GarageRiot

Donovan Lara - Founder and CEO for GarageRiot

The Car Enthusiast Social Network - where you’ll meet wrenchturners, master mechanics, tuners, traders and enthusiasts of all types.

Contact: Donovan Lara at donovan@garageriot.com | N/A | Visit Online!

         

• The history of GarageRiot: the name, and what inspired it’s creation.
• What’s in Donovan’s Garage and other Petrol-head Questions.
• How is GarageRiot structured? What are some of the features of the platform? How can one access the site?
• How does one become a member of GarageRiot? Are there membership dues? What are the perks of being a member of GarageRiot?
• GarageRiot events –  what kind and where. 
• What’s on the Road Map for GarageRiot? New features or capabilities coming soon?

and much, much more!

[00:00:00] Hello and welcome to the Gran Touring Motor Sports Podcast Break Fix, where we’re always fixing the break into something motor sports related.

Everyone is looking for somewhere to belong. One of the main reasons for me, the G T M was created was because we wanted to return that social aspect and sense of belonging back to track days. Utilizing social networking online is huge and a great way to stay connected to our groups. However, as much as the internet brings us closer together, it also tends to divide us into factions and petrolheads and car enthusiasts are not exempt.

We even get as granular as marquee clubs model specific forums and branded content and websites no one has ever heard of. Well, what if there was one corner of the net where there was no place for political rants, baby pictures, or even kitty memes? What if there was a place where obsessions run solely on petro?

Enter Garage Riot, the Car Enthusiast Social Network, where you’ll meet Wrench, Turner’s, master [00:01:00] mechanics, tuners, traders, and enthusiasts of all types. And with us tonight is Donovan Lara Garage Riots, c e o, and Founder to explain how all this works. And as always, I’m your host Brad. And I’m Eric. So let’s.

So welcome to Break Fix Donovan. Hey, thanks guys. Let’s hit up the hardest of hard-hitting questions. Oh boy. What’s in a name? What does Garage Riot mean? Where did it come from? Where’d you get the idea? You know, it took a while to come up with that name. We tossed around several names that I won’t share with you cuz they’re embarrassing at this point.

For a while it was hard, you know, looking at some of the, the original names. I think at one point we were looking at car registry or some other things. There was an octane reference here or there. You know, it’s hard finding a U R L first of all that that isn’t taken, you know, oddly enough, garage right Hit me.

I was on, uh, a beach in Florida, you know, kind of taking a vacation and just sitting there, a lounge chair chilling out and I don’t know, they, it just, I thought a garage [00:02:00] Wright might be kind of cool. So I, I would love to give you some kind of, you know, amazing, you know, meaning to it. But it really just kind of, it all kind of came together and thought it was cool.

So that actually begs an interesting question. Are the members called rioters? You know, we’ve been asked that before. They are now. Yeah. We’ve affectionately kind of called them that, but you know, you gotta be careful and you can’t, can’t talk about writing too much these days. So the name came after the idea, which is usually the case.

Right. So where did the idea for Garage Riot come from? What inspired you? You know, I, I’m a car guy like, like you guys are and really at the heart of it, you know, I spent a lot of time searching for parts for a car that was restoring. And, you know, I started to realize after a while I’m going over here for information.

I’m going over here for parts, I’m going over here for this, that, and the other started thinking about wouldn’t it be great if there was one place that united all of those pieces together? And at the time, and even still, there really isn’t one, there isn’t one place where you can go and, and really do everything.[00:03:00]

you know, you look for in individual websites across the web. Our goal was to be that place. And we’re getting, you know, we’re getting there foundationally, we’ve got some, some things to do and, and we’re not quite the be all, end all for car enthusiasts yet. But, you know, you really think about when you go to a lot of places on the web, really, they are divided up.

You know, you’ve got your BMW forums and you’ve got your, you know, this, that and the other. But there aren’t very many places where you can go and really be among just car enthusiasts themselves, right? I don’t have to own a Chevy to be friends with a BMW guy and vice versa. And that part of it I think is missing.

And I think we suffer from that. Um, as car enthusiasts on the web, you know, there really should be a place to unite us all. And if you wanna segment off, that’s great too. But even on Facebook, you know, there are groups that you join if you’re a BMW owner or a Porsche owner. So, you know, at its core it’s really getting everybody together in that truest sense.

And, you know, when you go to a car show, you don’t skip over the 34 Ford or you don’t skip over the 63 Corvette, you appreciate ’em all, hopefully if you’re [00:04:00] really a car enthusiast and, and talk to those people. So it really, at its heart, that was a place for us all to be together and, you know, kind of service our needs too.

If beyond just the social interaction piece of it, are there two-wheel enthusiasts on, on garage ride as well? Yeah, that’s the ultimate goal. I mean, ultimately, and, and we started out that way, but it was hard. I’m not a, I’m not a motorcyclist and I don’t really know anybody in that mor, I mean, I didn’t have people that ride.

I’m not as connected to that world as, as car world, but the ultimate goal is that, you know, hey, if you’ve got a motorcycle and you want to have a motorcycle profile and a car profile jump on there, man. You know, it’s, it’s all for everybody because I think there’s a lot of common chat, you know, we can talk about, you know, motorsports and, and everything, and we talk about, you know, you guys have seen it.

We talk about Mo Moto GP and other things on there. So I think it, it crosses over. We just haven’t actively gone after that particular market yet. So this idea has been percolating for a while, and obviously you guys have been live for a while. So when did this all start? You know, I actually had the idea back in 2006 and at the time, you know, development costs were really, really expensive.

I tried, I [00:05:00] got some investors together and we just couldn’t pull it off. And, you know, kept me up night after night for years and years and years until, you know, we got to a point where development costs were better. And you know, some platforms were available for us to really take advantage of that. So the site itself now has been up, I think this is our fourth year.

And we heard from Emily and Nate on our previous episode that you know, especially Emily, she’s a member of Garage Ride for a long time now, has a very low member number, and she said that she met you guys at the vintage. You were there with a booth and trying to get people interested and you’ve grown leaps and bounds since that point.

What’s membership look like these days? We’re in the couple thousand mark. I’d have to pull up the exact number for you, but, uh, yeah, we’ve definitely, grown Vintage was one of those places where, since, you know, I’m a BMW owner, we, we already had a little bit of a network there, so we thought that’d be a good place to test it out.

And the vintage where I, where I met Emily was actually the first time that we launched to the world. So we launched at Vintage first. That was April or May-ish, I think. Uh, the site had [00:06:00] been up since about January in, in various stages. So that was kind of our test market. We really wanted to go live to the rest of the world in July.

So we did that and it was pretty good. You know, it’s, it’s one of those things where, you know, people don’t know who you are, so you gotta do some explaining, but that was kind of a built in market for us. So that, that was really foundationally that was key for us. So since we’re talking about garages, what’s in your current garage?

Uh, oh boy. I’m down a car. Since we talked last n not crashed, well that’s another story. But the Daily Beaters, we’ve got an Explorer, 2013 Mini Cooper s and then in the actual garage, not in the driveway, I’ve got a 88. BMW M three, got an 88 BMW M five, and then nestled over on the other side of that is a 73 portion nine 11 that I’ve been restoring.

There’s the air quotes right for a really long time, and then further down the road in some storage spaces, I’ve got another E 28 M five, and a 1980 BMW three 20 I sport package car and I just, the one we were talking about a minute ago, I had a E [00:07:00] 36 M three that I sold to a 17 year old who wrecked it two weeks later.

That’s interesting. So obviously you’re a BMW fan and you’re probably a fan of other cars. So what are some of your favorites since we’re talking about cars? Yeah. You know, I’ve always, and I still tell people I’m a, I’m a Porsche guy, even though I, I own more BMWs, but you know, even as a kid I was always just kind of captivated by Porsches and, and I finally traced it back a few years ago, what it was, and when I was a kid, you remember the, the little slot car tracks, right?

And you can pull the trigger and my dad and my uncles used to take over the kitchen table with one of those tracks. And the cars they had, they had a nine 17 K and they had, you know, the, the Ferrari at the time and everything. But those nine seventeens, they had three or four of ’em and one of ’em was the Gulf Livery.

They had a green one, which I don’t remember where that one came from. And, uh, you know, of course the Red Lama winning car. And I, you know, I realized at that point that that’s still my favorite race car of all time. Just the shape of it. But that’s really when my love of Porsche happened. And, you know, there, there are tales of me and, you know, 10 years old taking pictures of neighbors car sitting out in the [00:08:00] driveway.

There was a bronze. Brown color, 9 24. That was a couple houses down and I used to go over there and take my, you know, camera and take pictures of it and, uh, kind of evolve from there. But I love all cars. Obviously I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t have started this site if that wasn’t the case. And unfortunately I love way more cars than I can afford to own and have the garage space for.

But yeah, you know, I’ve had, I’ve had a 63 split window vet. I had that car for about a year, year and a half. I had a Dotson 1600 low window. I’ve heard short window. They were short windows and somebody corrected me recently, but I think he was wrong. Uh, 67 , you know, in various cars in, in between. So I’m kind of all over the place.

And we’ll return to your obsession with cars a little later in the episode. But let’s get back to talking about Garage Rider a little bit. So we’ve recently, you know, engaged with you guys and I’ve, I’ve been on the platform and so is Brad and a bunch of o our other members are, have recently joined as well.

And I find it very inviting. I find it to be very relaxing environment. It stands true to what it says on the website, right? It [00:09:00] is car enthusiasts through and through. You’re not out there talking, you know, political nonsense, whatever. And it’s actually not even a repeat of the same content you would see on Instagram or Drive Tribe or somewhere else.

It’s actually some legitimate content that’s coming through. People are like, Hey, what do you think about this? What do you think about that? And there’s some really great conversations and banter going back and forth. So I found it to be really refreshing, even coming from the motorsports world. And we’re all car enthusiasts at the end of the day, but everybody’s bringing something to the table, which is awesome.

So let’s talk about why garage ride? How do you bring more people in? How do you get more car enthusiasts enthusiastic about garage R? . Yeah, I mean, I think you nailed it. Really. It is, you know, you, you, you think about the world today and, and the Facebook feeds, right? And if you’re not covered up with political conversation or you know, somebody ranting about something, I would be surprised.

So even before this latest, you know, kind of rash of political talk and, you know, kids, you know, my kids potty trained today and here’s this new cooking utensil I bought. We wanted to get away from that and [00:10:00] really just talk cars. That’s it, you know, and, and political conversation. Prohibited on our site.

We haven’t run into it, but, you know, if somebody was to get on there and start talking about it, that’s, that’s a no-no. And, and the reason for that is, you know, it turns people off. That’s not why they’re there. And really, when you think about Facebook, that’s not why they’re there either, right? It’s to find their girlfriend from high school kind of thing.

It’s not about, you know, this other kind of thing. So that’s what it is, and it’s an environment that, you know, like you said, you know, we want to kind of nurture those conversations and those relationships and really make it a place where people can come and, and share. And, you know, like you said, I, I’m, I’m really impressed with the different types of content that’s on there.

You know, it’s sometimes it’s just straight links to articles or videos, but, you know, there’s people on there that, that ask questions, which is great, right? We all have a wealth of knowledge, you know, some more than others, but somebody get on there and ask, Hey, you know, I’m having this problem with, you know, this car, and this is what’s going on.

And, and finding that again, which is another reason why it’s not specific to a make. You know, somebody gets on there and says, I got a problem with my. I don’t know, 69 Camaro, [00:11:00] a guy that may not be in that group but used to own one can say, oh yeah, that was an old, you know, you do this, that, and the other.

It’s really just that environment where we want people to feel free to share and really talk about what’s important to them in their card. Speaking of features that Garage Rio has, I mean when you’re, when you first log onto the site, you realize, you look at it and you go, oh, I recognize this. It feels like Facebook, or it feels like Twitter or LinkedIn or a lot of the other platforms that you’re used to.

But under the hood, there’s a lot more going on than what you just see the first minute you log onto Garage Riot. So let’s talk about some of the other features and capabilities that are there for members of, of the service. Yeah, and that was intentional, right? We want people to be. familiar with how to, to interact on a, on a social network like that.

So while we didn’t model it specifically after Facebook, the interaction, you know, Instagram, Twitter, it, it’s very similar. So, you know, we have, uh, obviously the feed, the activity feed where people go on and talk, we discuss that. You know, we also have, uh, a pretty robust album section, photo section. So, you know, that’s a place for [00:12:00] people to post about their own car, but also, you know, events.

I was in an event this past weekend and you can’t help but take a hundred pictures of all the cars in the parking lot. So it’s a place to put those, you know, places like Facebook have that sort of, but not really in that context, right? If I’m on a group and somebody’s posted a a hundred photos of car show they went to, I may or may not click through.

I don’t really care if, if it’s not contextually based on what I’m looking at. So really that’s a way for people to do that. Um, you know, we have, uh, an article section on. And while we’re not trying to be a media outlet, you know, it’s a chance for members and ourselves to write articles that we think people might enjoy.

You know, my 63 split window story is on there. Emily wrote, you know, some articles on there about what it is to be, you know, a, a woman in, in the car world. So it, it’s great and, and any, any member is welcome to contribute an article. You know, we wanna wanna share that as well. But we have a lot of other features coming and we have some that we’ve kind of narrowed down a little bit.

So we started originally with a really wide scope of features. I mean, everything you can imagine. We had, [00:13:00] you know, all the pages, the groups and things. Uh, we had classified events and we really tried to narrow that down. You know, we, it was, you know, imagine events alone, right? All the events in the us so, really tried to focus that down.

So when you come in, we want you to contribute and, you know, talk to everybody in there. It’s not about necessarily spending all your time in classifieds, which, you know, we’ll get back there, but, you know, we’re slowly opening that back up as, as we feel the needs gonna happen. But, you know, like I said, the, the, my garage part is coming soon.

Um, you know, we’re still working through it and, you know, you know, when you develop something there’s always something new you think of in process. So it’s continuing to, to get kicked back a little bit. But, you know, that’s something cool that, you know, we think users will be able to come into. While the concept of my garage isn’t necessarily new, it does solve a problem, right?

And you think about how many times have you wanted, you know, wanted to show somebody your car and you flip through 900 pictures on your phone trying to find pictures. So at its core, it’s a place for you to quickly pull up all that information, but show your car, show you what you’ve done to it. So we’re really excited about that and I think that’s [00:14:00] something that’s gonna keep people on the site and coming back.

Yeah. I can’t think of a time where I haven’t been in that particular use case where it’s like, Hey, let me show you my baby pictures that aren’t my kids, right? My cars. And it’s like you’re sitting there scrolling, you see people just rolling their eyes like, oh my God, here we go again. But yeah, it’s having that one click away rather than, you know, scrolling for days will be, will be fantastic.

Garage rides available on iPhone and Android. There is a web version as well, and I happen to use that one on my desk. So available on all three platforms. I find it to be rather smooth. Conversation is good. And to your point, there’s a lot of really great activity on there. Now I will say to sell it to my motor sports compatriots, I had to kind of frame it, I know you, you smirk every time I say this, but I’m like, hey.

It’s like the US based version of Drive Tribe. Right. And I have to say that because thanks to Brad who’s sitting here quietly smiling, g t M was one of the first tribes on Drive Tribes, so we’re we’re listed as G T M H P D E champions, if you go look us up. And, and we were very [00:15:00] fortunate to get on there early.

And you know, obviously that’s sponsored by Clarkson Hammond in May. You know, the, the Grand Tour on Top gear and all that kind of stuff, that’s a kind of similar platform. Do you see them as a competitor? Is there somebody else out there that, or, or do you guys stand alone in this particular vertical? I don’t think we have a direct competitor in the market.

Right. There are people that do some things we do and we do some things other people do, but I don’t think there’s, there’s one you could say, oh, this is just another version of Garage Riot Drive Tribe to me. Awesome. Right? It’s a great site, but to me it’s more media outlet led, right? It’s more about the stories and things, the tribes and things are that group aspect of it.

But you know, when you really look at that, that’s not much different than Facebook groups and some other things. So, you know, I think that’s where we’re different, and this is gonna be a terrible. Analogy here, but if you imagine Drive Tribe was more the Facebook of that type of world, we would be more the Instagram type of that world, right?

We’re, we’re more streamlined. Just get on there, show us what you got, let’s have some conversations. It’s less about [00:16:00] all of the news and all the articles that we can share with you. So yeah, I mean, I, and, and of course I wouldn’t want to compete with those guys, right? They’ve got endless money to compete with us.

But, you know, beyond that, we’ve, we’ve searched for competitors and really there are people that do slightly similar, slightly different things than us. But, you know, and, and your users will probably prove me wrong and say, Hey, these guys are like you. But we haven’t seen anybody like that just yet. I find it to be very unique.

And to your point about drive driving, no offense to them, it’s almost too much sometimes, right? You’re right. It’s almost too commercialized. I see the same articles again, like I would see on Gek or I would see on a bunch of other places, all just reposted there. So I’ve noticed on like other Facebook groups and, and stuff like that, that there’s a sense of elitism.

you know, where what I have is better than what you have and, and stuff like that. And it sounds like Garage Riot kind of shies away from that and it’s much more inviting and much more, you know, just general car enthusiasm all or welcome is that, is that the [00:17:00] case? And that’s kind of what you were trying to do with it.

Yeah, that’s exactly what we were going for. And we’ve been lucky that people, I don’t know if it’s the vibe that we put out or people, you know, we’re just attracting the right people. But we have a really good community and, and I know what you’re talking about and I’m still in Facebook groups and things myself and you know, you especially get somebody on there that asks a question, they’re brand new, right?

And it happens to be a question that’s been answered over and over and over again. And you always get the first, you know, smart alec answer. And it’s like, come on man. You couldn’t spend, you know, five seconds typing something nice. Or, I saw one the other day, and I can’t remember exactly what it was, but it was somebody was asking a question like, what kind of fluid should I put in, you know, this, that, or the other.

And the answer that somebody gave them, it seemed serious, but it was so wrong. If that person took them seriously, could really have done some damage to their car. And it’s like everybody else knew. I guess it was a joke if they knew the answer, but you know, why be like that? There’s no point in trying to be cooler than anybody else.

I mean, it’s, it’s really let’s all just, just hang out and get along and yeah, it, we, we try to be as humble as possible and, and like I [00:18:00] said, I don’t know if that that’s what everybody picks on or we just got the, the lucky, lucky group of people. Yeah. I’ll be honest, I, I thought that was one of the most surprising things about a large social network like garage RT in that coming to the table as a track rat and a longtime car enthusiast, and either Brad or I were both on there.

We’re not coming to the table like as the car show scene. You know, we’re not doing the grid life or anything like that. We’re, we’re track rats, we’re coaches, right? We’re in the right seat. We’re at a totally different level and I can’t say than, than everybody that’s there. I’m sure there’s other people that are in the same boat that we’re in, but.

Every time we throw something up, I always find like people like look at it, they respect it. There’s good feedback. It’s not like, oh man, you guys again with your whatever, you know, and we’re, we’re trying not to flood it either, you know? It’s just, I kind of find it interesting to the relationship between the people there.

It’s, it’s very inviting at the end of the day, so, Let’s talk then, and let’s switch a little bit and let’s get back to Donovan, the car enthusiast for, for a couple of minutes, shall we? So we talked about what’s in your garage, you know, things like that. [00:19:00] But being a car enthusiast is multifaceted. So there’s the car show aspect of it, there’s the racing aspect of it, but then there’s also the, uh, voyeuristic side of it, right?

There’s always something that draws you in, something you’d like to watch or something you wanna spectate. And this is gonna be motorsports related because we are gtm. Do you have a favorite motorsports discipline? I do. It’s changed. So in the early days it was dtm. , but you know, when, when I was really probably most interested in that, we couldn’t get it over here.

Now you can, you can see it, you know, fairly often, but, so d t m and, and, and my family’s from Germany, so, you know, get to see a little bit over there. Uh, and then went on into, of course, you know, Lama and, and those types of cars these days it’s f1. However, I think Lewis Hamilton is great, but, uh, and I, I was listening to your podcast talking about it, you know, I mean, come on man.

It’s, it’s, uh, it’s really just who’s gonna come in second in, you know, third and fourth. So, like I said, I like the guy and I think he’s amazing now. He’s a seven time world champion, and, and I’ll be excited to see him win his eighth, which he probably will. You know, I’m still in the, the Botox guys and, and Vel, I wanna see him come back and some of those.

So, [00:20:00] but it’s interesting, you know, I, I tried to watch F1 off and on throughout the years, and I could never get into it. And all my car buddies were like, man, you gotta watch f1. And I think it was 2017 I was watching a race and, uh, it, it might have been in Russia. or it was, you know, somewhere over there and it was the race where you guys probably remember where Hamilton Brake checked Vel and he got up next to him and swerved into him and, you know, they were exchanging words from that point on.

I was like, okay, now this is, this is good. Right? And you start to see the personalities and really, until you get into the personalities, it’s really hard to get engaged in, in a motor sport. And that’s something I miss from Indy car. You know, I don’t really know those guys very well, but you know, in Formula One you start to see their, their personalities.

And especially with the Netflix show, I forget what it’s called now, where they go behind scenes, strive or survive. Yeah. And that, that really helps too. And you get their backstory. So that, that’s kind of, that’s where I play these days. F1. I am still bating negative a thousand, right? I am, I cannot find anybody that likes W vrc.

What, what’s somebody write me? Uh, there’s gotta be somebody out there that likes [00:21:00] rally. But anyway, we move on. It’s because nobody knows how to get it. Nobody know to go to watch it. You’re the only person in the world that really simple. Folks, I’m gonna lay it out for you. Red Bull TV for free, all in 4k.

You can watch amazing coverage of WRC and wrc. Two from the driver’s perspective, their recaps are amazing. They summarize the race down. If you don’t wanna watch the whole thing, you can watch it live. It’s all up to you, but it is fantastic. It’s one of the best places. And then if you don’t get. WRC that way.

Go to motorsport.tv and you can get it free there too with a basic account. So anyway, I’ll leave, I’ll leave it there. That’s my shameless blog. Yeah, so I, I like wrc. I don’t watch it very often. It’s no group B, but yeah, I a hundred percent . So, you know, I’ve tried in, in, uh, I was in Europe one time and they were running, it’s Cyprus, right?

Where they run one of the races over there. Is that what one of the Corsica Cypress, I mean all over the place. I was gonna try to go over there, but uh, you know, I’m, I think I’m more interested in, in driving that type of race. Yeah. [00:22:00] So the target, Newfoundland, is that the, the one up where they do the rally through the city up in northern Canada somewhere?

Correct. I’d love to do that. I, I probably shouldn’t cuz I, I’d be the guy that hit the house. I don’t know if you ever seen that, but, uh, you know, I appreciate that, that kind of, that roasting racing. So since we’re talking about that, have you seen the movie Love the Beast with Eric? Yeah, where he was, he have a Ford or something that he restored a Ford Falcon.

Yes. And then he does target Tasmania in it. And I won’t spoil it for anybody that hasn’t seen it, but if you’re a car enthusiast, I highly recommend this movie because it speaks to all of us as Petrolheads and the passion. I mean, he wears all his emotions on his sleeve and, and it’s an amazing documentary.

If you haven’t seen it, it’s great. I mean, that’s one of the, the few that I’ve seen that, like you said, it’s really, it’s really passionate, you know, it’s really, really great to see. It’s not like the the John DeLorean movies that are out, although. Some of those are pretty good. Have you seen the, the Alec Baldwin?

Yeah, I reviewed it. There’s actually an article on our website about it for, for the best part of it though. And I’ll keep the, you know, it’s at the end [00:23:00] when, when the son says he should say yeah, he says, and then they actually show it. I giggled out loud for about five minutes after that. It was hilarious.

I found it funny when the daughter, John DeLorean was like, do you know what DMC stands for? It stands for destroyed my childhood, but no great film. But yeah, we reviewed that. We reviewed Shelby American and the Fonio documentary, uh, at the same time. And there’s an article on the website about that. But since we’re still geeking out about cars, let’s go with Brad’s favorite question.

you can only have three cars, sadly, on this desert island with coconuts and fruit and whatever. Eric, you know, talks about when he, when he pitches this question, but you got a three car garage, you can only have three cars for the rest of your. What would they be other than three split window Corvette’s.

only three. That’s not, that’s not giving me a lot. Uh, you know, it, it changes all the time. I mean, right now, and I’ll have to think about ’em, but I can tell you one of ’em would be an Aston Martin DB five, no question. Somebody just posted one on the site and it’s white. I haven’t seen a white one. I don’t think ever.

I [00:24:00] didn’t know they made a white one. I’d still have to go James Bond, you know, silver. But you know, for me, when I look at a car, I appreciate all angles of it. And while I love that car, I have a little bit of a hangup in the back end. The way the back end comes together, you know, it’s almost kind of Auburn boat tail meets 50 something Cadillac, but still, you know, love the car.

It’s iconic Ferrari two 50, you know, Luso is, is definitely up there. That car to me is just gorgeous. It’s incredible. E every aspect of it. And you know, I like cars that I can just sit and look at the Dotson that I mentioned earlier that I had, it was a 67 and I’m gonna say short window cuz that’s what I wanna say.

And for those that don’t know that, that just meant in 68 they went to the molded in pillar for the window, the 67. And before it was just bolted on. So there was no support there. But you know what I loved about that car? I loved so many angles of it, but the interior had toggle switches and you know, the way the back end came together.

So that was a car that I would just look at and, and it wasn’t a whole lot of fun to drive. Actually was pulling in the neighborhood one time with my father-in-law and the, his passenger door just managed to fling wide open for some reason. So, you know, there were those kind of things. Uh, a [00:25:00] radiator pipe was $90.

But for my third, I’ll tell you what I’m feeling, although I could probably after this tell you it’s gonna be something different. But I’m thinking a Porsche GT one street, uh, and I forget the German name. Something strata, but we’ll, we’ll go there. I think that would be incredible. Now that I see that, maybe I’m mc clear f1.

See now he’s leading into the million dollar man Question if you had unlimited resources, and that’s to include buying the car and maintaining it, and you could only pick one car and it could be anything, it could be a race car, it could be street car, what would it be? . Well, I’ll tell you why I buy cars.

Maybe I can help. That’ll help answer the question. I buy cars that I think are gonna appreciate. Right. And cars that aren’t something that everybody has. And you know, I know E 30 M three s aren’t exactly super limited, but obviously they’re, you know, they’re, they’re appreciating, they just sold one and bring a trailer for a quarter million dollars, right?

Yeah. Yeah, they’re crazy. I mean, they’re continuing to go up. They’re not super, super rare, but they’re, I, I don’t, I don’t know how much truth there is in that particular sale, but, well, even the M five s that I have, you know, I have two of them. Um, [00:26:00] I’ve always wanted ’em. They’re, even though they’re more rare, they’re just not worth as much.

So they will be, I think. But for me, so that, that million dollar question, it would have to be something that I think was gonna be just a super investment. So obviously I would say two 50 gto. Right. That’s kind of crazy. But bringing it back, semi realistic, you know, I think we’re still probably in the McLaren F1 or the Bugatti Veran, you know, cheer on, that kind of thing.

And then with all the one-offs that are being created these days, You know, who knows? I mean, I know there’s a bunch of special Bugattis and the Lamborghini Vino or you know, that one. Those kind of things. I love those. So it would have to be something very special like that, that was very, very low numbers.

And some of those are one of, one or one of four expensive to start out with. So, you know, it’s it for the limited consumer and it’s something that’s just gonna continue to appreciate over, you know, over time. All right, Donovan, sexiest car of all. Uh, are we saying sexy because of curves? Are we saying speed?

Are we saying high school? That’s, that is up to you. It, it’s subjective, [00:27:00] sexiest car while I like the curvy cars, the two 50 luaus and those things, I really like edgy car. You know, I like the, like we talked about the Lambos and stuff. To me, I think, uh, and, and this isn’t an all time, but I think, you know, when you get into the hurricanes and those with those really sharp edges, I just think those are sexy, man.

I think those are the cars that you pull up and everybody goes, wow. Right. You know, you pull up in a, a nine 30 turbo, maybe one guy in the parking lot will go, okay, cool. Everybody else will be like, oh, that’s just an old Porsche. I think that really exotic, edgy design, I think is really, really sexy. Every time somebody says that, I just have one thing that comes to mind.

The F 40. Well, that’s exactly, yeah, that’s exactly what I’m talking about. I mean, think about that car, right? It’s not super curvy. It’s edgy. It’s, there isn’t, you’re right. That might be the sexiest car ever, but it still looks good today. It does. Some, some buddies of mine years ago, and this is pre-Grad Riot.

I’ve got some buddies that did well, right? They sold some businesses and, and we all raced together. Actually the women’s in, uh, [00:28:00] champ car and a couple of ’em are worth, worth, a pretty penny. And I said, Hey, listen guys, you know, I, this was right when the market for cars really started going crazy and everybody started, started buying ’em up.

You know, at the time I bought a 73.9 11 for $8,000, you know, and it needed a little bit of work, but you couldn’t do that now, but, so I kind of saw some of that rise in some of these cars. I emailed these guys and said, , here’s five cars I think you need to keep an eye on. And they were in varying ranges of price.

You know, some of ’em, Hey, we wanna work a deal and you know, maybe I’ll babysit ’em and insure ’em and keep ’em for you, you know, that kind of thing. Let’s look at ’em. So, you know, some of ’em again, were, you know, some older nine 11 s, but a couple cars on that list, two that are most important. One was the Mercedes 1 92 0.5 U oh two, right?

At the time there was one for sale in Paris for 70, $75,000 I think. And you know, there were only 500 of those made. And I said, guys, you gotta. This car, this very one or one like it, it’ll be worth more I think. Now that one didn’t appreciate quite as much. I think I saw one for two 50 sell and bring a trailer a couple weeks ago.

But still, you know, not a bad turn on investment, [00:29:00] but the main one on there was the F 40. And at the time the F 40 was selling for 3, 3 50, which was the price of a new Benson door at the time. And I said, I, I don’t know. You know, to me F 50 s were seven 50. Enzos were still a million. And I don’t know why the F 40 took so long, but you know, I was like, guys, one of you needs to snap up an F 40 and they’re all big car guys and they didn’t do it.

And of course now I haven’t checked the price lately. I know they’re over a million bucks. But can you imagine, you know, if you went to a Lambo dealer and you have your choice of a brand new event door or a Ferrari F 40, same price, I mean it’s a no-brainer. I don’t know, I dunno how that I’d buy the f.

Personally, oh, I love the F 50. But yeah, I mean, E Eric is not a fan. . No, no, no, no, no. You never see ’em. Do you guys ever see ’em anywhere? No, because they’re ugly. That’s why I’m ask him. . I see ’em on YouTube all the time. That’s it. I don’t, well, I’ve never seen any of these cards. Unfortunately. The F 50 is quintessential nineties, right?

Like everything else that became bloated and rounded in the nineties, the [00:30:00] F 50 is the same thing. Yes, it’s, oh, am I ? It’s roots Hark back to the F 40. But when you look at the F 40, you know, it’s one of the last cars that Enzo put his hands on, or at least was involved with, you know, even at a high level within Ferrari, and you look at it and you go.

Wow. Right? It still screams Ferrari. You look at the F 50 and you’re like, did Alto Bianchi design this? Did, did guys at Fiat Design this? Like, what is this? Right? It doesn’t look like all the Ferrari that came before it. It’s just too mobious and marshmallowy and whatever. In my opinion, and the Enzo is way too angular.

It screams to the early two thousands where everything became, you know, wind tunnel esque and it’s never changed since that point forward, so, so the F 40, like the 9 59 retains those cutting edge designs, but also they’re ageless, right? You look at them and another car that’s in that category or two rather.

The Supra, the Gen four supras, they still look good today. They look very modern. And the other one is the Audi R eight, another car that you can’t tell me what year it is. [00:31:00] When you look at an R eight, they’re all kind of the same, other than the newest ones with the, you know, the goofy Lexus grill that they’ve put on these things.

But the early R eight s, they still look good today. Right. So that, that’s just my stance on things. Yeah. I, I always look at, when I’m looking at a car like that, I’m looking at a car that can stand the test of time. And one of those happens to be, let’s say, before looking really retro and it comes up a lot on this show, is the E type Jag.

Yeah. It’s a car that you look at and you go, wow, it still looks good today, 65 years later or whatever. You know, you’re like, it’s an amazing vehicle. It’s, it’s a piece of moving art, you know? But let’s turn that on its head a bit. What do you think is the ugliest. Oh boy. There’s too many . I was thinking our conversation about Ferrari’s.

Uh, well there’s some ugly Ferrari too. Don’t even get me started on that. Well, that is true. Like especially like the late sixties ones and, and the weird, some of the three 30 s and the 365 and I, I could give you one better, and it, and it’s on at previous episode, Monday, lt. I don’t understand that market at all.[00:32:00]

I don’t understand, you know, when they were 15,000, nobody wanted ’em, and I still don’t want one. But now, you know, they’re 80, some of ’em are 80, $90,000. And I, I don’t get it. I mean, I, I never liked the 3 0 8 either. And I know that’s heresy to a lot of people, but Last fever , well, to me it was too, it was too, commercial isn’t the word, but everybody liked it.

Yeah. So I’m like, okay, let’s zig-zag a little bit. Let’s do something a little different. But, you know, to me the, the compliment to that though was the 2 88 G T o. And what I was gonna say a minute ago was you think about the way that exclusive line progressed 2 88 G T O F 40, F 50 Enzo and beyond, they for sure got less attractive as they went on.

And while the 2 88 G T O. You could argue whether that’s better looking or not as good looking as the F 40. I think they were really close. Well they’re, they’re basically the same car underneath. Right. But the 3 0 8 coming from the Dino line, but also carrying the lines of the 2 88, cuz they’re all related during that time period.

The one thing about the 3 0 8 though yes it is the pop star of the eighties, you know, thanks to Magnum and a lot of other [00:33:00] stuff. But it’s right up there with the 9 44 and the, the E 30 M three. I mean, of that time period, the R Quatro and the RX seven and a lot of other cars that, I mean they’re all in that same boat as kind of the pop star heroes of, of the European sports car world.

As, as that was changing from the Brits really having cornered the market with all the Roadsters and everything. They built the Germans and the Italians kind of swept in and said look at what we have, you know, technology is superior kind of deal. But, so I feel ya. But you know, and there’s plenty of ugly Ferrari.

There are a lot. But you know, I think it’s the same too when you think about the DeLorean, right? It wasn’t cool to like the DeLorean. Now it’s sort of becoming cool to like it, but it was kinda that way. And I think for me, the 3 0 8, it was the bumpers. When you get one that has Euro bumpers on it, one of the early cars.

And I don’t really like the the GTVs, right? I like the, just the hard roof. I think that looks a lot better. And I actually preferred the 3 28 over that. I drove one. Which one? The 3 28 gts qv. I actually drove Amand y’all about a year ago and threw a sprinkler system. It was a guy who was like, Hey, look, you wanna drive?

Man, it drove amazing. But you [00:34:00] know what’s funny is we have a, a friend, some, some buddies of mine, we got a mutual friend that we kid. He’s the, the home of the unloved Ferrari’s, right? He’s got a 3 48, which that’s a great car. I love those. I do too. But now he’s looking for the, the GT four, which I always thought was pretty cool.

I like that car better than 3 0 8. I mean, honestly. But yeah, I think there’s a lot of them. And you know, my fear is always, I looked at mine at 3 55 at one point, which I think is a gorgeous car, but you know, you start to hear the don’t do that because all the exhaust man folds crack and this, that, and actually on Lotnik there was an article, a guy bought one and he was like, here’s why you don’t wanna own a 3 55.

And went through, I don’t remember now, but he had it for a very short period of time and spent like $15,000 repairing it or something before he got rid of it. But, but yeah, I think they’re great. I think the, the sixties Ferrari, I kind of lose track of, you know, like I said, the three 30 s and 365 s. Cause I didn’t particularly think they were that good looking.

But as far as ugliest car, I mean, it’d be easy to say, oh, it’s the pacer, it’s the gremlin, or, or one of those. But you know, the Aztec is in there to, I don’t know, man. Honestly, I think the Panamera is hideous. [00:35:00] I, I, I don’t like that car at all. Let me throw a car out at you. The Chevrolet h r . My, my wife wants one of those, so I, I I can’t totally, I totally agree, but No, no, she wants the ssr, the pickup truck one.

The HHR is the, the, uh, the milk, the, the milkman. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Those are pretty bad. And what’s worse is, it was just a rip off right from the, the other, the pt, yeah, the PT Cruiser. So, oh, I’m, I’m so glad you could share in this long running joke we have about the hhr. It goes back a long ways, but this is good.

I’m, I’m glad you’re, you’re confirming everything we have here. Some ugly car, but, you know, there’s some European only cars that are pretty hideous too. Let’s kind of flip things around a little bit, because car culture’s changing, right? And so we, we, we reminisce and we get nostalgic and we wax poetic about a lot of these older cars, and they’re beautiful.

But those days are changing, right? You’re well-versed in the car world. But if you had to buy a new 2021 model, what would it be? [00:36:00] Uh, you know, obviously I’m gonna skew towards Porsche, bmw, but I, I’ll, I’ll, I’ll do something different for the sake of this conversation. You know, I, I’ve. Come close a couple times to putting a deposit down on a cyber truck just because they’re so different.

And you know, to me that’s the DeLorean of, of our era. I just think it’s cool. And you know what’s crazy? You know, I don’t know if you guys have what experiences you had with Teslas, but uh, those buddies that I had, those things are. Ridiculous. You know, I got the buddy that’s got the, what is it, the zero to 16 2.2 seconds.

And the technology in those cars are incredible. When we take ’em over the mountain, you know, they’re able to turn on all of their data so they can tell what the temperature of each of their tires are and you know, all their, their Gs and all that stuff. It’s just really incredible. But what’s funny about that too is I don’t know how much that truck weighs, but I have to imagine it’s probably five or 6,000 pounds cuz that’s about what the cars are.

But the triple motor one will, they claim we’ll do zero to 60 in light. 2.2, 2.3. I don’t know why you’d want to go that fast in three or four tons worth of steel, but, um, but [00:37:00] that one to me would be more for the kids. You know, Hey, it’s cool, you know, dad’s got this truck or whatever, but problem with modern day cars, I think though is, you know, and it’s gonna sound very Jeremy Clarkson of me, but like that 1980 BMW I have, you know, my first car was a three 20.

I, I worked two jobs over the summer in college to buy it. And it was, you know, it was a decade old or something, or however old at the time, but I bought this one because it was another one of those cars. But you get in that car, it’s purely mechanical. I mean, it has power steering and things, but. , and maybe it’s psychological, but I just feel like I’m driving a car.

It’s not fast, but I’m not worried about, you know, the radio and I’m not worried about, you know, how bright the headlights are and, and all the other crap in it. Bluetooth, I just wanna drive the car and it feels really good. It’s small, you know, cars these days are big. I don’t know if you guys have seen a Camaro behind a, an suv, but they’re about as wide as each other, which is really crazy.

But, you know, and two, I’m disillusioned a little bit, like when you look at Porsche for example, you know, I, like I said, I love Porsche, but you know, base nine 11 is a hundred thousand dollars now. And that that’s [00:38:00] just. Kudos to them, right? To being able to have that kind of market can, and it seems like this has been the story of my life.

All the cars that I wanna buy are just outside of my reach, you know, financially. Whether it’s, you know, you know, whatever it is in, in the days and the early days when I first started working, it was, I was $20,000 shy of the car that I wanted, or you know, the one that I really wanted. And now it seems I’m missing ’em by a hundred thousand dollars.

I mean, it just seems to be this huge jump in cars. , you know, it’s hard. So, you know, I’d love to have a, a brand new nine 11 GT three Rs. The oh seven Rs, uh, green on black is one of my dream cars. That’s, that’s my fourth garage entry there. But, you know, you look at the new ones and they’re, you know, quarter million dollars and there are a lot of ’em on the road, and I don’t know how people are doing it.

What do you think of the EV revolution that that’s taking over the world? You know, we’re, we’re gonna have to go there, right? I mean, there’s no question, and I’m a fan for somebody else to own one, like my buddies that have ’em, I’m like, that’s great for you. But I always want that petrol, you know, I always want those cars.

I want the smell. I want the [00:39:00] sound. And, you know, when you’re next to somebody in a Tesla that gives it, you know, full beans and it sounds like a, a remote control car, that just, to me, that takes away half of what it is to. , I don’t wanna say a car enthusiast cause that’s not fair, but it takes away half of the appreciation that we have for the love of the sport.

You know, you go to the races to hear the cars, you know, as much as and smell that you don’t go. And, and that’s my problem with Formula E. I don’t know if you guys have watched those races or not. I can’t take ’em seriously, and I appreciate there’s some real drivers and some real technology in there, but no sound, you know, I’m just, I I can’t get excited about it, but they’ll eventually go there.

You know, for me it’ll probably be, you know, a daily driver and, and when I mentioned the cyber truck, that would probably replace the Explorer. So it wouldn’t be my, you know, BMW replacement. But it’s fun. I mean, I, I think the tech is really cool. And if it’s not a car that I’m trying to buy to and impress anybody or, you know, really have the fastest thing on the road, although they’re very fast, you know, if it’s really just kind of a, a function of driving, I can see myself going that route.

And so a follow up question to that is, what do you [00:40:00] think of the new humm. The new all electric Hummer Way overpriced. I don’t know how they’re gonna do it. I mean, what, it’s a hundred and a half I think. Yeah, it’s ridiculous. It’s, it’s like one 12 or something like that, starting for the day one edition. I, I think it looks cool, but I, I think GM is, and I don’t know if we have any GM people listening to this, but they don’t understand their market.

I mean, I think they’re assuming right off the bat that they’re gonna sell to, to all these executives. But, you know, in, in a topic that’s going around Garage Riot right now, you know, we talk about Tesla getting rid of their $35,000 base model, which I didn’t even know happened. But, you know, the fact or that they had one, but the fact that it’s obtainable for everybody, you know, think about Henry Ford, right?

That was his model. That was Volkswagen’s model. I won’t say by who, but we all know. But, you know, the idea that everybody could have an affordable car, and I think, you know, you want to come in high brand like that, but I think if they had done that with Cadillac, maybe they’d have gotten away with it. Man, I just don’t see.

Well, and and to your point, I think the lyric is priced less than the Hummer is so right there, it doesn’t, it just doesn’t make sense. Right. [00:41:00] But as, as we’ve talked about on the previous, you know, drive-through episodes, I think there’s speculation that the Hummer is a rebranded, what is it? The Rivian It, it looks very similar to the, the Rivian pickup truck.

So I, and I’ve said this many times before, I think GM’s late to the game. On a lot of things across the board. They were late to adopt hybrid, which they still really aren’t there. They’re late to adopt the shift in the market, like you said. I don’t think they know their market and now I feel like they’re lagging behind.

And so, you know, I have some conspiracy theories there myself about, you know, maybe they’re strategizing, maybe they’re waiting to see everybody else make the mistakes so they don’t have to spend the money to make those mistakes. You know, that kind of thing. And that is tactically very, very smart. That’s 10 years too late at this point.

Well, I was gonna say, especially when you look at the technology part of it, and you know, I’ve heard people in, in various businesses say, we don’t wanna be the leader. We wanna be a close second, like you said, let everybody make the mistakes. But, and, and, and I’m not a an EV expert by any means, but you know, from what I’ve seen, Tesla is so far ahead of everybody else right [00:42:00] now.

I mean, even just the cool feature of it, you know, there’s the feature where you can turn on so it talks to you in certain, you know, lane or you know, whatever that stuff. It’s just cool to be in that car, right? It’s not just an ev it does a lot of really cool things for you. So eventually there’s gonna be EVs all over.

I mean, we’re seeing ’em pop up every day. But, you know, I think the problem too with gm, and I think it’s a, a problem with manufacturers across the board, but if you build crap and it’s. , you’re in trouble, right? If you build crap and it looks good, you got a chance. I mean, look at the turnaround in Ford in the early two K, right?

They didn’t have a lot of great looking cars, but they started working with, you know, Ford, Europe and started really making some really nice looking cars, which they pretty much don’t make cars anymore. But look at Kia has turned around now. They’re not just this, you know, $6,000 crap box. They actually have some nice looking cars and I think people buy with their eyes.

And the problem with Hummer is, I don’t know that that’s a spectacular looking vehicle. I mean, to me it looks like a, a brick. I thought I saw the last time I saw it. I think the headlights or something say spell Hummer in the grill or [00:43:00] something like that. That’s a nice touch. It’s not very obvious, but I also think, you know, oddly enough, I think that’s an issue with Tesla.

I don’t think Tesla’s cars are particularly good looking. They’re pretty plain. And, and to give you context, you know, we go on these mountain runs and we’re stopping on the side of the. . I’ve had people comment about my M three and people have commented about this car and this car. People don’t even look at the Teslas.

Like they don’t even bother. And I think even if people know they don’t care because it’s basically a, a s sedan, you know, a family car? No, it’s an, it’s an appliance is what it is. . It’s like every other dishwasher in somebody’s house. You look at it, go, yeah, they got a dishwasher. Big deal. So if the, if the Hummer looked great, I think they could do, they could do a little bit more there.

But I, I don’t think it’s quite too, and I don’t wanna get on a conversation about the, the wagoneers, but what I do want to ask you about is the C eight Corvette. I like it in what, what will be the zero six trim kind of thing. But that’s been my problem with, you know, the C seven and, and, and those other cars in the base model trim.

I think it looks good, but I think it’s an amazing car and the fact that they’re selling it for 60 grand, I [00:44:00] think is incredible. And I, I thought I read an article that said they’re actually losing money, money on ’em, or breaking even at 60 grand, but 60 grand for a three second car is, is incredible and, and awesome for them.

I mean, they finally built a world car that people respect. Now, the design, it’s not necessarily just the gold chain wearing, you know, button down, hairy chest kind of guy, but. , I think they got some ways to go. I mean, we’re just talking pure design. Uh, I don’t think they resolve the way the back end comes together.

It looks like, you know, they backed in really hard into a Camaro or something, so, and you know, you’ve seen how many times they changed the taillights on the Camaro? It’s like every year. And I think they’re still trying to figure that out. But I saw a couple of ’em at Amelia Island this year. I saw a, a gumball blue one that was gorgeous.

They had an orange one and they had one of the, the semi race trim. I don’t know if it was an actual race car, but they had it made up that way. I think it’s a beautiful car and I, I wouldn’t be ashamed to own or drive one at all. I think they’re awesome. So I think to your point, you’re, you’ve made the same analogy.

I think I’ve paid several times about the Corvette and its posterior that Bob tailed it off and then they said, okay. Or the pencil broke. I don’t know which one, what it was, but yeah, it just [00:45:00] doesn’t look right. And then unfortunately for me, characteristically, it kind of resembles all the rest of ’em.

The NSX and the McLarens, I mean, from the front, they all kind of look the same now, which is unfortunate because, you know, the, the saying right now is there’s only one design that cheats the wind, but, . Okay. But I don’t know, I I, I won’t go there, . It’s not worth it. But it does go back to, I mean, I was talking about before that, and not all of my cars, I would say are, are beauty queens necessarily to everybody.

But, you know, a car that you could have in the garage and, and sit there and just stare at it for half an hour, you know, like you’re watching tv. I don’t know that, that the ca is there just yet, but, you know, big, big spoilers fix a lot of things. Right. You know, you think about some of the sexiest corvette’s I’ve ever seen were, you know, some C seven s.

You know, zero six is lowered with the front lip and the spoiler in the back, and not crazy, but, you know, you lower any car, put nice wheels on, it’s gonna help out. But, . I just think it needs that touch. And even the race car, you know, the one they raced recently, they’re racing this year, I think looks fantastic.

Yeah, you’re right. It, there’s, there’s a little bit back there and I’m, I’m sure they’ll continue [00:46:00] to fix that. You know, it is interesting the problems they’re having. There’s one of our social influencers took hers out and it caught on fire this weekend at the track. So, you know, between that and some of the other issues they’re having, they, they still have some things to work out and I can’t, and for everybody listening, I love gm.

I, you know, come from a GM family and all that, but, you know, I think that they, they do have some, some things to fix and a little bit of ways to go on some of that. So folks, if you liked this conversation, this is what you can come to expect when you join Garage Riots. So let’s talk a little bit more about what it’s like to become a member.

Yeah, it’s pretty straightforward. You know, you go to the site garage right.com and give us your information so you, you know, it’s your login and things, but give us your social security. No, I’m kidding. But really it’s just, you know, we ask you for a little bit of information about who you are, right? Just so we know who our members are, and then you tell us what kind of car you’ve got and that’s it.

I mean, it’s pretty simple for the, for the apps, obviously you have to go to the App store or Google Play and download it and go from there. But try to keep it simple, you know, don’t believe in, you know, a lot of the extra information and things. And, and we know a lot of that [00:47:00] information is so we know, you know, okay, well where are you at in the country?

That’s good for us, right? So we can say, well, you know, you’re in Atlanta, we’ve got a lot of people there. We can, we can target some ads to you. But it’s really that simple. So are there any membership dues or fees or anything like that? Nope, totally free. And, uh, yeah, I, you know, we, we had talked about something like that early on, a subscription model, but we don’t wanna do that.

You know, it’s not really, we’re not trying to make money off of our members. That’s not what it’s about. You know, you mentioned a second ago about, you know, that kind of grassroots approach in that, in the community, my business partner, he feels it as much as we do and more. Right? He wants to help everybody in our community almost to a fault in that, you know, he, he would give it all away for free if he could just to help everybody out, which is great because when you think about, we’re trying to get the word out and we’re trying to help people get the word out.

So however we can help somebody and they can help us is kind of how we’ve always moved. And, you know, the, we had, uh, the local chapter of the American Legion come to us. We were doing a show, they were asking, you know, how did you put this on? And, you know, what do we need to do? We’re gonna do our first show.

And we [00:48:00] ended up just working with them and helping them put on their show. And, you know, obviously didn’t take any money out of it. That wasn’t while we were there. It was really to help. Further that car enthusiast market and help people, you know, continue on with, you know, helping other people in the community.

So that’s really what it’s about. And you know, our car, we had car shows and, and you know, we gave away a thousand dollars grand prize. You know, it was unheard of in the area. I don’t think anybody did that. You know, it was trophies and things, but again, to us it was, hey, if you spent a decade of your life and you spend a hundred thousand dollars on your car, you should get something back for that.

You know, we’re, we’re here seeing all the work that you’ve done, you’re sharing it with the world. That’s awesome. You’re sharing with us. We wanna give something back to you. So it really is that kind of grassroots. Let’s all take care of each other kind of feel. And, and we intentionally do that. And we don’t ever want it to be corporate, you know, it’s, it’s just cold.

But, you know, we want to be, cuz we’re in the trenches too, right? We’re, we’re at the racetracks and we’re at the, the car meets and we’re, we’re online and chatting with everybody too. So we’re just one, one of everybody. Have you noticed or have you checked the [00:49:00] numbers and like, and the covid times, you know, everybody’s feeding to get that fixed, that that car show fixed, that that event fixed or whatever, but everybody’s doing it virtually.

Have you noticed any of your numbers increasing because of covid and people not being able to go out and still trying to, to get that car fixed? Yeah, it’s, you know, it’s crazy times. Obviously it’s been interesting. We’ve seen various spikes, but you know, for us, or we look at it two ways, right? We look at wintertime data and then we look at summer season data.

Oddly enough, we pick up at the beginning of each season. So about right now, we start to pick up members because people are inside, they can’t drive their cars, so they’re jonesing for something online, right? I want to talk and, and just be part of it. But, you know, COVID is, is as a whole. During that period, we didn’t necessarily see any peaks and valleys.

I think we saw more activity as far as, you know, the users that were sitting at home. But, you know, our numbers, I, I say that, not that we didn’t get any activity. I mean, our numbers have, have continued to increase across that span as well. So honestly, we probably wouldn’t have noticed a spike being more spiky than before [00:50:00] because it’s, we’re exponentially growing, thankfully.

So Covid may have had something to do with it, you know, maybe silver lining, but I, I don’t know, maybe it’s just luck. So, Donovan, are there any perks to being a member of Garage Riot? other than hanging out with the coolest car people on Earth. Of course, , I mean it, yeah, I mean, it is what you make it, right?

It’s really about being able to, to get into the mix with everybody. I mean, as far as, you know, are you gonna get paid, you know, that kind of thing. No, but I think it’s just really about opening your eyes to your community. So, you know, going back to what we talked about in the, in the beginning, you know, imagine somebody moves here from, from California, you know, they’re gonna try to find people to blend in with and car clubs to, to get involved with.

And, you know, more importantly, where we are, you know, we’re not far from the mountains, so a lot of mountain runs and things, and you know, again, it’s really important, right? I don’t think people think about it at the time, but let’s say that I’m a mini owner. I am a mini owner. But let’s say that I, I’m new into town and I, and I join a group or something.

Maybe I, I get the gist of what’s going on. Maybe I don’t. But [00:51:00] there’s a whole other world of, you know, the 98 other percent. , you have enthusiasts that have other brands that are out there doing a lot of things, right? So if they’re posting on garage ride about, Hey, we’ve got a, a meet this weekend, or we’ve got a mountain run this weekend, they may not have heard that in their mini group on Facebook.

So it, it really, I mean, communication is key in all of this. So I think that’s probably the biggest benefit of it all. , but what I wanted to clarify on the perks, discounts, anything like that for like becoming a member of Yeah, I mean, so we work with, you know, the, the sponsors that we have and you know, if there’s a discount available, we’ll provide that to them.

You know, that’s really based on the relationship that we have with whichever vendor that is. So we have a couple shops in town that do some advertising with us and they give discounts based on the fact, you know, you’re a garage right member. So it really expands globally. We don’t really have a perks program, although that’s something we might look at in the future.

When we were doing pretty big events, you know, we had discounts on, uh, entry fees and those kind of things. So it’s always there, you know, and we have garage right? Merchandise, it’s on Amazon and, and you know, we have it on the site, we’re gonna [00:52:00] bring some of that back too. So there, there will continue to be that, that aspect of parks there as well.

We noticed that during the signup process, there’s different types of accounts that you choose from during the registration process. So what’s that used? , yeah. Right now, so, you know, I mentioned that we have a lot of things kind of behind the scenes that we have, you know, developed and either not launched them just yet, or we’re kind of holding back, um, for the right time.

That’s really about understanding the different types of users that we have. So if you’re just a person, right, you come on there and give a personal account. If you’re, say a car dealership, you know, we would want you to come on there again, you know, us trying to help everybody out, right? We would want you to come on and in your profile, be able to display your inventory, or at least your website and your phone number, for example.

Something simple like that, that your personal profile wouldn’t necessarily have. So it’s a way for us to identify kinda the different needs of the profile, but also let the, the community understand that, oh, this is a dealership, right? This isn’t a person, this is somebody that I can go to, and now I continue to go back to their profile and get more information about what they do.

As an example, if I [00:53:00] signed up as a business, does that automatically entitle me to any sort of like advertising or anything like that? How does that work? No, not necessarily. Not yet. I mean, you know, all of our, our sponsor relationships are different. So, you know, we talk to, you know, depending on what they wanna do.

So we have some people that wanna be part of our marketing in everything that we do. So anytime we send out a physical mail or if we’re at a car, car show and giving out things, they want to be part of that. And then there’s some people that just are happy having their, uh, their banner on our website. So we at least right now, still try to have a, a one-to-one relationship with all of our sponsors and make sure that we’re, we’re doing the best we can for them.

There’s not really a one size fits all, and, and, and we don’t wanna have that again. It, it’s, you know, everybody in their business has different needs. So, you know, we wanna figure out how we can, can use that and, and leverage. So you mentioned several times events. And events is always kind of a trigger word for us because there’s all sorts of different types of, you know, automotive events out there.

So what kinds of events. Does Garage Riot put on and, and. So early on, [00:54:00] yeah, we, we used it as a way to get the word out. So we did car shows and, and I mentioned the the thousand dollars grand prize. And you know, that wasn’t by accident, right? It was partly to get people to go, Hey, wait a second, this sounds like a good place to go.

But also, like I said, to give back to people. So we did that pretty regularly. I think our first year we had one show, it was called Summer Riot. And it went really well. And then the next year we did, uh, summer Riot, we did Classic Riot. And um, we had a couple others and those were really starting to kind of segment the different types.

Right. Obviously we had one that was Euro Riot that was just for European cars. And then, and you know, it was interesting in doing that, you know, just on the car show world, you have people that show up and you know, member wise, we have people that, there’s a couple people on there that have million dollars in cars.

And then we’ve got some people that, you know, it’s their first car, right. You know, they did what they could. It’s probably a three or $4,000 car. And we noticed that too, coming into some of these car shows. And we had this really wide variety of people. And you know, I don’t know if you guys have been, you know, entered your car in a car show, but you know, sometimes you go in and as soon as you pull up you’re [00:55:00] like, ah, I shouldn’t be here.

Right. You know, this guy’s got this car that looks like it was done for sema. And I, you know, I’m in kind. A really clean bone stock car. So we tried to break that apart and start, you know, leveling the playing field. So yeah, you may not get that grand prize, but at least you know you’re gonna be competitive in, in whatever space you’re in.

So in the, in the track world, you know, the car show and the paddock is very different because if you look and you go, Hey man, you got straight body panels, you’re doing pretty good. And I’m, and I’m joking, right? But there are no beauty queens in the paddock. You know, generally speaking, I mean, there are some very prestigious cars that do show up, you know, McLarens and Corvette’s and Porsches and that kind of stuff.

But the guy in the, not in the instructor run groups, ? No, not at all. And, and not at the club racing events or the time trials. The guys that are really going after it, you’re like, Well, that’s cool. Your roll bar is three colors. That’s neat. You know, , so it’s, it’s, it’s just a whole different ballgame. So I don’t think any of our cars would win any awards other than the, the fact that they made it there and they run, but[00:56:00]

But, uh, so what other kinds of events, because you talked about, you know, mountain drives and things like that. Is that like a drive and dime? What el what else you got going on? . Yeah, we do that. The, so the mountain runs are a little more grassroots. It’s, Hey guys, we’re all going to the mountains this weekend.

You want to come? And, uh, you know, we do those, uh, we were also doing, it was every third Saturday, we did just kind of a casual get together at night. You know, people get up in the morning and they go to cars and coffee and, you know, I don’t wanna get up at four 30 in the morning just so I get a a, a car, you know, a park in space.

So it was a way just for people to get together and, and chill out and, and relax and appreciate each other’s cars. Beyond that, we haven’t done any kind of formal racing or any series like that. I mean, it, to me at this point, I think that’s best left to the experts, you know, and, and we’re trying to keep our, our reach still manageable.

And that’s what I meant too earlier by, you know, when we launched the site, you could do everything under the sun and it wasn’t manageable. So we kind of narrowed down and, you know, maybe we’ll get there one day, but, you know, you guys are the experts for that. So we wouldn’t wanna tramp on any toes there.

Well, that’s why we’re here to help. Right. But that’s cool. So with your Mountain Pass runs, [00:57:00] are those orchestrated or is it just kind of a lead follow thing? And, and I have a reason for asking this question, so, When you say orchestrated as far as meaning, are they, are they like a time distance kind of thing?

Are they planned out? Is there a route, is it like a Jim Kana? Because this all falls actually under a Motorsport discipline known as road rally. So that’s why I was curious to see if they were slightly more orchestrated or if it’s just a lead follow type of convoy to a destination. No, they’re more, they’re more casual than that.

Okay. Yeah, the last one we went on, we had, you know, a couple Teslas and we had some guys with really loud exhausts and, you know, we, we tore through the mountains and try to find different paths and honestly, you know, we do about as much stand there and talk about, you know, cars and everything else as, as we can.

So there’s one particular route that we take a lot and we’ll zip over the mountain as quickly as we can. And then at the end there’s a pull off and we’ll stop and we’ll just get out and, you know, just BS for half an hour and watch all the cars that go by. And then we’ll get back in and shoot back over the mountain and, you know, so it’s really a, a social thing.

And speaking of, you know, mountain [00:58:00] drives and, and shooting up over, back, back and forth over the mountain. How far are you from Tail of the dragon from here somewhere two and a half, three hours. I was just there with a group three or four weeks ago. Huh? So not bad. GTM is planning a trip next, probably next fall to Tail of the Dragon, so we’ll definitely, you know, keep in touch.

We should do it as a joint thing. I mean, why not, right? Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah, that, that’d be great. I was up, when we were up there. I took a a, a buddy of mine and some other people and we shot across, we came from the east side and we, we took some twisty roads to get up there and we started out and I was in my E 30 M three that has a slight exhaust leak.

Slide is being generous. So, you know, you can smell it. Is, is that like the exhaust, like the track where we cut the mufflers off and that this is, you know, it’s, it’s funny. So when I bought the car, and that’s the second E 30 M three I’ve had, and the first one I thought was gonna kill me from the smell too.

The guy had done a lot of, you know, he put an Al Canera headliner in it and I think the glue, you know, it burned my eyes every time I drive that car. So I got rid [00:59:00] of it. But this one, when I bought it, the guy goes, yeah, he said, listen, they have a tendency to kind of back out their exhaust manifold bolts.

So you have to have that tightened up. I’ve found nobody else that, that has ever heard of that. I’ve talked to some of the shops around here. They like you crazy. So this one though, for whatever reason, smells like exhaust. So I’d been in at the two, three hours to get up there. We took some curies, it was awesome.

We got up, went over the dragon. You know, went west over the dragon stopped for a second, came east, but when we came east, we were on, you know, super party twisties. And I happened to look down and, uh, mess with the fan on the AC to turn it down a little bit. And when I looked back up, I was, you know, obviously going into a, to a corner and that was it.

I was carsick from that point on. And, you know, it was that instant, you know, then the exhaust on top of it. So when we got to the other side, we stopped. There’s two little stores there, and I stopped in one and I, I told everybody, I’ve just gotta sit, just let me sit for a minute. Went and got some water and, uh, just had to chill out.

But I was not feeling well. And we left and I actually wore my mask in the car, you know, my, my [01:00:00] covid air mask and had the windows half down and I was still out of it for about another 30, 45 minutes. It was crazy. So I won’t do that the next time. I’ll make sure that I get my exhaust leak fixed and run with the windows.

So Donovan, that’s all really cool and you know, we’ll, we’ll see what, what next year holds. And obviously for all of us, it’s still very much a crapshoot as to what the schedule looks like and how things are gonna turn out. So let’s hope for the better for everybody. But since we’re speaking of roadmaps, what’s on the roadmap for Garage Riot?

Any new features you wanna share? Outside of the My Garage thing? Anything else coming that we should be looking forward to on the. Going back. So it’s one of those, you know, it took us about a year and a half to get up and running and then, you know, live, we went as kind of a beta launch and, uh, it’s been a, a constant improvement from there.

But, you know, we waited a little bit, probably a little longer than we should have waiting for it to be finished. And of course, it’s never finished. Right. We’ve always got something we’re developing and working on, and even still, it’s been, it’s been live for, you know, about four years. And this iter. Yeah, I think the, the garage is probably the nearest to completion.

Um, you know, we’re constantly doing [01:01:00] updates and it’s, it’s a lot of sleepless nights right now. We’re actually going through a server migration that I’m hoping doesn’t take the site down the next few days. You know, we have developed some other things that’ll bring that on. We’ve got a, a My Garage feature coming where you can really show off your, your car and, and what you’ve done to it and be proud of it and share it with the world.

We also have, you know, I mentioned we’re on Amazon, but, uh, we’ve got a YouTube channel. We’ve been kicking up for the past, uh, couple months. I think we’ve posted our fifth or sixth video today. Um, so that’s going, those come out of it every couple weeks, so check us out there. But, you know, constant improvements, we’re always doing that for, you know, we need more room, we need more, uh, storage space and bandwidth.

So the garage, uh, my garage as it’s called at the moment, I think is the most exciting. And like I said, you know, it’s gonna be a chance for you to tell us about your car, put your specs in, if you’ve modified it, your track times, where you were, what you ran, you know, those kind of things. So it’s really, it is your chance.

To shine as a, as a car enthusiast. And you know, you can turn it around and go, boom, here you go. Here’s everything about my car, and I can share it off. And if I wanna [01:02:00] see, you know, your fastest lap at Road Atlanta, I’ll just check out your profile and it’ll show me. Where do people go to find out more about Garage Riot?

Can they contact you once they’ve signed up? What’s your handle? Yeah, so obviously the URLs garage riot.com. You know, we’ve got the apps you just search for in the app stores at Garage Riot. But yes, I am Black M five on there. If you guys wanna ring me up. So as we’re kind of closing out the segment on Garage Rio itself, are there any sponsors or anybody you’d like to think.

Partnership, you guys, obviously. Hey, thank you guys. Yeah. Beyond that, I mean, we’ve got local shout outs to those guys, so hopefully they’re all listening. But, uh, we’ve got some shops coming online here real soon that, uh, by the time this, uh, goes live, hopefully they’ll be on, but, uh, we’ll have to wait and see on some of them.

Dunking Donuts. There you go. There’s one and Rock Auto I’ve noticed as well. Well, actually, you know, let me say something for those guys. Those guys have been great. So, you know, they get on there and post, and they’ll post, uh, discounts on there often. And, you know, they’re active members of our community, which is really great.

[01:03:00] You don’t expect that from, you know, a, a business like that. So whoever, and, and, you know, we haven’t talked to anybody on the phone, only email, whoever that person is or those multiple people are, they stay on top of it and, and really engage with our website, which is really, really cool to have a, a vendor that that.

on the site. So Donovan, we are super excited to continue the partnership that we’ve started with Garage Riot, and we have a couple things planned and we don’t wanna give away all the spoilers. We’re gonna have maybe some additional crossover episodes, some events, things like that. So we can’t thank you enough for coming on the show and describing to everybody what it’s all about, why they should get engaged and Garage Rio has been a very grassroots experience, which resonates a lot with G T M and with our community and with our listeners and our audience in that, you know, it’s more down to earth and how you guys are continuing to perpetuate enthusiasm in this case.

Enthusiasm around vehicles while GTM is continuing to try to spread motor sports enthusiasm. To me, it’s really interesting when I have a conversation with somebody about what Garage right is, and I [01:04:00] explain it to ’em. And it’s funny because you can see ’em at first, they’re kind of looking at you and you know when they get it because you can see that light go off, you know, and then they start telling you, oh, well I could do this and I could do this, and I could put, you know this.

And that’s when, you know, they get it. And that’s been one of the most inspiring things because, you know, we’ve had people come up to us at shows and go, I love what you guys are doing, you know, keep doing it. You know, I’m gonna get all my buddies on there. And, and that’s really the goal was really to create something that we wanted to use and everybody else wanted to use.

So thank you again for coming on the show. It’s been really, really awesome. Yeah. Thanks for having us and you know, this is, this is a good partnership for us and, you know, we welcome any and everybody and you know, no matter what you drive and based on what we said today or not, you know, you’re all welcome and, and we wanna, we wanna see you.

There you go guys. So when you get a chance, especially over the winter months here, check out www.garageriot.com. Reach out to at Black M five if you wanna make some new friends

If you like what you’ve heard and want [01:05:00] to learn more about gtm, be sure to check us out on www.gt motorsports.org. You can also find us on Instagram at Grand Tour Motorsports. Also, if you want to get involved or have suggestions for future shows, you can call our text at (202) 630-1770 or send us an email at Crew chief@gtmotorsports.org.

We’d love to hear from you. Hey, listeners, crew Chief Erik here. Do you like what you’ve seen, heard, and read from gtm? Great. So do we, and we have a lot of fun doing it, but please remember, we’re fueled by volunteers and remain a no annual fee organization, but we still need help to keep the momentum going so that we can continue to record, write, edit, and broadcast all of your favorite content.

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