Scaling Star Car Wash without tying up capital

When Kevin Gordon joined to scale Star Car Wash in 2005, he wasn’t interested in doing things the easy way. He was interested in doing them properly.

Star Car Wash has grown from a single site in Mascot into the leading provider of premium hand car wash and detailing services driven through one clear idea. Premium, detail-driven car care that machines simply can’t match. What followed was steady momentum, loyal customers, and a business that refused to cut corners.

Today, Star Car Wash is the largest network of premium hand car wash sites in the southern hemisphere, with 190 sites operating across Australia and New Zealand. Proof that quality, when scaled with discipline, wins.

From day one, Star Car Wash focused on consistency, the kind customers notice and come back for. That focus powered expansion across two countries and more than 1.5 million cars washed every year.

The mission hasn’t changed: deliver an unrivalled hand car wash experience while building a national network that sets the standard. Growth has never been accidental. It’s been deliberate, measured, and relentlessly customer-first.

Operating at scale brings realities you can’t automate away. Weather impacts demand. COVID shut shopping centres overnight. Foot traffic vanished.

Yet Star Car Wash held firm. Even in uncertain times, customers continued to invest in maintaining high-value vehicles – especially those who prefer human care over automated risk.

Scale also delivers strength. Purchasing power, operational efficiencies, and partnerships with brands like NRMA, Qantas and Mastercard reinforce Star Car Wash’s market leadership. And while AI is disrupting many industries, Kevin’s confident: hand car washing is safe – at least until robots learn finesse.

As the network expanded, a new challenge emerged. Not cash flow – that was strong. The constraint sat elsewhere.

Traditional bank guarantees were tying up lending capacity. Capital wasn’t idle, but it was trapped and expansion plans were being limited by outdated lease security structures.

Growth needed breathing room – and that’s where he discovered Lease Bonds as a business financial solution through it’s ability to release the cash trapped.

When originally looking for an alternative option, Kevin started with his landlord. One major landlord partner, Vicinity, agreed to explore an alternative to bank guarantees with Lease Bonds for their commercial lease security.

Vicinity considered Lease Bonds as it provided them with security on par with the big 4 banks with a Standard & Poor’s rating of AA-, which typically a landlord doesn’t want to compromise on, and it also was giving their tenants, Star Car Wash, vital support to their business that Vicinity wasn’t able to provide before. It seemed like a no-brainer for Kevin and Vicinity to swap out their bank guarantees with Lease Bonds, and with the digital platform, it wasn’t going to be a strenuous process on either party.

Kevin applied for a facility with eGuarantee which enabled him to get a once off approval that could action multi-site bonds under. Once approved, the shift to swap out their existing guarantees was seamless. Landlord was onboarded onto the platform which meant they were able to administer and approve all the bonds in one go, and Kevin could also see all the security amounts, dates, of all the bonds in one view. The 100% digital platform was intuitive, saving time from bank queues, and multiple branch visits.

Star Car Wash has now secured 16 Lease Bonds, unlocking approximately $656,000 back to the business and it was all administered within a week – from application to issuance. They are currently working on swapping out their other sites as well.

The capital that was trapped under the bank guarantees is now back in the business, where it belongs – working to support the growth of the business. Kevin has looked to reinvest it into service improvements, customer convenience, and accelerating national expansion. No dead money.

Star Carwash is wanting to continue its growth, particularly tackling the Northern Territory with a first site opening in Darwin in 2026.

eGuarantee continues to support Star Car Wash and Kevin in continuing to release more bank guarantees and to continue seeing the business grow from strength to strength.

With the right partners, modern lease security, and a clear vision, Star Car Wash is positioned to keep raising the bar – and proving that when you remove friction from growth, everyone’s better off.