Yuba City, CA Car Wash Market Analysis
Part of the Yuba City, CA MSA.
Data updated · May 22, 2026
Yuba City: 10 car wash locations, structurally tilted toward detail shop. Format dominance breakdown, per-format quality, operator rank, customer-experience signals.
Snapshot
- Locations
- 10
- Chains
- 3
- lead: Stealth Window Tint In Chico (1)
- Avg rating
- 4.37★
- Damage rate
- 2.7%
- 1.7× MSA norm
- Top format
- detail shop
- 80% of classified
- Median single wash
- $22
- range $9.95–$22
- Median unlimited
- $16/mo
- cheapest $16/mo at Surf Thru Express Car Wash
Market Quality snapshot
- Population
- 69,545
- ACS 2023 5-year
- Households
- 23,692
- ACS 2023 5-year
- Residents per wash
- 6,955
- 3.6× the national MSA median — lighter supply
- Express tunnels per 10K households
- 0.4
- below the ~0.5 expandable band · classified sites
Key findings
- 10 car wash locations operated by 3 chains and 7 independents.
- Detail shop dominates: 80.0% of formally-classified locations.
- Built from 2,232 Google reviews, 560 of them AI-extracted across 55 dimensions.
10 car wash locations in Yuba City, CA · dots colored by format · sized by review volume
Yuba City's car wash supply is structurally tilted toward detail shop. 80.0% of formally-classified locations operate as detail shop; the other formats appear at long-tail volume. Operating-quality signals below are best read as a study of detail shop's execution.
Headline operating signals: 4.37★ rating, 2.7% damage, 33.3% cancel friction. Aspect-level: Staff strong (0.80), equipment reliability weak (-0.68). 2,232 Google reviews back the analysis, 560 LLM-extracted across 55 dimensions.
Published pricing across the 2 of 10 Yuba City locations with menus available: median single car wash $22 (range $9.95–$22), median unlimited membership $16/month (range $16–$16/mo). The cheapest unlimited membership in the city is $16/mo at Surf Thru Express Car Wash (Good Auto-Recharge).
See the best-rated car washes in Yuba City, CA
Ranked by Google review rating
What does a car wash cost in Yuba City, CA?
Published menu pricing for car washes in Yuba City, captured from operator websites and the WashIndex AI calling agent. 2 of 10 tracked locations in the city have usable published pricing (20% coverage).
| Cheapest unlimited memberships in Yuba City | ||
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Surf Thru Express Car Wash Good Auto-Recharge | $16/mo |
| Cheapest single car washes in Yuba City | ||
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Yuba City Car Wash & Auto Detail Express Exterior Wash | $9.95 |
| 2 | Surf Thru Express Car Wash Ceramic Wash | $22 |
Pricing scraped from operator websites where published; the WashIndex AI calling agent rings up locations that don’t publish menus online to capture pricing directly.
About Yuba City, CA
How many car washes are in Yuba City, CA?
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What is the best-rated car wash in Yuba City, CA?
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Which car wash chains operate in Yuba City, CA?
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What is the median household income near Yuba City car washes?
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What is the average car wash rating in Yuba City, CA?
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How much does a car wash cost in Yuba City, CA?
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How much does an unlimited car wash membership cost in Yuba City, CA?
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What is the cheapest car wash in Yuba City, CA?
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What kinds of car washes does Yuba City have?
Format dominance is the structural story here. 8 of the 10 car washes in Yuba City run as detail shop. The mini-table below shows how the rest of the market splits.
Highest-rated format in this market: Detail Shop at 4.93★ (8 locations). Lowest: Full Service at 3.40★ (1 locations).
| Format | Locations | % of MSA | Reviews | Avg Rating | Damage Rate | Cancel Friction |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Detail Shop | 8 | 80.0% | 1,096 | 4.93 | 0.25% | 0.0% |
| Full Service | 1 | 10.0% | 158 | 3.40 | 11.54% | — |
| Express Tunnel | 1 | 10.0% | 978 | 3.90 | 8.03% | 34.4% |
What is the typical household income near Yuba City car washes?
10 car washes with ≥10 reviews are plotted below against ZIP-level mean AGI. With detail shop carrying 80.0% of classified locations, dot color reads heavily skewed toward a single hue.
Pearson r between ZIP income and rating across 10 qualifying locations: -0.12 — mild negative. Higher-income ZIPs host slightly lower-rated washes on average, which is unusual. Scatter mean: $66K AGI/return, 4.70★.
Car wash count and quality by income tier
Blue bars: location count per tier. Orange tick marks: average Google rating (same y-axis).
| Income tier (mean AGI/return) | ZIPs | Locations | Reviews | Avg Rating | Top Format |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Under $50K | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0.00 | — |
| $50K – $75K | 1 | 7 | 739 | 4.62 | Detail Shop (6) |
| $75K – $100K | 1 | 3 | 1,493 | 4.25 | Detail Shop (2) |
| $100K – $150K | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0.00 | — |
| $150K+ | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0.00 | — |
0 car washes at the top income tier (0.00★) vs. 0 at the bottom (0.00★). Detail shops concentrate in middle-income ZIPs — that's the part of the curve where the unit economics actually work.
Who operates the most Yuba City car washes?
Because Yuba City skews so heavily to one format, the chain rank reads like a ranking of how well each chain executes that format. Locations, reviews, ratings, and operational signals follow.
| # | Chain | Locations | Reviews | Avg Rating | Damage | Cancel | Upsell |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Stealth Window Tint In Chico | 1 | 480 | 4.90 | — | — | — |
| 2 | CKDetailing | 1 | 15 | 5.00 | — | — | — |
| 3 | Surf Thru Express Car Wash | 1 | 978 | 3.90 | 8.03% | 34.4% | 0.00% |
What do customers love and complain about at Yuba City car washes?
Aspect averages below are heavily shaped by Yuba City's dominant format. Since 80.0% of formally-classified locations operate as detail shop, the aspect mix is closer to a detail shop read than to a multi-format average.
Where are the 10 car washes in Yuba City, CA?
The location table below is shaped heavily by Yuba City's format dominance — most high-volume sites operate as detail shop.
| Location | City | Format | Chain | Rating | Reviews | ZIP AGI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Surf Thru Express Car Wash 1501 Colusa Hwy | Yuba City, CA | Express Tunnel | Surf Thru Express Car Wash | 3.9 | 978 | $78K |
| Stealth Window Tint - Ceramic Coating, PPF, Vinyl Wrap, Automotive Detail 2913 Colusa Hwy Unit A | Yuba City, CA | Detail Shop | Stealth Window Tint In Chico | 4.9 | 480 | $78K |
| Detail Pros 584 Franklin Ave suite b | Yuba City, CA | Detail Shop | — | 4.9 | 220 | $60K |
| Apex Mobile Detail LLC 1215 Colusa Ave | Yuba City, CA | Detail Shop | — | 5.0 | 210 | $60K |
| Yuba City Car Wash & Auto Detail 400 Colusa Ave | Yuba City, CA | Full Service | — | 3.4 | 158 | $60K |
| 530 Mobile Auto Detailing 260 Garden Hwy | Yuba City, CA | Detail Shop | — | 4.9 | 67 | $60K |
| Shaun & T's Vehicle Detailing 1427 Youngs Ln | Yuba City, CA | Detail Shop | — | 5.0 | 50 | $60K |
| Purity Auto Hygienics 1624 Starr Dr Unit 2 | Yuba City, CA | Detail Shop | — | 5.0 | 35 | $78K |
| Elite Touch Mobile Auto Detailing Yuba City 1178 Rosemary Ln | Yuba City, CA | Detail Shop | — | 5.0 | 19 | $60K |
| Landers Auto Detailing 1078 Franklin Ave apartment 14 | Yuba City, CA | Detail Shop | CKDetailing | 5.0 | 15 | $60K |
Data as of 2026-05-22. Pick a format and click Copy.
WashIndex. (2026, May 22). Yuba City, CA car wash market analysis. https://washindex.com/car-wash-cities/yuba-city-ca
WashIndex. "Yuba City, CA car wash market analysis." WashIndex. Last modified May 22, 2026. https://washindex.com/car-wash-cities/yuba-city-ca.
"Yuba City, CA car wash market analysis." WashIndex, May. 22, 2026, https://washindex.com/car-wash-cities/yuba-city-ca.
@misc{washindex_car_wash_cities_yuba_city_ca_2026,
title = {{Yuba City, CA car wash market analysis}},
author = {{WashIndex}},
year = {2026},
month = {May},
url = {https://washindex.com/car-wash-cities/yuba-city-ca},
urldate = {2026-05-22},
} About this analysis
Car wash inventory for Yuba City, CA is sourced from the WashIndex national car-wash place index, filtered to places whose Google-Maps-reported city matches Yuba City, and further restricted to places whose format the WashIndex LLM classifier identified as a car wash (excluding dealerships, gas stations, and other auto-related businesses that don't primarily operate a car wash). Inclusion in the parent Yuba City MSA dataset is established by point-in-polygon against the official US Census county boundaries (TIGER/Line, 2024).
Operating-quality signals are derived from 560 customer reviews processed through WashIndex's 55-field LLM extraction pipeline. Format classification comes from a separate per-location website-reading classifier. ZIP-level income data is from the IRS Statistics of Income (tax year 2022) — mean Adjusted Gross Income per tax return, which is directionally aligned with ACS median household income but available without authentication.
See our full methodology for the extraction pipeline, validation samples, and aggregation logic. Term definitions in the glossary.
Machine-readable: JSON ↓ · API root
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