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- Idea Of The Day - Build the Garage That Washes Your Car While You Sleep
Idea Of The Day - Build the Garage That Washes Your Car While You Sleep
Needs To Exist
February 20, 2026
In partnership with
GM. This is Needs to Exist (aka NTE), delivering you a startup idea that turns your garage into a self-cleaning machine for your car.
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Daily Idea - Garage Washes Car
The Chore Elimination Committee
Your Garage Washes Your Car
The One Liner
Your garage washes your car automatically.
The 140 character tweet (or X) version
Park. Walk inside. Your garage washes + dries your car automatically — including the undercarriage. No hoses. No lines. Just clean.
The Longer Story Version
The Problem
People want clean cars.
They just don’t want to wash them.
Car washes require detours.
DIY washing is weather-dependent misery.
Undercarriages quietly collect salt and corrosion.
Most people wait until it’s embarrassing.
Luxury homes automate lighting, climate, security, blinds.
But the car? Still manual.
The issue isn’t willingness.
It’s friction.
Maintenance only happens when the pain crosses a threshold.
That’s bad design.
The Solution
A home car wash system.
A dishwasher for your car.
You install a sleek archway in your garage (or driveway entrance).
You pull in.
Sensors trigger.
Precision sprayers hit the full body + undercarriage.
Minimal water. Optimized pressure.
Integrated drying system.
By the time you’re inside making dinner, your car is clean.
You don’t go wash your car.
It just happens.
Maintenance becomes infrastructure.
If we automated dishes and laundry decades ago, this is the obvious next step.
How We’d Build It
Phase 1: Prove Demand (No Hardware Yet)
Use Vizcom + Midjourney to render hyper-realistic garage mockups
Build a landing page in Framer or Webflow
Run Meta ads targeting luxury homeowners + EV owners
Use Typeform to validate install interest + price sensitivity
Close 10 pre-commit letters of intent
If people don’t want it at $8–15K, stop here.
Phase 2: Functional MVP for Luxury Builds
Sell installs directly. High margin. White-glove.
Phase 3: Scale Infrastructure
Develop modular kit for new builds
Add water recycling loop
Offer subscription maintenance
Partner with EV dealerships + luxury developers
Explore HOA community installs
GTM is not mass consumer.
It’s high-end new construction first.
Why It Needs to Exist
Salt damage is getting worse.
EV owners care more about longevity.
Smart homes are normal.
And the biggest signal:
If someone toured a $3M home and the agent said,
“Oh by the way, the garage washes the car automatically…”
They’d smile.
That’s the test.
The best products don’t create new behavior.
They remove friction from existing behavior.
This one removes a weekly chore forever.
Ship the message as fast as you think
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The Chore Elimination Committee
Four chores walk into the room. Only one leaves permanently deleted from humanity.
Nominees:
Folding laundry.
Washing dishes.
Grocery shopping.
Washing the car.
First vote: friction-to-importance ratio.
Laundry? Annoying, yes. But high importance. You need clothes.
Dishes? Already mostly solved. Dishwashers exist.
Groceries? Annoying… but also kind of life-critical.
Then there’s washing the car.
One member says: “This is pure vanity.”
Another says: “Wrong. In half the country it’s corrosion prevention. Salt eats metal. It’s maintenance disguised as aesthetics.”
Now the room gets interesting.
Someone asks: “If it’s real maintenance, why does it require a Saturday detour, weather luck, and a hose?”
Silence.
We automated dishes.
We automated laundry.
We automated climate control.
But the car? We still manually spray it like it’s 1972.
Is that tradition… or bad infrastructure?
Then comes the money question:
Which chore would people pay $10,000 to delete forever?
No one’s spending that to avoid folding shirts.
No one’s installing a grocery robot in their driveway.
But if your garage quietly washed and dried your car every night — including the undercarriage — without you thinking about it?
Now it feels less like luxury… and more like inevitability.
Final debate:
Does automation create laziness?
Or does it free cognitive load for things that actually matter?
The committee votes.
Laundry survives.
Groceries survive.
Dishes are already handled.
Washing the car gets eliminated.
Not because it’s hard.
Because it never should have been manual in the first place.
There’s a version of you that ships faster.
Not because they’re smarter. Not because they’re more motivated. Because they have inventory.
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Pick it. Twist it. Shrink it. Ship a scrappy version before dinner.
Momentum beats genius. Inventory beats motivation.
NTE Pro gives you both.
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