Census CBP 2023 · NAICS 811192
How many auto detailing businesses are there in the US?
Auto detailing does not get its own federal code either. It is counted with car washes, and this page shows exactly what that means.
- With employees19,807establishments
- Without employeesNot publishedat this code
- Employees172,644in the employer half
- Annual payroll$5.1 billionemployer half
Tunnel washes dominate the employment number, which is why average headcount is nearly nine per establishment in a trade most people picture as one person with a polisher. The solo mobile detailer is the part of this industry the federal data measures worst.
Businesses with staff, and businesses without
These are two different federal surveys covering two different universes, and adding them together without saying so is the most common way this data gets misquoted. They are kept separate here on purpose.
| Measure | Employer | Nonemployer |
|---|---|---|
| Businesses | 19,807 | Not published |
| People employed | 172,644 | None, by definition |
| Average staff each | 8.7 | Zero |
| Annual payroll | $5.1 billion | Not published |
| Source | Census CBP 2023 | See the note below |
Census does not publish a nonemployer figure for 811192. The nearest published level is NAICS 81119, Other Automotive Repair and Maintenance, at 97,480 nonemployer businesses, and that code also contains oil change shops and rustproofing. It is not a detailing count and is not quoted as one here.
car washes and detailing shops with employees are 0.237 per cent of all 8,361,342 US establishments with employees
The five states with the most car washes and detailing shops
| State | Establishments with employees |
|---|---|
| California | 2,231 |
| Texas | 1,858 |
| Florida | 1,668 |
| New York | 964 |
| Illinois | 783 |
Employer establishments only. The nonemployer side is not published by state at this level of detail, and in most of these trades it is the larger half, so treat this table as a ranking rather than a census of the trade.
Car Washes
Counted here
Automatic and self service car washes, hand washing, and automotive detailing shops.
Counted somewhere else
Mobile detailers with no fixed premises are hard to place, and mechanical repair shops are counted elsewhere entirely.
NAICS 811192 · 1 August 2026
What these figures actually say about car washes and detailing shops
Tunnel washes dominate this industry number, in a trade most people picture as one person with a polisher.
Average headcount here is close to nine per establishment, higher than every other industry in this dataset except contract cleaning. That is not what a detailing shop looks like; it is what an automatic wash looks like. The employment and payroll figures on this page are describing the volume wash business far more than the detailing one, and there is no way to separate them inside the code.
The solo mobile detailer is the part of this industry the federal data measures worst. Census does not publish a nonemployer figure at this code at all. The nearest published level also contains oil change shops and rustproofing, so it is not a detailing count and this site does not quote it as one. This is the only trade in the dataset with no usable nonemployer number.
Payroll per employee sits at the low end of the dataset, which is consistent with a workforce weighted towards attendants rather than paint correction specialists. A detailing business owner reading this page should treat it as background on their industry code rather than as a description of their own business.
When the federal data cannot see your half of an industry, the portfolio is the only evidence you have. Mobile detailing is bought inside a very small radius, so the suburb in the caption and the consistent driveway position in the photographs are doing the work a trade body number would do in another industry.
Every figure quoted above appears in the tables on this page or is arithmetic on them. Nothing here forecasts, values a business or suggests a price, because none of the three is measurable from a business count.
Where these numbers came from
Public domain US federal statistics, fetched by hand and baked into this site rather than called at build time. If you quote a figure from this page, cite the agency rather than this site, and use the wording below.
US Census Bureau, County Business Patterns, 2023, United States, NAICS 811192 Car Washes. Accessed 2026-08-01.
Counts establishments with at least one paid employee, measured in the week of 12 March 2023. A business with no employees is counted by Nonemployer Statistics instead, not here.
What these workers are paid
Marketing the trade
All the numbers
Common questions
- How many auto detailing businesses are there in the US?
- Census County Business Patterns counted 19,807 car washes and detailing shops with at least one paid employee in 2023, employing 172,644 people on a payroll of $5.1 billion. Census does not publish a nonemployer count at this level of detail, so the figure above covers businesses with staff only. NAICS code 811192.
- Why are there two different numbers?
- Because they measure two different universes. County Business Patterns counts establishments with at least one paid employee. Nonemployer Statistics counts businesses with no employees and at least a thousand dollars of annual receipts. Together they cover every US business, and adding them without saying so would be misleading, so this page keeps them apart.
- What else is inside this code?
- Automatic and self service car washes, hand washing, and automotive detailing shops. What it excludes: mobile detailers with no fixed premises are hard to place, and mechanical repair shops are counted elsewhere entirely.
- What does this count tell somebody running one of these businesses?
- Tunnel washes dominate this industry number, in a trade most people picture as one person with a polisher. When the federal data cannot see your half of an industry, the portfolio is the only evidence you have. Mobile detailing is bought inside a very small radius, so the suburb in the caption and the consistent driveway position in the photographs are doing the work a trade body number would do in another industry.
- How current is this?
- 2023 is the most recent County Business Patterns and Nonemployer Statistics release published by the Census Bureau. Both were fetched and baked into this site on 1 August 2026. This page makes no live API call.
Numbers persuade nobody. The pair does.
Every trade on this page sells the same way: a photograph of the problem beside a photograph of the result. Take the two, and Before and After Video Maker turns them into a 1080p video, a looping GIF or a still.