Heartland Carwash Association plans October roadshow across Minneapolis market
The one-day HCA Carwash Roadshow on October 14 will bus members through manufacturing plants and operating washes around the Minneapolis area.
By The Car Wash News Staff
3 min read
The Heartland Carwash Association is trading the conference hall for a tour bus this fall. The group has scheduled its 2026 HCA Carwash Roadshow, titled Land of 10,000 Washes, for October 14 in the Minneapolis area, according to reporting from Auto Laundry News.
The one-day event is built to get owners, operators, and industry professionals out of their offices and into working facilities. Attendees will start and end the day at Mystic Lake Hotel & Casino and travel together aboard a tour bus, giving the outing a shared, on-the-road structure rather than a traditional seminar format.
What the day includes
The centerpiece of the roadshow is a series of behind-the-scenes tours. Attendees will visit manufacturing facilities, including Autowash Systems and Ver-Tech, to see the equipment, technology, and processes behind the products they use daily. The itinerary also includes stops at both operating and developing car wash sites, letting participants compare different approaches to design, construction, equipment, and day-to-day operations.
The full-day package covers bus transportation, plant and manufacturing tours, car wash facility tours, breakfast and lunch, a happy hour and networking session, and special hotel rates at Mystic Lake. The emphasis throughout is on peer connection and direct observation.
Kristen Corbisiero, executive director and publisher of the association, said the goal was to build something outside the usual conference setting where members could see how other operations run and talk with peers. She said many of the best ideas in the industry come from talking with another operator who has faced the same problem, and framed the roadshow as a way to spark those conversations.
Why it matters for operators
Manufacturing plant tours and site visits offer something a trade show floor cannot: a look at how equipment is actually built and how competing washes solve the same operational problems. For operators weighing a new build, a retrofit, or an equipment purchase, seeing a developing site alongside an established one can clarify decisions that spec sheets and sales pitches leave vague.
The format also lowers the friction of networking. Spending a full day on a bus with other owners tends to produce longer, more candid conversations than a crowded reception, and those exchanges often surface practical fixes for staffing, throughput, and chemistry issues that operators are already wrestling with.
For Heartland-region operators, the October 14 date is worth putting on the calendar early, since bus capacity and the discounted hotel block will likely be limited. Even operators outside the immediate market may find the trip worthwhile if they are evaluating vendors like Autowash Systems or Ver-Tech, or simply want to benchmark their own layout and processes against active sites in the Minneapolis area. Regional association events like this one remain one of the lower-cost ways to gather competitive intelligence and build supplier relationships without the expense of a national show.
