Sparkle Lane Business Plan — Unit Economics
The economics of a single wash and of a single site: throughput, price mix, variable cost per car and site-level contribution.
Unit Economics
Jump to section
- Overview & contents
- i. Important Notice
- 1. Executive Summary
- 2. The Competitive Problem
- 3. Water: Compliance First, Saving Second
- 4. The Subscription Model
- 5. SWOT and Competitive Position
- 6. The Site and the Offer
- 7. Site Selection
- 8. Unit Economics
- 9. The Rollout and Its Gates
- 10. Funding
- 11. People and Operations
- 12. Compliance and Permits
- 13. Financial Projections
- 14. Break-Even
- 15. Sensitivity and Scenarios
- 16. Risk Management
- 17. Implementation Timeline
- 18. Returns
- 19. Key Performance Indicators
- 20. Key Assumptions
- 21. Conclusion
- A. Appendix A: Consolidated Financial Summary
- B. Appendix B: Site Capital Schedule
- C. Appendix C: Funding and Debt Schedules
- D. Appendix D: Risk Register
- E. Appendix E: Glossary
- 8.1 How a site matures
- 8.2 What the numbers mean at site level
|
Mature site, annual |
R |
% of revenue |
|---|---|---|
|
Revenue |
2 947 133 |
100.0% |
|
Labour |
(931 294) |
31.6% |
|
Rent |
(613 453) |
20.8% |
|
Chemicals, power, card fees, maintenance |
(436 176) |
14.8% |
|
Water |
(69 736) |
2.4% |
|
Site-level EBITDA |
896 474 |
30.4% |
|
Cars per day |
66 |
|
|
Revenue per car |
R122 |
8.1 How a site matures
|
Opening year |
Second year |
Third year onward |
|
|---|---|---|---|
|
Cars per day |
31 |
48 |
66 |
|
Utilisation of a four-bay site |
47% |
73% |
100% of the modelled target |
|
Subscribers |
— |
210 |
Capped at roughly 380 |
|
Revenue |
R1.03m |
R2.17m |
R2.95m |
|
Site-level EBITDA |
R146 000 |
R577 000 |
R896 000 |
|
Site-level margin |
14.2% |
26.6% |
30.4% |
|
Labour as a share of revenue |
34.5% |
33.5% |
31.6% |
A site takes roughly three years to mature. That is the single most important operating fact in the rollout schedule: the second site opened in Year 3 is still in its second year at the end of Year 5, and the third opened in Year 5 contributes only a part-year at opening-year economics. The Year 5 group result therefore blends one mature site, one second-year site and one part-year opening — which is why group EBITDA of R1.36 million in Year 5 rises to a R1.40 million run rate in Year 6 without a single additional site being built.
8.2 What the numbers mean at site level
|
Question |
The number |
Consequence |
|---|---|---|
|
What does a site need to break even? |
50 cars a day |
Against a mature target of 66; the gap is the weather buffer |
|
What does a site earn at maturity? |
R896 000 of site-level EBITDA |
30.4% of R2.95m of revenue |
|
What does a site cost to build? |
R2.195m gross, R2.015m net of the allowance |
Of which R445 000 is the recycling plant |
|
How long to repay the site from its own cash? |
Roughly 2.3 years at maturity |
Before group overhead and finance cost |
|
What does one percentage point of labour cost? |
R29 500 a year at a mature site |
Rostering to the demand curve is the lever |
|
What does a wet fortnight cost? |
Roughly R55 000 of walk-in contribution |
Subscription revenue is unaffected, which is the point of it |
The last two rows are the operating disciplines of this business in miniature. Labour and weather are the two variables that move a site’s result most, one is controllable and one is not, and the subscription base exists precisely to reduce the damage the uncontrollable one can do.