732 sites, 27 chains, 72,150 reviews — the Milwaukee car wash market across 4 counties. Format mix, operator rank, county breakdown, rating vs. income, aspect-level customer signals.
Snapshot
Locations
732
77% independent
Chains
27
lead: bp (54 sites)
Avg rating
4.36★
near national MSA median
Damage rate
2.0%
1.3× national MSA norm
Cancel friction
19.6%
Top format
detail shop
36% of classified inventory
Median single wash
$8
range $7–$50
Median unlimited
$20/mo
cheapest $15/mo at Mister Car Wash
Market Quality snapshot
Population
1,566,361
ACS 2023 5-year
Households
650,084
ACS 2023 5-year
Residents per wash
2,140
near the national MSA median
Express tunnels per 10K households
0.8
in the 0.5–1.0 filling band · classified sites
Key findings
732 car wash locations operated by 27 chains and 565 independents across 4 counties.
Weighted Google rating 4.36★ across the market; structural concentration and format mix sit near US-metro norms.
Built from 72,150 Google reviews, 19,037 of them AI-extracted across 55 dimensions.
732 car wash locations across 4 counties · dots colored by format · sized by review volume
Locations
732
Chains
27
+ 565 independents
Reviews
72K
Avg Rating
4.36
Damage Rate
2.02%
Median AGI/return
$80K
location-weighted
Executive Read
Milwaukee's car wash market reads as US-metro-typical in shape; the distinctive cuts are at the format and aspect levels. 732 locations across 27 chains and 565 independents, distributed across 4 counties. Customer-experience signals across 19,037 AI-extracted reviews produce the distinct read on this market.
Average rating across the 732-location market weighs in at 4.36★; damage rate 2.0%; cancel friction 19.6%. Staff is the brightest aspect signal (0.76/+1). Per-operator and per-format cuts below are more informative than the aggregates.
Published pricing across the 85 of 739 Milwaukee locations with menus available: median single car wash $8 (range $7–$50), median unlimited membership $20/month (range $15–$100/mo). The cheapest unlimited membership in the metro is $15/mo at Mister Car Wash (Base Plus).
Published menu pricing for car washes in the Milwaukee metropolitan area, captured from operator websites and the WashIndex AI calling agent. 85 of 739
tracked locations have usable published pricing
(12% coverage).
Single Wash
$8
median · range $7–$50 · 73 locations tracked
Unlimited Membership
$20 per month
median · range $15–$100 per month · 40 programs tracked
Cheapest unlimited memberships in Milwaukee
1
Mister Car Wash Base Plus
$15 per mo
2
Mister Car Wash Base Plus
$15 per mo
3
Mister Car Wash Base Plus
$15 per mo
4
Mister Car Wash Base Plus
$15 per mo
5
Scrub-A-Dub Car Wash xpress
$17 per mo
Cheapest single car washes in Milwaukee
1
Scrub-A-Dub Car Wash & Oil Change Xpress
$7
2
Scrub-A-Dub Car Wash xpress
$7
3
Scrub-A-Dub Car Wash Xpress
$7
4
Uncle Larrys Car Wash Basic Wash
$7
5
Jetz Convenience Center MKE on 70th Self-Serve Pet Wash
$7
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.
Official industry footprint · BLS QCEW 2024
The car wash industry in the Milwaukee metro, officially
Fast-growing
the Milwaukee metro is one of the faster-growing car-wash job markets: employer establishments grew 30% from 2022 to 2024 — ahead of the ~7% national pace — to 90, now employing about 683 people at a $33,014 average wage.
Employer establishments
90
NAICS 811192 · 2024
Industry jobs
683
private, annual avg
Avg annual wage
$33,014
per employee
Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, QCEW (private, NAICS 811192). Counts car-wash employer
establishments, a narrower universe than all physical wash locations — see methodology.
SBA Lending · FY2010–present
Car wash financing in the Milwaukee metro
Balanced mix
Since 2010, the U.S. Small Business Administration has backed 27 car-wash loans in the Milwaukee metro worth $24.7M, at a $769,200 median per car wash and a 0.0% charge-off rate. Its purpose mix tracks the national pattern — a blend of new builds, acquisitions, and reinvestment by existing operators — with no single signal dominating.
SBA loans
27
FY2010–2026
Total approved
$24.7M
7(a) + 504
Median loan
$769K
per car wash
Charge-off rate
0.0%
of 13 resolved
SBA car-wash loans approved per fiscal year
FY2026 annualized from its first 6 months.
Loans by county
Milwaukee12
Waukesha7
Washington5
Ozaukee3
What the loans fund · estimated from loan terms
New build / open33% · $743K
Acquisition4% · $214K
Expansion / improvement63% · $883K
Source: U.S. Small Business Administration 7(a) & 504 FOIA datasets (NAICS 811192), data through 2026-03-31.
See the Car Wash Lending Tracker for national figures and methodology.
Frequently Asked Questions
About the Milwaukee car wash market
How many car washes are in the Milwaukee metro?
+
There are 732 car wash locations across the Milwaukee-Waukesha, WI CBSA, spanning 4 counties.
What is the best-rated car wash in the Milwaukee metro?
+
Detail Doctors in Milwaukee, WI is the highest-rated car wash in the Milwaukee metro at 5.0★ across 498 Google reviews (filtering to locations with at least 100 reviews).
Which car wash chain has the most locations in Milwaukee?
+
bp has the most locations in the Milwaukee metro with 54 sites, followed by Kwik Trip (34 sites). The metro has 27 multi-location operators in total, alongside 565 independent or single-location sites.
What is the average customer rating in the Milwaukee car wash market?
+
The review-weighted average rating across all 732 car washes in the Milwaukee metro is 4.36★, based on 72,150 Google reviews processed through WashIndex's customer-experience pipeline.
What is the typical household income near car washes in Milwaukee?
+
Across the ZIP codes containing the Milwaukee metro's car washes, the location-weighted median IRS-reported AGI per tax return is $80K (tax year 2022) — a rough proxy for trade-area household income.
How much does a car wash cost in Milwaukee?
+
Single-wash prices across the Milwaukee car wash market range from $7 to $50, with a median of $8 across 73 locations that publish their pricing. The cheapest single car wash in the metro is $7 at Scrub-A-Dub Car Wash & Oil Change (Xpress). Pricing data is captured from operator websites and the WashIndex AI calling agent.
How much does an unlimited car wash membership cost in Milwaukee?
+
Unlimited car wash memberships in the Milwaukee metro range from $15/month to $100/month, with a median of $20/month across 40 programs tracked. The cheapest unlimited membership is $15/month at Mister Car Wash (Base Plus); the most expensive tracked is $100/month at Detailing Delivered (Mobile Detailers) (Biweekly Detailing Membership (Coupe)).
What is the cheapest car wash in Milwaukee?
+
The cheapest single car wash in the Milwaukee metro is $7 at Scrub-A-Dub Car Wash & Oil Change (Xpress tier). For ongoing customers, the cheapest unlimited membership is $15/month at Mister Car Wash (Base Plus) — a break-even of roughly 1.9 washes per month at the metro's median single-wash price of $8.
01Format Mix
What kinds of car washes does Milwaukee have?
The table below lists every operating format we classify, with locations, reviews, average rating, damage rate, and membership-cancel friction broken out per format. Milwaukee's mix sits close to the US-metro median shape.
Highest-rated format: Detail Shop at 4.81★ across 75 locations.
Lowest-rated: In-Bay Automatic at 4.13★ (69 locations).
Format
Locations
% of MSA
Reviews
Avg Rating
Damage Rate
Cancel Friction
Detail Shop
75
10.2%
8,112
4.81
0.59%
0.0%
In-Bay Automatic
69
9.4%
12,799
4.13
1.14%
0.0%
Express Tunnel
55
7.5%
21,704
4.17
5.75%
20.0%
Full Service
7
1.0%
4,066
4.23
1.25%
21.7%
Self-Serve Bay
3
0.4%
448
4.16
1.69%
—
02Income & Demographics
What is the household income near Milwaukee car washes?
Each ZIP in Milwaukee is joined to IRS Statistics-of-Income (tax year 2022) and to the per-location Google rating dataset. The scatter below sizes dots by review volume and colors them by format.
Pearson r between ZIP income and Google rating across 342 qualifying locations: 0.05 — effectively zero. Operating quality dominates over neighborhood income.
Scatter mean: $90K AGI/return, 4.23★.
Detail Shop In-Bay Automatic Express Tunnel Full Service Self-Serve Bay
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
10
101
7,591
4.38
Detail Shop (7)
$50K – $75K
17
144
23,611
4.36
Detail Shop (28)
$75K – $100K
17
112
10,045
4.21
In-Bay Automatic (23)
$100K – $150K
22
139
23,838
4.36
Detail Shop (23)
$150K+
7
34
5,277
4.49
Detail Shop (9)
Top-tier 34 sites, 4.49★ avg; bottom-tier 101 sites, 4.38★. Across Milwaukee's 342 qualifying locations, the income gradient correlates only weakly with rating — operator execution dominates.
03Dominant Chains
Who operates the most Milwaukee car washes?
The table below ranks the top 25 chains operating in Milwaukee by location count. Each row shows per-chain Google rating, damage rate, and cancel friction — the cleanest side-by-side cut on operator quality in the market.
Which counties have the most car washes in Milwaukee?
Counties of the Milwaukee CBSA are listed below by car wash count. Milwaukee County is the most density-concentrated. Reading the rating column tells you whether quality is uniform across the metro or whether specific counties pull in either direction.
Cross-county rating dispersion: 0.11★ between the highest- and lowest-rated counties with meaningful sample size.
What do customers love and complain about in Milwaukee?
The aspect grid below summarizes 19,037 AI-extracted reviews across 732 Milwaukee car wash locations. Each aspect lands on a -1…+1 scale (negative = customers complain more than they praise; positive = the reverse).
Staff+0.76
Wash Quality+0.70
Wait Time+0.56
Facility Cleanliness+0.51
Per-Wash Price+0.29
Membership Value-0.23
Equipment Working-0.64
06All Locations
Where are all the car washes in the Milwaukee metro?
The complete inventory of car wash locations in the Milwaukee MSA is captured in the underlying dataset; the table below shows the highest-review-volume sites for at-a-glance comparison. Each row shows operator, address, format, chain affiliation, rating, review count, and the IRS mean AGI for the ZIP.
Data as of 2026-06-09.
Pick a format and click Copy.
APA
WashIndex. (2026, June 9). Milwaukee car wash market analysis. https://washindex.com/car-wash-markets/milwaukee
Chicago
WashIndex. "Milwaukee car wash market analysis." WashIndex. Last modified June 9, 2026. https://washindex.com/car-wash-markets/milwaukee.
MLA
"Milwaukee car wash market analysis." WashIndex, Jun. 9, 2026, https://washindex.com/car-wash-markets/milwaukee.
BibTeX
@misc{washindex_car_wash_markets_milwaukee_2026,
title = {{Milwaukee car wash market analysis}},
author = {{WashIndex}},
year = {2026},
month = {Jun},
url = {https://washindex.com/car-wash-markets/milwaukee},
urldate = {2026-06-09},
}
About this analysis
Car wash inventory for the Milwaukee-Waukesha, WI CBSA is determined by point-in-polygon test against the
official US Census county boundaries (TIGER/Line, 2024) for the 4 counties that
make up the MSA. Each location was verified to fall inside one of those county polygons; lat/lng comes from
Google Maps metadata.
Operating-quality signals are derived from 19,037 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.
The free WashIndex platform shows every Milwaukee car wash on an interactive map, with the same review-derived
signals and demographic overlays that power this analysis. Filter by format, drive-time, or operator and compare any
location head-to-head with its true competitive set.