Car Care Advice

As a woman, I normally enjoy shopping, but shopping for car care products is not as high on my list as shopping for shoes.

Having established that I know nothing about cleaning cars. My husband decided to take me on a shopping trip to Halfords to look for car care products. He said to me “Go in have a look around and make a list of what you think you need”.

So I did, well sort of. Our daughter was with us and Halfords is not the best place for a grabby four year old.

Anyway, I was at this point feeling rather lost among the wheel cleaners and “banana oil” and was honsetly a bit fed up. I picked up this that and the other, there was so much stuff there I could’nt figure out if I was coming or going.
As for what to use while cleaning the car, I did the natural thing and went for a sponge first - not good as sponges can scratch cars and damadge paintwork. We worked out that a nice wash mitt is fine, no need to go overboard and spend £15. One that is machine washable is good. Synthetic is in this case better than natural as I will explain more in a later article.

But there were so many products to choose from, one manufacturer might have 5-6 different waxes and polishes. Whats the difference? Does it matter? Does anybody care? I just wanted somebody to tell me what to choose! But my husband admitted he was just as confused as I was.

After ten minutes I still had no clue and was feeling gawped at by both staff and customers, I took my screaming daughter and husband out of there, unfortunatly for Halfords, never to return again.

When I had calmed everyone down, I told hubby that we should try our local ASDA next. It was easier to keep my daughter happy in familiar suroundings, but they really had no car care products to speak of. It was only a small local branch and while the superstores carry a large stock of products, but ours only do de-ice and a few chamios leathers.
So we finished our shopping and then went across the road to a £-strecher. We struck car care gold! Well for me anyway. It was easy to find what I was looking for, where they only stocked one brand which was CarPlan, which my husband informed me was good quality and widely used by the Motor trade.

With only one range it was easy to choose - a shampoo, a window cleaner, a wheel cleaner, a tyre sheen etc. Easy-peasy!

Just about everything I needed was there, a wash mit, a synthetic chamois leather, they even sold buckets for £1.50 each (I was informed I would need two). The only thing they didn’t sell was a wax, maybe they had sold out?

My husband even got excited about a soft brush that he found for about a pound, he said it was even better than the ones they had at work which cost ten times as much.

In conclusion - I found out that ‘it’s a jungle out there’. There is certainly no shortage of car care products available. But car care is basically cosmetics for men. Its a fashion driven industry where manufacturers release lots and lots of products for enthusiasts to play with. For somebody who just wants to keep a car clean and in good order its hard to know where to begin. Of course you could ask, but these places don’t seem to be woman friendly and I wouldn’t be certain that the staff in Halfords knew the products any better than I did - after all, I didn’t see them testing them.

You don’t need expensive products with fancy labels to keep a car in tip-top condition. Having said that, I have been told that there are certain products and certain brands that I really should steer clear of. So what’s a girl to do?

Luckily for me, I have a husband and a father who between them know a hell of a lot about such things. So that’s me sorted then! But don’t worry, stay tuned and as I discover products that I like I’ll let you know where to get them.

Just one more thing… as the products I have tried so far have been designed to appeal to men they tend to have obnoxious sweet fruity perfumes. This isn’t so bad for the exterior of your car, but who wants their car to smell like…
I’m on a mission to find products that smell like the products I use to clean my house and my clothes. I’ll keep you informed.

Anna

Bookmark It

Hide Sites