Soapy Joe's gathers 500-plus staff for appreciation event
The San Diego operator brought team members from its 27 locations together at Mission Bay for a day of recognition, food and games.
By The Car Wash News Staff
2 min read
Soapy Joe's Car Wash, a family-owned chain with 27 locations across San Diego County, hosted a company-wide appreciation event that drew more than 500 team members to De Anza Cove Park on Mission Bay on Wednesday, June 24.
The gathering was open to all employees across the organization, according to reporting from the International Carwash Association. The company framed the day as a way to recognize the work of its staff and to reinforce a people-first culture.
What the event included
Attendees spent an afternoon with food from several local food trucks, interactive games and activities, prize giveaways, and swag bags for every participant. The company said the event was designed to give colleagues from different locations a chance to connect and celebrate shared wins away from the workplace.
"People are the heart of everything we do," said Lorens Attisha, CEO of Soapy Joe's, who tied the event to the company's appreciation for the service its teammates provide customers daily.
Soapy Joe's described the day as one expression of its broader commitment to a positive workplace culture and to investing in the people behind its growth. The chain offers express service and premium upgrades across its San Diego County footprint.
Why it matters for operators
Labor remains one of the toughest challenges in the express wash model, where frontline teams directly shape the customer experience that drives membership retention. High turnover carries real costs in hiring, training and lost consistency, so recognition efforts that keep employees engaged can pay off in lower attrition and steadier service quality.
A large single-day gathering is a visible gesture, but the more useful takeaway for operators is the underlying approach. Bringing staff together from multiple sites addresses a common problem for multi-location chains: employees at individual washes rarely interact with the wider company and can feel disconnected from the brand. Cross-location events, even smaller ones, can build a sense of belonging that a single site event cannot.
Operators weighing similar investments should think about how to measure the return. Recognition spending is easier to justify when tied to retention metrics, employee survey scores, or referral hiring, rather than treated as a standalone expense. For smaller operators without the scale of a 27-site chain, the same principle applies at lower cost: consistent, genuine appreciation tends to matter more to frontline workers than any one large event.
The move also carries a recruiting benefit. Publicizing a culture of appreciation gives operators a talking point in a competitive labor market, where wage alone often is not enough to attract and keep dependable staff.
