You may have noticed lately several car wash businesses popping up around Wichita. One young bilingual entrepreneur has carved out her niche in the market by making her business mobile. Instead of a customer waiting in line at a car wash, her company comes to you.
Twenty-Five-year old Jocelyn Galicia always knew she wanted to work for herself.
"I learned that entrepreneurship was a thing when I was 12 years old from another amazing woman entrepreneur. I saw her, I was inspired by what she did and so I really wanted to do that as well," she says.
"She owned a restaurant that my mom worked at, and it was the only female entrepreneur that I had ever seen as a kid."
Galicia is a Wichita native. After attending Wichita East High School, she decided to pursue entrepreneurship at Wichita State University. She joined her cousins who started a mobile oil change company to pay for college. After running that business, she became CEO of her own auto services company that needed a new name.
"So 2U Auto, because we come to you. I just yelled in a room of entrepreneurs. I was like, 'Guys, I need to change my name. What do you guys think?' And someone said that back and I checked and the domain was available."
Galicia says her mobile business works because it's more convenient.
"It so much more convenient for our customers than having to go somewhere and wait in a waiting line or in a waiting room for two or three hours, or leave your car and have to request a ride from someone. Cars are parked 95% of the time. I was like, why can't we as a service provider go to customers?"
She says 2U Auto can provide customers quality cleaning, competitive pricing and the ability to clean up to 20 vehicles at once.
"We are also sustainable," Glacia says. "We use a waterless wash process. So we use one gallon of water [unlike] regular car washes do."
As a person of color and a woman in a male-dominated industry, Galicia says sometimes she's pressed to prove herself.
"I've heard like, 'Okay, can I talk to your husband though?' At that point, I was single. I'm like, 'I don't have a husband.' And also, I'm the owner, so it's just little things like that that you have to deal with."
Her business was not immune to the effects of a global pandemic.
"There was even a two-week period at the beginning where we had $90 worth of sales. And I was like, 'Wow, I don't even think I'll be able to pay myself this month.' It was very difficult initially, however, we added disinfection services, and it's back and better than it was before COVID."
Back and better than it was before, she says she's building a strong clientele.
"We service and partner with Cargill, Fidelity, Cox Communications and we've done work for AT&T."
Galicia is also a part of a reality TV show for entrepreneurs called "The BLOX." She was one of 20 out of 5000 business owners selected nationwide — and placed in a house.
"We all lived together for an entire week and we talked about business and we did business competitions, challenges, and it was very high intensity. We learned all about marketing, creating a community for your customers, structuring your business legally, tons of different workshops."
Galicia says she is part of season two which will be released this summer.
There's also more on the horizon for Galicia. She will open a second 2U Auto in Kansas City on May 1.
She says owning is business is like a roller coaster ride.
"Every day there's highs and lows. It's really intense and really cool."
