CINCINATTI — Kroger Co. is adding an automatic car wash to its supermarket and gas station combo in Grove City, Ohio, with more such operations on the way. Ken’s Car Wash is the initiative of the retailer and partner, Skilken, a Columbus, Ohio-based developer that has a 50-year relationship with Kroger. “During one of our meetings with Kroger it came out that they had been looking to partner up with a car wash company but hadn’t found anyone. They gave us an opportunity to come up with a concept, and it has worked perfectly,” Skilken president Ken Gold, who founded Ken’s Car Wash, told SN. The first of the car washes opened in November in Delaware, and another opened in Mansfield, Ohio in December. Eight more are in “some form of entitlement or construction,” Gold said. Skilken is now working with Kroger to develop more car washes in both Kroger’s Great Lakes division, which covers Ohio, Michigan and West Virginia, and its Delta division, which covers Arkansas, Mississippi and Tennessee. Kroger did not respond to a request for comment.

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