Today, he helps bridge technology and operations by speaking the operator’s language and enabling customers with empathy.
Transcribed and scored by The B2B Podcast Index.
Jim Gilkey: Jim Gilke back with another episode of Account Based Beverages, a show that is actionable to the point and quenches your ABM thirst. Today's guest is Braxton McKee. Braxton is the senior content marketing manager at Rinsed. He grew up working in the car wash industry which is the industry that rinsed serves at 18 at a uh, local small business that was acquired by private equity. He grew to lead CRM and incremental revenue for that 150 car wash location operator and, and he was a customer of Rinsed for about four and a half years before he eventually joined the team. So today Braxton helps promote Rinsed by speaking the operator's language both for prospects and enablement for existing customers. Braxton, what piece of ABM advice do you have for us today?
Braxton McKee: Sure, yeah. So it's unique car washing, right? So the car wash industry is still a super top knit industry. We've watched cars for 100 years but we've really had memberships for about 10. So it's still really tight knit. We like to talk it's account driven. So most of our growth coming from Rinsed is strategic accounts. It's multi site operators, investors or private equity PE backed groups. My top thing is going to be speak the operator's language. So on my background in the industry it was really a great experience for me to grow up and understand the industry. I feel like a lot of other SaaS or tech companies in general should have the same approach. So your customer does not have the same pain points as you. Uh, they don't always stare into you about CAC or automation percentages. All they really care about is that they wash four cars this week in 120 cars per hour. Membership conversion rate over 20% if the term is under 5%. That can be applied in any industry. I feel like these are just really niche car wash examples but that's what they care about, that's their pain points. Right. So how about that you're not just selling a software but that you're helping operators run a stronger and really a more profitable business using your product. So that perspective also means you can bridge the gap between a technology and a daily operation, ensuring that it's not just a theory but it's also super practical. What's unique about this industry and you can say it about others such as construction, automotive, just in general, the industry I ah serve is predominantly blue collar. We're selling a white collar marketing tool to a blue collar crowd. There can always be some friction with that. Right. So you have to earn your respect by relating to that experience in the field every day. Second thing, I have a bonus one today. I guess empathy drives enablement. So you've been in the pit, you know what 100 degree day looks like at the car wash, um, staffing headaches, opening and wash at 6am and your equipment's always down. That empathy changes how you enable. So instead of here's a feature, here's how you avoid losing 200 cars this weekend. Relate every feature that you have to the pain points of the business and it's also making that unique to the account that you're after. Right. So as I said in the beginning it's we have very strategic accounts that we always look for in the industry and that's mostly the larger multi site feedback groups. Knowing their markets, their climates, what weather events do they experience, what's their competitors know? The competitors within two miles know what the competitors habits are. That's how we approach going and serving our prospects and our customers frankly is just being niche and being unique. Not every car washer, not every customer is the same.
Jim Gilkey: Awesome. And the one that I would add on there, the way that I found Braxton, you had a video talking about win backs and I think an underlying theme of this, not just going for proposing a deal to somebody to try to get them back, but being able to go through and restore the story that they might have had early on. Is there anything that you might want to add about those that you might have had relationships with before that you're trying to bring back into the fray?
Braxton McKee: Yeah, I would say that an existing customer that you've lost is still more cost effective to go after than a customer net new and I think that's true in probably most industries. That's me being ignorant saying that, but that's just my experience. It's good stat from our industry association that I'll reference is 54% of all churned customer or churned members still wash at the same wash. So do you know that percentage about your industry? I guess is what I would say to all the viewers is do you know or do you see a churn as a true exit to that relationship with that customer or do you see that as just the beginning of a new story, a plethora of opportunity just going off of that?
Jim Gilkey: Absolutely. And if you're trying to figure out your story that you want to tell in abm, Scrappy ABM is our show sponsor. They're actually running a free ABM in a day workshop coming up in November. So go to scrappyabm.comworkshop and you can get registered for that now. Bringing it back to this episode, Braxton, what is your account based beverage of choice?
Braxton McKee: I am short, sweet and to the point. Maybe an ice cube in it just to make it cool to the touch.
Jim Gilkey: I will sometimes put ice cubes in mine if I need to get the caffeine through my system faster, but black coffee is definitely a favorite here on Account Based Beverages. You shared some really great advice. If people want to learn more, where can they find you online? Sure.
Braxton McKee: Yeah. Braxton McKee on LinkedIn.
Jim Gilkey: Awesome. I'll make sure that I link your LinkedIn account in the show notes and on the post on LinkedIn. Thank you so much for joining us on an episode of Account Based Beverages.
Braxton McKee: Thanks for having me.
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