The membership metrics that actually predict revenue growth

Most dashboards measure the wrong things

If you ask most car wash operators what their key metrics are, you'll hear: total monthly revenue, number of members, and cars washed. These are useful numbers. They are not predictive numbers.

Total revenue tells you where you've been. Member count tells you how many people signed up — not how engaged they are. Cars washed is a throughput metric, not a value metric. None of these numbers, on their own, will tell you whether your business is about to grow or about to plateau.

Metric 1: Active member rate

This is the percentage of your total members who washed at least once in the past 30 days. It sounds simple, but it's one of the most powerful leading indicators we track.

A location with 600 members but only 55% active rate is less healthy than a location with 400 members and 80% active rate. The second location has a tighter, more engaged base — and when they run a promotion or add a service, those customers respond. The first location has a lot of people paying monthly and quietly forgetting they have a membership. That's a churn wave waiting to happen.

Metric 2: Revenue per member per month

This goes beyond just membership dues. It captures upsells, add-ons, retail, and any additional visits from members who buy individual washes when they want something extra.

Locations that grow this number — even by a few dollars — compound significantly over time. A $4 increase in revenue per member per month across 500 members is $2,000/month, $24,000/year — without adding a single new customer.

Metric 3: New member to 90-day retention rate

The first 90 days of a membership are make-or-break. Customers who visit at least 4 times in their first 90 days retain at dramatically higher rates than those who visit 1-2 times. This means your new member onboarding — whether that's a welcome text, a reminder, or just a great first experience — has outsized impact on lifetime value.

Track this cohort-by-cohort. If your 90-day retention is declining, you have a new member experience problem. If it's improving, whatever you changed recently is working — double down on it.