How to choose a detailer or valeter in Bangor and Newtownards

Fixed yard, forecourt or mobile

This is a small market: 12 businesses in total across Bangor, Holywood, Donaghadee, Newtownards and Comber, so choice in any one spot is limited. In Bangor itself, four fixed valeting premises – Bangor Auto Valet, Bangor Car Valet, Auto Detail Valet Bangor and Mall Valeting & Detailing – and one forecourt wash and valeting centre, Wash My Ride, give you somewhere to leave the car and collect it later. Auto Heaven Detailing, Supreme Clean Valeting and Tradevalet all come to you instead, with Auto Heaven the most established of the three, publishing a full service menu up to multistage paint correction and, by its own account, around 1,000 maintenance washes a year.

Where coverage is thin

Holywood and Donaghadee each have just one business recorded here – BM Agencies in Holywood, and Extreme Clean Car Wash Car Sales, a car sales forecourt that also runs a wash, in Donaghadee – so there's no real choice in either town on this list. Newtownards & Comber has two: Nice 'N' Clean, a fixed wash and valeting business on Comber Road, and 24/7 Valeting, a mobile operator based in Conlig, the village between Bangor and Newtownards. If you're in one of the thinner towns, it may be worth asking a Bangor-based mobile operator whether they cover your postcode too.

What we could and couldn't confirm

2 of the 12 detailers and valeters listed here show a Google rating, taken from the business's own Google profile and linked from the listing; the others have no rating from a source this directory can link to. Most of these listings rest on directory entries rather than a business's own website – Bangor Auto Valet, Supreme Clean Valeting, Bangor Car Valet, Auto Detail Valet Bangor, Mall Valeting & Detailing, BM Agencies, Extreme Clean Car Wash Car Sales, Nice 'N' Clean and 24/7 Valeting all have none – so ring first to check a business is still trading at the address given before you make a special trip. Tradevalet's listed website does not currently resolve, so treat its service menu as unconfirmed until you've spoken to them.

Questions worth asking before you book

• Is this a fixed premises you can leave the car at, a forecourt wash centre, or a mobile operator who comes to you?
• If it's mobile: does it cover your exact postcode, and does it bring its own water and power?
• Is the address and trading name you've found still current? Several of these businesses have no website to check, so a quick call before you travel is worth it.
• For Wash My Ride: have you tried Facebook rather than the phone, since its own site says phone bookings aren't available?