1. 44 SEMANewsJuly2013
BUSINESSSEMA
ByChadSimon
Car-Care 101
Evolving Trends and Modern Technology
Keep Product Manufacturers on Their Toes
A
nyone who has ever walked into a retail store knows that the
number of car-care options available can be overwhelming,
even to the most hardcore car guy. It’s not much easier for
the product manufacturer, either. Paints are getting harder
and more durable, so car-care developers have to reformu-
late their products to keep up with constantly evolving technology.
Car care encompasses a wide range of
surfaces, from paint to wheels and tires.
Each offers several material options, such
as clear coat vs. matte and chrome vs.
aluminum. There are literally hundreds
of products specifically designed for each
type of surface. To choose the best product
for the job, it’s crucial that consumers and
professional detailers know the makeup and
condition of the surface they’re working
on. Big bucks have been spent custom-
izing the vehicles, so products to enhance
and maintain their appearance must func-
tion without causing damage. To help
ease the burden and keep your custom-
ers coming back, experts recommend that
retailers educate them and stay on top of
evolving trends.
New Matte Finishes Create
New Challenges
Morefinishoptionsareavailabletodaythan
ever before, said Ron Fausnight, research and
development manager for Houston-based
ITW Global Brands—the parent company
of several brands that include Rain X and
Black Magic. The base coat/clear coat, which
was new 20 to 30 years ago, has become
the traditional finish. Conversely, consumers
with a lower-gloss, matte-type paint should
understand that waxing transforms it into
a high-gloss finish. A good-quality car wash
will work on any finish, but avoid the low-
gloss paint areas when waxing and use a
detailer to touch it up, Fausnight suggested.
According to Robert Dipede, global
business development sales and marketing
manager for Los Angeles-based Shining
Monkey, wraps and matte-finish paints are
all the rage. Plasti dip—a spray-on rub-
ber coating that changes the color of the
car—is another surface covering that people
are using. But there are few products on
the market specifically formulated to clean
matte-finish paint, matte vinyls and even
printed vinyls.
The matte-finish trend has made a come-
back from the old rat-rod days of the ’50s
and ’60s, but it has spread to luxury vehicles
this time, as inspired by Ken Block’s ’06
Mercedes-Benz CLS, according to Dipede.
“It makes the car look more stealth,” he
said. “People customize their cars to make
them different. That’s part of what the
whole matte look is about.”
The look also creates new opportuni-
ties for customizers, and new problems
for detailers.
“We’ve developed products that help
maintain, clean and protect all of those
surfaces without causing the matte finish
to look shiny or change color,” Dipede
said. “It makes the surface look original by
leaving an invisible barrier without adding
shine. You can’t see the protective barrier,
but you can feel it with your hand.”
Over the past 20 years or so, the car-care
market has seen a general decline, partially
because paint technology has improved dras-
tically, according to Michael Pennington,
director of training and consumer relations
for Irvine, California-based Meguiar’s. Base-
coat/clear-coat technology has slowed the
aging process, which is why cars don’t need
to be waxed as frequently. However, the
market has flourished among enthusiasts.
n Matte finishes have always been prevalent on rat rods, including this ’47 Dodge Busi-
ness Coupe. However, there are few products on the market specifically designed to care
for them.

2. www.semanews.com 45
“Car guys wax their cars on a monthly
basis because they want to, not because they
have to,” Pennington said. “They have an
emotional connection; they take pride in
their cars and they want to pamper them all
the time because they consider their cars as
extensions of themselves. The perception is,
‘I take care of my car; therefore, I take care
of myself.’ A small percentage of the market
is made up of enthusiasts, but they buy a
tremendous amount of products.”
Overall longevity, durability, clearness,
increased color options and shine have made
paints look more vibrant. Despite their lon-
gevity, clear coats tend to scratch easily, but
they don’t grind out and oxidize, unlike the
early lacquers and enamels. Swirls, scratches
and towel marks are now the number-one
complaint. Because clear coats are sensitive
to abrasion, yesterday’s products don’t nec-
essarily work on today’s finishes, so enthu-
siasts must always choose products tailored
to their finishes.
“We have a variety of products on the
shelf designed for the finishes of the ’30s,
’40s, ’50s and ’60s, and we still make
them,” Pennington said. “They might work
on a new finish, but we have ones that are
designed specifically for modern finishes.
The abrasives are different and the formula-
tions are different because they’re designed
for scratch-sensitive clears.”
As for mattes, Meguiar’s carries products
that work but are not specific to the finish,
according to RJ de Vera, associate direc-
tor of public relations and event market-
ing for Meguiar’s. “People want miracle
solutions for matte that just don’t exist,”
he said. “Once you get a big scratch on
matte, you can’t do anything about it
because you change the sheen of the actual
clear coat when you use a compound and
an abrasive to polish it out. You can get
rid of the scratch, but then you’ll have
a shiny spot.”
Keeping Up With
Modern Finishes
In caring for modern clear coats, today’s
waxes should contain mild polishing agents
so that they are gentle and don’t cut into
the paint, suggested John Nemec, who over-
sees new-product development and market
research for ITW Global Brands.
To keep pace with these changes, Shin-
ing Monkey anticipates market trends by
developing products three to five years out.
The problem here, according to Dipede,
is getting newly developed products to
retail, because retailers tend to react slower
to trends.
“We develop products that are growing
with the trend, and retailers take a long time
to react and get the products to the shelf
because they’re so new,” Dipede said. “For
example, we have a matte and vinyl cleaner
we’re trying to launch in a few of the larger
national chains. The retailers are hesitant
because they don’t know how popular matte
cars have become. They are out there, and
there are no products on the market for
them, so the problem is getting retailers to
listen to what’s happening.”
Limit Confusion
There are hundreds of pre-waxes, clean-
ers, glazes, polishes and rubbing compounds
on the shelf that all say the same thing, and
it’s confusing to the consumer, according
to Dipede.
“We try to explain to the average guy—
because he doesn’t know the difference
between a wax, a polish or a glaze—the
different uses and how to apply them,” he
said. “In our packaging, we tell consum-
ers they don’t need to do three steps on
their cars. If they want to, great, but they
don’t have to, especially with modern fin-
ishes. As long as you have a good mainte-
nance program, you’re using a good soap
and you’re not going through no-touch
car washes too often, the paint will last
15–20 years without looking weathered
or torn.”
Andy Marocco, owner of Route 66 Speed
Shop, suggested that manufacturers keep it
simple. The company recently developed
Rat Wax, which Marocco says is the first
product on the market specifically designed
to clean and protect rods and custom cars
with flat, matte and satin paints.
“Consumers are inundated with deci-
sions,” he said. “They don’t want several
different products. They want one product
that they can use on everything, including
windows, seats and chrome. The key to
connecting with consumers is to get out
and talk to them and understand what
they need. The market tells you where you
should be, so it’s important to respond
quickly to new trends.”
Right Tool, Right Technique
Education is key in Meguiar’s effort to
build a relationship with the consumer.
Pennington stressed teaching consumers
about three key points: Evaluate the fin-
ish, choose the right products and use
good technique.
“When you go to the doctor, he evaluates
you and writes a prescription,” Pennington
said. “It’s your responsibility to read the
directions and follow them. What happens
if you just start popping pills randomly?
They don’t do the job, or you may die.
Think of all the different brands of car
care as medicine. If you don’t know what’s
wrong with your vehicle, there’s no way you
can choose the right products, and if you
don’t follow the directions, you’re not going
to get good results. The best way to get good
n Using a drill-activated (DA) dual-action polisher system on this ’07 Porsche 911 TT will
get rid of scratches and swirls that washing alone can’t remove.

3. 46 SEMANewsJuly2013
SEMAn BUSINESS
results is to understand what you’re working
on and where you want to go.”
When choosing the right product for
paint, there are five steps consumers should
follow: wash, clean, polish, protect and
maintain. Every car needs to be washed fre-
quently using quality microfiber towels and
clean mitts, because if they don’t remove
the dirt, it’s going to bond and get etched
into the finish. According to Pennington,
the majority of Americans use dishwashing
liquid, and it works, but it strips the wax
protection off. He compares it to using an
all-purpose cleaner on your hands all the
time. To stay ahead of the game, use a pH-
balanced, non-detergent car wash designed
for automotive finishes.
People often wash and wax their cars
and consider it detailing, but Pennington
believes they’re missing the boat. Surface
prep, or cleaning, removes bonded con-
taminants and defects, including scratches,
swirls, stains and fallout that washing can’t
remove. Not everybody does this, even
though it can easily be performed using a
drill-activated dual-action polisher system
with specialized microfiber pads.
“This is what makes a car look really
good,” he said. “Think of it as exfoliat-
ing your skin. A lot of companies make
compounds or clay products. Whether the
surface is rough and you want to make it as
smooth as glass, or you want to get rid of
swirl marks, that’s where this is done.”
Polishing creates gloss and is an optional
step, comparable to putting lotion on your
skin. The next step is protection, similar to
applying sunscreen, which slows down the
effects of Mother Nature. The disconnect is
that most people don’t know how to protect
their vehicles, according to Pennington.
“They see swirls, so they wash and wax,
which leaves them with protected swirls,”
he said. “If you put sunscreen over grease
and grime on your hands, you get protected
grease and grime. Not to mention that the
wax doesn’t work as well and it doesn’t wipe
on or off as easily. If you’re evaluating your
car for the first time, you need to wash, clay,
compound, wax and maintain your car.”
Three to four months later, it’s time to
reevaluate. The vehicle’s finish shouldn’t be
rough and have swirls, so a wash and wax
would be all that’s necessary.
“So you know how to care for your car
now,” Pennington said. “You’ve used the right
tools and you haven’t put scratches back into
it. It’s like cleaning your house once per year or
vacuuming every weekend. If it already looks
good, you never need to do a deep clean.”
Matte care is slightly different, but always
be critical with washing and drying, wax
and protection, Pennington suggested.
Don’t use cleaners (compounds and clay)
or polish, because they are designed to take
out swirls and scratches by leveling a little
bit of paint. Never use an abrasive, and do
all the work by hand. For protection, a non-
abrasive spray wax works best. For mainte-
nance, quick detailers can be used.
n At the 2012 SEMA Show, LINE-X and West Coast Customs unveiled this customized ’13
Camaro 1SS Coupe dressed up in the LINE-X Body Armour spray-on protective coating.
This unique coating presents another challenge and opportunity for the car-care industry.
Fresh clear coats shouldn’t be waxed
because they need to breathe, and wax
actually creates a film or barrier, accord-
ing to Chris Springer, refinish marketing
applications specialist for PPG Automotive
Refinish. Detail sprays are more effec-
tive. On custom finishes, Springer recom-
mended using nothing.
“If you’re using multiple layers of clear
coat or putting cover-up stripes or graphics
or any type of artwork, that product will
gas 60 to 90 days after the car has been
painted,” he said.
Matte finishes are similar, and more
matte care products are slowly being
introduced, whereas gloss care has been a
washed-out market for some time.
“Matte is more of a niche, and the
OEMs are driving that,” Springer said.
PPG’s Perspective on
Paint Care
“They tell us that by 2015, almost every
OEM will have a matte vehicle in its
standard offerings. It’s a market that’s not
flooded with care products, so when the
matte finishes first came out, there were
no care guidelines for them. For instance,
if you rub too aggressively on a matte fin-
ish, you could raise the gloss. Some matte
finishes are more durable than others. It
could scratch if you don’t use a good-quality
wash mitt.”
Springer acknowledged that he has
been seeing matte finishes on modern cars
for the past couple years at the SEMA
Show in Las Vegas, and companies need
to continue developing products that will
help clean and protect mattes without
creating shine.
“Most consumers are steered away from
matte because of the preconceived notion
that it’s going to be harder to care for, but
honestly, it’s no harder to care for than a
shined car,” he said.
PPG often works with aftermarket car-
care companies to help them develop prod-
ucts for their new clear coats. “We welcome
those relationships,” Springer said. “We
have a full-functioning body shop in West-
lake, Ohio, and those guys come in and
test out their products on clear coats and
other products that haven’t even hit the
streets yet.”
PPG also develops product-selection
guides for consumers that walk them
through the entire process.
“Are you fixing a damaged vehicle, or
are you doing a restoration on a custom
vehicle?” he asked. “We have products tai-
lored to those applications. The same rules
apply to car-care finish companies. If I walk
in and have this entire bank of Meguiar’s
Gold Class in front of me, how do I choose

4. www.semanews.com 47
Evaluating the finish and choosing the
right product is just as important for wheel
care. If you choose the wrong wheel cleaner,
you can damage a set of wheels. Understand
what you bought, the surfaces you’re work-
ing on and, more importantly, the types
of brakes and suspension components you
have, Pennington suggested. When you
spray a wheel cleaner, it goes all the way
through and hits all the components. For
example, if you have chrome wheels with
high-performance brakes, you would not
use a chrome wheel cleaner because it’s
aggressive. You would choose an aluminum
wheel cleaner or the weakest and safest
product from a pH-balance perspective.
Whether you’re a detailer or a consumer,
take the safest, least-aggressive method.
Developing Eco-Friendly
Solutions
Over the past decade, the push for devel-
oping “green” products across most indus-
tries has become a trend of its own, but the
car-care industry has yet to fully embrace
it. ITW Global Brands has reformulated its
washes to ensure that they don’t contain any
Prop. 65 components, which require com-
panies to put a warning label on the bottle
that informs consumers of potential cancer
or birth defect risks. The company also uses
organic compounds across its product line.
“These products are normally just as
effective as traditional ones,” Fausnight
said. “They may be a little more difficult
and expensive to formulate, but usually
you can get your performance to where
you need to be and still be environmen-
tally friendly. In the personal-care indus-
try, there’s a real push for organic green
products. We haven’t seen that so much
in the automotive industry. Consumers are
more concerned about performance and
price. While they don’t want to harm the
environment, it’s not their major motiva-
tion behind making a decision on what
to buy.”
Shining Monkey’s Ken Block 360 prod-
uct is 100% natural. “We don’t play it up
in our marketing because, typically, envi-
ronmentally friendly products in the auto-
motive market do not sell,” Dipede said.
“You’re trying to protect your car, which
is treated with a chemical, with something
that’s natural. For car people, I don’t think
they see the correlation. The mentality is,
‘I have paint on my car; I want something
that’s going to protect my paint. I don’t
think this plant-based natural product is
going to do the trick because it doesn’t have
the stuff in it that it needs for my paint to
be protected.’
“We’re not saying that’s our stance as a
company. We want to try to save the envi-
ronment as much as everyone else, and we
try to come out with products that have
an eco responsibility to them. But again,
what’s right for me? Help the consumer
by providing information that calls out
the product’s different uses.”
Springer believes old-school trends are
coming back, including the big glitter
glamour-style low-rider flakes. “You see it
in the bike industry. Harley-Davidson is
launching six PPG colors that are driven
on that big old-school flake look. Guys
are taking their grandma’s tablecloth and
laying it on the hood of their car and
spraying pearl through it and laying candy
on top of it.”
One of the biggest challenges the
industry faces is adhering to VOC com-
pliance, according to Springer. Some
companies had to convert from petro-
leum-based waxes to water-based, which
he said is difficult to use on a finish that
is more technologically advanced, harder
and shinier.
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5. 48 SEMANewsJuly2013
SEMAn BUSINESS
Common Car-Care Terms
Carnauba is the hardest natural wax on the market. It comes from a palm tree
that grows in Brazil. The leaves excrete wax to protect them from the sun and keep
the plant from drying out. The leaves are harvested from the palm, and the wax is
removed from the leaves and purified. Manufacturers add carnauba to synthetic
waxes to add durability and protection; however, the higher the carnauba doesn’t
necessarily mean better protection.
Polymer is a synthetic wax that provides better protection and longer durability
than carnauba.
Hydrophobic means afraid of water. Wax makes the water want to get off the
surface, making it bead. Beading doesn’t necessarily mean there’s wax protection. It
just means there’s something on the surface. One part of the water molecule bonds
to the glass, and the other is water repellent. The surface tension of the water holds
it together.
Nanotechnology is good for making hydrophobic surfaces. A nano surface can
reduce the contact between the water and surface itself. On a molecular level, the
nanoparticles form little dots, almost like a bed of nails, where you’re pushing on the
surface but you’re only touching on the points. This reduces the contact between the
water and the surface and allows the water to bead up even higher.
we have to listen to the consumer and
ensure that we deliver products they will
purchase. Right now, green products are
not selling to car enthusiasts. If you talk
about waterless car washes to anyone at a
retail store, they’re not even going to want
to listen to you because typically no one
buys them.”
Meguiar’s has a different stance regard-
ing the industry’s reaction to environ-
mentally friendly products. Pennington
believes that, while they can’t completely
replace the traditional car wash, there’s a
slight movement with rinseless and water-
less car washes due to wastewater regula-
tions enforced by various cities and towns
and the fact that many apartment dwellers
don’t have access to a hose. Also, certain
regions prone to droughts impose water
restrictions on their residents. These con-
sumers are prime targets for marketing
these products.
A waterless car wash is applied much
like a spray detailer. It allows the user to
remove dust and dirt from a car using
several towels. A rinseless car wash uses
about a gallon of water. According to Pen-
nington, the DIY market is fairly new and
is just coming on, but professional detailers
have been doing it for years.
Paint is also heavily regulated, which is
why many are now water-based instead
of a traditional lacquer. Some compa-
nies still make earlier-generation products
because they’re still being used on early-
technology paint.
“As a trade person, pay attention to your
town’s regulatory situations,” Pennington
suggested. “Even some of the chemicals in
detailers fall under volatile organic com-
pound (VOC) regulations. Body shops
have to follow city and state regulations
on the VOCs they are allowed to have.
We worked with Mothers to educate the
California Air Resources Board on VOCs
and come to a mutual agreement. Many of
our products are VOC free, and some con-
tain VOCs, so we’ve had to adjust some of
our formulations.”
Future Trends
ITW Global Brands sees more custom-
ization, especially in Asia, where enthu-
siasts change the color of their vehicles
with polymer film. “This is very niche,
probably less than 10%, but they’re willing
to pay for it, so it balances out,” Nemec
said. “The other side is the convenience.
We saw the evolution of paste wax, liquid
wax and now spray wax. People want that
waxing property, but they’re not will-
ing to spend 2.5 hours outside waxing
their vehicles.”
Dipede believes printed vinyls and
unique graphics are starting to trend.
“Multi-layered, almost sticker bombing
your car, on both interiors and exteriors,
is also happening,” he said. “We also see
subtle modifications on the exterior with
heavy modifications under the engine and
powertrain. We’re trying to develop prod-
ucts that make the car look as original as
n Know what type of surface you’re working on. If you have a delicate finish, don’t use
a regular wax. Instead, use a detailer or spray wax, which provides shine without being
aggressive toward the finish.
possible from a gloss perspective inside
and out. We don’t want our products to
alter the surface as products have in the
past, with the exception of our wax, polish
and detail spray. These will give you a nice
shine and texture.”
Though most people want quick results,
there will always be those who want to
spend hours pampering their vehicles.
“Oftentimes you see technology mov-
ing into simpler ways to remove scratches,
apply wax, clean windows and solve
problems, such as dirty wheels and water
spots,” Pennington said. “That’s where the
industry is headed—easier and faster. This
invites more people into the hobby and
shows them how easy it is.”