By 1812Blockhouse
At 355 E. Main St. in Lexington, a building that once dispensed prescriptions is now sending vehicles through a wash tunnel.
Buckeye Express Car Wash has opened its newest location in the former Rite Aid building, transforming a familiar retail site into a modern express car wash and marking another step in the steady expansion of a Mansfield-based company that has grown into a recognizable regional brand.
The opening was formally celebrated with a ribbon cutting hosted by Richland Area Chamber & Economic Development, underscoring the business and redevelopment angle of the project as much as the wash itself. Chamber and company posts described the event as a celebration of Buckeye Express’s new Lexington investment, with company social media also noting the presence of Mayor Jarvis and local supporters.
From Mansfield outward
Buckeye Express describes itself as a locally owned company based in Mansfield, built around a fast, high-quality exterior wash experience and a strong emphasis on customer service. Its public messaging leans hard into local ownership and repeat relationships, making a point of distinguishing the business from a faceless national chain.
That positioning fits the company’s growth pattern. Buckeye Express says it now has 12 locations in Northeast Ohio, and local reporting on the Lexington opening identified this newest wash as the company’s twelfth Ohio site. In other words, this is no longer a single-market operator, but it is also not expanding with the anonymous sprawl of a giant corporate brand. It has grown one community at a time, outward from its Mansfield base into places such as Ontario, Marion, Norwalk, Ashland, and Elyria, with Lexington now joining that list.
The business model is built for repetition
Buckeye Express operates in the express exterior wash segment, a format built around speed, convenience, and volume. Customers stay in the vehicle, move through the tunnel, and then can use vacuum stations on site. The company’s FAQ says the vacuums are free with the purchase of a single wash or wash plan, and local reporting on earlier Buckeye Express openings has highlighted unlimited monthly plans and different wash tiers as key parts of the model.
The Lexington site adds one notable wrinkle. The facility includes a temperature-controlled indoor vacuum area, a feature clearly designed with Ohio weather in mind. That is the kind of detail that sounds small until a customer is standing in freezing wind in January or heavy humidity in July. For a business that depends on repeat traffic, creature comforts matter.
Monthly membership is central to how this kind of company works. Buckeye Express promotes unlimited wash plans with no long-term contracts, and customer-facing material on its website includes testimonials referencing a price point around $25 a month. That recurring-revenue structure is now standard in the car wash business, but it also helps explain why chains like this keep expanding. The goal is not simply to capture one wash on a muddy afternoon. It is to become part of a customer’s weekly routine.
A cleaner transaction
The company is also in the middle of a significant operational shift. Buckeye Express says it will be cashless beginning March 16, and company posts have repeated that March 15 is the last day cash will be accepted at locations. Its FAQ also notes that contactless payments such as tap-to-pay, Apple Pay, and Google Pay are not currently supported in the way many customers might expect, recommending traditional card use instead.
From the company’s perspective, cashless operation likely means faster transactions, fewer handling issues, and tighter operational consistency across locations. But it would be a mistake to treat that as an uncomplicated upgrade. Cashless systems are convenient for many customers, but they also shut out some people and irritate others. In a smaller-market setting, that tradeoff is real. Convenience for the business is not always the same thing as convenience for every customer.
What the project says about Lexington
The Lexington location works as a local business story, but it also works as a redevelopment story. Across Ohio and elsewhere, former pharmacies and mid-sized retail buildings are being reimagined because their original users are gone and not likely to return in the same form. The practical question becomes not what the building used to be, but what use can keep it active, visible, and economically relevant.
Photo: Richland Area Chamber & Economic Development
