Brown Bear Car Wash celebrated its 61st anniversary Aug. 23 with a record-breaking 32,789 free washes at 26 tunnel wash locations across the Puget Sound area. The total surpasses the previous one-day record of 30,853 set in 2017.
Over the past 12 years the family-owned, Seattle-based company has provided over 350,000 free “Beary Clean” washes to celebrate its August “birthday” and to honor former and current service members on Veterans Day.
“It was our biggest ‘Free Car Wash Day’ yet, and an appropriate a way to say ‘thank you’ to our customers,” said Brown Bear founder and CEO Victor Odermat. “For a hectic 12 hours, we added sparkle and shine to thousands of cars and trucks, and generated a lot of smiles among our customers, too.”
Odermat opened the company’s first location in 1957 at 15th Ave West in Seattle. Brown Bear now owns and operates a total of 48 car washes throughout the Puget Sound area and Spokane.
Brown Bear is the largest car wash operator on the West Coast and 10th largest in the United States. Widely recognized for its environmentally-friendly practices, Brown Bear uses gentle, biodegradable cleaning detergents at all its locations.