Allie Goodrich Brought Backwards Design From the Classroom to a Car Wash

Anthony Codispoti (00:00)

Welcome to another edition of the Inspired Stories Podcast, where leaders share their experiences so we can learn from their successes and be inspired by how they've overcome adversity. As you listen today, let one idea shape what you do next. My name is Anthony Kotospodi, and today's guest trained as an early childhood educator, then took those same teaching methods and used them to build a leadership development program inside a car wash company.

It's not the career path you'd predict, but the results speak for themselves. She joined a fourth generation family business at a moment of rapid growth and built a training infrastructure from scratch, including a leadership development program that has continued to evolve. Also a learning management system and a weekly company broadcast that keeps culture consistent across multiple locations. Her name is Allie Goodrich.

And she's the director of leadership development at Benny's Car Wash, a family-owned operation in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, founded in 1951. Benny's now runs 10 locations, offering car washes, oil changes, detailing, be quick convenience stores, and an 11th site in Zachary pending the start of construction. Under Ali's leadership, the company has built a scalable people development system that helped Benny's earn recognition as.

Company

of the year in the car wash industry. See, this is a story about what happens when someone brings a teacher's heart into a business that most people would never associate with world-class training. But before we get into all that good stuff, today's episode is brought to you by my company, Ad Back Benefits Agency. And you'll want to hear this because it's hurting almost every business you know. See, health insurance costs go up every single year, and retail operators are furious about it. They're paying more.

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Allie Goodrich (02:55)

Thank you. I'm so excited to be here.

Anthony Codispoti (02:57)

So, Allie, you studied early childhood education at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. What first drew you to teaching in the first place?

Allie Goodrich (03:06)

My story is so cliche. It is the elementary f if from kindergarten wanted to be a teacher life story. when they say the it's a calling, it's a thousand percent that.

Anthony Codispoti (03:23)

So since you were a little kid, this was what you wanted to do.

Allie Goodrich (03:26)

Always. Yeah.

Anthony Codispoti (03:27)

So you go to school, you get your degree. What was your first job after college?

Allie Goodrich (03:32)

I was a seventh grade math teacher at Lake Pontchatrain Elementary. this was closer to New Orleans area. and I didn't stay long. It was rough. I everything that they say about a first year teaching experience amplified on top of that. It was just it was not what I expected it to be. now mind you, it was a low income area, so it it was a different experience.

But I moved to a high income area for the rest of my teaching, my traditional teaching career.

Anthony Codispoti (04:10)

Well, and folks that I know that are in teaching, they're like there's something about middle school kids that is just the hardest slash the worst.

Allie Goodrich (04:18)

They are very emotional. They're very emotional. but it was the best content. So I taught math, right? So it was the last year where they're saying, how am I ever gonna use this? Well, literally that's what I was teaching was everything that the normal adult human needs for life.

Anthony Codispoti (04:40)

Yeah.

And so then you end up in this high income school district. better experience at that point? How long did you stay?

Allie Goodrich (04:48)

I was there for four years and it was a whole different set of issues that it just wasn't fun. It it was not what I was too young to stay in a field where I wasn't having fun. I wasn't enjoying every aspect of my life. And I needed I needed to get out from underneath it.

Anthony Codispoti (05:09)

And where did you go? What came next? Benny's was the next thing. Okay, so how did

Allie Goodrich (05:11)

Benny's Benny's was next.

Anthony Codispoti (05:15)

so how did you go from teaching middle school and high schoolers to working at the car wash?

Allie Goodrich (05:23)

So I started looking. I was and I was at elementary school after I left middle school. So whole different ballgame too. not high school. No.

Anthony Codispoti (05:32)

Not high school. I I I invented that. Okay.

Allie Goodrich (05:35)

gosh, no. I c they would all be larger than me. my elementary kids were larger than me, so it would not have worked out. No, so I was at Oak Grove primary teaching fourth grade at that point. Once I've kind of made the decision that this is not where I want to be, this is not it.

I started looking and Benny's had an ad that said in the tagline, this would be the perfect job for a teacher looking to transition out of the classroom. I said

Anthony Codispoti (06:03)

Like somebody wrote an ad for you.

Allie Goodrich (06:06)

Yeah, sign me up. So it actually was a few months before I heard anything back. So I had kind of like forgotten about it, kept looking. And once I got the call, it was was smooth sailing and pretty much not long after that.

Anthony Codispoti (06:22)

So you came in in late twenty twenty one as the director of training. When you arrived, what did the training landscape at Benny's actually look like? Was there an existing system in place or were you starting with a blank slate?

Allie Goodrich (06:37)

So procedures and everything, there were documented documented procedures, things were taking place, but there were multiple versions of it. the w best way to kind of describe it was each profit center was kind of operating as its own business. So at the this location we do it this way, and at this location we do it this way. Now, mind you, everyone was putting out a quality product, everybody was doing like they were handling business, training was taking place.

It was just there was no consistency across the board of what we what does Bennies do? And so when I came in, that's really kind of where the COO at the time, he was like, This is what we need to do. This is what I'm trying to create. And so that gave me the kind of fuel to say, Okay, well if how how do we want to do things? And that's where it kind of spiraled from there.

Anthony Codispoti (07:32)

And

so where did that voice come from? Who was determining this is the Benny's way?

Allie Goodrich (07:40)

We kind of considered everybody's ki way of doing things. And then we took our subject matter experts, which we would consider our area managers at the time, and our chief operations officer at the time. So we basically pulled everything together and said, okay, let's look at it. What are we actually doing? And then we waded through the kind of the one percenters and things like that, where it was only niche to this site.

or because of a certain thing. Well, if it was something that we could fix, then we were fixing it and we were gonna move forward. Other than that, it was let's get our subject matter experts to agree on a a procedure and let's roll with it.

Anthony Codispoti (08:23)

Did you run into any resistance as you were trying to roll this out? I mean you're coming in, like you said, each of the profit centers had been doing really well. They were delivering a great product, training was taking place, and now somebody they've never met is coming in and saying, Well, we're gonna change all

Allie Goodrich (08:40)

yes. That's that's the short answer. Yes. However, I've I'm about to make five years. We're about a year and a half into the actual true rollout, like from deadlines, specifics, all the things. We are it took a while for everyone to get on board and see the benefit. Once they saw the benefit of it and how the

the training was actually making their jobs easier and how they could hold their team accountable a little bit easier and things of that nature. They it was like, let's keep going. The momentums just started rolling after we kind of got the buy in.

Anthony Codispoti (09:23)

So I we understand what it looked like before, we understand that things are really good now. Until people can see the results, how do you build that bridge? Like, do you have any tips for folks? Because that's a really common problem. Like here we are, yes, it's working well enough, but we have a vision of what we want to get to. And once you get onto the other side, it's like, okay, this worked, everybody's bought in, but how do you bridge that gap?

Allie Goodrich (09:53)

It was phased. So we did everything in phases and like base certifications. When we say base certifications, that's the associate level certification. From top down, area manager down, everyone went through this certification program so that we could all be on the same page. There was consistent messaging across the board. If one person went from one place to the next, everyone knew what we were talking about, because everyone had experienced it. And so

it took through that short kind of like baby stepping it to actually for them to kind of start seeing it. And then once they saw it, they were like, well I'm ready for the next level. Give me give me more.

Anthony Codispoti (10:38)

And

so

what was it that we're seeing in that first phase?

Allie Goodrich (10:42)

so it was all our certification program is essentially online coursework. So everyone's getting the Benny's messaging of how we do the things. And then the on-the-job training supports whatever that messaging is and certification of basic we call them process walks at the time. Our new LMS system calls them observation checklist. So it's still the same thing, it's just new wording for us. But basically it's here's my SOP.

And I'm going to watch. Did the employee do X? Did the employee do X? Once you can see that they have a hundred percent do that, we verify it and we keep er like we're saying that you are no longer being in the training phase of this. Now we're in the facilitate and maintain phase.

Anthony Codispoti (11:31)

Everything became a lot more formalized, these different steps

Allie Goodrich (11:33)

Yes,

Anthony Codispoti (11:34)

that probably mostly existed before, just now it's like very

Allie Goodrich (11:37)

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Anthony Codispoti (11:40)

like checkbox style.

Allie Goodrich (11:42)

Yes, and the checkbox style in the verification, but we also have we left room for the Benny's level standard of excellence. So yes, they are wiping a window the way that we've asked them to do it in terms of folding the towel correctly, but are they doing it with a sense of urgency? Are we doing it to with the customer's perception in mind? So it was we had to keep those level

kind of gray area ish just so that we can make sure that we weren't just doing it, we were doing it.

Anthony Codispoti (12:17)

I don't know if this pertains to Benny's, but other folks that I've talked to in the car wash industry say, especially for those frontline workers, there's a lot of turnover, right? And

Allie Goodrich (12:27)

There is. Yeah.

Anthony Codispoti (12:28)

okay. And and so these are the folks that you want to get trained to deliver the the quality result that, you know, customers keep coming back for. but with that high level of turnover, I don't know. Talk to me about how you think about that. Like how do you

in such an environment, how do you look for good folks? How do you how do you hire good folks? How do you retain the ones that you know you get in that are a good fit for the culture? Kinda talk to me about that.

Allie Goodrich (12:57)

So I'm not the subject matter expert on this, but I can tell you what our processes look like. So we live by our core values, create amazing results, compassion, loyalty, proactive, and fun. From the jump, from the time that someone submits an application, we are looking for them to embody our core values.

through our first interview, through the way that they interact with our secretary whenever she comes into the when they come to the interview for the main building. Like we have rubrics for everything that's gauging how people are acting and interacting with our other staff before they even get to a second interview for to see if they match the site's culture. So we're just looking for great people first.

Before we even everything that we do, we can teach. I can teach you how to wipe a window. I can teach you how to guide a car into the tunnel. I can teach you the sales script to use to make sure that we're can giving consistent messaging. That is all teachable items. I can't teach you how to smile. So that's what we're looking for. We're looking for people to come through that already embody what we're trying to create as a clock company.

Anthony Codispoti (14:12)

Gotcha. So what is your current day to day role consist of? Because I think I think your position there has kind of evolved over the last few years.

Allie Goodrich (14:23)

It has. So I actually kind of look at it as a week to week versus a day-to-day, 'cause my day-to-day changes. It's an adventure every day. But two weeks out of the month are surrounded by our leadership development classes, whether that's prepping for it or facilitating it or doing the evaluations afterwards. so that's two weeks out of the month. Other than that, I'm working on BiniVision every week, which is creating, filming, putting it out, and

reviewing, editing content, creating new content, dependent and supporting any of the departments in whatever shape, form, or fashion that is. So if someone says, Hey, I want to roll this out, what would be the best way to approach this for the employees? Then I'm saying give me all the information and I can make it digestible for everyone else to understand.

Anthony Codispoti (15:13)

Tell us more about Benny Vision. What is this?

Allie Goodrich (15:15)

That is our weekly company video. And we can't take credit for the creation of the idea. we actually got it from a different car wash, but it is uniquely ours now. And it is so much more than what we've ever thought it would be. So basically it's my little vlog podcast situation. but we it's our way of communicating our recognition like our highlights and recognitions, our updates, our announcements. we make it interactive. We

reinforce our core values. We talk about safety. It's a like t little training moments that we can throw in there. core value of the week where we reinforce what these core values not only are, but what they look like in in real life. And it's really been such a fun adventure. we are one episode away from four years. Four years worth

Anthony Codispoti (16:10)

That's exciting.

Allie Goodrich (16:11)

of episodes. Yeah.

Anthony Codispoti (16:12)

So I want to talk about one of your core values, the fifth one that you mentioned, fun. Tell me about

Allie Goodrich (16:18)

Yes.

Anthony Codispoti (16:18)

how that shows up in the comments.

Allie Goodrich (16:21)

everywhere. so we have a so specifically at the sites, we don't talk about fun as being this just like I'm playing a game. We talk about it in just how we interact with people, how the culture lives, how things are going, ha like making just being lighthearted and at the end of the day, and I hate to do this because I I hate whenever peop other people do it is

At the end of the day, we're just washing cars. Like, so we're not performing, we're not saving

Anthony Codispoti (16:54)

You're not saving lives here, right?

Allie Goodrich (16:56)

lives here. So it's not so serious that you can't enjoy the moments and enjoy the people around you and enjoy what you're doing next to the people that you're with. but one of the ways that we support it is every site has an Akimbo card, which it's basically just a credit card that has or a debit card that has money for each site.

It is used only for our team members. So they can plan site outings, they can do little treats, they can do activities. like I just got a picture yesterday from a team that went to Top Golf and that was one of their site outings. So we want we encourage them to just invest in their team and the camaraderie of the site. The other beyond that, we have competitions seasonally for different things. So October's coming up, so I'll have a bunch of little

Benny Vision things, we'll do pumpkin contests and gosh, I don't know. We do so many this so many little stuff throughout the year.

Anthony Codispoti (17:57)

Talk to me about summer of fun, fall fun.

Allie Goodrich (18:01)

yes, we just launched Fall of Fun. So basically for the next six weeks on Benny Vision, I'm gonna have a different puzzle or something along those lines where team members can text in their response to the puzzle. If they participate, then they get an entry to our drawing. If they get the right answers, they win additional entries to the drawing. At the end of the six weeks, I'll we'll have like PTO, we'll have

money towards our Benny's like swag site,

s and most of the time I throw in some little like other small treats as well to go with it. I that's company wide. Right now in the corporate office we're also doing our own version of Fall of Fun, where basically I go to like five below and I get a whole bunch of those little cheap games and I make them into a whole different random version of it. And it gets very competitive. We have a T I actually had to do two leagues this year a gold league and a good vibes league.

Because the Gold League people are my competitive, we're serious, it's time to win. Where my good vibes people are like, Yeah, we're we just wanna play, just to play. but that's gonna be a couple of months where I just rotate games through. I have some additional things like a question of day on the board or bonus point opportunities, just just as much silliness that we can in add to kind of take the the rote day to day stuff and breathe for a moment.

Anthony Codispoti (19:34)

I

love that. So for folks who aren't familiar, give us the full picture of Benny's. What all does the business do? Where can customers find you? And when they do experience one of your locations, what all is available to?

Allie Goodrich (19:48)

So our locations are all set up a little bit differently, but we range from car wash, oil change, and convenience stores. We have like one location that just has the car wash, but then you also have some some doubles, and then mul some of our sites have all three profit centers. So you can get gas discount, gas, fuel, snacks, you can get quick lube, tap like 15-minute oil change, other preventative maintenance services.

And then the car wash with we offer interior services as well. So we're located in the Greater Baton Rouge area, with our ten locations. We do kind of go into two of the parishes that are next to us, Livingston and Ascension, which counties for everybody that's not in Louisiana.

Anthony Codispoti (20:40)

So are you originally from this area then? I I I would have assumed more of an accent.

Allie Goodrich (20:46)

so I was born in Louisiana but I spent thirteen years in Texas, North Texas, and I've it only comes out sometimes. Has to be the right settings. Yeah.

Anthony Codispoti (20:58)

Maybe a couple of cocktails in or like you're just around like some of your old friends and

Allie Goodrich (21:03)

Yeah, certain family few drinks, tailgating season. Yeah. So that's usually whatever comes out, but it's not all the time.

Anthony Codispoti (21:15)

My wife has an uncle, great man who originally from the Boston area. but he's been away so long, like I rarely detect an accent, but at his son's wedding where he was having a good time and a lot of the family from Boston was in, it was like, my gosh, like it

Allie Goodrich (21:31)

Yeah.

Anthony Codispoti (21:31)

like really dialed up there. He went back to his roots, so I think that's a normal thing.

Allie Goodrich (21:35)

Yeah, there's a few

there's a few core words. Like if someone shows me something cute, I'm like aw sha. Like like the

Anthony Codispoti (21:43)

What is that?

Allie Goodrich (21:43)

exactly. It's so

Anthony Codispoti (21:45)

I I think you just cursed on the show, but I'm not sure.

Allie Goodrich (21:49)

shabe is really like what people would say, but it's basically you saying, that's so cute. Aw

Anthony Codispoti (21:56)

Say the say it again, Shabba Bay.

Allie Goodrich (21:58)

shah, like shabe, that's so sweet. Or mayla.

Anthony Codispoti (22:02)

Is Shabba Bay is like

like my goodness, baby or like what is like what's the lit

Allie Goodrich (22:06)

Just that's cute.

It's just all that's cute. Yep. Yep.

Anthony Codispoti (22:09)

Okay. All right. Just something I that that's my thing I learned today.

So you originally built this four-phase manager and training program, but the leadership development process has continued to evolve. So do you feel like it's completely dialed in now? Are you still making changes to it?

Allie Goodrich (22:33)

I think it's dialed into what we want it to look like and it'll get us the results that we're looking for individually within it specific items that is still evolving. So I'll give you an example. My leadership development classes, I'm pretty much always editing, revising in after every class because I'm still go I'm still early enough in the process that I'm like, okay, I went through this class.

And I'm not quite sure that that hit the mark. I'm still gauging it because like I said earlier, our everyone's gone through it. Area managers, general managers, assistant managers, so all of these people that already exist in the roles that the classes were developed for also went through it. So how they went through it is gonna be different than what someone who's new to leadership development is gonna experience or need.

So I'm having to kind of gauge now that I'm getting into those newer people or those fresh faces, I'm like, ooh, wait, that may s may need a little tweaking just because it's a little over what we're looking for at this point.

Anthony Codispoti (23:45)

So clearly you guys put a ton of time and energy into training your entire team. Talk to me about Benny U and how this is helping folks progress through the ranks there.

Allie Goodrich (23:59)

So the beauty of this is that it is employee driven. So from entry, they are deciding what path they want to take with the company. Everyone everyone starts at this base level pay. And as you acquire technical skills, there are pay raises attached to those skills, completion of those skills. And so once from level to level, there are certain technical skills that are

appropriate to that that role. And once they achieve them, you're ready for promotion. Now I will step back and say for a second that all of our promotions are also associated with our core values assessment. The way that I can best kind of explain the core values assessment is kind of like a performance review, but it's not skill-based. It's core values. So our like teamwork.

and attendance and reliability and loyalty and compassion and all of those things. everything is rubric based so that we can tr eliminate and as much gray area as possible and like put on the facts. yeah.

Anthony Codispoti (25:12)

So sorry, let me let me jump in

there real quick. Like how do you how do you black and white define whether they're meeting the criteria for teamwork, for example?

Allie Goodrich (25:23)

So basically we broke down the behaviors that we would be looking for in those things, and we made a rubric that says a one would look like this, a two would look like this. And you can't just put blindly put a score on there. You have to have evidence to back it up. So if you're scoring this person, you have to have a justification of what evidence you have collected that would represent the score. It's

Anthony Codispoti (25:52)

Is that end

up being a lot of work for the whoever's assessing them?

Allie Goodrich (25:58)

We do it quarterly, so it's kind of already happening like throughout. So we're and it's not all on one person. GMs would do their assistant managers, assistant managers help in the process of doing the entire staff.

Anthony Codispoti (26:15)

Not it. Okay. Sorry, I interrupted you as you were explaining what the Ben EU is and and how it works and employee driven. Please continue.

Allie Goodrich (26:24)

Okay, so core values assessment technical skills is essentially what's necessary for all of our moving forward. So once you get to a certain level, we introduce the soft skills. That's where my leadership development classes come into play. So and I two, I wanna wanna kind of give a understanding it's not just show up to a class, right? There's online work, there's pre

pre-class assignments that they have to do just to even gain entry into the class. So we're getting all of these little like time management and responsibility, accountability, like we're building all of that into these little layers of it, even if it's just framed around attending a class. And you get evaluated on your participation while you're in the class. So not only do you have to show up, but you have to show up and show out and be a part of it.

So up to ops three, which is what we our lowest level, at least in the car wash, our lowest level of assistant manager, maybe essentially like junior, it is employee driven. Once you meet X criteria, you get this role. After they become ops three, that's where the introduction of an interview process comes back into play. So you still have all the courses that you have to do.

We're logging MOD hours, manager on duty hours, where we're evaluating your decision making as you run the site. And you meet all this criteria, you still have to go through an interview process with our COO, our CHRO, and their area manager to say, hey, are you ready for this role? Because at that point, you're basically doing everything that a general manager does. And so we need to make sure that they are.

fully capable of accepting that responsibility.

Anthony Codispoti (28:20)

So I have to imagine that this is a great retention tool for you guys, right? helps to reduce, at least to some degree, that high turnover that you see because people come in and they say, There's a path forward for me. Right? I

Allie Goodrich (28:34)

Yes.

Anthony Codispoti (28:34)

if if I have the ambition, the drive to want to move up, there that opportunity exists. I'm wondering if you have mentioned names or not, but any little case studies, little anecdotes of folks that have made their way up from a

relatively entry level role into something more

Allie Goodrich (28:53)

Earlier this year, we had an employee get promoted to general manager and she went through the entire process. Fra now I will say that we put her our last step of the we call it ops one boot camp. Ops one is essentially our GM in waiting, or at least that's what we anticipate it to be. We don't have a lot in at the moment. she did a condensed version of boot camp, but sh she went from

base certifications to general manager. She went through the entire process and it was one of the coolest experiences because they did let me sit through her actual like presentation later on. and it was for the final like big interview. They have to present a presentation of like their journey, the SMART goals that we put in place for them to achieve.

how they've adjusted, how they've gone through this process, what they've gotten out of this whole thing. It's not just a a matter of like being the person that knows how to do things really well. It's you still have to be the right person for our company. And that is one of the coolest things. We have three people now who have become GMs. The two that bef other than her were existing employees that still all went through the process.

But they had already been familiar with the company a little bit longer than she had.

Anthony Codispoti (30:22)

That must have been really rewarding to see. Yeah.

Allie Goodrich (30:24)

It's so cool.

I get the giggles and I got to sit in on the actual interview for one of them and that was by far my favorite because he was an employee that was a general manager with the company.

took a step back into a lower role, left the company, came back, and went through all of this stuff. And he was appreciative of how the company has evolved and put all of this stuff in place for him to be where he's at.

Anthony Codispoti (31:02)

That's really cool.

Allie Goodrich (31:03)

Yeah, it was very cool.

Anthony Codispoti (31:05)

So I wanna understand something a little bit because you use something called backwards design in your curriculum development. That's a concept from the education world. Can you explain what this is and maybe contrast, compare how it shows up when you're training car wash managers versus in in a like more traditional school teaching environment?

Allie Goodrich (31:29)

So the idea itself, I would say, is not limited to the education field by any means. It is a design framework. So essentially, what do you what does success look like? And then take your step backwards. What do you need to get there? So when we s first started thinking about this, my question was always to whoever I was talking to was what do what do you want them to be able to do? In a perfect world, what does this look like?

If you can describe that to me, then let's start breaking it down. Okay, cool. If this is what perfect looks like, then how do they do this? How do they do this? How do they do this? And that's where everything is built from there.

Anthony Codispoti (32:14)

Understood. You know, right or wrong, my assumption is the car wash industry is not one that most people would associate with this level of sophisticated leadership development. Am I accurate

Allie Goodrich (32:28)

Mm-hmm.

Anthony Codispoti (32:28)

in that? Are you guys an outlier or is this more common than what I'm assuming?

Allie Goodrich (32:34)

So I will say, and I can only speak from my experience, the industry as a whole is definitely behind the curve. However, when you think about it, and again, I hate doing this, but people do it all the time, it's just a car wash. Right? That there tells you exactly without knowing anything, how people perceive the industry. Or, you know, people customers still think that we just put soap on their car.

There's no soap. It's not soap. It's chemicals. It's chemical based like acids and and bases that and then they add a a lubricant just to for the just so that the customers can be app be appeased by the bubbles. It's a show. The

Anthony Codispoti (33:17)

So the bubbles aren't necessary, huh?

Allie Goodrich (33:19)

bubbles are not necessary at all. Yeah. So they are just there for show. Yep.

Anthony Codispoti (33:22)

Blew my mind. The bubbles are just there for show. That's theatrix, huh? my gosh.

Allie Goodrich (33:30)

Yeah, no, it's so

Until you get into it and you really understand the intricacies of like how niche this industry really is and how cool it is, we are definitely behind the curve. We are behind the curve on training, but

Anthony Codispoti (33:45)

When you say we,

you mean the industry in general, not Benny's. Benny's is the ahead

Allie Goodrich (33:48)

Correct. No, no. We are.

Anthony Codispoti (33:50)

of. You're the the leader of the pack, it sounds like.

Allie Goodrich (33:53)

We are n I wouldn't say the leader of the pack, but we're in the running. as an industry, we're definitely behind the curve. But within I'm almost to five years, I have seen the shift and actually been a part of the shift moving forward. Like when I say that, the International Car Wash Association, they have their own training program called LEAD. And we have served as subject matter experts and provided feedback and helped with

create content to to support that. So we've been a part of the movement as well.

Anthony Codispoti (34:28)

Gotcha. Another thing that you're part of is the community. you raise a lot of money. The annual haunted car wash alone has raised over two hundred thousand dollars for our lady of the Lake Children's Hospital. talk to me about how that community involvement factors into the culture that you're building.

Allie Goodrich (34:49)

It is a is not directly linked, right? So I don't have a class that's l for leadership development called community involvement. But the compassion being one of our core values, the loyalty, the create amazing results, the fun, being a part of that shows up in just how we show up for people in general. And that that's a consistent message across

everything that we do, that we support the people that we interact with, we want to leave a positive lasting impact on everyone that we encounter. And part of that is being the Baton Rouge community and doing everything possible to be someone who leaves a lasting impact. Our the Alfreds are a hundred percent the huge role and staple in this community.

Anthony Codispoti (35:41)

Mm. So tell me what the annual haunted car wash looks like. Like is it just sort of decorated and I come get my car washed or do you set up like a maze that doesn't have anything to do with the cars getting washed?

Allie Goodrich (35:55)

They are getting a rush. I will not say that it is the as quality as normal because we fly those cars down the tunnel. Our chain speed is moving rapid, and so the cars are really just going through. But we kind of make a maze out of our one one of our locations. And so we flow traffic through kind of like a zigzag, and what we have are different kind of scenes set up. So we have

gosh, you're I'm on the spot, I'm gonna forget everything. We've kind of narrowed down our theme to carnival for over the last couple years. And so we have the food stand and we have the bearded lady and we have the the the magicians and there's so so many different things. So you'll you'll drive through scenes and we have employees out there that are all dressed up, costumes to the nines, doing all of the jump scare type stuff.

And then they work their way through, they actually get a wash and go through the tunnel. We have started pulling people out of the tunnel because it's not ideal for several reasons. Nobody wants to stand in a wet tunnel all night. But also the safety issue is is a thing. it's loud. It's loud and wet. So we put people at the end of the tunnel and we're starting to put more stuff just in it that people can look at.

Anthony Codispoti (37:20)

And the people at the end of the tunnel they're dressed up and these carnival. Yep, got it.

Allie Goodrich (37:23)

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Anthony Codispoti (37:25)

Carnival characters. you guys are getting ready to open up an eleventh location. and Zachary, we referenced this in the intro. Have you been there for the opening of an additional location, or will this be the first one since you've been part of the team?

Allie Goodrich (37:44)

So I've been here since we've opened profit centers on existing locations, and our tenth location was just opened this year. So we've had a convenience store that's open at our Lee location. So that was we got to see that. We've had a few oil changes open. but this year we opened up the baker convenience store and car wash, and it has been really cool because that one was a long time coming.

The community has embraced us fully and they are excited. It is already our highest performing convenience store in terms of like food sales and our car wash is beautiful. Now, mind you, the general public is not gonna appreciate how beautiful and amazing the car wash is because they don't get to see all of the things nor do they know the differences between them. But when I tell you that thing is nice, it it makes all of our little nerdy car wash people just

Get excited.

Anthony Codispoti (38:45)

I love that.

Allie Goodrich (38:46)

Yeah.

Anthony Codispoti (38:48)

and so when a new location opens up or even smaller like a new profit center, how much does that change what you're doing? And does it stretch you thin at all?

Allie Goodrich (39:01)

Not me personally. I would say that the thing there is making sure that whatever differences arise, so every location has a different setup in the slightest way, right? Because it has to fit the land of property that we're working with. We're also very innovative and so we change the way that we do things. we're trying to establish that these processes are still.

the best processes for this location and also make sure that it still fits with everything that we're doing. In the scheme of things, that's not a giant like undertaking. It because they have to kind of work through it themselves first to see what works for them. And then we can make adjustments. Ultimately, the way that we wipe a window is still going to be the way that we wipe a window. The way that we vacuum is still going to be the way that we vacuum. So with the way we guide cars on,

all of that's gonna remain the same. It's just kind of more of the logistics side of things and working with different equipment if needed. The big thing I think is the and I wouldn't say it's breaks, but it definitely takes some settling in time, is pulling people to a new site. So we started training at other locations to prepare people for the opening.

So we have three different locations where they're, you know, starting to build their own culture and be a part of that site. And then all of a sudden you rehouse them to somewhere else and it they're coming from all different areas and we shake up yeah, we shake

Anthony Codispoti (40:40)

Like I don't know those people.

Allie Goodrich (40:43)

up their foundation. So I think that's the part that's hardest, but it's not necessarily me, it's them navigating their new home.

Anthony Codispoti (40:53)

Yeah. And that's interesting and it makes a lot of sense that you would pull experienced people from existing locations to help with this new spot rather than bringing in just a whole brand new staff that's never had any experience inside of Benny's.

Allie Goodrich (41:08)

Yeah. Yeah, no, we pulled we pulled like our operations managers, a general manager, they all went but and then we added new employees on top of it. But we wanted a strong core to kind of set set it up.

Anthony Codispoti (41:22)

Yeah. So in your role now director of leadership development, we've talked about a lot of the really cool things that you've done and are doing. Any future visions of some new things that you'd like to introduce that maybe haven't been rolled out?

Allie Goodrich (41:38)

So I the my biggest thing that I'm looking forward to is having this defined career path for all the profit centers. So we have it for car wash, we just rolled it out at like we're at the very beginning stages of our convenience stores, and then the oil change will be next. so that's what I'm most excited about is having it truly applied to the entire company. And I do want to side note that that

Our career paths all funnel to the same endpoint in terms of yes, the technical skills are different, but everyone comes to the leadership development classes. So I have cross divisions working together, which is really cool because the they they get to work with each other and experience the same things and understand the same things. Hey, we work for the same company, we're experiencing the same problems even if we're in the different divisions.

sorry, I lost my train of thought. What were we talking about?

Anthony Codispoti (42:39)

That's okay. No, you you hit you hit it on the head. it

just we were talking about, you know, what it is that you were excited about rolling out in the future. And I know, you know, obviously you're a big part of h making all of this happen, putting the foundation in place. But tell me about some of the other really great folks that you work closely with that make this happen too.

Allie Goodrich (43:01)

So my counterpart specifically is Alexis. And she is we since she was brought into the training department, we have gotten to the point now where we are finding our niche. And so where my natural teacher side of things, I spend the time working with the people leadership development wise. She is very analytical. She is so she's doing and very procedural.

And so she is handling the hard skills, the hard, the technical skills. She's making sure that all of the everyone's following the same processes, procedures, and navigating everything over there. so to we complement each other's in the best way possible just for that purpose. The other people that I love to give a shout out to is our HR department because they go through so much to find the right.

people. Now, mind you, it's not going to be perfect every time, but they put a very high standard at the the front. And it is truly beneficial because we've seen the difference in our turnover. But the real MVPs, the real MVPs of all of this are my my general managers, my ops managers, anybody else that has hands in training. They are the ones that make the mit the vision come to life.

They're doing the day to day and they are ensuring that we are all trying to reach the same goal.

Anthony Codispoti (44:34)

You've made the playbook, but if people aren't following it, then you know, it's just a a stack of paper or ideas in a drawer. So they're the frontline folks that are making it happen. How are you using AI in your work today, Allie?

Allie Goodrich (44:49)

AI is my my best friend. And nor I say best friend because I talk to it like I'm having a conversation with my best friend. I'm like, hey, how are you doing today? Here's my problem.

Anthony Codispoti (45:02)

And what does it tell you?

Allie Goodrich (45:04)

It tells me exactly what I'm looking for. All of the random it says

Anthony Codispoti (45:07)

No no no, when you ask it how it's doing today, what what's the answer to that one?

Allie Goodrich (45:10)

it says it's fine, it's good, it's happy to talk to me.

Anthony Codispoti (45:13)

Okay.

Allie Goodrich (45:14)

So so I always approach it with

Like, here's where I'm at. This is what we did. This is what we were trying to do. Help me troubleshoot. And so it I'm really using it a lot for my editing prop purposes. Hey, this assign this activity that I did in the class hit here, here, and here, but I don't think I'm quite where I want to be with this aspect. Give me give me a rundown.

And it'll tell me and it'll tell me, give me suggestions on like little tweaks that I can do. And I'm like, it's genius. I should have thought of that myself.

Anthony Codispoti (45:54)

Which tool or tools do you use?

Allie Goodrich (45:56)

So our company uses Microsoft, so we are using Copilot, but we also use Claude at like the upper level to and we're starting to like put our systems and stuff into it so that we can kinda have a more intelligent review of data.

Anthony Codispoti (46:13)

When you say put your systems into it, what does that mean?

Allie Goodrich (46:16)

So any of the systems that we're using, like our POS systems, our L our learning management system will be added in there eventually. any of our data collecting softwares that we use, they're gonna start feeding Claude so that we can kind of get a more personalized like question answer when it comes to Bennies.

Anthony Codispoti (46:38)

It's got all of your sort of like your wiki, your your company information so that it can reference your data, who you guys are, your language, your voice, how you approach things. That's really cool. What are some things that you want to do with it that you haven't been able to get there quite yet?

Allie Goodrich (47:00)

So I don't think we're ready for it yet, but what I ideally I want to get even more personalized with development opportunities. So as soon as someone gets through the the standard process of our leadership development program and our career path and all that, once they get to that like last bit, I wanna be a GM or I am a GM or something of that nature, I want to be able to personalize someone's experience.

Give them the content that they're gonna be most beneficial, that's gonna benefit them the most. give them the resources that they need that is going to help them target specific things that will help them grow and not a blanket statement.

Anthony Codispoti (47:50)

And do you think that personalization comes from feeding in information specific to that person or just their role where they are, more generally like male, female, age bracket? Like what if you could kind of look into the crystal ball, what do you think that looks like?

Allie Goodrich (48:08)

think it's gonna be very specific to what they're what we're seeing and what others are seeing. So one of the things that

Anthony Codispoti (48:16)

Some from their review assessments.

Allie Goodrich (48:18)

s yeah from the core values assessments to our we use disk so disk profiles looking at those blind spots if that shows up the navigating the team that they're working with or just you know

trying to refine what we're at. We don't ever want to say we're done learning. N none of our training is a checkbox for the purpose of just I did it, so I'm done. We have really embraced the we are always learning, we are always growing.

Anthony Codispoti (48:51)

Like that. Let me shift gears on you now, Allie, and I'd like to talk through one of the hardest things you've had to overcome personally and what going through that has taught

Allie Goodrich (49:03)

So within the last year, a little over a year, I say actually, my dad had a stroke. And the way that I present to people is the always ready, always happy, want to do all the things, be the support, be the biggest cheerleader. That rocked my world.

And I had to start learning how to compartmentalize, even more so. I as a teacher, you had to do the things with the kids, right? It's a little bit easier because kids are not as perceptive as adults are. So they don't see the the look on your face when you're not looking directly at someone or you know, the little things like that. So this over this past year my world really turning upside down because my dad is my rock.

I had to figure out how to mask and present to the same way and teach the things that I'm all teaching them about showing up consistently for people. And my reality is not your reality, vice versa. And that was rough because there were days when I knew that my dad was just not in a good place and I had to show up and put a giant smile on my face and treat everyone the way that I

always treat them and joke around and play and and just I'm the happiest person in the world and Allie makes me feel like sunshine. And that was not what was on the inside.

Anthony Codispoti (50:44)

Do you feel like I'm trying to think of how I want to phrase this question? Because I mean that that's a really hard thing to go through and to continue to be going through even today, right? it's still going on. I mean,

Allie Goodrich (50:57)

Yeah, it's still going on. Still rough.

Anthony Codispoti (51:01)

do you do you actually feel like your employees would feel like they were let down if you didn't show up with that happy, smiling sunshine every day? Or

Is that maybe a story that you're telling yourself and they would actually understand if you had an off day?

Allie Goodrich (51:21)

They would understand because we've built relationships throughout all of this, that they know that I'm human. but

It is my passion to be a support to others. That I know that I've created this narrative in my head that they would just the reason that they'll never be a good leader is because I was upset that one day. Right. So when I know that my s my time with them is limited, I do my level one classes are once a month.

And it's on a rotating cadence of there's four classes, so every four months I'm going through these classes. The level two classes are every six months. So I'm only doing this class every six months, right? Following the same cadence. When I know that my time with them is specific to that time frame and that's my opportunity, it's gotta be the most beneficial experience that I can provide for them. Now they're only gonna get what they take out of it.

on their level of that, but I can't be the reason that they didn't have the opportunity to get everything possible.

Anthony Codispoti (52:36)

Hmm. Yeah, I get that. So you want to be that motivator, that sense of support for your team. In the past, your father has played some of that role for you. He's been your rock to use your words. Now the world's been turned upside down and you're an the parent.

Allie Goodrich (52:59)

Yeah, at le th at least that's what it feels like. I hate to say that.

Anthony Codispoti (53:02)

And so who do you go to for support?

Allie Goodrich (53:05)

my husband.

Anthony Codispoti (53:06)

Okay.

Allie Goodrich (53:07)

And and fun fact, my husband also works for the company and we met here. Yeah.

Anthony Codispoti (53:12)

Okay. H how long have you been married?

Allie Goodrich (53:16)

we will make two years in November. but my husband is the general manager of one of the car wash locations. Yeah.

Anthony Codispoti (53:23)

Okay. And did he

get promoted to that role in part because of your training program?

Allie Goodrich (53:29)

He did have to go through an early iteration of the manager and training process, but it is not the existing process. and he got it on his own accord. I was not involved.

Anthony Codispoti (53:44)

You didn't go in there and tweak the algorithm to to favor him? No. Okay.

so as you think about the work that you're doing now, Allie, what is it that you most want to be remembered for?

Allie Goodrich (53:57)

that support piece. So I want to be a resource. I want to know I want people to know that there is someone in their corner at all times ready to help them move forward. And with that same piece of you are capable of doing it. Because I I my my big idea that I always kind of embrace the classes with

is taking these big conceptual concepts and showing them how easy it actually is. Like this is not some grandiose idea or thing like that. One small behavior change, one small this is what sh l all adds up to be that big concept. And so the idea that I can be there with them and troubleshoot and be a support system and say, hey, you've got it.

You've got the tools, resources, and if you don't have them, I'll find them. So I just that's what I want to be for everyone is a support.

Anthony Codispoti (54:59)

What's something fun you like to do outside of work?

Allie Goodrich (55:02)

Fish. I like to be on the water.

Anthony Codispoti (55:05)

Are we talking lakes? Are we talking going out into the ocean, deep sea stuff?

Allie Goodrich (55:10)

Lakes, South Louisiana, so we're we're in we're in the bayou.

Anthony Codispoti (55:15)

Okay, gotcha.

I've just got one more question for you today, Allie, but before I ask it, I want to do three quick things for the audience. First of all, anybody who wants to know more about what they're doing at Benny's Car Wash, it's really simple. Go to Benny's CarWash dot com. We'll have it in the show notes, but very easy to remember and spell, Benny's CarWASH dot com. And if you're enjoying the show, please take a moment to subscribe wherever you're listening. It also sends a signal that helps others discover our show.

So thanks for taking a quick moment to do that right now. And as a reminder, you can finally get your car wash employees access to therapists, doctors, and prescription meds that counterintuitively actually increases your company's net profit starting in the very first month. There's no copays, no deductibles. A lot of your tart part-timers are gonna qualify too. And if you want, you can keep your broker.

So learn more about how to have happier employees and a stronger bottom line with this Bain Capital Insurance product at backbenefits.com. So the last question for you, Allie. A year from now, what is one very specific thing that you hope to be celebrating?

Allie Goodrich (56:26)

the true established executed rollout for all three profit centers, that career path.

Anthony Codispoti (56:34)

And you think twelve months is a reasonable time frame?

Allie Goodrich (56:37)

Yes. so I think so because the Oil Bay has already had their procedures pretty locked in for a while, which is why we went to the convenience stores before the oil change. So we kind of weighed our options there and said, Hey, look, let's let's really invest our time and be quick. Oil bay, they're they've got their stuff. We're gonna go ahead and start backfilling with these leadership development courses and these other things.

So that when it's time to roll out, when it's time to establish this true process, they already have the requirements in place.

Anthony Codispoti (57:14)

When this when this is all set up and in place, obviously there's always more work to do, but do you feel like this positions the company for even more rapid growth?

Allie Goodrich (57:25)

Mm rapid, I don't know, but steady, yes. for the purposes of we are gonna have people in the pipeline and it's not just people that are capable, it's the people that are willing and want and want to be a part of this this family.

Anthony Codispoti (57:47)

Ali Goodrich from Benny's Car Wash, I want to be the first to thank you for sharing both your time and your story with us today. Thanks for being here.

Allie Goodrich (57:53)

Thank you so much. I had a great time.

Anthony Codispoti (57:55)

Folks, that's a wrap on another episode of the Inspired Stories Podcast. Thanks for learning with us. And if one thing stood out, put that into action today.

Connect with Allie Goodrich:

Website: bennyscarwash.com