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Paved Paradise: How Parking Explains the World Around Us

November 16, 2023

On this episode of the Break/Fix Podcast, we dig into a topic that touches every driver, commuter, and city dweller—parking. It’s something we all think about, gripe about, and plan our lives around. But what if parking is more than just a daily nuisance? What if it’s a lens through which we can understand the evolution of our cities, our climate goals, and even our sense of personal space?

To unpack this, we welcomed journalist and author Henry Grabar, whose book Paved Paradise explores the hidden world of parking and how it shapes our lives in ways we rarely consider.

Grabar’s journey began with a simple observation: why are our downtowns – supposedly the most valuable real estate in any city – so often dominated by low-value parking lots? As a journalist covering architecture, housing, and transportation, he found that parking kept surfacing in every story. Eventually, it demanded a story of its own.

From the horse rails of 1923 to the EV chargers of today, parking has always been a battleground between progress and practicality. And as Grabar points out, we’re now at a pivotal moment: the rise of electric vehicles (EVs) is forcing us to rethink not just where we park, but how we power our cars.

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One of the most pressing issues in the EV transition is infrastructure. According to the American Community Survey, one in three American households lacks access to a private garage. That means millions of people rely on street parking or shared lots – places where installing EV chargers is expensive, logistically complex, and politically fraught.

Grabar notes that while some cities are experimenting with curbside chargers, lamppost retrofits, and even wireless charging pads, the economics often don’t add up without public subsidies. And with technology evolving rapidly, cities are hesitant to invest in infrastructure that might be obsolete in a decade.

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Synopsis

On this episode of the Break/Fix, we engage in a stimulating conversation with Henry Grabar, a writer from Slate Magazine and author of ‘Paved Paradise’. The discussion revolves around the influence of parking on daily life and urban planning. Grabar explains his motivation behind writing the book, stemming from his observations of excessive parking lots in American cities and his work as a journalist covering architecture and transportation. Key points include the history and evolution of parking, the impact of parking requirements on affordable housing, the challenges posed by the transition to electric vehicles, and comparisons between American and European approaches to parking. The conversation also highlights how parking policies exacerbate housing costs and how charging for parking could create more efficiency. The episode concludes with considerations on making parking greener and Grabar’s future plans.

We like that you explicitly don’t blame the car or the drivers; but the architects; but also a plea for more mass transit – but wouldn’t that also be a shift? Bus depots and train stations would need more parking if they were more popular – more like the expansion of airports?
We recently had David Page from Food Network on the show, he’s the creator of Diners/Drive-Ins/Dives; and we realized that one impact that wasn’t covered in the book was food’s impact on parking?
What we particularly enjoyed was how you humanized parking through the characters, their stories and the impact – sometimes for worse, sometimes for the better to illustrate some truly illuminating facts!
You talked alot about Solana Beach in CA; more extreme was Car Week in Monterey Bay / Carmel Valley – so many people descending on an area already hamstrung for parking – it was insane; how could we fix that?
People often forget that parking for events isn’t always subject to the parking rules talked about in the book- lots of gouging and profit during events where parking is already stressed. Why should we pay $20 to park in a grass field?
Thoughts on apps like Parking Panda, where you can reserve spots ahead of time? Is that better or worse? Park Mobile too?
Parking in Europe is very different from the US; why?
Can parking lots be made greener?
What’s next for Henry Grabar, where do you take the conversation surrounding parking next? Do you have another book in the works? #spoilers

Transcript

Crew Chief Brad: [00:00:00] BreakFix podcast is all about capturing the living history of people from all over the autosphere, from wrench turners and racers to artists, authors, designers, and everything in between. Our goal is to inspire a new generation of petrolheads that wonder. How did they get that job? Or become that person?

The road to success is paved by all of us. Because everyone has a story.

Crew Chief Eric: All of us, at some point, when asked by our friends, family, or significant others to venture to a new place have uttered the words What’s the parking situation like? But have you ever stopped to wonder why we ask that? Tonight’s guest unlocks the secrets of how parking has influenced our daily lives in a profound way, and chronicles them in his new book, Paved Paradise.

We welcome writer and author Henry Grabar from Slate Magazine to Break Fix to talk about how parking Explains the world around us.

Henry Grabar: Happy to be here.

Crew Chief Eric: Joining me tonight as co hosts are [00:01:00] Don Wieberg from Garagetown Magazine and Tom Newman, who you might remember from the Randy Lanier episode earlier this year.

So, welcome. Thank you.

Tom Newman: Henry,

Crew Chief Eric: it’s great to meet you finally. Likewise.

Don Weberg: Hi, Henry, I’m Don.

Crew Chief Eric: Hi, Don. This is such a divisive topic. So many people actually wanted to be on this episode. They all have something to say about parking and it’s not lost on the non drivers either. Funny enough, just the other day, my daughters were arguing about how much parking they needed to add to their ever growing Lego city.

And that brings us right to Henry’s book. And not just a book, but a study. In parking. So Henry, tell us about the who, the what, the when, the where, the why of how this all came to be. What inspired the book and what pushed you over the edge to write it?

Henry Grabar: One of my inspirations was traveling around to American cities, going downtown and just seeing how much space had been dedicated to parking lots and garages and feeling like this is such a weird way to organize what is supposed to be the [00:02:00] economic center of this place.

Why is there so much? Low value land use concentrated at what’s supposed to be the most valuable place in the city. I think that’s a mystery that’s been with me for years now on a more specific answer would be to say that I work as a journalist and I write these stories about architecture and transportation and housing and at a certain point.

Parking just kept coming up in story after story. And that may not surprise your listeners. I’ve since obviously talked to many people who have affirmed for me that parking is at the heart of what they do and their work and their concern in their daily life and all that. At the time, I felt like, wow, this is a subject that’s absolutely everywhere.

And I felt like hadn’t really been explained in that way.

Crew Chief Eric: It continues to come up and I don’t think it’s ever not going to end. Even just the other day, I was watching an episode of the hit series 1923, which is part of the Yellowstone Trilogy. Harrison Ford makes a comment as he rolls into town. He’s like, where did the rails go for the horses?

And the guy goes, I had to put in space for parking. He goes, well, [00:03:00] where am I going to park my horse? It’s a story as old as time, but what’s interesting about that, taking us back to 1923, I feel that we’re at a point where history is repeating itself a hundred years later, going back to the 1920s. You make reference of this in the book where cities were changing, parking was taking over as it was expressed in that Yellowstone episode.

But nowadays we have to consider the change in the automotive landscape. Where are we going to park? All of these EVs, how are we going to make charging available to electric vehicles? We’ve reached 7 percent market saturation. They obviously that number is going to increase. They wanted to increase, but parking is extremely limited.

So now the ice powered cars are sort of like that horse that need to make space for the EVs. So you didn’t really cover that too much in paved parking, but I wanted to explore that idea with you.

Henry Grabar: It’s something that I’ve been thinking about a lot lately. One of the leading indicators of whether somebody will buy an electric vehicle is whether they have reliable access to charging [00:04:00] for a lot of people.

That’s not a problem because they live in a detached single family home with its own garage. And so you can, at the very worst, just plug it in the wall, need slightly more reliability, maybe spend a little bit of money to install a level 2 charger or something like that. According to the American Community Survey, 1 in 3 American households do not have a private home garage.

And that means they either depend on some kind of multifamily parking situation, like a shared lot or garage, or they park on the street for either of those two groups. Transition to EVs is going to be really fraught because it’s not clear exactly how we’re going to be able to provide chargers at scale, especially for people who park on the street and.

Obviously, if meeting our climate goals depends on decarbonizing the automobile fleet, and that in turn depends on installing all these EV chargers, and that depends on sharing parking and being cooperative in how we think about street space and all that. Boy, I don’t know. It’s a tall order.

Tom Newman: One of the things that I think our [00:05:00] listeners would be really interested in is the origin of the garage.

A very sacred space to petrolheads and gearheads like myself and Eric and Don. I know it’s particularly important to Don. Can you talk a little bit about the origin of the garage and where that came from?

Henry Grabar: Rumor has it that Frank Lloyd Wright built the first. Enclosed domestic garage in Chicago and the Robey house and you can still go see that it’s a bulky concrete walled structure, which is typical of those early garages because they thought cars might explode.

And so you need to be protected. And they also had, you know, like, uh, trenches in the floors. You could get down and work under there and garages were originally at least as far as cars are concerned where spaces. To work on cars, they weren’t necessarily primarily intended to store cars, but to work on them.

That is the origin story of the garage. And it’s funny, even Wright recognized pretty early on, he started building carports instead of enclosed garages at a certain point. And I think he said, because he was afraid garages would fill up with stuff if he built them as part of the [00:06:00] house. And indeed that did end up happening.

Don Weberg: Henry, what you’re saying is spot on. I’ve heard this too. From my perspective, it came from the carriage house, but where we split here a little bit, the carriage house was obviously something more wealthier people had, and that was kind of where the transition came from. The wealthy person goes from having a horse drawn carriage to just a car.

But I’ve heard Henry’s story too, and I have heard that Frank Lloyd Wright was the first one to think, Hmm, where do we put a car?

Crew Chief Eric: Well, 1 of the things that stuck out in the book, there’s a whole set of chapters there where you talk about paid parking and metered parking and the advent of the meters and how that came to be in their history.

And it’s important to this discussion. And I think it plays into the conversation as well because I sort of gave it some thought. What wasn’t mentioned was. The transition from the mechanical meter to the electric meters and every electric paid parking meter that exists, whether now they’re park mobile enabled or otherwise means there’s electricity at that parking spot.

Granted might not be level three, 400 [00:07:00] watt might be one 20 might be two 20, whatever. That’s an opportunity for the parking capitalists to jump on that and say, let’s consolidate a parking meter and a charging station all in one.

Henry Grabar: I haven’t heard about the idea of parking meters. I like that idea a lot. I have heard from people saying potentially lampposts could be used like streetlights, obviously, are another source of power that’s coming into the street.

And those could be used potentially to install level one trickle chargers. The problem with that is. You have to have your car plugged in for a long, long time to get enough juice to drive 300 miles. The other issue is if you’re going to install something that’s a little higher touch, it’s going to provide more power.

It’s expensive. And I talked to the charging companies about this and they said, basically, it needs to be subsidized by cities. It doesn’t really pencil out for them to install chargers at the curb because they’re never going to make enough money. Charging people for that power to recoup the cost of installation and maintenance.

And the maintenance is a big issue here because these are public things. People will vandalize them. [00:08:00] People will drive into them. They’ll just break. There’s the weather, obviously. To have these things installed on the curb, they need to be subsidized. By the city or maybe by federal grants or something like that.

And then again, you’re looking at how much money are we going to spend to ensure that charging is electric. That’s a complicated political decision.

Crew Chief Eric: So then does it push it back to something you talked about in the book where now we have to relegate. EVs to a special parking lot or garage that has all the facilities and ability to charge those cars rapidly.

Henry Grabar: One potential future here is that charging technology gets fast enough that actually charging in the future comes to resemble filling up at the tank and you’re able to charge fast enough that it stops being such a concern. We don’t need to think about electrifying every single parking space. Another one that I heard is that building codes will actually contribute more chargers than the Infrastructure Act.

Will in terms of its commitment to charger installation, because a lot of progressive jurisdictions are now saying, if you’re building [00:09:00] parking, a certain amount of it needs to be electrified or needs to have the infrastructure in place to install electrification in the future. So the wires running under the concrete or whatever it is.

So people I’ve talked to have said pretty soon at the rate of new construction, it’s so much easier to build these things in new buildings than it is to install them in older buildings. Of course. Pretty soon new buildings are going to be contributing more EV chargers than retrofits.

Tom Newman: Or who knows, it could be like Mario Brothers.

We just drive over a strip in the road. Boom! Fully charged.

Crew Chief Eric: Don has actually talked about that before, where there’s some concepts, almost like mag chargers you have on your phone, you can drive over them. Even Rolls Royce, I believe, Don, developed something that would slide out underneath of the car?

Don Weberg: Yeah, it was Rolls Royce.

They have developed their electric car, but back in the day before they had one, they were feeling out their market and they were literally running around the world with this electric car showing their better customers the technology. You know, when asked, how do we charge it? They thought they were so slick because it was [00:10:00] literally a slab that goes in your garage floor and the car just rolls right over it.

The slab starts charging the battery. You’re done. You don’t plug anything in. You don’t touch anything. The car and the slab do everything for you. Well, it was considered very gimmicky and it was very cute and very cool. But of course, back then all the customers were still fairly older. People who didn’t really see a benefit or advantage to electric cars.

So Rolls Royce, they just shelved the whole idea. And now I understand it’s making a comeback because there’s a younger buying circle. That technology has been discussed in several municipalities about if you stop at a stoplight, you have a magnet there and that magnet senses all the cars. And when it hits a certain number, then it clicks over the lights.

Well, if we could do that with. Chargers, you would be charging your car while you sit at a red light. So red light to red light, you’re charging all these electric cars. It was pretty cool. But to Henry’s point, that requires a huge municipality investment, the city, the state, the [00:11:00] County, whatever, they’ve all got to get in on this, or they’ve got to start getting the people to vote in a bond to cover the whole thing.

Which again, it is a big political discussion.

Henry Grabar: I love hearing about that kind of technology. And again, that may not be ready to go to market right this second, but it feels like more evidence that the whole scene is evolving. And so we’re in this weird place where we are trying to obviously get the fleet to be electric as soon as possible.

But at the same time, we don’t want to commit billions of dollars to ripping up every city curb to install a technology that might be obsolete in 10 years.

Don Weberg: Exactly. That’s a big part of the problem too. Everybody’s worried about obsolescism. I mean, look at it, Tesla, arguably they were the first ones to market with a car that was acceptable as an electric vehicle while you’re still plugging them in, in your house, they haven’t adopted the drive over platform yet.

Why is that? It’s very interesting why Tesla has not gravitated to what Rolls Royce has been proposing. Why is that? I don’t know how [00:12:00] you feel about Tesla, but I’ve noticed it seems like what Tesla does. For the electric movement, the world follows it. Does every municipality want to invest in breaking up all the corners and installing these charges?

It’s a lot of work and a ton of money.

Crew Chief Eric: And why we’re talking about EVs first is because it’s top of mind for everybody. And again, parking is even more important in some ways. And all of this is evolving together. And one of the things I really liked about your book, Henry, is that you didn’t explicitly blame car owners, drivers, or otherwise, but the architects.

And it felt like there was a plea for more mass transit in there. When I boiled that down, it made me think a lot about How it parallels this discussion about EVs. There’s arguments to be made about how we’re displacing the carbon emissions. We’re moving it from the city centers back to the power stations by moving away from ice powered cars and people roaming around aimlessly looking for parking spots.

And then now we have these EV chargers and the coal power [00:13:00] plants are working harder than ever to power them. So it made me wonder. If we could switch to more mass transit, which the United States is so large, people oftentimes don’t really understand its grandeur as compared to Europe and Asia and other places that have more robust mass transit.

If we did ride more trains and buses, wouldn’t then we be offsetting the parking and forcing the bus depots and the train stations to have to accommodate more people that are driving to them to then use their services?

Henry Grabar: Yeah, I suppose that would happen. I mean, I think in places that do have higher rates of mass transit usage, carbon use per capita is lower full stop.

So yeah, there’s like some driving that needs to happen around those systems. But on the whole, it’s definitely a more sustainable way to get from A to B. There are pros and cons in the US context. I try not to make this book a call for mass transit investment, because I think unfortunately, in a lot of places in this country, The land use is simply not conducive to mass transit.

There’s never going to be a sufficient density in some of these places to [00:14:00] enable people to get to and from work reliably on an efficient mass transit system. That’s self sustaining or like moderately subsidized. There are places in this country, obviously where mass transit absolutely should be invested in where we definitely could be getting around without our cars.

But I think what’s appealing about parking as a subject is. Even if you live in a place that’s entirely car dependent, like one of the developers I talked to in my book is in Plano, Texas, north of Dallas. Totally car dependent environment, and even in a place like that, there is so much low hanging fruit in terms of the reforms that can be done around the way we treat parking to make a more pleasant and walkable environment.

Even if everybody has to drive there and drive away.

Tom Newman: After reading the first few parts of your book, I sat back and thought to myself, we are a horrible species. I mean, that is truly. And before any of our listeners think I’m crazy, you describe terrible things like fights and property damage and even murder inspired by parking disputes.[00:15:00]

Even small things like when we’ve walked out of a store, get in our car. and notice somebody waiting for the parking space that we are about to vacate, we might adjust the mirrors, fiddle with the radio, adjust a package on the seat, you know, whatever, knowing that the person who is waiting is growing increasingly frustrated and even angry.

And I think it’s fair to say that all of us have experienced the latter circumstances. And if you haven’t done that, I think you’re just a big fat liar. So what do you believe is the source of this sense of entitlement and ownership with public parking spaces when here in the United States, we’ve been taught that property is kind of a pinnacle of our society.

So why do we act this way when we don’t actually own the parking space?

Henry Grabar: That’s a million dollar question. I just want to say, you make a fair point about the opening chapters of the book. However, the narrative structure of the book [00:16:00] is sort of to set the stage with the problem and then emerge with some ideas for making it better.

So, the human race, or at least the American people, are not all bad in general terms and also in terms of their approach to parking. There’s definitely some reasons for optimism out there. With respect to our fixation on parking, part of it, and this gets back to the idea that this book is not supposed to hold drivers accountable for the parking situation, part of it is that we live in a society where we all have to drive to do.

anything. We have to drive our kids to school, we have to drive to the supermarket, we have to drive to go vote, we have to drive to work, we have to drive to the ball game, we have to drive to the park. That’s not our fault. The environment is constructed in a way that makes it impossible to do anything else and places in this country where driving is optional.

Are so scarce that they’ve become some of the most expensive real estate around. It actually is perversely a privilege to be able to live in a place where you’re able to walk, which is insane, but that’s sort of where we’ve ended up. And that goes back, I [00:17:00] think, to the fierce attachment we have for parking, because parking is literally the link between driving and whatever else you wanted to do in the first place.

And so I think, of course, people get attached to parking spaces. There are also circumstances in which parking is scarce. And in those situations, I think people also get. Territorial, right? Like if you go to a cold weather city where people shovel out public spots, there is a sense of ownership that creeps in and that happens everywhere.

Honestly, people park in front of their house. They often begin to think that space belongs to them just out of force of habit.

Tom Newman: I found that to be a particularly fascinating part of the book is the psyche. There was an academic that you referenced in the book that did a study that just to kind of paraphrase that said that.

When somebody drives to a certain place and they have to park, there has to be X amount of time between the destination and where they park. I thought that was just truly amazing because, you know, I had this conversation with my father and I’ll come back to that in a minute, but I think contributes one [00:18:00] to the ownership piece of it, and two.

This perception that there is never enough parking.

Henry Grabar: Yeah, that’s absolutely right. That’s a very important part of this, right, is that we have this expectation of parking, which is that we have very high expectations and particularly with respect to location. Now, I don’t think this is a fixed figure.

Actually, I don’t think there is some golden rule that says an American will only walk 200 feet from a parking space to get to where they’re going. If you look at a mall, for example, people will park at a mall. and they will walk five, six, seven, eight minutes to get from their parking space to a store inside the mall that is their actual destination.

That’s because malls are really nice to walk around in, and I think in cities that offer a pleasant pedestrian environment, you see that same kind of flexibility about parking. I’m from Manhattan. In Manhattan, when you’re driving someplace and you see an open parking spot, even if you’re five minutes away from where you’re going, you take it.

Because who knows what you might find when you actually get where you’re going. So I have this kind of [00:19:00] risk aversion. I like to park as soon as possible in case I don’t find another spot. Right. But obviously if you’re in an environment where the streets are pretty hostile to pedestrians, there’s no trees, there’s lots of cars going really fast, cutting in and out of driveways, well.

Then you probably do want to park directly in front of the restaurant. You came to eat at, and it’s probably not that interesting to you to park five blocks away and walk under the highway to get where you’re going.

Tom Newman: Can you talk a little bit about how parking has a direct impact on things like affordable housing?

And when I say affordable housing, I’m going to. borrow your explanation from the book, that’s not necessarily a home or an apartment that requires a lottery ticket from the city for you to become eligible to rent that property at a reasonable rate, but how parking in general just drives up the cost of housing, property values, taxes.

I don’t think a lot of people realize just how much parking affects what we keep in our pocket.

Henry Grabar: I don’t like to think too much about. Affordable housing, which is to say, like, [00:20:00] it’s actually subsidized by the government, requires a lottery ticket, et cetera. I prefer to think about naturally occurring affordable housing, which is to say, workforce housing that’s built by for profit developers, but at a low price point, doesn’t have a pool hall or a dog park on the roof or anything like that, but it’s just a place to live.

And for Okay. Most of the history of this country, those types of apartments have been the backbone of our housing infrastructure, and they have in recent decades disappeared. One of the reasons they have disappeared is that we’ve made it really, really challenging to build things, and one of the primary ways in which we’ve done that is to require all this parking with every project.

There’s just certain infill lots in cities where If you’re going to require every project to include two parking spaces with every unit, you are severely constraining the types of structures that can be built both geometrically and architecturally, but also financially, because building a spot in a structured parking garage to say nothing of underground is really, really expensive.

So even if you make [00:21:00] the project pencil, you find yourself entering this sort of cycle of escalating costs and rents. And I’ve talked to developers about this, and one of the things they say is, Once you’ve built all that parking in, you’re no longer at that bare bones tier of affordable rental unit.

You’re starting to add in perks and amenities, and then you say to yourself, Well, maybe actually this project ought to be targeted at a higher income level. And so then you install granite countertops, and then you install that dog park, and then there’s a Japanese rock garden in the back. And so, these things tend to build, and you get in this arms race, where everything’s getting nicer and more luxurious, and before you know it, you have very few people actually building the type of Basic work a day, but perfectly satisfactory housing that is so desperately needed.

Don Weberg: I’m from Los Angeles. You’re from Manhattan. Both of us are from big cities. And I think arguably Los Angeles is really the city that led the way they saw the cars, the future way back when. And so they started developing in that regard of, we have to create [00:22:00] spaces for all these cars that we’re going to park.

We have to create. Basis for people. We have to create roads that these cars can go down and not hit a horse on the way. You know, when you bring up the low income housing, it’s kind of interesting because when you go back to Los Angeles and you look at a lot of older, what used to be low income housing, even though they didn’t call it back then, it was just where the poor people lived.

The parking was basically the street. Because there weren’t very many cars and yet, isn’t it ironic that LA grew into this massive metroplex where you can’t get around without a car. I mean, you have got to have a car. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There’s a bus and whatever, but you had to have a car. So it was always interesting to me how those developers back then, how are we going to build something for lower income people yet still accommodate the car?

And like you say, well, the minute you start accommodating the car, well, God, they’ve got a car. They must have some disposable income. So yeah, let’s. Put a rock garden, let’s make it a little nicer. Seems to be more of the human DNA. We want better, better, better, better, better. We want [00:23:00] to aspire to build the best, to be the best, et cetera.

And I think even for our poor people, if you’ll just forgive that term for a minute, we want them to be the best poor people in the world. We have granite countertops. We have electric vehicles for our poor people, if that makes any sense. It is interesting to listen to you talk about how one pulls at the other, which pulls back.

It’s a very interesting pendulum.

Henry Grabar: This is a longstanding debate in the regulation of housing in the United States, right? Like you can go back to the late 19th century, early 20th century, progressive reformers visiting tenement buildings and saying these conditions are unacceptable and every bedroom needs a window.

And every apartment needs a fire escape, those kinds of regulations. I think today we would all basically say, yeah, that should be a basic condition of having an apartment in this country. We don’t want people building windowless apartments just because we have a housing shortage. And I can think you could see parking on that spectrum to the original desire with the zoning for parking.

Was not to entirely eliminate the [00:24:00] construction of apartments, although some people later used zoning for parking to accomplish that goal, but it was really to ensure that we solve the spillover parking problem on the street. There are unintended consequences to putting requirements on the creation of housing.

You have to make choices. And I think if you’re interested in an automobile society, everybody drives everywhere. And you could certainly make the argument that it would be great if everybody had a parking spot at their house. But I think one thing we’ve realized over the last few decades is that that requirement, however, noble in name, and I don’t even think it was that noble in name, but that’s another conversation.

It has severe externalities in terms of the look of the architecture, the cost of the housing, the walkability of the neighborhoods, like there’s all kinds of negative effects that go along with that.

Don Weberg: I live now in Dallas. I’m getting all this news from all over the place. And it’s the darndest thing.

We’ve got one developer here in Dallas and he’s huge. He literally gone from homeless. To he’s almost a billionaire. So obviously property and parking minimums is a huge part of the conversation. Now, when I moved here, I thought the [00:25:00] last thing in the world I was ever going to hear about again, we’re parking minimums.

Maybe in Houston, you’d hear about this, but everywhere else in Texas. Are you kidding me? We have more land than we know what to do with out here. So I don’t think anybody, nope. Nope, there’s a lot of cities out there who want to be sophisticated and big city and have parking minimums. Well, of course, all the businesses are up in arms over this because all that does is curtail business.

So it’s interesting in a conversation with him, he told me about Fayetteville, Arkansas. And in Fayetteville, he sent me a video, real nice video that this guy put together. And it was how the entrepreneurs, the business owners, etc. got together and essentially ganged up. On City Hall and said, we want these gone.

Well, of course, City Hall said, well, where’s everyone going to park? Have to have our parking? No, no, no, no, no. Get rid of them. And this is what’s going to happen. You’re going to see success downtown. You’re going to see revitalization. They had buildings in Fayetteville that Hadn’t been used in 30 years because they [00:26:00] didn’t meet the parking minimums.

It was really kind of crazy instead of being grandfathered in where, okay, this building was built during the civil war. It has five parking spaces, but it can service, you know, 300 people in a day. The city said, no, we got to shut that down until you can build parking minimums.

Henry Grabar: I talked to a bunch of architects who described the situation with historic buildings in particular as the parking padlock.

You may not be able to see it, but like across the front door, these old buildings is a parking padlock. Unless you provide enough parking, you can’t unlock the door and do something with the building that still affects structures today. But if you go back and you rewind 70 years of our urban history, how many buildings have we lost?

To this requirement, how many formerly walkable, formerly dense neighborhoods full of like great old loft buildings with 14 foot ceilings have been torn down to satisfy this requirement.

Don Weberg: Back in Los Angeles, we had a restaurant tour. He had a beautiful, beautiful building at the corner first in [00:27:00] Maine. I mean, how do you forget that?

And it was derelict. Well, why can’t we use it? parking. There’s no parking for it. Okay. So if I buy this building and turn it into a restaurant, let’s say, what do I have to do? Well, you have to provide all this parking. Essentially what it meant was, you know, here’s the block and here’s the little piece of property with the building.

Our guy had to buy basically this whole three quarters of a block, leaving whatever businesses are leading up to his building. So he had to buy all the houses. Tear him down, pave it, and turn it into a parking lot for his now restaurant. Is this still there? Did it happen? Did he tear down the block? He tore down the block.

First in Maine, it’s a place called Original Mike’s. You can look it up on the internet. And yes, Big Mike, as is known, he’s six foot eight. He bought every single house one by one by one. He literally had to go door to door, make offers to all these people.

Henry Grabar: That was insane.

Don Weberg: And all the people accepted because they were good offers.

So he bought the entire block. And then, of course, the city realizing, hey. We’ve got a nutcase on our hand. What can we built him for [00:28:00] now? The whole point was he hadn’t even set foot in that building yet that he wanted to turn into a restaurant slash nightclub. He hadn’t even touched that thing yet because he wasn’t sure he was going to be able to.

He had to secure all those houses, you know? So yeah, the restaurant is still there. He no longer owns it, but it is still there. It’s very popular. So Fayetteville takes a chance. They get rid of the parking minimums. And the next thing you know, that Civil War building gets leased by a company who wants to open a wine bar restaurant situation.

It is the cutest thing on the face of the planet. And people are parking blocks away because they want to go to this experience. They want to go see the wine cellar. They want to go eat the food. They want to do this. Well, of course, next door you got a shop. Next door you got this. The next thing you know, Fayetteville, Arkansas is lifting all of its parking restriction.

Now, it’s been an incredible transformation. To lift these, and it kind of goes with what you’re saying, let’s build a nice little area where people will walk five to ten minutes to get to their destination. Well, why are they doing that? Because it’s a nice [00:29:00] area.

Henry Grabar: It’s exactly what you say with Fayetteville, right?

The distance people are willing to walk is fungible. It does fluctuate. Based on the quality of the urban environment. And if you create an environment, that’s exclusively parking lots, you are going to create the expectation of easy parking. And it’s a negative cycle in that sense.

Don Weberg: I kind of blame Los Angeles for it in a way I go right back to it.

And that was the city of the future. They were the ones who embraced the car and they realized this is the future. We have to welcome the cars. Part of how they did it was. You have an avenue, and on either side of the avenue you have shops and restaurants, and what they did was they built alleyways behind them, and behind that were parking lots.

And that, for Los Angeles at least, that’s where the parking minimums started, was they realized, oh my gosh, we’ve got all these businesses entertaining all these people, they’re bringing their cars, they’re not able to park them, so now we have to impose these parking minimums on them. It was an understandable decision by the city, but at the same token it’s a double edged sword because it drove business away.

Crew Chief Eric: Don has [00:30:00] inadvertently reached back to another episode that we did where we had David Page from Food Network on, and we talked about his new book Food Americana and the influence that food has had on the automotive industry. Sort of the undertone here is, especially in these city centers where they’re trying to change things over and even the urban and suburban areas.

A lot of these decisions revolve around food and our ability to get it, whether we’re getting it, take out, dine in or grocery stores, people need to eat. We need our own personal fuel. And so it’s really funny how we don’t talk about it. It’s almost like food is sacred in this sense where we don’t recognize how it even influences this discussion about parking.

Henry Grabar: Yeah, I think that’s true. I think restaurants have suffered the most from this policy. We talked a lot about housing is obviously more important in a fundamental way to our society than restaurants are. But the thing about restaurants is that the requirements for restaurants are super, super high. And a lot of cities, it’s one space for every 100 square feet of interior [00:31:00] space and a parking space with an ingress and egress is about 300 square feet.

Maybe 250. So you’re talking just at a basic level, 2 to 3 times as much real estate devoted to parking as to restaurant, 100 square feet, a restaurant, 250, 300 square feet of parking. And so, yeah, you do end up by requiring. A kind of land use that is mostly parking and I think you look at a fast food restaurant in the suburban strip mall and that is kind of corporate architecture that comes from standards that have been established by Chick fil a or Taco Bell or whoever it is.

That’s also very much in tune and a form that has evolved with those local parking requirements that say that for every parking. Number of stools at the counter or whatever. You need this many parking spots.

Tom Newman: That’s an interesting point too, because you’re talking about the size square footage of the parking space.

While absolutely pertinent to food in restaurants and so forth and so on, I was really struck by that same [00:32:00] kind of logic being applied to housing in terms of, okay, you’re building an apartment complex or a townhouse unit or set of units, maybe there’s 10. Because of zoning laws or somebody’s arbitrary decision for these 10 units, we now suddenly need 40 parking spaces.

And I know that’s a little bit hyperbolic, but based on the research that you’ve done and what I’ve read, it doesn’t quite seem that far fetched.

Henry Grabar: I got my attention drawn recently to a project in Venice, California, where the project was opening on an old public parking lot. And so in addition to all the parking spaces required for the units, They had to rebuild all the spaces in the parking lot, and that can really push your parking ratios really high.

And I think, again, it makes sense intuitively to a lot of people. They say, you’re building something in a dense neighborhood, you have to provide parking, because otherwise it won’t be enough. I think what those people don’t realize is, in addition to the fact that, obviously, more parking creates more car ownership, which creates more traffic, [00:33:00] you’re building yourself into a big congestion problem, but there’s also the fact that Parking is so expensive to build.

And this is one of the things that shocked me most when I started working on this book, because you think of parking as being the land use of last resort, the thing that happens when the building’s been torn down and there’s nothing else that anybody wants to do with it. But the average cost of a stall in a structured garage in 2023 was 28, 000 nationally in LA, it’s much higher.

Underground, it’s much higher. Think about that. At the typical fee that people are willing to pay for parking, it takes so long to make a 28, 000 parking space pay off if it ever pays off, considering the cost of maintenance and depreciation and all that. So it’s a real difficult situation.

Tom Newman: I shared a story that kind of illustrates this challenge, if you will.

I hesitate to call it problem because I’m sure that there are people that are smarter than me that, you know, have quote unquote planned ahead, but still, it just kind of seems a little bit off. A couple months ago, [00:34:00] unfortunately, my mother wound up being diagnosed with a condition that had her in the hospital.

Prior to that, I was over at my parents house, and we were talking about what books we’re reading. And I looked at my dad, and I said, you need to read this book, Pave Paradise. And he said, what? Parking? Are you kidding me? And I said, well, let me ask you a fundamental question. Is parking a problem? And he goes, oh, yeah.

There is never enough parking, and kind of what Eric alluded to at the beginning of the show, whenever we set out, the first question a lot of people ask is, what’s the parking situation? Like I said, he was convinced that there’s never enough parking. Mom has her procedure. She has to be admitted overnight.

I happened to look out the window of her hospital room and it overlooked the parking lot. My eyes kind of got a little wide there for a second because perspective is everything, right? And I said, hey, Pop, come here and take a look at this. You know, he looked up and he goes, yeah. And I said, do you remember that conversation we had about never enough parking?

Probably the first third of the hospital parking lot. [00:35:00] Was packed, not an empty space anywhere. But then you looked out beyond and the remaining 60 to 70%, you know, whatever was just a sea of empty asphalt. And I said, do you still think we have a parking problem? His jaw literally hit the floor. You know, when we talk about the problem with parking is it’s a perception issue, right?

We have an excess of parking that nobody wants to use. It’s all about the parking we want,

Henry Grabar: right? That’s an opportunity to talk about. I think 1 of the most. Counterintuitive ideas in the book, which is the idea that paying for parking creates more parking spaces. And what you describe in that hospital parking lot is often true on a local Main Street where the very best spots will be taken first thing in the morning by people who more often than not work at the businesses or the offices on that block.

And they will [00:36:00] park there at 7 30 or 8 in the morning and they will park there all day. And so people will arrive at midday and they’ll say, there’s no parking available here. They’ll be correct that there is no parking directly in front of the place they want to go. But often that available parking is just one block, two blocks away.

And what’s happening here is that it’s sort of poorly organized. If you charge even a little bit for those prime parking spots, those all day parkers will find that over the course of 12 hours. You know, that dollar an hour starts to add up, especially if they’re parking there every day. And so they’ll park two blocks away, and that means that when you show up for lunch, you’ll have a spot directly in front of the restaurant that’s available to you, and it will cost you one, two, three dollars, something like that.

And for the people who park further away, maybe it’s free parking, maybe it’s cheaper parking, but in any case, the walk that they make to and from work, to and from their car, Is amortized over the course of that 12 hour workday. I think that’s an important thing to think about walking distance as well.

Nobody wants to walk 10 minutes to spend 30 seconds in a store picking up [00:37:00] their dry cleaning. But if you’re working for 12 hours and 10 minute walk isn’t so bad.

Don Weberg: What you 2 have brought up here. It kind of sounds like the segue to where cities start to slide back into that parking minimums.

Conversation because you’re bringing up people who they arrive at 7730 in the morning, they get the prime space in front of their work. The car sits there all day. And then they come out, they go home because they leave their car there all day. But other people are arriving. They got to park 23 blocks away.

I think this is where city council, etc. Start to wake up and say, Hey. We need parking minimums. And I wonder, do you see that too? Am I on the right track? I think

Henry Grabar: that’s, I think that’s the history of parking minimums in a nutshell is you have these overcrowded city blocks, merchants fearful that their customers are going to leave and go to a suburban shopping mall and parking minimums are the result to try and constrain new businesses from opening and putting more pressure on the parking picture.

There is obviously another way, right? I mean, the other way is. charging for that parking. There’s often this fear, if we charge for our [00:38:00] parking, no one will come here anymore. If that’s true, you have bigger problems. If the whole attraction potential of your central business district, your retail strip, if what you’re offering is only good enough for free parking, if it’s not worth a dollar an hour to someone who’s driving down there, then frankly, it’s obviously just not that good.

I’m not trying to be mean, but this gets borne out when you start charging for parking. People continue to come, they continue to patronize the restaurants and shops, they find the parking situation is easier than it was before, and that’s worth something to them, right? Because there is a cost of free parking, and it’s time.

It’s the time you spend getting to the main street, finding there’s no available parking, circling the block, etc., etc. You know, Don Shoup, who’s the godfather of parking studies, would say, you should price the parking. So that there’s always an available space on every block and if that price is so high that nobody drives there anymore.

Well, then you lower the price. I mean, that’s kind of the magic of parking meters is that it is a [00:39:00] wonderfully flexible policy as opposed to, for example, tearing down a row of houses to build a parking lot. That is hard to reverse.

Tom Newman: Yeah, and that’s a fantastic thing, and I’m going to give a quick shout out to my friend Mike Carr.

He’s actually a land use attorney, and when I told him about this podcast that we were going to do, he was very enthusiastic because he deals with it. He described a brewpub investment company that purchased an industrial area, a former plant of some kind just north of Philadelphia. And they turned it into this brew pub, shops, so forth and so on, made a parking lot based on the usable space that they own.

The township that it resides in, they basically told the owners that you don’t have enough parking. They said, what are you talking about? We have enough parking. Our lot’s never full, but we’re profitable. We’re doing well. And they said, well, you know, maybe if you installed meters, we could share the profits and increase the parking that will attract more people to you.

And they [00:40:00] said, no, I think we’re good, but you could do it if you cut down the trees. And their response was, we like the trees. And basically told them to go pound sand. And they won. I

Crew Chief Eric: don’t know that some of the studies really capture the end user, what all of us may be thinking. Some of it is reactionary.

Some of it is, based on behaviors that have been observed. But in this conversation, I begin to think about how I choose my parking. There’s often times where I want to pay more for a particular type of parking. So I’ll give you a prime example. I hate driving in the district of Columbia. So I will take any Metro and station because I can park there all day for five bucks.

And when I’m in the city, I don’t need my car anyway, but because I’m a car guy. I’m more worried about my car and what state it’s going to be in when I get back and, you know, not having to drive through potholed, ridden streets of DC. And the same is true at the airport. I pay more for covered parking because I don’t want my car out in the elements.

When I come home from a trip as a car enthusiast, I think about parking in [00:41:00] a totally different way. That whole situation is yes. What is the parking situation? But what’s that premium parking that I’m going to get? Not because I’m trying to show off, but because I’m trying to protect my personal investment.

So there’s a lot of other factors here. And I think that plays in maybe to the discussion and it’s sometimes overlooked.

Henry Grabar: Yeah. I think also we should acknowledge too, that there is a gender element at play here too. I’ve talked to women drivers who will say they also will value a premium parking space because they don’t want to walk 15 minutes through an urban street at night or through like a sketchy ass parking garage or something like that.

So like, that’s another group. I mean, it’s kind of another question about whether this is fair or not, but let’s just say there is definitely a market out there of people who would like to be able to ensure that they’re going to have a great and safe parking spot that’s close to where they’re going.

Crew Chief Eric: And I think that’s where the mobile apps come into play. And my wife has brought up more than once an app called parking Panda, which was not referenced in the book. You get references to park mobile and some other apps like that, where you can [00:42:00] do metering digitally and things, but parking Panda is actually a reservation.

System. So think about that. You’re a single female. You don’t want to walk through that parking lot at night, but you could reserve a spot at a certain time near a store. So you’re closer. I think that parking Panda, that more concierge white glove approach to parking is really interesting. I ask her frequently how it really works and she says it works great.

I’ve always gotten the spot that I reserved. There’s nobody else sitting in it and things like that. And so something else to look at. There’s a lot of technology now that can help the parking situation.

Henry Grabar: Yeah, I couldn’t agree more. One of the things I’ve been wondering about lately is like. What if we thought about parking meters away?

We think about tolls. Now there’s a lot of places where you drive around New York and you get told automatically via license plate recognition

Crew Chief Eric: or easy pass.

Henry Grabar: Yeah. Or easy pass. But like now you don’t even need easy pass. They’ll just take a photo of your license plate and send you a bill in the mail.

It’s made this process very seamless and people generally no longer think about it. Like. Oh, I’m about to pay again for this service. It’s just become kind of a [00:43:00] fixed item on your monthly budget. Oh, you got to account for insurance, registration, tolls, etc. One of the advantages of doing this with parking would be you could get rid of this whole.

Rigmarole we go through with the parking meters and the fines, like there’s really no need for anybody to be fined for overstaying a meter and there’s no need for anybody also to have to pay more money than they need to pay if they leave a spot early. That whole system is so primitive and it doesn’t need to exist anymore because we have cars.

The drive around and read license plates and could just say, you were foreseen in this spot at this hour, you were no longer in the spot at this hour and you get billed according to that. And that’s that.

Crew Chief Eric: Same is true now at a lot of airports, they have those scanners that look down to see if a car is sitting in the spot.

Not only does it help you find an available spot quickly, but that technology can be used to say, okay, that car was there at that moment and no longer there to be super accurate, because even when somebody is coming by on a little scooter or something like that and taking those pictures. That’s based on a cycle, right?

How many times are they going by in an [00:44:00] hour or whatever it is? So the accuracy is better than, okay, I put in a quarter in the meter and I only use 10 cents worth of that quarter, that sort of thing. So Henry, in the book, you talked a lot about Solana beach, which is a very particular area in California.

Lots of things going on there with respect to parking and housing and architecture and things like that. But I thought it was funny. That this past summer, Don and I experienced what could be considered parking hell in a way, especially for car enthusiasts, bigger than the Solana beach problem encapsulated in 10 days is car week, which happens in the Carmel Monterey area.

And not only is parking stressed in that area in general, now you have car enthusiasts with multiple cars and trucks, and they’re going to pebble beach and the quail and all these shows and all this. Extra is descending upon that area and it takes an already stressed parking situation and makes it tenfold.

So I wonder if Car Week, Carmel, Carmel Valley, Monterey could be used in maybe a future study to look at how they [00:45:00] handle that situation because Car Week has been around for many, many years and it’s not going away anytime soon.

Henry Grabar: I mean, Car Week is a particularly funny example because it’s like a very vivid illustration of the old axiom, you’re not in traffic, you are traffic.

You’re not having trouble finding parking, you are creating a parking shortage. It’s tough because I think for a lot of big events, the obvious answer is cars have never been good at getting a lot of people to one place at one time because of simple geometric constraints. But obviously if driving is a precondition, that’s definitely a tough one, but it would be a fun experiment to run, right?

Like you got a lot of, a lot of people who think about this stuff like you guys do, surely they could come up with a system or an experiment or something like that to figure out the parking situation. Of course, a lot of the time, what you have in those situations, you get all of a sudden a very vibrant black market for parking spaces.

You go to like, uh, near a college football stadium or like near Churchill downs on the day of the Kentucky Derby,

Tom Newman: Indianapolis 500.

Henry Grabar: Yeah. Like, you know, 25 bucks to park in my driveway for a [00:46:00] couple of hours. Yeah.

Crew Chief Eric: Or 25 bucks to park in the grass. Like that’s not even a parking spot, right? It’s not officially sanctioned.

Everything’s

Henry Grabar: a parking spot, uh, on the day of the big game.

Crew Chief Eric: In our last segment here, let’s talk about. Us versus them. That’s the U. S. versus other parts of the world, especially Europe and Asia, which are also car dense as well. You spent some time in Europe this summer, so did I, and I noticed a stark contrast in the way Europe handles its parking situation versus the U.

S. Obviously, they are more compressed, we have a lot more land, but I don’t see oceans of asphalt. A lot of times, cars are Hidden from plain sight in these underground garages or garages are built into buildings. They’re integrated. Denmark has a big policy of no single use buildings. So every building they construct has to have a multifaceted approach to it and can be used for something in the future if it is abandoned.

So I wanted to talk about some of the differences there between Paris, Copenhagen, even Montreal, you know, Canada handles [00:47:00] things differently than we do. And some of your thoughts on what you’ve seen in your travels.

Henry Grabar: Yeah, let’s just get one thing out of the way right off the bat. The car ownership rate in Europe, and especially in Canada, is not that much lower than it is in the United States, especially Western Europe.

It’s easy to look at some of these European cities and just say, well, that’s Just a totally different paradigm. We’re never going to be like that, et cetera. And there are definitely fundamental differences, but these remain societies where lots and lots of people drive. And I think one of the fundamental changes that they’ve made that distinguish their urban environments from ours is to think about parking in a different way.

One thing I noticed in a lot of European cities and in particularly smaller cities and even towns is that they have what they would call a park once strategy. The idea is instead of an American city where like every sandwich shop and dentist office and movie theater is required to have its own parking lot, a lot of European cities will have a public parking garage, paid parking usually, that’s sort of on the edge of town or maybe even at the center of town, but they’ll have a few of them and there’ll be [00:48:00] really big signs when you drive into the city that will say, here’s where to park.

Here’s how many spaces are left. And you’ll go there and you’ll park, and then you will spend several hours on foot. You will go from store to store, to restaurant, to movie theater, or see a play, see a concert, or whatever. And then when you’re done, you’ll go back and find your way to your car and leave town.

But that is a way to ensure that there may still be lots of people that are driving to and from the city, but they’re not driving to and from the various establishments inside the city. And that permits that parking to be shared between all the uses in the city, and also sort of kept off the main drag and out of sight.

Crew Chief Eric: And Don and I commiserated over an experience that we shared, but separately in Venice, where you’re not allowed to be in the ancient city of Venice. You have to park in Padova and take the train in and everything is walkable. There are no cars allowed in Venice. You either do everything by boat. Gondola, and then you have the option of bike, scooter, Vespa, all that kind of stuff.

And Italian cities, Venice is not alone in that sense. Florence is very similar. You park on the outskirts of the city and you [00:49:00] walk into the city. Granted, they got to make deliveries and sometimes they have special exceptions for things like that, but they try to push the cars out of the cities and make them more walkable.

Now, you were just back from Paris, totally different situation there.

Henry Grabar: Yeah, Paris is really interesting. First of all, it’s a big city, right? We’re talking a metro area of 10 million people. So it’s not some little, no offense to Venice, but like it is a different scale. They’ve decided basically that if you’re going to drive a car in Paris, you need to have a garage to park it in.

They’re really trying to cut down on street parking and people who use street parking. The idea now is that’s for deliveries, that’s for ambulances, that’s for pickup and drop off and taxis. It’s not for long term car storage, long term car storage has to happen off the street because that street space is too valuable in a city.

That’s as dense as Paris is in the last couple of years, they’ve converted all these free parking spaces to all kinds of new uses. And my favorite, one of these is they’ll take blocks in front of schools and turn them into play streets. And this has happened all over the city, but like, they’ll just get rid of the cars and the [00:50:00] blocks in front of the schools and on these blocks, they used to have these big fences along the sidewalks.

To prevent the kids from playing and wandering into traffic and getting hit by a car. And since they closed the blocks of traffic and got rid of the parking spaces, they’ve been able to tear down those fences. And so you end up with this much more open and pleasant environment. And it’s pretty low touch, right?

It’s not like they’ve done a ton of work, spent a ton of money. Just the presence of these kids coming in and out of school all day creates a kind of automatic social life in the street. There’s soccer games, there’s hopscotch, there’s kids on scooters, bikes, parents picking up, dropping off their kids, and then other people from the neighborhood too who will just come and they’ll take that block if they’re bringing their cart to or from the market because it’s easier than walking on some narrow sidewalk and cafe terraces spreading out because it’s quieter because you don’t have the motorcycles going by, etc.

All that’s possible when you begin to look again at Parking spaces.

Crew Chief Eric: If we go over to Asia, we talk about Tokyo and other parts of Japan. As an example, they actually feed the size of the vehicles accordingly, and they [00:51:00] have minimums and things like that, where even the width of the car is important because that also dictates how many cars they can fit.

In a parking area versus some of the larger vehicles we have in the States. This is why they don’t have things like a Yukon or a Tahoe or an expedition or something like that. It just wouldn’t physically fit in places that you could park, let’s say in downtown Tokyo. So they have a whole different approach that it affects the automobile industry in such a way that they have to physically make the car smaller.

And I think that’s really interesting too. So Henry, how can we make parking lots greener? There’s these oceans of asphalt out there and we see them being overutilized and sometimes underutilized. Like paddocks at a racetrack are completely empty if nobody’s there for a race, right? And so it makes me wonder, especially in thinking about conversations about us versus them and how Europe does things differently, why aren’t we seeing more solar panels?

Going up to provide shade for vehicles, keeping them cooler. That way we don’t have to run ACs as hard, which is a positive thing for the [00:52:00] environment as well. And I bring it up because I’ve only noticed it in one place in the United States and it has a European influence. And that’s at Ikea where they provide the shaded solar paneled areas that you can park under.

So what are your thoughts on making parking lots greener in the future?

Henry Grabar: The economics are just not in favor of building those solar panels over parking lots, which is unfortunate, but I agree. It’s a great place for them. France actually has a law now that parking lots over a certain size, I think, have to be half covered in solar panels.

So a city or state could do that and decide to try that out. I think it’d be pretty interesting to see what happened. The other thing about parking lots and making them greener is obviously the impervious surface. One of the issues we see every summer in the United States is these increasingly intense rainstorms that Overwhelm our sewer system and flood businesses, basements, people’s houses, et cetera.

One of the ways we can deal with that is to try and address all this concrete and asphalt that makes up our cities. Parking lots are not the only or even the primary source of impervious surface. That’s probably [00:53:00] buildings. But the buildings are challenging to work with and parking lots are right there.

What could we do to make, maintain their parking function, but transform them so that they permitted water to go into the ground and replenish our aquifers instead of running right into our sewer systems. And I think that’s a big challenge, but it’s not a very difficult one. Somebody’s going to figure out a way to do that.

And we ought to make it obligatory for new parking lots to conform to those rules.

Crew Chief Eric: What’s next for Henry Grabar? Where do you take this parking conversation next? Do you have another book in the works? Any spoilers you can share?

Henry Grabar: So far I’m on a, uh, parking policy road show. I’ve got a couple trips scheduled to Orlando, to Denver, Santa Fe, Boston.

Gonna be talking parking. More broadly, I’m a Loeb Fellow at the Harvard Graduate School of Design. And so I’m taking classes and taking a break from writing and trying to learn some stuff.

Crew Chief Eric: Well, Henry, we’ve reached that part of the episode where I get to ask you any shoutouts, promotions, or anything else you’d like to share that we haven’t covered thus far.

Henry Grabar: This was a really thorough conversation. Gotta [00:54:00] give a shout out to Don Shoup, the Godfather of Parking Studies. His book, The High Cost of Free Parking, is the Bible of parking. It’s a big book. It’s not for everybody, but it is the Bible. And also to the Parking Reform Network, which is A really interesting group of local activists who are trying to change parking laws for all the reasons we’ve just discussed.

So if you’re interested in this that might be a good place to get started

Don Weberg: Everyone that says life is all about the journey and not the destination has obviously never had to search for parking To learn more be sure to check out henry’s new book paved paradise available on amazon and audible Depending on your reading style.

You can reach out to henry at henry dot grab bar at slate dot com, or follow him on social media via linkedin.

Tom Newman: Henry, I could talk to you for hours on this, and I know that sounds kind of geeky, but that’s just the hard truth of it. Candidly, I never really considered or even thought about how parking can be so impactful, [00:55:00] not just within car culture, but across many different echelons of everyone’s life, not just the people who own cars.

Crew Chief Eric: Henry, I can’t thank you enough for coming on Brake Fix and sharing this extremely interesting study on one thing that I think all of us, whether you’re a car enthusiast, motorsports enthusiast, just a person in general, have a vested interest in, which is parking. And I don’t think any of us have really…

Sat down and thought about how much it affects our lives in a profound way. And I think I can speak for my co hosts in this. We appreciate you bringing this to light, bringing this to the surface and making us take a deeper look, internalizing what parking really means to all of us.

Henry Grabar: Well, I, uh, I really appreciate you all giving us such a close read.

So fun to talk to people about this subject and especially to people who have been thinking for so long about cars and how they work. Thank you so much, Henry. Oh, this was so fun. Anytime.

Don Weberg: Good to meet you, Henry

Paradise

Pink. A [00:56:00] and a hot

that you, you.

Crew Chief Eric: We hope you enjoyed another awesome episode of Brake Fix Podcast brought to you by Grand Touring Motorsports. If you’d like to be a guest on the show or get involved, be sure to follow us on all social media platforms at GrandTouringMotorsports. And if you’d like to learn more about the content of this episode, be sure to check out the follow on article at GTMotorsports.

org. We remain a commercial free and no annual fees organization through our sponsors, but also through the generous support of our fans, families, and friends through Patreon. For as little as 2. 50 a month, you can get access to more behind the scenes action, additional Pit Stop minisodes, and other VIP [00:57:00] goodies, as well as keeping our team of creators Fed on their strict diet of fig Newtons, gumby bears, and monster.

So consider signing up for Patreon today at www. patreon. com forward slash GT motorsports, and remember without you, none of this would be possible.

Highlights

Skip ahead if you must… Here’s the highlights from this episode you might be most interested in and their corresponding time stamps.

00:00 Introduction to BreakFix Podcast
00:39 Meet Henry Grabar: Author of Paved Paradise
01:45 The Inspiration Behind Paved Paradise
03:25 The Future of Parking and Electric Vehicles
04:58 The Origin of the Garage
06:27 The Evolution of Parking Meters
19:21 Parking and Affordable Housing
28:16 Fayetteville’s Transformation: From Parking Minimums to Vibrant Community
29:15 The Origins of Parking Minimums: A Look at Los Angeles
29:58 Food and Parking: An Unexpected Connection
30:41 The High Cost of Parking Requirements for Restaurants
32:53 The Real Cost of Parking: Financial and Spatial Implications
33:58 Personal Stories: Parking Perceptions and Realities
35:36 The Case for Paid Parking: Efficiency and Availability
37:35 Parking Minimums: History and Impact on Urban Development
41:48 Innovative Parking Solutions: Technology and Policy
46:12 Global Perspectives: How Other Countries Handle Parking
51:29 Making Parking Lots Greener: Challenges and Opportunities
53:23 Conclusion: The Future of Parking and Final Thoughts

Bonus Content

There's more to this story!

Be sure to check out the behind the scenes for this episode, filled with extras, bloopers, and other great moments not found in the final version. Become a Break/Fix VIP today by joining our Patreon.

All of our BEHIND THE SCENES (BTS) Break/Fix episodes are raw and unedited, and expressly shared with the permission and consent of our guests.

Learn More

Want to learn more?

Henry Grabar is a staff writer at Slate who writes about housing, transportation, and urban policy. He has contributed to The Atlantic, The Guardian, and The Wall Street Journal, and was the editor of the book The Future of Transportation. He received the Richard Rogers Fellowship from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design and was a finalist for the Livingston Award for excellence in national reporting by journalists under thirty-five.

Don’t forget to pick up a copy of Paved Paradise at your local book store or on Amazon today!

Everyone that says life is all about the journey, and not the destination, has obviously never had to search for parking. To learn more, be sure to check out Henry’s new book “Paved Paradise” available on Amazon and Audible depending on your reading style. You can reach out to Henry at henry.grabar@slate.com or follow him on social media via LinkedIn.

For gearheads and petrolheads, the garage is more than a place to park – it’s a sanctuary. Grabar traces its origins to Frank Lloyd Wright’s Robie House in Chicago, where the first enclosed domestic garage was built. Initially designed as a place to work on cars, the garage has since morphed into a catch-all storage space, often filled with everything but vehicles.

This evolution mirrors our shifting relationship with cars and space. As Don Weberg of Garage Style Magazine pointed out, the garage’s lineage can also be traced to the carriage house – a symbol of wealth and status that transitioned into the automotive age.

Parking Meters, Power, and Possibility

One of the more intriguing ideas discussed was the potential to repurpose existing infrastructure – like electric parking meters and streetlights – as EV charging stations. While the power output might be modest, it’s a tantalizing glimpse into how we might retrofit our cities for a greener future.

But as Grabar cautions, the economics are tricky. Charging companies often can’t recoup the costs of installation and maintenance without subsidies. And vandalism, weather, and wear-and-tear make curbside chargers a risky investment.

The Psychology of Parking

Why do we get so territorial about parking spaces we don’t even own? Grabar explores the psychology behind our obsession with parking, from the passive-aggressive rituals of mirror-adjusting and radio-fiddling to full-blown disputes that escalate into violence.

In a society where driving is often the only way to access basic services, parking becomes the final link in the chain. It’s no wonder we treat it like a birthright.

Parking and the Price of Housing

Perhaps the most surprising revelation is how parking requirements drive up the cost of housing. In many cities, zoning laws mandate a minimum number of parking spaces per unit, making it nearly impossible to build affordable housing without also building expensive garages.

Grabar argues that these mandates often lead developers to abandon low-cost projects in favor of luxury units with granite countertops and rooftop dog parks. The result? A housing market that’s increasingly out of reach for the people who need it most.

While Grabar doesn’t frame his book as a call for mass transit, he acknowledges that better public transportation could alleviate some of the pressure on parking. Still, he’s realistic about the limitations – many American cities simply aren’t dense enough to support robust transit systems.

Instead, he advocates for smarter parking policies: eliminating minimums, encouraging shared parking, and designing walkable environments that reduce our reliance on cars in the first place.

As the episode wrapped, the conversation turned hopeful. Whether it’s wireless charging pads, zoning reform, or just a better understanding of how parking shapes our world, there’s a growing awareness that the status quo isn’t sustainable.

And maybe, just maybe, the next time someone asks, “What’s the parking situation like?” we’ll have a better answer.

Reading List

Don't miss out on great book like this one, or other titles we've read and covered as part of the GTM Bookclub on Break/Fix Podcast.

My Travels On Racer Road: Can-Am and Formula 1 in their golden age

DeLorean: The Rise, Fall and Second Acts of the DeLorean Motor Company

Driving to the Future: Living life following Formula One racing

Geared for Life: Making the Shift Into Your Full Potential

Fenders, Fins & Friends: Confessions of a Car Guy

Racing While Black: How an African-American Stock Car Team Made Its Mark on NASCAR

The Last Lap: The Mysterious Demise of Pete Kreis at The Indianapolis 500

Performance Thinking: Mental Skills for the Competitive World...and for Life!

The Other Side of the Fence: Six Decades of Motorsport Photography

Little Anton: A Historical Novel Complete Series

Lone Rider: The First British Woman to Motorcycle Around the World

Colin Chapman: The Man and His Cars: The Authorized Biography by Gerard Crombac

Paved Paradise: How Parking Explains the World

Shipwrecked and Rescued: Cars and Crew: The

Gran Touring Motorsports's favorite books »

Goodreads

Guest Co-Host: Don Weberg

In case you missed it... be sure to check out the Break/Fix episode with our co-host.

This content has been brought to you in-part by sponsorship through...

Where Cars Meet Cuisine: A Delectable Drive Through American Food Culture

Don W

November 14, 2023

Where Cars Meet Cuisine: A Delectable Drive Through American Food Culture

What do Camaros and cupholders have to do with clam strips and drive-thrus? On this episode of the Break/Fix podcast, we take a joyride through the intertwined evolution of American car culture and culinary innovation with two-time Emmy Award winner David Page – the creator of the iconic show Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives and author of Food Americana.

David Page didn’t set out to revolutionize food television. After a storied career in network news, he found himself pitching ideas to the Food Network – until one fateful call led him to invent a show on the spot. “Don’t you have anything about diners?” the exec asked. Page replied, “Oh yeah, I’m developing a show called Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives.” He wasn’t. But by Monday, he had a pitch – and soon, a series.

Tune in everywhere you stream, download or listen!

Despite early skepticism from network brass (“There just aren’t enough restaurants,” they said), the show exploded. Page produced the first 11 seasons; it’s now in its 40-somethingth. And Guy Fieri? Page admits he was unsure at first – “a cartoon in flip-flops” – but quickly saw his natural talent. “He didn’t know jack when we started, but he picks it up quickly.”

Don Weberg of Garage Style Magazine joined the episode to share his own Guy Fieri story. After a chance email from Fieri’s team, Don featured Guy’s garage – and his beloved Camaro – in the magazine. That car, a ’67 originally purchased by Page, became a visual staple of the show. Later, production swapped it for a ’68, but the connection between cars and culinary storytelling was already cemented.

Spotlight

Synopsis

This Break/Fix episode explores the intersection of the American automobile industry and culinary culture with guest David Page, a two-time Emmy Award winner and creator of Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives. The discussion highlights how post-WWII car culture influenced fast food and drive-thrus, the rise of convenience stores like Sheetz and Wawa as food destinations, and the potential impact of electric vehicles on food delivery and road trips. David also discusses his book, ‘Food Americana,’ which delves into the Americanization of various cuisines. The podcast underscores the evolving dynamics between food and travel in American society.

How the car industry influenced the Food Industry and Vice-Versa
How much time do we spend eating in/around/with our vehicles?
What’s the difference between a Diner, Drive-In and a Dive?
Cars also gave rise to Delivery (were Pizza Hut & Dominos the first?) how has the EVolution changed this?
Has anyone ever studied the environmental impact that food delivery has?
Is there a best car to eat food in?
With EV charging taking considerably longer; places like Sheetz, Rofo and Wawa are poised to become “eateries” and not just convenience 7-11 style locations.
On the show (Triple D) Guy Fieri is always seen with the Camaro; why that car? Is it the “most American” – why not a mustang?

Transcript

The road to success is paved by all of us because everyone has a story.

Crew Chief Eric: Have you ever thought about where cars and culinary delights might collide or maybe how both the automotive and food industries have had a direct effect on one another? With the help of tonight’s guest, we take a delectable journey through time and taste while exploring how the American automobile industry and the tantalizing world of food have intertwined and evolved over the decades.

Don Weberg: Two time Emmy Award winner David Page. Change the world of food television by creating, developing, and executive producing the [00:01:00] groundbreaking show Diners, Drive Ins, and Dives. So get ready to indulge your appetite as we dish out stories behind the iconic cars, the birth of fast food, drive thrus, and the fusion of culinary culture with car culture, all while exploring how these two American passions have shaped each other in surprising and delicious ways.

Crew Chief Eric: With that, let’s welcome David to BreakFix.

Don Weberg: Welcome, David.

David Page: Well, thanks for having me. It’s good to be here.

Crew Chief Eric: And joining me is one of our regular co hosts on BreakFix, Don Wieberg from GarageDom Magazine. Welcome back.

Don Weberg: Thank you. Thank you. I know. Thank you. You’re beautiful.

Crew Chief Eric: Normally on a BreakFix episode, we’d be investigating the hidden lives of pro drivers or automotive designers asking them the who, what, when, where of their automotive past.

But in this case, it’s sort of like one of Don’s jokes. Two car guys in a restaurant tour walk into a dive bar. Hey. So why are we here? Tell us how we got here. Tell us about how you [00:02:00] created Diners, Drive Ins, and Dives. By accident,

David Page: I’d had a long network news career, been all over the world, show produced at both ABC and NBC, came back to the States, and then I left to open my own production company, which for a while was a license to starve.

I couldn’t sell a show to save my life. There was a programming executive at the Food Network who was at least willing to talk to me. And I’d call her and pitch stuff and she’d politely say no. One day I’m pitching and she’s obviously feeling sorry for this pitiful guy. And she says to me, don’t you have anything about diners?

And I said, oh yeah, I’m developing a show called Diners, Drive ins and Dives. And I told her all about it. And she said, you know, that sounds pretty good. This was like late on a Thursday or late on a Friday. She said, we have a development meeting Tuesday. So get me a write up for a one hour special on Monday.

Hung up the phone. I was pleased that she was interested, but I had a problem because I was not developing a show [00:03:00] called diners, drive ins and dives. I had just pulled the phrase out of thin air and then mumbled for a while about what would be in the show. Fake it till you make it. I guess I spent the weekend calling around the country, talking to restaurateurs, food writers, chefs.

Put together a writeup, sent it in, and pretty quickly they picked up a special. Not that long after they picked it up as a series. Now they weren’t tremendously enthusiastic about it. I mean, after the first few episodes scored well on the ratings, an executive went out of his way to tell me that, look, this looks great and enjoy it, but we don’t figure this has more than a couple of seasons in it because there just aren’t enough restaurants.

Don Weberg: Did you really think you would actually run out of restaurants?

David Page: No, I didn’t. They did. Okay. Understand one of the rules of television is that executives don’t know shit. So it’s like getting notes from an executive. They have to send you [00:04:00] stuff telling you what’s wrong with your piece. Mel Brooks famously said all of the notes he got on blazing saddles.

He said, absolutely, absolutely. Absolutely. And then ignored the ball. Because if he had done what they wanted, the movie would be eight minutes long. I did the first 11 seasons, they’re now in season 40 something, so I guess there are enough restaurants.

Don Weberg: That’s how you invented the show. How was your first meeting with Guy?

Tell me about how he came along.

David Page: First of all, I didn’t meet him until we were shooting. When they picked up the special, I said, well, should we talk about a host? And they said, no, we got Guy Fieri. I said, who the hell’s that? And they said he won the second Food Network Star Contest. I said, what the hell is that?

Cause I didn’t watch food TV. So I Googled him. My first thought was I’m screwed. I mean, here’s this cartoon in flip flops, shorts, and spiky hair. Now our first phone conversation was useful because I was at our beach house, which turned into our full time residence on the Jersey shore, and I was cooking [00:05:00] something that required.

Fennel. I don’t remember what it was. It might’ve been, uh, trepino. Anyway, I got him on the phone, or he called me back while I was out shopping, and I said, I can’t find any fennel. And the first thing he said to me was, use sambuca. Same flavor. So we started off kind of in a foodie conversation. When we first met, it was when we started shooting.

And we began at a small diner in Jersey, across from a refinery in Linden. And the crowd there is, shall we say, homegrown. First of all, I’ve worked with all of them. Brokaw, Diane Sawyer. I gotta tell you, Guy was green as grass, but had, and to this day probably still has, more natural TV talent than anyone I’ve ever worked with.

There’s just something there. He didn’t know Jack when we started, but he picks it up quickly. For example, at the Bayway, he had jumped behind the counter to start serving [00:06:00] food and joking around with the customers, and he kept joking that if he screwed up an order, the Mafia would get him and we’d find his body somewhere.

I finally pulled him outside and said, Dude, You’re in a tough part of Jersey, I wouldn’t make those jokes. And by the way, there’s a guy at the counter who’s packing. So he gave up on those jokes. And I say that as a proud resident of Jersey, those jokes went away and off we went. And it was a great experience.

Don Weberg: I run Garage Style Magazine. And here’s an old, old cover. A hundred years ago when this issue came out, we got an email from a man. He was some sort of producer, handler, something of Guy Fieri, saying he’d come across the magazine. Guy is a good car guy. Can we get his garage in the magazine? It looks pretty good.

So they sent me some snapshots. Really loved what I saw. I said, yeah, let’s put it together. Now the B. Perfectly frank, I’d only seen Guy Fieri on commercials, whatever. I never really watched the show. So my sister calls and she says, uh, what are you up to [00:07:00] the next couple of weeks? I said, well, I’m going up to Santa Rosa, Santa Rosa.

What’s up in Santa Rosa? And I say, well, you ever hear of Guy Fieri? Oh yeah, yeah. I know Guy Fieri. We went to school together. Wait, what? Yeah, we went to school together. You and I’ll be no kidding. So we get up there and yeah, we had a great photo shoot. We put him in the magazine and I’ll put it to you this way.

Very interestingly, he is one of the very, very, very few. In fact, if we go through the issues, we might find he is the only. Human being that I allowed to be in the garage while we shot it. Cause he wanted that photograph of himself with that Camaro. Who’s Camaro is that? The one that’s on the TV show. Is that his?

Well, the

David Page: one that’s on the TV show now is a 68 that right. The production company that followed. After I left the show, they bought that the one that we were using originally I purchased for a stupidly large amount of money because I was in a rush and it was available and it was a 67 although [00:08:00] there wasn’t a single.

Numbers match component anywhere on that car,

Crew Chief Eric: David. We didn’t bring you here to recount all the trials and tribulations of triple D. What we really want to get to crosses the line into your new book, Food Americana and where the automotive industry and the food industry have collided many times over the years.

So let’s kind of switch into second gear now. And talk about how the car industry has influenced food and vice versa. In your book, you talk a lot about how much time we spend eating in and around our vehicles. I can’t get a number for that.

David Page: You know, it’s funny. NHTSA has everything. I did specifically because we were going to chat.

I chased down some stats and what I find fascinating is that my generation, the boomers, Spend the most time eating in cars and quite counterintuitively, Millennials and Gen Z spend less. I would have assumed that [00:09:00] especially coming out of the pandemic, the number would be up. There’s a difference between getting food with a car and eating in a car because an analyst was telling me just a couple of days ago that if you add up quick service restaurants, Takeout, drive thru, all forms of obtaining food.

82 percent of restaurant meals are now takeout one way or another, which is a stunning number when you think about it. There’s another statistic. Half of the time that people leave their house or hotel or wherever they’re staying, 50 percent of the time, they anticipate that food will be part of the journey.

So, the ability to drive to food has been with us for a long time. I mean, look, when cars first came out, there was no thought of driving and eating at the same time because These did not have Rolls Royce like suspensions, but there was an assumption that the car [00:10:00] and the opportunity to eat would be intertwined.

Early cars came with picnic baskets or other similar extras, if you will, that made it possible to pack your food and take it with you. In maybe the forties or fifties, you started to see rudimentary forms of cup holders. I wouldn’t go flying down the highway with them because they were mostly small indentations in the glove box cover.

When it was open, it was in the eighties that. We went bananas, the Chrysler Corporation brought out the first minivan and it had cupholders. And suddenly we were into this era of, I don’t mean this to sound sexist, but it was a term that was used, soccer moms. And everybody’s family having a van, and it became essential to have a cupholder.

At one point, there was a van that had 19 of them, and incredibly, there is a Subaru out [00:11:00] today that has 19 of them.

Crew Chief Eric: It’s funny you bring that up because on the other side of the pond it took the Germans forever to adopt cupholders in their vehicles because of the restrictive rules of the Autobahn. Those

David Page: rules simply mirrored public taste.

I lived in Germany for several years. While I was there, I owned a Maserati B Turbo, which is derided by many these days as a crappy car, but God knows I loved it on the Autobahn. And they just have a different view toward the civilian professionalism required of driving. First of all, it’s much harder to get a license there.

Many American military parents actually send their kids home to get a license in the U. S. that is then recognized in Germany. But they’re serious about, you don’t mess around on the road. That includes first aid, all sorts of stuff. To get licensed. I know when I was working for NBC and the Frankfurt Bureau, we had a couple of regular drivers when we were doing stories in Germany, and these guys had the biggest Mercedes [00:12:00] possible and they drove it at 9, 000 miles an hour, but it was with both hands on the wheel.

And this was taken seriously even today. I mean, I have a Mercedes SUV and it has real cupholders, but the car I had before this was a SLK 55 AMG. And the cupholders in that kind of spit in your face and said, you Americans want to drink in your cars, try using this, and you had to pull this thing out in front of the central air conditioning vents, and then a.

Thing dropped down and you could put your cup in it, but it was like a reminder that if you’re gonna do this, you’re a moron. So no, I felt a very Germanic sense of disrespect when I was driving that car, which was a great car, real fast, no brakes. Now, let me back up one second to talk about why we ended up with cup holders in cars or why we ended up eating in cars.

That was [00:13:00] thanks to the changes in American society that followed World War II. After World War II, for white Americans, this did not apply to minorities. I mean, blacks were not included in the benefits of the GI Bill. But for white Americans after World War II, this was Katy bar the door. Everyone seemed to have a ton of money.

We had won. We were great. Everything was possible. Science was the future. Among other things, under Eisenhower, we started to build interstate highways, and that facilitated something called a suburb. People started leaving The urban areas because they could afford cars and the American dream was now outside of the center city, which resulted in people commuting to and from work, and that fostered a growing dependence on the drive in or the drive through, and it all escalated from there.

[00:14:00] But it was the move to suburbia. That put us in our cars for all of those hours and while you’re in a car you might as well eat.

Crew Chief Eric: As the interstate highways increased and parking is also part of this equation too, how that’s changed and evolved. Cities versus urban sprawl versus suburbia and things like that.

In the older days, the cities, people would walk to restaurants. Like you can still see a lot of those old downtowns where you walk up to a diner or dive or whatever. My

David Page: daughter lives in New York City. We walk to restaurants.

Crew Chief Eric: Exactly. Would you say the turning point was really the real estate game that Ray Kroc was playing with McDonald’s and how that introduced these larger parking lots, people driving through, driving in, as you were describing?

David Page: To some extent, I mean, look, Ray Kroc didn’t invent fast food. That was done by the folks at White Castle back in the late mid twenties. But yes, Ray Kroc figured out how to take the concept broad. And what it took to get [00:15:00] there, and you’re right in referring to it as real estate because McDonald’s makes, as I understand it, most of their money from renting the land they bought to the operator of the restaurant.

And yes, the ability to park, the ability to drive through, although it’s interesting because initially drive in was not a drive through. It was a place you drove to and then sat in your car with a tray on the window, eating and drinking, sort of like American graffiti. The concept of driving through took a while to catch on, and it continues to grow every year.

The pandemic had a lot to do with increasing the degree to which we are comfortable doing that. And broadening the restaurants from which we get our food that are now willing to fulfill that need. But yeah, I mean, it was Ray Kroc. I’ll give you that.

Don Weberg: I live in Texas now. I was born and raised in Los Angeles.

You talk about urban sprawl and the [00:16:00] highway system. That all started right there in California. There’s a town in New Mexico, and it still has its original McDonald’s. They were the first drive through in at least all of New Mexico. I don’t think the U. S. Relevant. Yeah. And the whole reason for it was they were losing sales.

And how were they losing sales? Well, the town is supported by a military base. And the rules of the military base are you can leave the base in your car, but you can’t get out of your car if you’re in uniform. So if you want to eat. You can’t go into McDonald’s. So McDonald’s responded to that by building the drive thru.

That way the men and women in uniform, they could go through a drive thru, pick up some food, and they’re on their way.

David Page: You know, it’s interesting. Texas arguably had the first drive in.

Don Weberg: Is that right?

David Page: Yeah, the pig stand barbecue and hamburger restaurant of which I think maybe I’m wrong. I don’t know if there are any left.

It was generally credited as the first drive in, I believe.

Crew Chief Eric: We’ve talked already throwing out a lot more than [00:17:00] just the triple D’s. There’s other ones out there too, but for the audience, what’s the difference between a diner, a drive in and a dive?

David Page: Well, I kind of have to retroactively define it. Cause as I said, I pulled the name out of my, you know, what being serious about it, a diner historically is a privately owned restaurant with a massive menu that does legit home cooking quickly.

and cheaply. A drive in is McDonald’s, the pig stand, any bunch of places that are in anyone’s town growing up where you drive the car there and you can eat sitting in the car in front of the restaurant. A dive is where you go when you’re drunk and you need grease. So that’s the definitional difference.

Crew Chief Eric: Let’s switch into another section I’m going to call delivery Or

David Page: DiGiorno, so

Crew Chief Eric: as cars changed, got bigger, evolved, added things [00:18:00] like cup holders, other amenities, probably even changed the design of their door cards and their door frames to accommodate for the drive ins and things like that. They also gave rise, thanks to two big fast food chains, which were Pizza Hut and Domino’s to this concept of delivery.

Now we have things like DoorDash and whatever. But we can also begin to talk about the evolution, as we like to call this, the introduction of EV cars into this whole concept of delivery.

David Page: First of all, delivery was not invented by Pizza Hut and Domino’s. They’re the ones who took it. And I’m trying to remember who was first.

I think it was Domino’s. But. There were independent pizzerias doing delivery. It was whichever of these chains came up with it first and then the other followed that turned it into a nationwide expectation. From there it grew. Chinese food being deliverable, although that actually started in urban settings where a car wasn’t involved.

It was more likely a bicycle. But yeah, we [00:19:00] came to expect delivery, although we associated it for the longest time with second rate food. With all due respect to people who’ll tell you that Domino’s or Pizza Hut are food, they’re not. They’re some sort of polymer from Mars. Increasingly, as the need arose specifically around the pandemic, the concept of good food being delivered kind of invented itself.

And nothing happens overnight. There were delivery options throughout the years. I guess DoorDash and Uber Eats and such may have existed before the pandemic. Probably not Uber Eats, but probably DoorDash. Anyway, it was the pandemic that basically… took higher end food and made it deliverable. Is that good?

I guess. If you’re going to eat good food and you don’t want to cook it, I guess that’s fine. I mean, you pay a price for delivery. It doesn’t appear to be going [00:20:00] down, but we are as a society, especially after the pandemic, into a sense of affordable luxury. It’s like, I can’t redo the kitchen, so I’ll get a granite countertop on the island.

People want a sense of pampering themselves. Uh, I’m preparing a speech to the. Regional Convention of the International Council of Shopping Centers. Hey, they booked me. So I’ve been looking into some of the statistics around delivery and food. And one thing I found in my research is analysts are now saying that when it comes to retail, food is the new apparel.

Consumers are cutting back on things like clothing, but want to pamper themselves with a feeling that they’re enjoying elevated food.

Don Weberg: There’s a Richard Gere movie out there, and I’ll be darned if I can remember what the title is.

David Page: I’m sure the title was, I’m really good looking and women love me.

Don Weberg: Don’t forget, I’ve never met a mirror I didn’t love.[00:21:00]

David Page: Well, there’s that too.

Don Weberg: He’s a better

David Page: actor than you give him credit for, but anyway, you were mentioning a Richard Gere movie.

Don Weberg: The quote that he used in the movie, and it’s always stuck with me, was, food is the only art that nourishes. And I’ve always loved that quote, food is the only art that nourishes.

And if you think about that, it’s kind of true. And it goes a little bit hand in hand with what you’re saying that people want to treat themselves these days to me. And maybe I’m wrong. I just kind of want to get your thoughts on this COVID really turbocharged. Those food delivery services. Yes. And I think in a way because we couldn’t go out We couldn’t go to a restaurant.

We couldn’t go wherever so we had to have it brought in It’s become one of those luxuries that is now Much more of a necessity

David Page: it allows you to perceive it as luxury and by the way The same is true of cars for people who like cars Sliding into a Porsche, or when I had that much dried Maserati, given the change in exchange rates I bought [00:22:00] used and sold used for the same 12, 000 American,

Don Weberg: it felt

David Page: good.

There was some real wood, there was some leather. Unlike EVs, when I stepped on the gas, I heard a roar. It made me feel good. And again, I spent 12 grand on that car. I didn’t spend a hundred and whatever. There are things that nurture the soul. Now, not everybody gives a damn about cars. There are people who just couldn’t care less and that’s okay.

But look, my first car was, no, my second, my first car was a 67 Comet convertible. My second car was a Camaro. And when I smashed it up, my third car was a Camaro. I’ve always been a Camaro guy, not a Mustang guy, because Mustangs were Comets, and Camaros at least had something going for them. But they made me happy.

It’s what do you want to be surrounded by? What can you add to your life at a reasonable price that makes it… In your view, [00:23:00] better food does a lot of that cars do it. For some people, it’s interior design. For some people, it’s a hike in the woods. It’s whatever generates some dopamine.

Crew Chief Eric: We sometimes make light of the progress that’s being made on this new technology of cars and how it’s going to become like Johnny cab, and they’re going to be faceless, nameless personless vehicles.

Companies like Amazon and others have already experimented with drone delivery and things like that. And now you’re seeing that Domino’s, they’re publicly commercializing the fact that they have EVs in their fleet. They’ve got their own cars. It’s no longer, you know, a high school kid with his mom’s Honda Civic delivering your pizza.

They’re in a Chevy Bolt. How is that going to change the restaurant business as they get deeper into EVs, self driving cars, maybe even potentially autonomous vehicles? Do you see that having an impact on the restaurant business?

David Page: I don’t believe many restaurant owners operating on a 5 percent margin are going to risk the [00:24:00] insurance payments for autonomous delivery.

It’s going to be 20 years at least before America trusts autonomous cars. As for EVs, it’s just the next step. The thing that’s holding that back from broad acceptance nationally is lack of charging stations. I guess if I’m a restaurant, I can afford my own charging station for my own fleet. That’ll continue to grow, especially given the fact that delivery is, you know, you’re not going 400 miles, but I assume you could charge an EV, give your delivery driver the keys.

He’s out for the entire evening. He comes back, puts it back on charge, and it’s ready to go tomorrow morning. That seems to me, one of the most reasonable applications for electric vehicles. It’s going to be harder that on the way from here to visit some friends in Michigan, until I’m comfortable that I can really recharge the battery and that I don’t lose an hour of travel time.

When I do, I’d love [00:25:00] to have an electric car, but I’m not ready yet. It’s not consumer friendly enough in my view.

Crew Chief Eric: Well, we’re going to put a pin in that thought and unpack it as we move along here. I don’t remember which restaurant chain it is, but they’re also positioning, you know, be a superhero, come and do takeout again, come pick up your own foods.

We’ll pay you to not have to deliver it. Right. But we’re still putting cars on the road one way or the other. Oh yeah.

David Page: No, that’s not going to change. Look. The carbon footprint of pickup and delivery, I haven’t seen a number for it, but I’m sure it’s pretty big. Then again, just to be contrarian, nobody has told me what the carbon footprint of making batteries for electric cars is or generating the electricity that those batteries hold.

So I’m not convinced that the savings are as great as anyone claims them to be. Theoretically, I guess electric cars are better. And since that’s where we’re going, that’s where we’re going.

Crew Chief Eric: And I’m glad you brought that up because it’s been something that was top of mind even after reading your book, which was the environmental [00:26:00] impact of takeout and delivery.

And it’s part of the equation that we really haven’t looked at. And we talk about the environmental impact of a lot of other things and how we should be doing more mass transit, but when it comes to food, there just seems to be this exception to the rule. Well, yeah, but there’s also an exception to the rule going to work.

David Page: I mean, there are certain parts of life where. In the public mind, the downsides are put in the closet because that’s just how we do things. With all due respect to the governments of Southern California, you’re not going to get in the short term a whole lot of Angelitos. To try taking the bus. It’s just not in their DNA and the city isn’t set up for it.

There are similar problems in the New York area. Robert Moses, who was in charge of building virtually everything for a very long time, was a noted racist. And built the center medians on the [00:27:00] suburban New York parkways to be too narrow to fit mass transit because he didn’t want minority populations finding an easy way to commute from the suburbs.

It’s always something.

Crew Chief Eric: So you touched on this before how the interstate highway system post World War II, the Eisenhower network of roads changed food, right? It opened us up. We could go to other cities and other towns and other places to experience the culinary diversity that’s out there. You could take barbecue as you talk about a lot in the book, and it’s just geographically different depending on where you are, what the taste is going to be like, things like that.

So the interstate highway system opened that up. If you’re going to take a road trip, what are the top five places to drive through and have a fantastic meal?

David Page: Those are not necessarily the same thing. I’m going to tell you places you want to go. You got to go to Maine for lobster as it should be consumed.

On the way back down the coast, you have to go to [00:28:00] Massachusetts to Ipswich for whole bellied fried clams, which are not clam strips. When you continue south, you need to go to the Carolinas for whole hog barbecue. You then need to go to New Orleans for every single damn thing that they sell. Then you’ve gotta head way north to Chicago for Italian beef.

And Polish sausages served at a place called Mr. Beef, which was the restaurant that they ripped off for the show, the bear. And which used to be just down the street from the merchandise Mart. It’s still there. NBC left the Mart, but when I was at the NBC bureau there, the bureau lunch every now and then it’d be to walk down the street to Mr.

Beef, sit on the pigeon shit covered tables outside and chow down. Let’s see. How far have I gotten? I’ve gotten to Chicago. I would zigzag back down to New Mexico [00:29:00] for anything involving green chilies, probably a green chili cheeseburger, into Texas for Central Texas brisket barbecue, over to L. A. for Mexican American street food, And then up to Seattle for anything involving salmon, and then I’d rest.

That’s David’s one

Crew Chief Eric: lap of America right there, you like that?

David Page: What the hell, why not? And I’ve missed, you know, 90 percent of all the good places, but…

Crew Chief Eric: True, and there’s a lot of them, and there’s plenty of awesome drives and foods to experience out there, and it’s kind of funny… Don and I were recently out in Monterey for car week and talk about an area of the world where food is everywhere.

And the drives are amazing. The same can be said up in the canyons of LA and Malibu and Santa Monica.

David Page: If you’re going to drive a Pacific coast highway, then get yourself up to Santa Barbara for some tri tip barbecuing. The only other place that I know of that uses that particular cut of [00:30:00] meat is Argentina.

Of course, in Santa Barbara, they put it on this. Wood fired barbecue where they literally they have a wheel and they control the temperature by moving the food up and down in terms of its proximity to the fire. It’s not barbecue. Barbecue is not grilling. They call it barbecue. It’s grilling. Barbecue is really low and slow over indirect heat.

Except when it’s not like at the rendezvous in Memphis, where they cook their celebrated ribs directly over the heat in a converted coal chute. Every rule is meant to be broken, but there you go.

Crew Chief Eric: And I’m glad you brought up tri tip because that was one of the things we were talking about while we were out there.

And I was telling Don, I’m so excited to go to the track for the Monterey Historics. And he’s like, oh yeah, you just want to see old race cars. It’s like, no, you don’t understand. I can get one of the best tri tip sandwiches at the racetrack. And I’m looking forward to that probably more than anything. And he was just kind of put his head in his hands in disbelief.

Yeah, no, it’s a cut that doesn’t [00:31:00] exist in the rest of the country. Getting back to our discussion about cars and food and how cars have changed in this and that. And, you know, we were talking about drive thrus earlier, and I’ve noticed as the drive thrus have been remodeled. Dimensionally, they have changed to accommodate the fact that the best selling vehicle in North America is the Ford F 150 and me and my lowly Volkswagen have to reach up through the window to get my takeout.

David Page: Yeah. You’ll also notice that the newer architectural models of quick service restaurants include many more drive thru lanes. And many of these companies have now come out with models that only have drive thrus and convenience stores. Which are making a big play to beat the QSRs at their own game are now starting drive thrus.

Wawa, the famous chain here in, in Jersey, apparently is planning to open a place in Florida, not that far from Tampa, that is drive thru only for food. May not be only, but it’s intended to sell food and they will have a [00:32:00] drive thru. What they will not have.

Crew Chief Eric: There was something very entertaining in the book.

David Page: Well, thank you.

Crew Chief Eric: Well, there were many things entertaining in the book. At least one. That one part. There was something I picked up in the book, and it’s on page 111 for anybody that’s reading it. And you talk about…

David Page: Hold on. Page 111, you said?

Crew Chief Eric: You referenced foods that are ideal for eating in the car, and you made reference to the bagel being one of the best grab and go foods for a car because it has no crumble.

So is that the only food that really doesn’t make a mess while you’re eating, or are there other things that you would consider eating in your car?

David Page: There’s extremes. The food that is ostensibly eaten in the car… That, in my view, is impossible to eat in the car, is In N Out burger, double double animal style.

It’s a double cheeseburger, two patties, two slices of cheese, covered with [00:33:00] basically chopped lettuce and some version of Russian dressing, in an insane amount. And there is no way to bite into that without wearing it. On the other hand, it may be on a given day, the greatest single food item on earth. When I was last out in California shooting, we went to In N Out Burger four nights in a row and ate sitting on the hood of the car.

And we didn’t mind sitting on the hood cause it was a rental car. And if we dented it, you know, the hardest one to eat is in terms of quick services, Taco Bell. Cause that garbage just falls all over the place. The bagels good, a donut’s good. Anything substantial is fine. The bacon, egg, and cheese that is a staple here in Jersey.

I mean, in New York, it’s a staple, but you eat it walking down the street. The bacon, egg, and cheese is perfect for a car. If you get up with a good, strong Kaiser roll, you need something to hold onto that won’t fall [00:34:00] apart. And you have to be careful with how much ketchup you put on a bacon, egg, and cheese, because that’s where you nail yourself.

You can’t eat something like a scone. Cause it’s just all over the place. You can’t eat something that involves chili cause it’s all over the place. Now you can do what I do, which is to drive with my wife and the other seat. And she’s in charge of like taking the bacon, egg and cheese out and taking a half of it and putting the wax paper around it and giving it to me.

At which point. I immediately discard the wax paper and the ketchup falls on my shirt, but an attempt was made.

Don Weberg: So she’s the pro when it comes to eating in the car, sounds like.

David Page: My wife is the pro in terms of everything.

Don Weberg: Ah, just ask her.

David Page: I’ve been married for 30 years and she’s in the kitchen listening to this, so.

Oh, she just said it, I am not. Okay.

Crew Chief Eric: Well, the inverse of that question. Let’s look at the best car to eat food in. It probably isn’t the Maserati B Turbo. It’s probably not a 911, but it [00:35:00] also can’t be a van or a limousine. So in your opinion, are there cars you’re like, man, this is a great place to eat a sandwich.

David Page: The great car for eating in is we have a Mercedes GLE 350. It’s the larger two seat, two bench SUV. It’s a perfect road trip car. It’s fast, it’s comfortable, it’s got good cup holders and the console in the middle is big enough that if you’re on your own, you know, it’s got the two doors that open on top of the console.

You can actually put like fries in there and the burger next to the gear shift on the console. And you got a pretty self sufficient eating environment.

Crew Chief Eric: Is there a favorite road trip car that isn’t the Mercedes? Something you really like.

David Page: I hate to say this, but I’m in love with that Mercedes. I mean, we bought it off lease.

It was the first year that they came out with the supposed one piece big infotainment screen. It’s a great car. When I had the AMG. That was a great car for making time and it was comfortable, but [00:36:00] now for me, a road trip, if it involves other people, you need room, you need to be able to keep supplies in the back, you know, extra water and stuff.

Crew Chief Eric: And napkins.

David Page: No napkins go in the console and in the, uh, well actually in the, to the left in the door pocket, you can keep napkins and hand sanitizer for when it’s all a little too much. The best car for a road trip is anything you rented, because every wrapper goes in the back seat. If you really want to do an Animal House style road trip, you go to Wawa, you buy all this garbage, and then, you know, you just unload it behind you as you go.

In fact, for the next book, I spoke to the guy who owns a company that manufactures packaging. For products sold at convenience stores, the package is a plastic cup shaped item that fits in the cup holder. And you can fill it with nuts or M& Ms, different companies do different [00:37:00] things. But he makes packaging specifically for non liquids to go in the cup holder.

Crew Chief Eric: See, Don, David hit on it. I’ve been saying forever, no one aspires to own a rental car. Oh, God, no. I’ve always wondered who buys a car from Hertz. Well, David, you mentioned something earlier that I wanted to expand upon, and I said we were going to put a pin in it. Now it’s time to pull that pin out of the corkboard and talk about places like Wawa, Royal Farms, and Sheetz.

You made mention about these convenience stores kind of becoming restaurants, destinations to be, and this actually ties back into the conversation of EVs as well, because to your overarching point, if I got to sit around for an hour, I need to find something to do for that hour. So why not go to what used to be a service station, hang out there, get a meal.

Let’s talk about how those locations, which weren’t originally associated with Hey, let’s go to Sheetz for dinner. Now are these sort of meccas, these places you do want to spend more time and how they’ve changed the [00:38:00] quality of their foods.

David Page: I think you mentioned in an email that Sheetz has seating. Most of the convenience stores still do not.

I don’t know about Casey’s, which is famous for their pizza. In the Midwest, they may have seating, but that is the next step that is still not really being discussed by most of the convenience stores. They’re busy right now trying to convince you that their food is as good or better than McDonald’s. And they’re doing a pretty good job of it.

I mean, while you get mashed potatoes, if you want mashed potatoes, they just announced a big pizza program. They’re retrofitting 900 locations to start with pizza ovens. So yeah, they are vastly expanding their place. In the food convenience universe, and they are taking potential sales from grocery stores who are also at this point becoming more and more what’s called a gross salon, where [00:39:00] they’re selling prepared food.

And in some cases you can eat it there. I can’t predict. I’ve read nothing about competitors to sheets adding seating, but it would not surprise me. I mean, it’s obviously the next place to go.

Crew Chief Eric: And I pick on them only because where I live, I’m very fortunate that I have all three within close proximity of one another.

So it’s very easy to do a case study and compare. Well, all three, you

David Page: have sheets and who else?

Crew Chief Eric: ROFO and Wawa within a couple of miles of each other. Okay. And who’s got better food? There’s the dilemma. You go to ROFO because you want the chicken. And you go to Wawa because you want that breakfast sandwich or that sub or whatever you’re looking for because Wawa’s got that delicatessen almost style to it sometimes.

Or you want that, you know, turkey dinner wrapped in bread they serve. But Sheetz is sort of like, to your point, it’s like a grocery. I go in there. It’s got the cold case. It’s got shelf stable stuff. It’s got non perishables. It’s got a little like mini ice cream parlor. It’s got almost like a mini Starbucks in it.

It’s got all these [00:40:00] options. And as my kids like to joke, it’s the place I can fill up my car and fill up my belly on a whim. And I’m not locked into, well, I only serve chicken. I got all these options. If I want a chicken sandwich or I want sliders or I want a salad, I just go to the touch screen and it’s MTO, right?

Made to order.

David Page: Yeah, it’s made to order to the extent that a bunch of pre prepared ingredients are put together. I mean, there’s a lot of microwave usage at all these places. Oh yeah.

Crew Chief Eric: Oh yeah.

David Page: But you know, it’s like Casey’s famous for their pizza. It’s not like they’re making the dough on side.

Don Weberg: No, but David, they warmed it up just for you.

David Page: Well, let’s say, hey, listen, the big thing in the bagel world is something called par baked bagels. Go into your local bagel shop and you smell the wonderful smell of fresh baked bagels coming out of the oven. Well, they were 90 percent baked. At a manufacturer and then they were frozen and sent to Bob’s store and Bob put him in his [00:41:00] normal oven.

You know, he didn’t have to boil the bagels. He just heats them up and you have them. They’re not bad. They’re better than lenders, which owns much of the retail bagel market. Although the number one seller of bagels in America is still Dunkin Donuts.

Crew Chief Eric: Surprisingly enough.

David Page: Well, hey.

Crew Chief Eric: But where I’m going with all this is.

I feel that sheets is taking a step in a direction that maybe others will follow. And you’re to your point, it’s not McDonald’s or Wendy’s chick fil a or whatever, it’s somewhere in the middle between your fast casuals, your Panera’s and your blaze pizzas and stuff like that. And I’m not sure there’s a category for what they are yet, but I do like the grosser on kind of idea you’ve got going on there.

David Page: However, understand something from a financial standpoint, the ability to sell food attracts customers. And increases sales per square foot. When you start dealing with additional real estate costs for what is in essence, dead space for people to sit there [00:42:00] and eat when let’s face it, you’re not offering them the most conducive environment.

I’m not smart enough to know where the graph lines cross there.

Crew Chief Eric: Having visited European countries and you spent some time over there yourself. They have these concepts of these rest stops. Like we do on the New Jersey turnpike is famous for all the rest.

David Page: No, you’re the, the auto strata restaurants in Italy are the best.

Exactly.

Crew Chief Eric: The outdoor grills on the auto strata are fantastic. Go in there and chefs. And it’s like a restaurant and you sit down, you bring up your tray. I’m not worried that my Tesla is outside charging for the next hour because I’m having a home cooked meal while I’m at the gas station, right? So I’m wondering if we’re going to eventually catch up, somebody will step out from a Sheetz or a Rofo or a Wawa and say, we’re going to do what the Autogrill does.

And I saw those even this year, when I went over for Le Mans, a lot more of those types of things were popping up in France and in Denmark and other places in Europe, modeling that Italian style of that roadside turnpike [00:43:00] side restaurant.

David Page: And I guess you’re predicating this on having to recharge your EV.

So, this isn’t going to matter until there are enough EVs that you’re going to get enough of a customer base from those recharging them to justify the expense. Secondarily, unlike Europeans, we constantly want to get where we’re going. I don’t know how many people on a road trip, if you’re me, you’re calculating how many of the 12 hours you can do in 10.

How many of those people are going to say, well, I got good momentum here. Let’s just sit down and have a leisurely meal when you can drive through and then throw the wrappers at your kid in the back. And again, so much of this is predicated on guessing human behavior. I don’t know again, at what point those two lines cross, if I have to recharge my Tesla.

Crew Chief Eric: We could maybe agree that it’s going to change. The [00:44:00] way we think about food because our travel is going to change. If the market saturation of EVs continues to climb the way it’s been doing.

David Page: Call me when that happens. No, I, you know, I don’t want to be negative, but I don’t know as someone who’s been immersed in the food world for quite a while.

How important that quality of food is going to be to folks on a road trip, for the most part, throughout the American population?

Crew Chief Eric: Well, I guess we’ll have to find out. Nobody knows the answer. I guess we will. I would personally like to see it elevate itself, because if I am going to sit there for an hour, I want more than just a burger, maybe, to choose from, right?

David Page: Yeah, but I don’t want to sit there for an hour, so by the time I get an EV, it’s going to have the kind of range I need. That’s true. And I can get where I’m going. Without having to sit for an hour, because until I don’t have to sit for an hour, the EV is not for the average American. They’re forcing us there in terms of legislation.

And I do see more and more charging stations popping up. What I would [00:45:00] not be comfortable on a long road trip having to worry about where the next charging station is.

Don Weberg: Now, interestingly, you guys are both talking about how great Europe is. Because they’ve got all these wonderful restaurants on the side of the road.

They have Chef Pierre over there going to create you a croissant. He’s going to do something wonderful. And yet, flip side of the coin, both of you are lamenting on, I don’t think I want to spend an hour waiting for this. So are the European places quicker? Are they more efficient than we are here in America?

I’ve only been to restaurants on the auto

David Page: strata for some reason. I don’t recall restaurants on the autobahn. They were like cafeterias in that they were still quick serve restaurants. You could get in and out in 20 minutes if you wanted to scarf it down, but it was a higher quality of food unquestionably.

Don Weberg: What you’re kind of describing is interesting to me because living in LA. Family in Las Vegas. We were hitting that 15, four to five times a year. At one point, [00:46:00] one day we’re driving along up there and we noticed a new place being built. No wonder what that is. Two months later, we’re driving back to Vegas and there it is.

It’s built. So we got to stop. We got to see what this is all about. Giant, huge ice cream is standing off the side of the road. And it says. Eddie world. Have you heard of this place? No, Eddie world within what is this? We got to go see this place. So we pull off the road and there they are bank upon bank upon bank of car chargers right to the side of them.

Of course is fuel fill up stations. Not only do they have that, but they have the spray bottles so you can clean your windows properly. They have the lavender scent. They have the orange scent. You can spray those in your car to get rid of the scent of road trip that we all love. You go inside. There are seven or eight different eateries in there, and each one of them is independent.

It’s not like they’re all owned by Eddie World, they are independently operated. And what’s interesting is what you guys are saying about the Europeans. I’m sitting here thinking that’s what Eddie World is doing. They have these different little eateries where you [00:47:00] can go. The food is not bad. Granted, it’s not the best, but it’s not bad.

Where their hook is. And I think anybody listening will appreciate this. Cleanest bathrooms on Highway 15. Cleaner than Bucky’s? Ah, let me get to that. Okay, so Eddie World literally has a staff. And this staff, the whole job is bathroom attendant. They literally switch from side to side. You have two men’s room, two women’s room.

They’re cleaning one, then they’re cleaning the other, cleaning one, cleaning the other. And they go back and forth. It’s like painting the Golden Gate Bridge. You go down one side, You flip over, you go down the other, you come back, you go, you just keep doing it and you keep it clean. It works really, really well.

Now, Eric brought up Bucky’s. So we have that here in Texas. It was the first time I’d ever seen it was when we moved here. It was a really, really similar concept, except. I don’t think they have the dedicated bathroom staff and that just turns me off. But what you have is a huge shopping section there for all kinds of touristy stuff.

A big selection of barbecue or [00:48:00] what you were referring to earlier as kind of frozen foods that become edible later on, thanks to a microwave. And it’s really, really interesting to me to watch this. All of it’s revolving around, boy, my Tesla. My maki, it’s out of juice. I got to plug it in. That’s going to take a little while.

So it goes to your point of, I see a clash coming up. Americans have always prided themselves as being efficient.

David Page: No, we like to say we’re efficient, but it takes us 40 hours a week plus bring and work home to do what the French do in 36 hours.

Don Weberg: This is true, but in serving the world, we’re also serving the motorists of the world, aren’t we?

So it’s interesting to me to listen to you guys, talk about the European way of doing it and thinking to myself, isn’t that wawa isn’t that what they’re kind of doing, it’s just, I guess it’s a quality of food. That’s a little, it’s a quality

David Page: of food issue. The place on the auto Strada is closer to an American diner in that the food is actually cooked there.

That’s all now you can pull off an American highway and go to a diner. And [00:49:00] enjoy the same thing. And you can also be out in 20 minutes. So those places exist and they’re great. Or if you’re going to Vegas, you can pull off 15 at, uh, I think it’s Death Valley and go to the Mad Greek. Oh yeah. That’s an extraordinary restaurant.

They make their gyros from scratch. Yes. It’s not that stupid cone of junk. It’s actual food. We did a piece on them on diners. Now, does the Mad Greek have EV charging stations? I would hope so, because in its day, it was the only tourist attraction on that stretch of desert.

Don Weberg: Yeah, that town is called Baker.

David Page: That’s right. Yeah. And then they have that big thermometer, right?

Don Weberg: Yeah, that’s their big draw. In fact, I don’t know if it’s still for sale or not, but just a few years ago, you could have bought the Baker prison. Damn. I know. You missed your chance, man. You

Crew Chief Eric: know, time is everything.

Don Weberg: It is. It is

Crew Chief Eric: David. You hit on something really important there.

You could go [00:50:00] to that Greek restaurant and kind of go off the beaten path.

David Page: It’s right at an exit,

Crew Chief Eric: but you said, well, maybe they have a charger for me there. And if they don’t, then there’s the dilemma. I want the really good Euro, but I still got to charge my Tesla. No, they’re going to, they’re going to need a charger.

Where I’m going with this is. We are now creating a new type of competition between the restaurant tours and let’s say a sheets or a rofo or a Bucky’s or whatever, where it didn’t really exist before everybody knew their place in the pecking order. You went to the gas station to get gas and you went to the restaurant to go eat, but now when the gas station becomes the restaurant, how much business in turn are these restaurants going to lose?

And when do they start becoming filling stations?

David Page: It’s a massive battle and it’s underway at a very high level right now. I mean, the pressure that convenience stores are putting on traditional quick service restaurants is immense and the restaurants are pushing back saying they have dishes you can’t get elsewhere, but no, it’s the pressure on QSRs is [00:51:00] substantial.

Crew Chief Eric: And there’s also another battle in there, which always goes back to something we talked about earlier, parking. Yes. Because the service stations are designed to handle more people at a quicker rate of time, all those kinds of things, versus the restaurant that parking is designed by occupancy, right? The number of people they can seat and feed and all that kind of stuff.

So now you’ve got a Buc ee’s that they look like a Home Depot. I mean, they’re just huge. They can replace and accommodate a lot of the truck stops. They can replace and accommodate a lot of other locations you go to. It’s sort of one stop shopping, the Home Depot of service and food in that respect. So how does the restaurant compete?

How do they adapt? How do they adjust to this, as you said, forcible change in the automotive industry?

David Page: There’s only two ways to compete. One, unique offerings and two, price. It’s a tight vice to be squeezed in the good news is the degree to which we like to drive through stuff. That’s not going to go away where they’re really hurting.

These days is the number of people working from home [00:52:00] because that’s killing their breakfast business, which is one analyst pointed out to me whenever a quick service restaurant chain. Is in trouble, they improve breakfast and they make a big deal about breakfast because that was pretty easy to pick folks off.

You know, you’re going to travel in the morning. Anyway, you’re going to want a cup of coffee. Now we’re giving you this breakfast sandwich filled with gold. Come get that. They’ve lost that. Frankly, it’s tough. In some respects, the future belongs to the convenience stores. They’ve got the opportunity because they’re kind of bare bones versions of what they can be.

And they have just started to be that. But again, it comes down to something I’m not qualified to assess, which is the cost of real estate versus the income you’re going to get from your food selections.

Crew Chief Eric: Well, either way, this is actually a great segue into talking about your book, Food Americana, where you don’t, you don’t talk about gas stations and this type of stuff that we’re expanding upon [00:53:00] here, but let’s tell the listeners what Food Americana is about, why you wrote it and where they can get it.

It’s

David Page: my attempt to answer the question, is there an American cuisine? I spent a long time living in Europe, working in Europe, Africa, and the Middle East. The perception of American cuisine is to a great extent what we’ve exported, which is fast food. In fact, we have created a cuisine of our own, much as many of us like to think of the country as an ethnic melting pot.

We have taken from various immigrant groups who came to the country, we have absorbed some of their cuisine and modified it. A, because ingredients are not available or, or technology is different, pizza ovens here were different than pizza ovens in Naples. And also because of our own tastes, Mexican American food was downspiced from its original so that more Americans would [00:54:00] eat it.

We’ve gotten to the point now where certain Cuisines are as American as could be, despite their origin. For example, I posit that sushi is now an American food. Is it the same sushi as is served for the most part in Japan? Of course not. It’s our version of it. And, you know, people want to say, well, I ate at that Chinese restaurant, it’s not authentic.

Well, it may not be what they’re serving in China today, which, by the way, one of the most popular dishes in China today is scrambled eggs and tomatoes. But even if it’s not authentic to what’s served in China today, it is authentic Chinese American food that evolved from the dishes first brought here by Chinese men in Canton who came here to pan for gold during the California gold rush.

And we’re accompanied by restaurateurs who pretty quickly figured out that Americans were not fond of entrails. So [00:55:00] chop suey ended up being made, not with awful, but with pork, chicken, or beef, to that extent, I don’t think Thai food is part of American cuisine. Cause it’s not something available everywhere that on a given day, it’s absolutely one of the things you consider having when you go to lunch.

I don’t think Vietnamese food is, despite great attempts to make Americans fall in love with it. Peruvian food is not. Chinese is. Mexican is. Pizza certainly is. And of course, hamburgers, which were German when they first came over here. It’s what we take and then what we do with it. And by the way, when I say Absorbing the cuisines of other countries and cultures, that includes Native Americans, who taught the settlers, among other things, what to do with shellfish.

No Brit who had just arrived here by boat wanted to eat a lobster. But when there’s nothing else available, you eat a lobster. Once the Native Americans taught you to dig a hole, start a fire, when [00:56:00] you’ve got embers, throw the lobster in, cover it up, and then come back, which is the same technique used in a New England clam bake to this day.

Crew Chief Eric: I read the book. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

David Page: Well, thank you.

Crew Chief Eric: It’s full of fascinating facts, details, anecdotes, and it’s a good one lap of America, especially when it comes to just like you described earlier. So I can’t recommend it enough to people to pick up a copy of Food Americana and read it for themselves.

And you hinted there’s a second, I have

David Page: another book in the works that is tentatively titled Eating While Standing. It’s all the ways we eat. Including convenience stores, and food trucks, and hot dog carts, and the state fair, and the amusement park. I’ve been working on that for a while, and, uh, that’s next in the shoot.

Crew Chief Eric: Well, I am looking forward to reading that when it comes out.

David Page: Let me get a plug in for Food Americana. The best place to get it is Amazon. I mean, you can get it pretty 12 or 15 copies, since I’m still paying for my daughter’s MFA. Um… [00:57:00] Ha, ha, ha.

Crew Chief Eric: Well, David, we have reached that part of the episode where I get to ask you our final question, which is any shout outs, promotions, or anything else you’d like to share that we haven’t covered thus far.

David Page: Yeah. You got to check your local radio stations, but I do a syndicated radio show called martini music, which is all about the music of the thirties, forties, and into the fifties. You got to see if it’s carried in your market, but I’m very proud of that. And number two, did I mention, I just. Paid for seven years of my daughter to get an MFA that I mentioned, it was at Columbia University cause I didn’t want to die with any money.

So go to Amazon and buy 30 or 40 copies of Food Americana.

Don Weberg: So about that Maserati, huh?

David Page had pursued his passion both personally and professionally, creating diners, drive ins, and dives, and hands on [00:58:00] producing, its first 11 seasons took him deep into the world of American food. Its vast variations, its history, its evolution, and especially the dedicated cooks and chefs It’s those experiences, that education and the discovery of little known stories and facts that led David to dig even deeper and tie the strands together in his new book, Food Americana.

To learn more about David Page, you can follow him on Facebook at David. Page. 1840.

On Twitter, At page prod on Instagram at Food Americana. And don’t forget to pick up a copy of Food Americana at your local bookstore or on Amazon today.

Crew Chief Eric: Well, David, I can’t thank you enough for coming on break fix. I love how your book reflects your speaking and for the listeners that have been through this ride with us, just like this episode, the book is knowledgeable, it’s [00:59:00] humorous, and often with this touch of sarcasm.

This has really been an entertaining and delightful and enlightening episode. So thank you for spending your evening with us and discussing food and cars.

David Page: Well, you guys are great. It was a pleasure to be here. You actually know what questions to ask and you actually read the book. So there you go.

Crew Chief Brad: If you like what you’ve heard and want to learn more about GTM, be sure to check us out on www. gtmotorsports. org. You can also find us on Instagram Also, if you want to get involved or have suggestions for future shows, you can call or text us at 202 630 1770 or send us an email at crewchief at gtmotorsports.

org. We’d love to hear from you.

Crew Chief Eric: Hey everybody, Crew Chief Eric here. We really hope you enjoyed this episode of BreakFix, and we wanted to remind you that GTM remains a no annual fees organization, and our goal is to continue to bring you quality [01:00:00] episodes like this one at no charge. As a loyal listener, please consider subscribing to our Patreon for bonus and behind the scenes content, extra goodies, and GTM swag.

For as little as 2 and 50 cents a month, you can keep our developers, writers, editors, casters, and other volunteers fed on their strict diet of fig Newtons, gummy bears, and monster. Consider signing up for Patreon today at www. patreon. com forward slash GT motorsports, and remember without fans, supporters, and members like you.

None of this would be possible.

Highlights

Skip ahead if you must… Here’s the highlights from this episode you might be most interested in and their corresponding time stamps.

00:00 Guest Introduction: David Page
01:58 Creating Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives
04:21 Meeting Guy Fieri
08:05 Food Americana and the Automotive Industry
17:50 Evolution of Food Delivery
25:52 Environmental Impact of Food and Cars
27:39 Top Road Trip Food Destinations
31:31 Drive-Thru Revolution
32:20 Eating in the Car: Best and Worst Foods
34:52 Ideal Cars for Road Trips and Eating
37:20 Convenience Stores as Dining Destinations
43:01 The Future of Roadside Dining with EVs
52:49 Exploring American Cuisine
57:03 Final Thoughts and Promotions

Bonus Content

There's more to this story!

All of our BEHIND THE SCENES (BTS) Break/Fix episodes are raw and unedited, and expressly shared with the permission and consent of our guests.

Some stories are just too good for the main episode… Check out this Behind the Scenes Pit Stop Minisode! Available exclusively on our Patreon.

Learn More

Food Americana: The Remarkable People and Incredible Stories behind America’s Favorite Dishes (Humor, Entertainment, and Pop Culture)

We love how this book reflects David’s story-telling, like in this episode, it’s knowledgeable, humorous and often with a touch of sarcasm!

To learn more about David Page you can follow him on social media @david.page.1840 on facebook, @pageprod on Twitter and @foodamericana on instagram – and don’t forget to pick up a copy of Food Americana at your local book store or on Amazon today!

Page’s book Food Americana dives deep into how cars changed the way Americans eat. Post-WWII suburban expansion, fueled by the interstate highway system and the rise of the “soccer mom” minivan, made cupholders a cultural necessity. Chrysler’s first minivan had them; today, Subaru offers models with 19.

Interestingly, Baby Boomers spend the most time eating in cars – more than Millennials or Gen Z. But while in-car dining may be down, takeout is booming: 82% of restaurant meals are now consumed outside the restaurant, thanks to drive-thrus, delivery apps, and pandemic-era habits.

Fast Food, Real Estate, and the Rise of Drive-Thrus

Ray Kroc didn’t invent fast food (White Castle beat him to it), but he perfected the model – especially the real estate game. McDonald’s profits often come from leasing land to franchisees. Drive-ins evolved into drive-thrus, and necessity drove innovation: one New Mexico McDonald’s built its first drive-thru to serve military personnel who couldn’t leave their cars while in uniform.

Texas, meanwhile, claims the first drive-in: the Pig Stand. And as Page explains, the diner, drive-in, and dive each serve a distinct purpose:

Diner: Privately owned, massive menu, fast and affordable home cooking.
Drive-In: Park and eat in your car.
Dive: Where you go when you’re drunk and need grease.

EVs, Delivery, and the Future of Food on Wheels

The pandemic turbocharged food delivery, turning it from a convenience into a perceived luxury. Domino’s now touts its EV fleet, replacing the high school kid in a Civic with a Chevy Bolt. But Page is skeptical about autonomous delivery: “It’s going to be 20 years at least before America trusts autonomous cars.”

EVs make sense for short-range delivery, but infrastructure lags behind. And while delivery may feel indulgent, Page reminds us to consider the environmental impact – not just of driving, but of battery production and electricity generation.

Road Trip Eats: David Page’s Culinary Map of America

If you’re planning a food-fueled road trip, Page offers a mouthwatering itinerary:

Maine – Lobster, as it should be.
Ipswich, MA – Whole-bellied fried clams.
Carolinas – Whole hog barbecue.
New Orleans – Everything.
Chicago – Italian beef and Polish sausage at Mr. Beef.
New Mexico – Green chili cheeseburgers.
Central Texas – Brisket barbecue.
Los Angeles – Mexican-American street food.
Seattle – Salmon, any way you like it.

And don’t forget Santa Barbara’s tri-tip grilling – though Page insists it’s grilling, not barbecue. “Barbecue is low and slow over indirect heat. Except when it’s not.”

“Food is the only art that nourishes,” Page quotes from a Richard Gere film. And for car lovers, sliding into a well-worn Camaro or hearing the roar of a Maserati is its own kind of nourishment. Whether it’s a drive-thru burger or a trackside tri-tip sandwich, the fusion of food and cars is a uniquely American joyride.

Reading List

Don't miss out on great book like this one, or other titles we've read and covered as part of the GTM Bookclub on Break/Fix Podcast.

Gran Touring Motorsports's favorite books »

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Guest Co-Host: Don Weberg

In case you missed it... be sure to check out the Break/Fix episode with our co-host.

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From Dealership Floors to Auction Blocks: The Journey of John Kraman

Eric M

November 9, 2023

From Dealership Floors to Auction Blocks: The Journey of John Kraman

In the latest episode of the Break/Fix Podcast, we dive into the life and legacy of John Kraman – an automotive enthusiast whose journey from dealership kid to the voice of Mecum Auctions is as compelling as the cars he reveres.

John’s story begins in 1960s Los Angeles, where his father worked at the legendary Harry Maher Pontiac dealership in North Hollywood. Nestled near the heart of the entertainment industry, the dealership supplied cars to movie and TV productions – including the iconic used car scene in Hitchcock’s Psycho. For young John, it was a playground of chrome and horsepower. “I used to hang out at the dealership, talk to customers, read brochures,” he recalls. “It was my happy place.”

His early exposure to the muscle car boom – especially the debut of the Pontiac GTO—left a lasting impression. So much so that in 1976, at just 19, he bought a 1964 GTO in Cameo Ivory with tri-power and a four-speed. He still owns it today.

Tune in everywhere you stream, download or listen!

Beyond the GTO, John’s formative years were shaped by other automotive icons:

The 1963 Corvette Stingray, which he calls “a game changer” for its futuristic design.
The fastback Ford Mustang 2+2, which inspired him to buy a 2014 GT with a Coyote V8.
The 1966 Oldsmobile Toronado, a front-wheel-drive marvel that still ranks among his favorites.

And while he’s quick to celebrate the greats, he’s not shy about calling out the flops – like the 1972 Chevy Vega, the car he took his driver’s test in. “Terrible engine,” he laughs. “I’ve got a love-hate relationship with that car.”

Kraman enjoys spending time with his wife Christine, four grown children and five grandchildren as well as connecting with his rock ‘n’ roll roots playing guitar and singing in a classic rock trio called “Redline 7000.”; photo courtesy John Kraman

Spotlight

Synopsis

This episode of the Break/Fix features John Kraman, the voice of Mecum Auctions, who shares his fascinating journey in the world of classic cars and broadcasting. Raised in Los Angeles during the 1960s and 70s, Kraman’s early exposure to automobiles at his father’s dealership cultivated a lifelong passion for cars. He discusses his career evolution from a car sales manager to an aircraft mechanic and ultimately joining Mecum Auctions in 2006. John has been a commentator on Mecum Auctions broadcast since 2008 and provides insights into the dynamics of auctioning classic cars, the transitions in his career, and the growth of Mecum Auctions into a leading entity in the collector car industry. Throughout the episode, he reflects on significant cars from his personal collection and provides anecdotes about his experiences in the auction world.

Growing up a California native and spending your formative years there, you have to have been exposed to a number of spectacular cars – what are some that you’ve owned, what are some favorites from that era? what are some of the dream cars, and why those cars? Tell us about the worst cars? What do you think the ugliest car ever built might be?
Working with Frank Mecum, you were DoS, what did that job entail? How did that transition come from DoS to voice of Mecum? That sounds like a very drastic shift in roles.
When you’re at an auction cars are coming on and off the blocks, and if you watch the MECUM broadcasts, it’s almost like watching a baseball or basketball game and you are the sportscaster… You must have encyclopedic knowledge on all these cars? How can you speak to each one that goes by in detail? How do you do it?
Let’s focus on some of the different Auctions you cover. You’re traveling all over the country going to these events. How do you make them unique or emphasize them when you’re there? How do you differentiate (or highlight) them.
Evolution of Auctions? (John has been there nearly 20 years); what has he seen change? What has shaken up the auction world? Was it mostly the introduction of online sales?

Transcript

Crew Chief Brad: [00:00:00] Break Fix Podcast is all about capturing the living history of people from all over the autos sphere, from wrench, turners, and racers to artists, authors, designers, and everything in between. Our goal is to inspire a new generation of Petrolhead that wonder how did they get that job or become that person.

The road to success is paved by all of us because everyone has a story.

Crew Chief Eric: Raised an auto obsessed Los Angeles during the 1960s and seventies. Our guests spent his youth hanging around the dealerships where his dad sold cars. This experience bred a lifelong interest in both the cars and the business of selling them, and he’s enjoyed a long and successful career. First as a sales manager for retail autos, and later shifting gears to work in aircraft.

Don Weberg: Joining the Mecu team in 2006, John Kramon served as the co-director of Consignments for Mecu Auctions alongside Frank Mecu, beginning in [00:01:00] 2008 and continuing today, Kramon has been the commentator of Mecu Auctions broadcast on N B C Sports Network, MotorTrend TV, and others, and he is here to tell us about his fascinating career journey in the world of classic cars and broadcasting.

Crew Chief Eric: Thanks Don. And with that, let’s welcome John Reman to break fix.

John Kraman: Hey guys. Matt, I just wanna say thank you so much for taking some time to have me on your show. Always a pleasure.

Crew Chief Eric: My illustrious co-host tonight is Don Webert from Garage Style Magazine. So welcome back Don.

John Kraman: Thank you for

Don Weberg: having

John Kraman: me. One of my favorite magazines, by the way, Don Love the publication

Don Weberg: Me Coming Garage Style.

I’ve been together for a long, long time. It’s interesting, Eric and I were talking about, my God, has it been that long? You know, which is really kind of interesting.

Crew Chief Eric: Let’s get to it then. Gentlemen, like, all good break, fix stories. Everybody has a superhero origin. So let’s talk about young John Reman, the Petrolhead growing up in la growing up a California native spending.

Your formative years there, you’ve been exposed to so many spectacular cars, [00:02:00] and what led up to your involvement at Mecu?

John Kraman: You know, I was lucky. I. Like a lot of people, like a lot of classic boomers, always just fascinated with cars. But I had a big advantage growing up in Southern California during the time period where the Corvette was starting to come on its own, the invention of the muscle car.

And I was right there as a little kid just soaking up and absorbing all the nuance of that in real time when it was happening. My dad worked for a very well-known Pontiac dealership in North Hollywood, California in Lankershim called Harry Maher Pontiac. I mean, a legendary dealership supplying a lot of vehicles to the movie TV industry as they were right down the street there from all the studios and that auto dealership.

By the way, that was the used car scene. We all remember the movie Psycho and the famous used car scene. Well that was filmed right there, Harry Hart Cadillac, 1960, a few years before my dad started working there. But that dealership still exists today. Wouldn’t you know it? And that building shown in Psycho is still there.

It is now Universal. B m W Mini isn’t [00:03:00] that typical of how things evolve and how things happen? So anyway, as a little kid growing up there, I used to literally hang out at the dealership, talk to customers, look at the cars, read the brochures. I became fascinated with the whole culture of cars, selling cars, servicing cars, being in the automobile dealership.

It was kind of my happy place as a kid, never thinking that all these years later, that that enthusiasm and a little bit of that knowledge. Would be useful for my role at Mecu. Never planned on that. Just a little kid. Loving cars

Crew Chief Eric: running between the aisles of cars at the Pontiac dealership. Yeah. Here you are, young John in the mid sixties and the G T O hits the showroom floor.

What is your first impression?

John Kraman: Totally blown away. That car left Such an impression on me as a youngster. In July of 1976, when I was attended 19 years old, I bought a 1964 Pontiac g t o, and I still own that exact car today.

Don Weberg: Oh, wow.

John Kraman: Yeah, almost 50 years later. Nice. What color? Cameo [00:04:00] Ivory, which is white with a dark aqua interior, and it’s a two door hard top body south.

Three nine, tri power four speed. Just like the song. Wow. Yeah. So anyway, that set the stage for my obsession with cars. And I remember my dad actually having me talk to customers and explain, of course, cars were a lot simpler then various features, options. I had the options list memorized, the different engines, the transmissions, the gear ratios, what it all meant.

And there were actually several times that I can recall. My dad tells a story. Completely differently that I did all the work. But I remember adding my 2 cents on several of the deals that my dad actually got put together, and he always said that they kind of took pity on a guy with a young kid there that was hanging out the dealership.

But the reality is no place outside. I would rather be, my dad continued to sell cars. He eventually went and sold those mobiles right down the street at Pioneer Oldsmobile. Now that’s North Hollywood. Toyota, one of the biggest Toyota dealerships in the San Fernando Valley. Maybe the biggest in the valley, one of the biggest in LA I think.

So [00:05:00] that kind of goes without saying as well that the evolution of the new world has occurred. Pontiac and Oldsmobile both gone now replaced by very popular imports. It’s fun for me. Every once in a while, I get back out there and I go around my own stomping grounds and go past the old Barris Custom City.

George Barris, of course, king of the Customizers, had his shop there, saw the Batmobile go together within a matter of a couple weeks and saw it on the TV show and got to know George later. And I’m still friends with Joji, his daughter to this day. I still continue to tap into the influence and all of the really cool stuff that was going on back in that time period.

You know, music, fashion cars, there were civil rights that were changing as well, that were much needed. All the press of the Vietnam War, I tried to kind of discount that that was a little bit over my head and stay focused on the cars and then all the pop culture stuff as well, and it was a heck of a decade to be this wide-eyed kid really just picking up on all the nuance of it.

Our bottom line, of course of that is it set me up to do what I do and it’s. Go on TV and talk about cars and kind of what was happening back in the era, [00:06:00] the fifties and the sixties and the seventies.

Crew Chief Eric: Pontiac and Oldsmobile, two brands that are no longer with us. And you said they were replaced by more popular imports.

That begs the question, were there other cars outside of the Pontiac and Oldsmobile dealership that got you attention? Is there something. More beautiful than the G T O?

John Kraman: Well, actually there’s a couple and like a lot of youngsters and even those folks that aren’t so young, the first time that they got a glimpse of the all new Chevrolet Stingray in 1963 was a game changer for me.

And I remember it vividly. It was a saddle tan coop with a matching interior. And I remember looking inside it and. Thinking it had a manual transmission. And it dawned on me that, no, wait a minute, it looks like a manual transmission shifter, but it was actually an automatic and always point that out on our TV show from time to time when I see one.

But that 63 Corvette to this day continues just to captivate me with its design and style, the futuristic look. And I’m not the only one. And while I’ve owned three Corvettes at 72, a 2010, and a. Mid-engine cars, it’s 2020. That 63 Corvette has always just been a little bit out of my reach. It just every year [00:07:00] they go up and up.

Maybe I’ll have one someday, but I’ve got a nice collection of plastic replicas and for right now, that’s gonna have to do, but another car or two that really made a huge impact on me was the Ford Mustang coming out about the same time that the G G O did. But interestingly, it wasn’t the convertible in the coop that first came out in April, 1964 that left a memory is when I saw the first.

Fastback two plus two, which came out about six months later. And that car means so much to me that eventually I succumbed to the blue oval. Bought one of the retro style modern era Mustangs. The uh, SS 1 97 platform 2014, the last year coop ordered it. Black with the coyote, five liter and a six speeds a gt.

And that car’s got 25,000 miles on it and I love it. And that will always be a part of my collection as well. And the fact that it kind of looks vintage esque in a lot of the different clues helps me kind of connect the dot from the modern era back to the vintage day, but yet with all the performance and reliability and serviceability of a modern car.

And then the final car I wanna mention, I’m gonna do a shout out thanks to the folks at. Pioneer Oldsmobile. Long gone now was the very first [00:08:00] 1966 Oldsmobile tornado that I saw. The landmark front wheel drive car that debuted, of course in late 1965. I remember seeing the first one at the dealership. It was turquoise.

The wheel arches, the long hood, the short deck, the rotating drum speedometer, the flat floor and the front, because it’s front wheel drive, no transmission hump or drive shaft. To this day. I consider that to be one of the most beautiful cars ever. It did win MotorTrend car, the car of the year, by the way.

I don’t own a tornado, but that would be one I would probably have on my short list. If I could get some space in my six car garage, which is currently full.

Don Weberg: You’d need quite a bit of space for the tornado. Yeah,

John Kraman: it’s a big car.

Crew Chief Eric: They’re not all winners. John, I think we can all agree on that. Is there a car that sort of gets under your skin?

Something you just, you can’t stand, you don’t like?

John Kraman: Well, how about the car that my dad brought home for me to go take my driver’s license test in? All right. Being a car salesman. Back in those days, they had demos and they could drive a car off a lot. I don’t think that they do that much anymore. Maybe some of the higher ranking sales managers who get to drive a vehicle.

But I think the rank and [00:09:00] file salespeople, I think that perk is long gone. So my dad, he brings home for me off of the used car lot, 1972 Chevrolet. Vega, oh, sedan beige with a three speed, not a four speed with a three speed manual transmission on the floor. And I only had a limited amount of time driving a manual shift car.

Bottom line is I took that car and I got my driver’s license and I passed my test. Thank goodness I. To this date, I’ve got kind of a love-hate relationship with the Chevy Vega. It was the car I got my license in, but on the other hand, it’s turned out to be one of the worst cars ever built. Certainly the powertrain was pretty poor.

The aluminum block with a cast iron cylinder head with the dissimilar metal of those two completely different materials and that heavy head. Caused a tremendous amount of head gasket problems, and then you didn’t have any cylinder liners, so the rings would wear into that aluminum boar almost instantly.

Terrible engine. I’m gonna vote for the Chevy Vega as my car that I don’t miss [00:10:00]

Crew Chief Eric: growing up amidst. The deep seated car culture in Southern California. Everywhere you turn. Yeah. Every block you walk down, every street corner there’s something different, something unique. And movie stars driving this, regular guy’s driving that the doctor just bought a Ferrari.

You know, all these kinds of things. Yeah. If you didn’t grow up on one of the two coasts, you kind of missed out. Right. It was basically Chevy Ford or Mopar. What you gonna order this week? Mm-hmm. You know, kind of thing. But at some point all of us have to grow up. We’re gonna get deep into your mecu career as well, but you said you worked in sales, you worked with your dad and things, but what did you go to school to do and how did that lend itself towards your future?

John Kraman: Well, I was one of those guys that was fortunate enough to realize that one way or another I was gonna have something to do with cars. By the time that I got into high school, I took every auto shop class that I could possibly take. I just wanna say in the public school system now, those are really hard to find, but back in the day, this would’ve been the early seventies.

Pretty much every school had them, and I took full advantage of that in my senior year. I was able to actually go to, we called it VO-tech. [00:11:00] I went, and that was three hours a day. I went to auto shop, and I mean, we did literally everything from A to Z. The only thing that I didn’t do, It was body work, but from a mechanical standpoint, everything from A to Z engines, transmissions, you know, rear ends.

And we would work on other people’s cars, students, cars, teachers, cars, outside cars. While I was doing that, I worked for a very prominent high performance speed shop called Sterling Speed Engineering. Now this time, In my junior high school, we’d actually moved from California, two of all places, Rockford, Illinois, which is actually where I was born, but we moved to California when I was five, so we moved back to the Midwest and I worked at a speed shop that’s still very well known today and cut my teeth on working in the machine shop on the high performance engines of that time period.

Everything from Hemis and big block Chevys, small block Chevys, you know, pretty much everything across the board. The Ford FE engines, a lot of 4 27 Ford engines. And being able to be hands-on with that. Also, over the years has given me a lot of insight, a lot of background, a lot of experience to be able to talk about all of this.

We’re talking 50 years later now. [00:12:00] All of that worked to make me this, obviously this pretty well versed car kid, but at age 19, My career took a different path. I became an aircraft mechanic because a friend of mine that lived behind me worked at an engine overhaul shop that overhauled aircraft engines, and he said, we’re hiring people like crazy.

And I, when I talked to his boss, he hired me immediately. So I had a really good career. Eventually, I got my pilot’s license and I learned to fly, and then I transitioned, took my sales enthusiasm and sold airplanes. And I did that actually for 20 years. From 1986 to 2 0 0 6, I sold airplanes. And worked on ’em as a mechanic, as an instructor, as a pilot, and an aviation enthusiast.

Again, being very mechanically oriented, that helped. Being a pilot obviously helped, and understanding the sales process helped as well. And that’s where my background with Mecu started. 2 0 0 6, a fellow pilot, David Burroughs, who’s the founder of Bloomington Gold. Very well known guy, both in the Corvette world and then of course in the aviation world.

He is a steerman where we’re two trainer enthusiasts, and he’s an instructor [00:13:00] pilot and a formation pilot. In that group and still does that to this day. Anyway, long story short, he put Dana and I together. He knew I was his car geek and an airplane geek, and I spent about 15 minutes talking to Dana and boom, he said, John, I’m looking to expand this business, looking to get some people that can help me.

He said, we’re a big auction company now. We’ll do about $80 million in sales this year. This was 2 0 0 6. He said, I’d like to build this business up to be 125. So fast forward to 2022. I’m proud to say that Mecom Auctions generated ready for this guys $785 million in the sale collector vehicles calendar year 2022.

That’s not that far off of our target now of $1 billion. It’s been one wild, crazy ride, guys, I can tell you that.

Don Weberg: Wow. Almost a billion. Unbelievable.

John Kraman: Yeah, that’s a lot of Corvettes. Corvettes are the number one most popular single model of the entire Mecca Auction block. Corvettes are number one representing roughly about [00:14:00] 10% of the total inventory.

So man, you’re right. A lot of Corvettes.

Don Weberg: I always make that joke ’cause you probably know I write some of the descriptions for me. Yes, you do. Yep. And I come from a blue oval family, so I’m much more comfortable with blue oval stuff. It’s funny how many Chevys I’ve written working for Mecu, and it’s funny, it’s gotten to a point now.

I think I know more now about Chevys than I do Fords, which is really, really interesting. But I was just telling Eric the other day, he and I were bantering it back and forth, you know, nine 11 versus Corvette, and I found myself in the corner of the Corvette and this and this and this, and this. In the back of my mind, I’m sitting there.

Why do I know so much about cor? Oh, MECU, of course. You know, it’s really kind of funny the way it just all rubbed off. So yeah, when you go back through and you look at all the Corvettes, MECU is sold, it’s insanity. How many Corvettes go through Mecu?

Crew Chief Eric: You know how we settled that debate, John?

John Kraman: Huh? It’ll never be settled.

So I’m really anxious to hear how you guys resolved it.

Crew Chief Eric: The answer was Dodge Viper, a c r 2016.

John Kraman: Oh. Pivot. [00:15:00] Love it. We need a tie killer. You know, I love that. I mean, that’s a classic battle man. Since the nine 11 came out in 1965, what a sensation that car has been, and I love both cars. Biggest advantage the Corvette has over the nine 11 typically is value.

It’s a less expensive car,

Don Weberg: right?

John Kraman: So if you’re looking, you know, bang for the buck, Corvette’s got the edge, arguably. But if you’re looking for, obviously world-class distinctive car with a rich history, It’s pretty hard to go wrong with a nine 11, and I think the resale value of those things prove that point.

In a perfect world, you’d have one or multiples of each. That 63 Corvette I mentioned earlier that kind of drove home the point for me that I wanted Corvettes to be a part of my life. And I’ll tell you, I, I just adore ’em. They’re just something about being behind the wheel of those cars, three different distinct generations.

I love them all equally, and they all take me to a different place when I’m behind the wheel. All of them are equally the place that I wanna be just at different times. Very fun.

Don Weberg: They all are amazing. Nine 11 Corvette, any of them. And it’s funny, we can argue till Kingdom come and [00:16:00] literally still not have a winner because both of us are Right.

Right. You know, and then, yeah, have the viper guy step in and what the heck? We’ll have a three for all. None of us are gonna be exactly wrong. We just have different, you know, it’s amazing. It really, really is. But you know, if you really want to talk great cars, John. And I think Eric will agree with me here on this.

You know, it really comes down to it. Chryslers TC by Maserati. It gets no better. Am I right?

Crew Chief Eric: Here we go again.

John Kraman: I’ve got a good story about one of those I knew you would. We do about 35,000 cars a year. We are of course, the Indisputed World’s largest collector car auction company by far. So yes, we’ve had the Maserati tcs, and this goes back probably at least a dozen years ago.

It was on TV and it brought like $6,000. Which, depending on the condition, it’s still a $6,000 car. The guy that bought the car was next to his buddy, and I don’t know why the camera, the microphone was on these guys, but his buddy says, Hey man. He said, I didn’t know you wanted that car. Did you really want that car?

And he looked over to his buddy, clears a bell and [00:17:00] said, no, not really. I just wanted the hat. Back in that time period, you’d buy a car and you’d sign the bid sheet and the gals would give you a mecu hat. It was hysterical, and to this day we still talk about that and make jokes about that. One of the great moments in Mecu history, we’ll never forget, it’s kind of like the scene from Caddy Shack, then the pro shop buying supplies, the judge has got, you know, that real ugly, corny hat on, and Rodney Dangerfield looks over and says, Hey, look at that hat.

I bet you get a free bowl of soup with that hat. Same kind of a deal. Same kind of a deal.

Don Weberg: Looks good on you though, you know?

John Kraman: Right. That’s the scene.

Don Weberg: Yeah. You know, one thing we’ve had on our mind, John, is how on earth do you go from the director of Sales to the voice of Mecu? How do you transition from signing people up to sell their cars?

Which I, I assume that’s what Director of Sales does

John Kraman: Exactly. To

Don Weberg: now you’re gonna be the voice of Mecu.

John Kraman: How’d you do that? You know, I have to give all the credit to Dana Mecu. Dana Mecu is the company [00:18:00] founder. He started Mecu Auctions. In 1988, so we’re celebrating 36 years of Mecu auctions. This year it was him and his wife Patty Boys were little.

In fact, all four sons heavily involved in the business right now. He had a dream that he wanted to do this auction company, and it started to get some good momentum going. I got started with the company in 2 0 0 6 and in 2 0 0 8 we went on television and Danny came to me and goes, Hey John. He said, Just put together a deal for a TV show and I thought, oh, that’s good.

That’ll really increase our business. Our visibility will go way up. I said, smart move. Smart move. Never dreaming or thinking about it for even one second, guys, that I would be on this TV show. I don’t have any experience. I never did tv. I had no idea what it entailed. And he said to me, and I think you would be a good guy to be on the show.

I kind of had this panic just sort of overwhelm me because I don’t wanna disappoint the boss. But I also don’t know anything about being on tv. He says, I’ve talked to the producer, his name is Terry Langner. He is a well-known automotive producer by the way. And he said, I talked to Terry and he wants you to come to his studio in Indianapolis, do a little kind [00:19:00] of a mock screen test.

And I said, alright. So I went down there. At the time, this was 2008, Terry Langner was the producer and his company was producing Bear Jackson. It just so happened that he had hours and hours and hours of footage, both audio and video footage. So he put video up on his screen, slapped a headphone on me, and took the audio out and said, as these cars come up, just talk about the cars.

I think three cars popped up and I remember two of them. The first one that came up was a 68 road runner. We can talk three hours on a six eight road runner, right? The second car that comes up was a 67 Corvette and it had a big block hood, and I didn’t know which engine it had, of course, but I knew it was a 67 Corvette convertible with the big block hood.

Again, an easy car to talk about and I, I’d correctly, the cars gave a little bit of background in the significance of both cars, and Terry was talking to me on the headset and he goes, man, he said, wow. He said, You know these cars. And I said, well, I am a car guy. And he goes, but here’s the deal. To be on tv, you have to be able to listen and take [00:20:00] timing commands for commercial breaks and all these other things and feature ets and we’re gonna, let’s listen in all these different things.

But yet you have to continue your thought and not stop talking. When somebody’s talking in your ear, can you do that? And I said, well, I don’t know. And he goes, well, let’s try it. So another car rolls up, I forget what it was, and I’m talking about it. And he says, okay, well we have to go to commercial break in 30 seconds.

And. All I can think of was somebody’s talking to me, stop talking. I didn’t want to talk all over him. So he goes, no, no, no, John. He said, you can’t do that. You gotta finish your thought. You got time to finish your thought. And we struggled with it for about 20 minutes. He goes, you think you could do it?

And I said, Terry, I don’t know. He said, let’s give it a try on the show. Fast forward to the first show. I can’t tell you when it kind of crossed over, but he told me before I went there, he said, John, you need to keep one thing in mind. You’re the car guy. All the other people you’re gonna be working with, they’re experienced television talking heads.

You’re the car guy. All you need to do is sit back and talk cars. And that’s when it hit me, guys, that, well, I’ve been spending my whole life talking cars. One of the only things I know how to do. [00:21:00] Anyway, we gave it a shot and here we are now, guys, 16 years later, hit TV show or second year with MotorTrend.

I’m the lead TV commentator, analyst. I’ve transitioned away starting in 2017, away from being, uh, director of Consignments along with Frank Comb. Into director of company relations, being the company spokesperson, attending a lot of car shows and events and speaking, a lot of interviews, podcasts, which takes up almost all of my time.

I don’t know how I had time to handle consignments, but the bottom line is the company has grown radically over the years, and certainly our exposure on television has. Been a huge part of that obviously, but for me personally, imagine this car guy growing up in California and the stars aligning perfectly to the point where I’m the guy representing the rank and file car guy.

Guys like you maybe that are not on tv. You just gotta know, man, I’ve got your back. Two things, I wanna make sure that the dialogue is accurate and I wanna make sure that the dialogue is relevant and sometimes I steer the show a little bit if the other guys start getting off into [00:22:00] a different direction that may not be either accurate or relevant.

I gently and quietly come in and kind of reel the conversation back in all these years later, we’re very respected as not only being a great auction company, a great company to do business with, but also real true enthusiasts and real true car guys. And I think that resonates with a lot of the folks out there that are car guys that sometimes get disappointed with how cars and how car people and all that stuff are portrayed on television, especially when there’s inaccurate information being portrayed.

Not on my watch.

Don Weberg: You know when you’re out there commentating, you’re doing your thing on the tv, you’re talking about that Roadrunner, the vet, the Viper, whatever it is, how much of that is Kramon and how much of that is Google? Do you have computer assistant there? Do you have that? How does that

John Kraman: work?

Remember what I said earlier that Terry Lingerer, the first producer who ended up producing, I don’t know, maybe the first three, four seasons of us, Jerry Lingerer told me, John, all you gotta do, sit back and talk cars. No, I don’t have a computer. I don’t have one there up at our announce booth. I [00:23:00] do have the description of the car that’s as supplied by the consignor that everybody else has access to.

The public has access to that. It’s up on the website. It’s up on the bid screen. I do have that in front of me when there’s information on it. Sometimes a wife might consign a car that morning and her husband passed away the week before and she needs to sell the car, and she doesn’t know anything about it.

It’s a sad tale. We don’t talk about that on the show. That happens. And then sometimes the information as it’s relayed isn’t always accurate, so I have to kind of check it on the fly. But all the other tidbits, all the historical background and the facts and the figures and the production numbers and colors and engine sizes and options and why this is an important car.

All of that’s 100%. Sit back, relax, talk cars. Now keep in mind you think, oh, that’s impressive. Cars on the auction block less than two minutes, and we have a lot of ground to cover on that car, including some of the bidding action. It’s not like I have to do a half hour documentary on the car. I would probably do some research if I was going to do that on a specific car.

We wanted to make it feel like it’s car guys sitting around talking cars, [00:24:00] not reading off the script, which we’re not, not reading off a computer screen, which we’re not, and I don’t even have access to Google. Now, I do typically have my cell phone up there with me, but I will tell you the cards come up in the auction block and leave so quickly.

As we’re doing about 350 cars a day, there’s no time even to input and put it in. If I don’t know something, I just won’t say it. I will stay within my knowledge box. Fortunately, there’s enough there to cover what I need to cover.

Don Weberg: Given what you’ve just said, I’m assuming you’re relying a lot on that camera.

The camera that’s down, looking at the car going over hundred percent. You’re probably looking at what the camera’s looking at. You’re seeing certain details and you’re saying, okay, it has this, it has this, it has this, and you’re talking about those pieces,

John Kraman: right? Exactly, and you know, I’m not sure a lot of people have even thought of.

It’s interesting that you say that because in the early days I would be actually looking at the car. It was instinctive to look at the car and not what we call our program monitor. Our program monitor is a screen, just like this computer screen is right in front of me. That’s actually showing what’s going out to the viewer.

It’s what the production truck [00:25:00] is choosing for images to go out there. And I’m looking at that, not the car. I could do it. At home on my computer looking at the program monitor. Right. So that’s exactly what I’m doing. So if the camera is looking at the taillights and I’ve got a tidbit about taillights, I’ll talk about it.

I’m not gonna talk about taillights if we’re looking at the steering wheel or the shifter. Right. Or in the engine department or at a wheel and tire. So you’re exactly right. And over years, I’ve learned just to sit back. Be conversational and anticipate how long the camera’s gonna be there and where it probably is gonna head next.

Don Weberg: Could you ask the camera guy go back to a certain area or go to this area if you wanted to see something? Very

John Kraman: rarely that will happen, and they’ll typically be one of the floor reporters, not me in the booth. I won’t do that, but sometimes they’ll do it themselves. If they leave the interior, and I’m still talking about the console and the shifter and the shift knob, they’re listening.

They can’t talk to me because there’s a limited amount of people that have [00:26:00] access to the announced team that can actually talk to ’em because of distraction purposes. But I’ll see the camera then start to pan back in while I finish out my thoughts, and that’s a pretty common trick. So obviously heads up to our total 100% Pro TV crew.

It’s about 45 people. To put on the TV show, even though there’s six announcers, I always say we could do the easy part. I sit back and talk cars. It’s all those guys lugging cameras and dealing with sound and camera angles, and it looks seamless and it looks nonstop, and it is to the viewers. But I will tell you, there’s a lot of moving parts not only to the TV production aspect.

Also in conjunction with the actual auction itself. The execution of the auction is a major, major operation and it’s gotta blend well with tv. And over the years we’ve learned really to work together. Everybody gets along, there’s no tension, there’s no egos. We just get out there and we do it and we pack it up and a couple weeks later we’re doing the same thing somewhere else and it’s just nonstop.

Crew Chief Eric: So what’s fun about this, John, is watching the Mecca Auctions on television when you can’t be there and [00:27:00] listening to the banter that you have with the other announcers, it’s on par with watching a basketball game or a baseball game. But even for those of us in the racing community, it’s not too different.

Even then listening to like IMSA TV where John Hind Hoff is constantly going on all this data about the cars and the drivers and all that kinda stuff. So, For me as a newcomer to the auction scene, watching the Mecu programs on MotorTrend has been beneficial because it helps me augment knowledge that I have.

You guys are picking on certain things that maybe I wouldn’t notice even if I was there. I still don’t know how you retain all this stuff. Yeah. But let’s talk a little bit more about Mecu M itself and the different auctions. You as a commentator, as you mentioned earlier, have to travel all over the country to different events.

Obviously mecham’s, biggest event of Year being Kissimmee, and there’s lots of others. Monterey Harris. Burg Las Vegas for with the motorcycles only, things like that. How do you as a commentator, make them all feel different, make them unique? There’s always the variables. You never know what kind of car is gonna show up, sort [00:28:00] of like a box of chocolates,

John Kraman: right?

Fortunately for us, it takes care of itself because each of our own individual auctions has its own personality. Let’s take two extremes that you mentioned. We’ll take our Kissimmee Florida auction. Now we’re, keep in mind we’re in Kissimmee twice. We were there in July for what we call our summer special, but that’s a fraction of the size of our big auction, world’s largest collector car auction.

It’s in January, Kissimmee, Florida, which is Orlando by the way. That’s a monster. That is an event that is a bucket list item for so many car enthusiasts. Just to be able to go to that and experienced 4,000 cars crossing the auction block. Over a period of almost two weeks. It’s just incredible. It is so big and so much fun, and it’s continuing to grow and grow and grow each year.

Then let’s transition over to talk about our Monterey California auction. That’s our traditional auction during Monterey Car Week. That’s obviously mid-August every year. It’s our smallest individual auction guys, only 600 cars, but of that 600 cars over three days. We will have the [00:29:00] highest per car average of any Mecu auction.

And I tell you this contrast of these two, because each of our auctions has their own distinctive personality and purpose, and part of what we do in setting up a day’s lineup of cars. Keep in mind, typically our shows are six hours long. We’ll explain at the top of the show. I will. Okay. Here’s what we’re gonna see today.

Based on our experience, this is what we can look forward to.

Don Weberg: You’ve been in the auction world for quite a little while. Is there any one thing or any two things, any events that have happened or any changes that have occurred that have really made the auction world the oh wow moment?

John Kraman: Honestly, I think that it’s the visibility.

It’s the fact that lector car auctions and even other automotive shows, the build it shows and all that that are so popular right now. Car collecting auctions, all of that. It’s put that into the public mainstream. I think it’s really helped not only make ’em auction other auctions as well. And I think it’s helped the collector car [00:30:00] industry in general as it began kind of as entertainment.

And now it’s a way to sort of chronicle and document and promote what happens at a collector car auction. And as we all know, it’s exciting, it’s stimulating. There’s the X factor there. Some people say it’s the cars or it’s the sound, or it’s the auctioneer banter, it’s the pricing. The bottom line is, is it’s all of that.

It’s this cocktail that’s just magical. Now, not everybody can pull it off, whether it be on television or not. The way that Mecca does, I hate to be bragging, but we’ve got the best auctioneers, the best auction team, I think the best TV crew in the business, and I’m not talking about me by the way, and it all conspires to make people say.

Man, this is fun. This is cool. I wanna be a part of it.

Crew Chief Eric: You’ve mentioned several times, John, having been with Mecu for nearly 20 years. You’ve seen cars come and go in the tens of thousands at this point. But what else have you seen in the evolution of auctions, and let’s talk a little bit about road art and on [00:31:00] time and things like that.

John Kraman: Yes. Let’s talk about the transition. Or the addition of what we call absentee bidding, which would either be telephone bidding or internet bidding, or another way, which is actually called proxy bidding, where you can in advance let us know what your maximum bid would be on a particular lot. And I’ll have to say that we’re coming out of what I call the pandemic era.

Now we have learned and we have transitioned as a company. Being known as a very exciting live auction company, but we have improved our hardware and software over a period of time to be able to accommodate all types of this absentee bidding. And it’s been huge. It has added a tremendous amount to the accessibility about what we do.

Covering the action on the TV show. You see it, we talk about it. We put the camera at the internet bidder, we put the camera at the phone, bidders. We even have got microphones where you can even hear what they’re saying to the potential buyer on the other end of the line. And we try to cover that and bring everybody into the experience.

That has been a huge part of, of our growth and our [00:32:00] accessibility. And the other part of it is what you mentioned, it’s not all about collector cars, it’s about tractors, it’s about motorcycles, it’s about road art, which that’s our trademark name for. Anything that might be automotive related from oil cans, dealer displays, gas pumps, vintage toolboxes, neon signs, vintage porcelain signs.

I mean, the list is massive. Automotive memorabilia is a phenomenon right now. The prices are, Wild on that stuff. And Becom Auctions being an auction company that specializes in the sale of collector vehicles, but is wide open for anything that might fit in with that, that might go hand in hand. It’s gotten to the point where we’ll have memorabilia at our auctions.

We’ll have. Memorabilia specific days, sometimes at our auctions, our Kissimmee auction and our Indianapolis auction, or two in particular that do. And then we’ve got what we call Mecca on time, where we’re [00:33:00] always running an auction nonstop. There’s one, one running right now where it might be smaller items, and I also wanna stress that it’s really easy to get signed up as a bidder for any of the stuff, whether you want to come to an auction.

Or whether you want to just bid online or bid on the telephone. It’s very simple and straightforward and once again, you can do it online or you can call our office, talk to somebody there and get all your questions answered. We have

Crew Chief Eric: reached that part of the episode where I get to ask any shout outs, promotions, or anything else you’d like to share that we haven’t covered thus far.

John Kraman: So much of the credit for what we do, for those of us that are visible in the company, the auctioneers, the auction staff, which would include our bidders assistants, those of us on the TV crew, my post Scott Hoke and Bill Stevens, Steven Cox, Katie Osborne, Chris Jacobs. Everybody knows him from overhauling, but it goes way beyond that.

It goes to the entire crew, man. It takes about 350 people to run Acum auction. These people are brought in from literally around the country. We have a full-time office staff of about 150 people at our headquarters up [00:34:00] in Walworth, Wisconsin that are right now as we’re speaking, they’ve got their head down working future auctions on top of each other.

That’s not our road crew, that’s our office crew that stays home, and then there’s those of us on the other end that will leave the office and go out on the road. And we’re bringing in, like I said, about 350 people to run these auctions. There’s a lot of moving parts, but everybody works hard to make sure this thing operates like a well-oiled machine.

Gotta give a shout to them. And then of course, you know, Dodge the brotherhood of muscle. They’re our exclusive automobile manufacturer. A lot of changes going on in the auto automotive world right now. But Dodge telling us they’re gonna maintain that brotherhood of muscle image, they’re gonna keep pushing forward with cars that are fun and exciting to drive.

John

Don Weberg: Reman is the man with a real passion for classic and collector cars. He holds his personal collection near and dear with some of his favorites being a 1964 Pontiac G T O a 2014 Mustang gt, and a 2010 Corvette C six. Outside of his work with Meko and Cars, Kreon enjoys spending some time with his wife, Christine, [00:35:00] his four grown children and five grandchildren, as well as connecting with his rock and roll roots, playing guitar and singing in a classic rock trio known as.

Redline 7,000. To learn more about John, you can connect with him@mecom.com or on social media at Carr kramon, on Twitter or on LinkedIn. And don’t forget, you can tune in every two weeks for a new episode of Meum On the Move Podcast hosted by John.

Crew Chief Eric: Well, John, I can’t thank you enough for coming on Break Fix and sharing your life story with us and how you have become the voice of the number one auction in the world.

And I look forward to seeing you in person at future Mecom Auctions, but also catching up with you on TV and learning from your encyclopedic knowledge. It’s fantastic and just keep up the good work.

John Kraman: You got it. Eric, thanks to you guys for having me on. We’ve had a great conversation. Anytime you guys wanna talk cars, talk mecu talk trends, I’m on board to do [00:36:00] it with you guys.

Don, thank you brother for everything that you do out there. Love the magazine. Never miss a chance to look at it. And that’s another important element of the collector car world as well, where we display and how we display our pride and joy. Maybe more about that on the next episode. That’d be great.

Nobody sells more than.

Don Weberg: Nobody. Mecom Auctions is the world’s leader of collector car vintage and antique motorcycle and road art sales hosting auctions throughout the United States. The company had specialized in the sale of collector cars for more than 35 years now, offering more than 22,000 lots per year and averaging more than one auction per month.

Mecom Auctions is headquartered in Walworth, Wisconsin, and since 2011 has been ranked number one in the world with the number of collector cars offered at auction, and is host to the world’s largest collector car auction held annually in Kissimmee, Florida, [00:37:00] as well as the largest motorcycle auction held annually in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Mems Road A and Mecca on Time. Divisions offer a wide variety of collectibles for live and online auctions. You can learn more and follow Mecu and their upcoming events@www.mecu.com, or you can follow them on social at Mecca Auction on Facebook. At Meum Auctions on Instagram, at mecom, on Twitter, and at Mecu Auction on YouTube.

Crew Chief Brad: If you like what you’ve heard and want 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 or text us at (202) 630-1770 or send us an email at crew chief@gtmotorsports.org.

We’d love to [00:38:00] hear from you.

Crew Chief Eric: Hey everybody, crew Chief Eric here. We really hope you enjoyed this episode of Break Fix, and we wanted to remind you that G T M remains a no annual fees organization, and our goal is to continue to bring you quality episodes like this one at no charge. As a loyal listener, please consider subscribing to our Patreon for bonus and behind the scenes content, extra goodies and G T M swag.

For as little as $2 and 50 cents a month, you can keep our developers, writers, editors, casters, and other volunteers fed on their strict diet of fig Newton’s, gummy bears, and monster. Consider signing up for Patreon today at www.patreon.com/gt motorsports. And remember, without fans, supporters, and members like you, None of this would be [00:39:00] possible.

Highlights

Skip ahead if you must… Here’s the highlights from this episode you might be most interested in and their corresponding time stamps.

00:00 Introduction to Break/Fix Podcast
00:27 Meet John Kraman: From Dealerships to Mecum Auctions
01:49 John’s Early Car Influences
03:33 Iconic Cars of the 60s and 70s
04:45 The Evolution of Car Dealerships
06:16 Memorable Car Models and Personal Stories
11:59 John’s Career Shift to Aircraft
12:46 Joining Mecum Auctions
14:24 The Corvette vs. 911 Debate
16:25 Funny Auction Stories
17:37 Transitioning to the Voice of Mecum
17:52 Becoming the Voice of Mecum
18:15 First TV Experience
19:57 Challenges of Live TV
20:37 Transition to Lead TV Commentator
22:45 Behind the Scenes of Mecum Auctions
27:35 Unique Auctions Across the Country
29:37 Impact of TV and Technology on Auctions
32:00 Expanding Beyond Cars
33:20 Shoutouts and Acknowledgements
34:38 Conclusion and Future Prospects

Bonus Content

There’s more to this story…

In this special edition of Break/Fix (Part-2 of “The Voice of MECUM with John Kraman” episode), John takes us behind the scenes of MECUM Auctions and shares his pro tips and an inside scoop for auction goers as the former co-Director of consignments and now a commentator for the MECUM TV series on MotorTrend.

Some stories are just too good for the main episode… Check out this Behind the Scenes Pit Stop Minisode! Available exclusively on our Patreon.

Tune in everywhere you stream, download or listen!

Learn More

This episode has been brought to you by MECUM Auctions the world leader of collector car, vintage and antique motorcycle, and Road Art sales, hosting auctions throughout the United States. The company has specialized in the sale of collector cars for more than 35 years, now offering more than 22,000 lots per year and averaging more than one auction each month. Mecum Auctions is headquartered in Walworth, Wisconsin, and since 2011 has been ranked No. 1 in the world with the number of collector cars offered at auction and is host to the world’s largest collector car auction held annually in Kissimmee, Florida, as well as the largest motorcycle auction held annually in Las Vegas. Mecum’s Road Art and Mecum On Time divisions offer a wide-variety of collectibles for live and online auctions.

This episode is sponsored in part by Garage Style Magazine. Since 2007, GSM has been the definitive source for car collectors, continually delivering information about Automobilia, Petroliana, Events and more… because after all, what doesn’t belong in your garage?

To learn more about John, you can connect with him at www.mecum.com or on social media @carkraman on Twitter, or on LinkedIn; and don’t forget you can tune in every 2 weeks for a new episode of “MECUM on the Move” Podcast hosted by John.

John’s career path wasn’t a straight line. After high school, he immersed himself in auto shop classes and worked at Sterling Speed Engineering in Rockford, Illinois. But at 19, a chance opportunity led him into aviation. He became an aircraft mechanic, earned his pilot’s license, and eventually sold airplanes for two decades.

That blend of mechanical expertise and sales savvy set the stage for his next chapter.

Becoming the Voice of Mecum

In 2006, fellow pilot and Corvette legend David Burroughs introduced John to Dana Mecum. At the time, Mecum Auctions was doing $80 million in annual sales. By 2022, that number had skyrocketed to $785 million.

John started as co-director of consignments, but in 2008, Dana tapped him for a new role – TV commentator. With no prior experience, John took a screen test and nailed it. “All you need to do is sit back and talk cars,” the producer told him. And that’s exactly what he’s done for 16 seasons.

Today, John is Mecum’s lead TV analyst and director of company relations. He’s the voice behind the scenes, guiding viewers through the nuances of collector cars with encyclopedic knowledge and genuine enthusiasm.

What makes John’s commentary so compelling? It’s all real. No teleprompters. No Google. Just decades of lived experience and a deep love for the hobby.

“I don’t have a computer up there,” he explains. “If I don’t know something, I just won’t say it. I stay within my knowledge box.”

He watches the program monitor, reacts to what the camera sees, and shares insights that connect viewers to the car’s story. Whether it’s a Road Runner, a Corvette, or even a Chrysler TC by Maserati (yes, there’s a hilarious MECUM story about that one), John brings authenticity to every moment.

One of the episode’s funniest anecdotes involves a bidder who bought a car for $6,000 – not because he wanted the car, but because he wanted the MECUM hat. “To this day, we still talk about that,” John chuckles.

The episode wraps with a spirited debate: Corvette or Porsche 911? John loves both, but acknowledges the Corvette’s bang-for-buck advantage. Still, the hosts agree – sometimes you need a tie-breaker. Enter the Dodge Viper ACR.

The MPN team was shocked to hear about the passing of Break/Fix Guest John “the Voice of MECUM” Kraman from our friends at MECUM Auctions … we were fortunate to work with John on several occasions and featured his story on Break/Fix podcast – John was a legend with encyclopedic knowledge of classic cars and will be severely missed! Please take a moment to relive his story, in his own voice, above. RIP John.

John Kraman’s story is more than a career arc – it’s a tribute to the car culture that shaped him. From dealership floors to auction blocks, he’s become a trusted voice for enthusiasts everywhere. “I’ve got your back,” he says. “I want the dialogue to be accurate and relevant. Not on my watch will misinformation go out.”

And that’s why we love him.

Guest Co-Host: Don Weberg

In case you missed it... be sure to check out the Break/Fix episode with our co-host.

This content has been brought to you in-part by sponsorship through...

From PACCAR to Pikes Peak: Keri Weishaar’s race to the sky in a Semi!

Daniel S

November 7, 2023

From PACCAR to Pikes Peak: Keri Weishaar’s race to the sky in a Semi!

When Keri Weishaar first dreamed of driving big rigs, she wasn’t imagining fame or fanfare – just the chip trucks rolling in and out of the mill where her dad, grandpa, and brother worked. But her path would take her far beyond her small-town roots, through snow-covered mountain passes, onto proving grounds, and even up Pikes Peak with a Hollywood stunt driver.

Keri’s story is one of dual mastery: she holds a mechanical engineering degree and a Class A Commercial Driver’s License (CDL). Her career began in 2007 in the automotive industry, and by 2008, she was delivering trucks to proving grounds in Indiana. But she wasn’t just dropping off vehicles – she was intercepting broken parts, diagnosing failures, and challenging design engineers to do better.

Her hands-on experience gave her a unique edge. “I’d say, ‘This is how poorly your part performed. Can you fix it?’” she recalls. That blend of technical insight and real-world grit became her signature.

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Driving a semi isn’t just about horsepower – it’s about awareness, patience, and respect. Keri describes the road as “a trucker’s world,” where situational awareness is paramount. “It’s like being a teacher looking after toddlers,” she jokes, referring to smaller vehicles darting unpredictably around her rig.

Her early years behind the wheel were marked by white-knuckle intensity. “I would sweat and have a death grip on the steering wheel,” she admits. But over time, the nerves gave way to confidence, and she learned to navigate the road with calm precision.

Spotlight

Synopsis

In this episode of Break/Fix, we interview Keri Weishaar, a seasoned truck driver and mechanical engineer with a Class A CDL. Keri shares her journey from growing up aspiring to be a truck driver in a small community to achieving her goals. She discusses her experiences driving across the country, including challenging routes like Montana’s snow-covered passes, and her role at Bosch Automotive proving grounds and the PACCAR Technical Center. Keri also details her thrilling co-drive with Hollywood stunt driver Mike Ryan at the 2010 Pikes Peak International Hill Climb. Beyond trucking, Keri’s passion for motorsports led her to various forms of racing, including desert racing with Best in the Desert series, short course racing, and even a tryout with Monster Jam. She also founded Trophy Girl Designs, creating custom safety equipment and other products. Throughout her story, Keri emphasizes the importance of perseverance, community support, and pursuing one’s passions, inspiring a new generation of petrol heads.

Let’s talk about The who/what/where/when/how of Keri? What’s your petrol-head origin story… How did you get into Big-Rigs? Did you come from a trucking family?
So there’s more than meets the eye here, you actually have a degree in Mechanical Engineering… What drove you (pun intended) to get a CDL? Why?
What’s it like to drive a semi? To be a trucker? The life of a trucker?
Best/Worst Moments in trucking?
Have you used any of the new SEMI-TRUCK simulators that many of us are seeing on social media? Is that good training? A good aid, or nothing substitutes real life experience?
In some of the photos on your website, I see evidence of semi-truck (super truck) racing; how did you get into that? It’s really popular in Europe, what’s it like to race a semi?
Trucking was made more popular in the last 10 years by shows like “Ice Road Truckers” and “World’s Most Dangerous” roads and other programs on History channel. How “real” is that? What do you think of those programs?
Let’s talk about what you’re doing at Trophy Girls Design, with respect to safety – what types of gear or products are you manufacturing?

Transcript

Crew Chief Brad: [00:00:00] Break Fix podcast is all about capturing the living history of people from all over the autos sphere, from wrench, turners, and racers to artists, authors, designers, and everything in between. Our goal is to inspire a new generation of Petrolhead that wonder, a. How did they get that job or become that person?

The road to success is paved by all of us because everyone has a story.

Crew Chief Eric: Our guest has had her class A commercial driver’s license, also known as A C D L since 2008. She has logged thousands of highway miles driving across the country. Some of those include the snow covered passes of Montana with a loaded 52 foot trailer during winter testing. She has also been trained and qualified to drive on the durability test track at the Bosch Automotive proving grounds, as well as the track at Paccar Technical Center.

Mountain Man Dan: In addition to training Keri Wise, co drove with Hollywood Stunt Driver and [00:01:00] then 16 year Pikes Peak International Hill Climb competitor Mike Ryan at the 2010 Pikes Peak International Hill Climb and today finds herself designing safety equipment for trophy roll designs. She’s here to tell us more about her automotive journey.

With that, let’s welcome Keri to break fix.

Crew Chief Eric: That’s right, and my co-host tonight is the one and only Mountain man, Dan. So Keri, welcome to the show. Why don’t we get started like all good break fix stories. Tell us the who, what. Where and when of carry. How did you get into big rigs of all things? Did you come from a trucking family?

Keri Weishaar: Yeah, I get that question a lot. I had three generations back home. It was either logging or the hospital where the two industries, very small community, and I did grow up wanting to be a chip truck driver, just like all the trucks I saw drive in and out of the mill that my dad and my grandpa and my brother worked at.

Luckily, I’m not. I’m a little bit better. I’ve achieved a few more things.

Crew Chief Eric: Speaking of which, [00:02:00] on your resume it says you got a degree in mechanical engineering, you also have a C D L, so you’re sort of dual hatted here a little bit more than meets the eye. Why?

Keri Weishaar: So my goal was to enter into the automotive industry as a career.

With my engineering degree, and I was able to do that in 2007. And in 2008, the position I entered into required that I have a C D L and I delivered trucks to the proving grounds in Indiana, and then I’d fly back home. I would leave them there to die. They would die on the durability track. I would go back home and manage all the failures that happened, and I was housed at the headquarters where the design engineers were.

So I’d intercept these broken parts and say, This is how poorly your part performed. Can you fix it for. I did that a few times, got a lot of miles under my belt, and then I switched to a different company.

Crew Chief Eric: I’ve only ridden in a semi [00:03:00] one time, and it was actually pretty recently and it, it was an interesting experience, but for those of us that have only had the privilege to drive regular passenger vehicles, What’s it like to drive something so big and how did you learn and how different is it to learn to drive a semi than a passenger vehicle?

Keri Weishaar: It can be really intimidating because of the size of it. You’re in charge of this massive machine. It can be a little scary that if you don’t do the right thing, it could do a lot more damage than a regular car. The first couple times I went cross country out on the road in a truck, I realized the road really does belong to truckers.

The rest of us just commingle in between them. But really it’s a trucker’s world out there, and it really doesn’t seem like it until you do it yourself. I mean, you have to fit in around them. They can’t stop as quickly. Not everyone drives carefully around truckers, but you should. If you don’t, they’ll get you every time.

They’ll win every time.

Crew Chief Eric: So I wonder if it’s more like when we’re on the racetrack, they say all the [00:04:00] time, we have to be situationally aware. We have to look way ahead. Our heads are on a swivel, as they say, right? We’re constantly looking around. Is that the same for being a trucker or do you get a moment where you can actually relax when you’re behind the wheel?

Keri Weishaar: It’s constantly watching. The side mirrors can’t really see out the back unless you’re like in a day with no trailer. So constantly watching the mirrors, even looking out your driver’s window. When there’s nobody nearby, you can yeah, relax a little bit. Honestly, over the first five years that I got in a truck and drove, I would sweat and I would have white knuckle grip on the steering wheel.

I was a good driver, but I was able to control the nerves. It’s not easy, and now it’s just like driving anything else

Mountain Man Dan: because I’ve driven some larger trucks in my years as well. For me, the biggest thing out on the road is it’s not so much you are driving, you have to pay attention to everyone else’s driving.

Almost like you’re a teacher looking after a bunch of toddlers and all the small cars are the toddlers. ’cause you don’t know if they’re gonna just turn in front of you. [00:05:00] Did you find it difficult trying to deal with other drivers on the road that are not respectful of the big trucks?

Keri Weishaar: It gets irritating.

You know, I’d say most people are aware and respectful of the size of us and the space that we have to do the maneuvers that we need to do. Then yes, sometimes there’s people that kind of make your heart skip a beat, like. You just got in front of me. You better keep going. I really hope you don’t suddenly slam on the brakes because that was a bad move.

Mountain Man Dan: One thing, when I was getting my license, when I was younger driver coach that I had when I was getting my regular license, one of the best lessons that he told me, and I’ve taught it to all the young drivers, I teach Drive on the road. He was like, there’s right of way. There’s right of weight. You might have right of way coming down to a open.

He’s like, there’s a semi or something coming. They’ve got right of weight. They can’t stop as fast as you let them go.

Crew Chief Eric: And for the listeners out there, that’s wait, W E I G H T, not w a i t. Just wanted to clarify the right of weight. I like that though, the right of weight. I [00:06:00] do feel that I have grown a newfound respect for.

Truckers in the trucking industry, especially towing the race cars and trailers and enclosed trailers and things like that. It doesn’t compare. It’s apples and chainsaws. I get that. But there are things that irritate me and it’s like, do you not realize that I’m, I’m towing something. I got something behind me.

Right. It’s not that easy. Even if you’re in a pickup or an SS u V. So I definitely get it and, and it’s amplified on that larger scale plus when you’re loaded down, but there’s a lot of training involved in that. Kind of walk us through what you had to do, what the exercises were like. I mean, you knew how to drive a car, you drove yourself to the training center to become a semi driver, but what was the rest of it like?

Keri Weishaar: My situation was a little bit unique. It was normal for people to go through training within my company. We didn’t have like a third party person train us, or I didn’t go to like specifically a truck driving school. But in my position at the time, I was required to be potentially decking a [00:07:00] bobtail truck.

So that means without a trailer. Onto the back of another bobtail truck, so it’s not bobtail anymore, it’s got another truck up on the fifth wheel of it and taking that to Indiana. So that was more than a Class B requirement. That was a Class A at that point.

Mountain Man Dan: In fact. Did you have your A Class CDLs? And for our listeners that aren’t aware of it, there’s a class and B class, as you were saying, when you’re going down the road and see a dump truck.

That’s a B class ’cause it doesn’t have trailer behind it. But if the dump truck has a trailer behind it with air brakes and stuff, then sometimes you’re

Keri Weishaar: required to have the A, because you can drive a heavy duty truck bobtail with a Class B license on the road. Normally employees would get trained. To drive with a Class B, get some miles under their belt and then go for the Class A.

But I went for the class A right away, planned for three weeks, but we only used two and he assigned me off. Normally he would train with 45, 47 foot trailer, but those weren’t available, so we used a 52 foot. And this was in [00:08:00] the Portland area, so that included some mountain driving. He just said I was one of his best students.

And I think a lot of that has to do with being a female, which I’ve heard repeated over and over again. Same thing with my forklift training. I got a hundred percent, I was like the best student he’d ever had in like 15 years because we don’t have an ego. We just listen, do what we’re told. And if they’re a good trainer, then we’ll come out ahead.

Mountain Man Dan: So you said you went, started getting your B’S first and going to your raise. You went straight to getting your A’s. Did you also get additional endorsements? Because I know there’s hazmat endorsements, there’s passenger, there’s all kinds of endorsements that go along with the CDLs.

Keri Weishaar: I didn’t do studying for everything, but I took the test for everything and I didn’t pass.

Makes sense. I didn’t study. But I do have my air brake restriction removed, so it’s not necessarily an endorsement. It’s more of a restriction that’s removed. And then I have any combination, but that does not mean doubles or triples. I don’t [00:09:00] have my passenger endorsement to where I could like drive a school bus.

Didn’t wanna do hazmat because you have to keep up on it. I felt like the chances of me using it were low and I like, I could have got it the one time, but I felt like I wasn’t gonna put in the effort to keep up on it

Mountain Man Dan: because there’s so many different things hauled and the endorsements factor into what you’re hauling and what your thing is.

So that made sense that you didn’t pursue the hazmat.

Keri Weishaar: Yeah.

Mountain Man Dan: So that, are there any endorsements that you don’t have that you would like to obtain?

Keri Weishaar: Not at this point. I think one of the big things I still wanna drive in my lifetime is a limo, and I’m already qualified for.

Crew Chief Eric: Nice. So is the training more like aviation school where it’s all about hours behind the wheel and it’s nothing like the driving test we take to get our standard driver’s license?

Right.

Keri Weishaar: There’s just extra stuff. It’s still just like a half hour to hour driving test with someone that will sign you off to go to the Department of Licensing and get your license. But yeah, there’s extra things you have to perform, especially [00:10:00] like a pre-trip. There’s a bunch of things on the truck you have to physically walk around, look at and touch and talk about, so they know that you understand that you’re checking on the mechanics of this vehicle, which is not required of a regular car,

Crew Chief Eric: which is more like a pre-flight check for an airplane, right?

You have to do all that and submit your plans and all those kinds of things. So that’s really interesting where it’s a blend of kind of those two worlds. What would you say is the hardest thing or the most challenging thing to learn? Or maybe it’s the hardest thing to do when you’re driving a big rig?

Still,

Keri Weishaar: road signs are hard for me. It’s hard for me to pay attention and read every single one because I’m used to driving my regular car and a lot of the signs don’t apply. Right. But when you’re a truck, they all are important. Yeah, I miss the speed limit. Sometimes

Crew Chief Eric: I thought you were gonna tell me it was, you know, parking or, or some sort of maneuver or something like that.

Right. I would’ve never guessed roadside.

Keri Weishaar: No. I can actually parallel park, truck and trailer. [00:11:00] Wow, that’s awesome.

Crew Chief Eric: So since we’re still talking about training, There’s been a big push in the racing world to use more and more simulators to train drivers, to get them accustomed to different race tracks that they’ve never been to and things like that so they can learn their breaking points and their apexes and track out points and things like that.

But I’ve also noticed on social media, there’s a lot of folks posting about semi-truck simulators and they look fascinating ’cause they’re very detailed, they look almost very realistic. The windshields are screens, you know, those kinds of things. Do you see that being more prevalent in the teaching side, or do you think it actually helps or there is no substitute for just being out on the road?

Keri Weishaar: Yeah, I’m not really exposed to that because I’m not in the industry of creating truckers. I’m in the industry of creating trucks. I’m more on the manufacturing and service side, but as far as video games and simulating the road, my brain cannot make it work. I have to feel those G-force. It’s [00:12:00] a completely different learning concept.

I may become good at a video game. I don’t really care for them too much, but does that really translate to being good in the car with certain suspension and power and tires traction and contact patch and all that? It’s totally different. So that’s just something that my brain can’t get to correlate.

Crew Chief Eric: You know, you mentioned, let’s call it the pre-flight check or the pre-travel check. How much survivalist training is also involved? How much do you need to be able to do on your own, especially if you’re on a long haul from let’s say, Northern California to the middle of the country and you get a flat or something breaks, you’re kind of on your own, or is there a network of folks that you can rely on to help you in an emergency situation?

Keri Weishaar: There are big rig tow companies. So just like any other driver, if you are not mechanically inclined and you’re not really sure what’s going on with your car, but you feel it’s unsafe for you or others on the road, you pull over and you call for [00:13:00] help. Truckers can do that as well. They don’t have to be mechanics.

However, they do have to go through the way stations follow extra rules on the road. You know, you can’t go over certain bridges. You have to put on chains sometimes before regular passenger cars, sometimes not. Just depends on the state and how they run their policies. Yeah, there is some extra responsibilities and then you are required to check your load after the first 150 miles of your trip.

Certain companies may have safety checks that you have to do, submit electronically or on paper at the end of your shift that are more strict than what like the local state laws require.

Crew Chief Eric: You mentioned the way stations, if you’ve ever driven for any sort of distance, especially across the country, you see trucks just lined up waiting, or there’s signs that say trucks must exit now for wait station, things like that.

What is that all about?

Keri Weishaar: Each axle has a maximum weight that you can be. You drive over about three miles an hour [00:14:00] on the scale, and they see each of those axles as they go by possible. A load shifted and you were really close to the max on axle, and now you’re over, which means you’re under somewhere else, so they’re gonna have you pull into the lot and you have to make an adjustment or offload before you can continue again, and it’s also a chance to pull you in randomly for an inspection to make sure all your equipment is up to par.

Mountain Man Dan: As she was saying there, d o t does that for the purpose of helping prevent issues with the roads where too much weight loss actually calls. Because if you pull up certain stoplights where a lot of truck traffic is, you’ll notice there’s major crown in the center of the road from where the wheels of the semis sink the asphalt in.

Yeah. That hit the stuff loaded properly. So if you have it not loaded property and you’re gonna across a bridge or something like that, it can cause damage to the bridges. So they try to make sure that’s done. And when you’re talking about load shifting, that is not uncommon to where if a load shifts bad enough, it can actually cause a trailer to flip onto to its side.

Wow. Because I’ve seen that a couple times here with [00:15:00] the trucks near my house when they’re hauling equipment out. There’s been three of ’em in the amount of time I’ve lived here that have wound up on their side. ’cause they took the turn onto the on ramp a little too fast and the load shifted and the box trail just fell onto its side.

Crew Chief Eric: Dan segues into a great point. So let’s take a sort of pit stop here in in the realm of trucking and talk about your best and worst moments in trucking.

Keri Weishaar: So there’s one very anxious moment that I had. I was leaving a break check area. My partner had just done some programming on my truck for some reason.

Not something that I’d ever experienced before or really even heard of before, or it’s not something that we’re required to check, but I took off down a grade that’s usually where you find a brake check areas before a downhill grade, and I had no engine brakes, which were absolutely necessary to complete this decline in a safe manner.

So I had to do an emergency stop and smoke the brakes a [00:16:00] little bit. But luckily I found a shoulder to do that right before I hit a guardrail. And fixed everything, and I left myself enough room to check the engine brakes before I entered back onto the road. I was still on the shoulder and they returned, and so we were able to continue our truck.

But yeah, that was a very scary moment for me. I was very upset. I did not like that at all.

Mountain Man Dan: Our listeners might not be aware of it, but a lot of the layman, like guys will call it a Jake break, but what it does is it actually uses it. Exhaust pressure to help keep compression on the engine, to help slow it down, alleviate it to where you don’t overheat your brakes going down a steep grade, because one of those things coming down through the mountains, it’s not too difficult to overheat your brakes.

And then you’re just rolling.

Keri Weishaar: Yeah, the brakes are not enough. And then another more funny time was actually the very first time I set out on a solo trek. I was gonna leave from home because it would save me time. Not going to work the next morning just to get the truck. So let me take it home so I could leave [00:17:00] from there in the morning.

So I got my fuel the night before. I go to the fueling station, and it’s not like you just put in a credit card like you do at the regular pump. You go in and of course, because it’s for business, I gotta collect all my receipts and whatnot. I go and have them turn the pump on. They authorize it for a certain amount, attach it to your truck, serial number, your company, whatever, go back out.

I pump the fuel. I come back in to get the receipt. Well, there’s a different clerk there. He is like looking for this receipt on these different printers or machines and he is like, are they getting like oil or truck wash or anything? I’m not sure what he is talking about. They, but I’m like, no. So he is kind of frantically looking around, well, are they getting any services?

Is anyone out there helping them? I’m like, who’s they? He’s like the driver. I’m like, I’m the driver. I was like 25 years old, 26 years old. This really young girl asking for a receipt for a truck. There was no way he was gonna guess that I was the driver. And he [00:18:00] apologized profusely. He’s like, I am so sorry.

But eventually we sorted it out that my company would automatically get the documentation. I didn’t need a paper receipt, but that was quite an embarrassing moment for him and really funny for me. Even a little bit more of an interesting story, which is the trip that the, uh, no engine brakes happened on.

There was a team of two trucks traveling together. I was one driver, and then there was medium duty truck with a flatbed. So it’s a truck configuration with straight rails in the back, no fifth wheel for towing a trailer. So it would accept some kind of body, like a mixer or a garbage or dump. The others that tow a trailer are referred to as tractors.

So I had a truck with me and I was in heavy duty tractor with a sleeper and a long band trailer. We are in Wyoming and we are trying to get to Silverthorne in Colorado, and there was a road closure [00:19:00] on the way that we would normally take. So we took a lunch break and had to improvise. One team went ahead.

They left about 20 minutes before me because I work in testing for a truck manufacturer. Sometimes our trucks are heavily instrumented, so that means we have string gauges on certain parts on the truck with wires coming off of them to a data collection point. So I happen to have strain gauges on my airbags, so the air suspension.

This road that they spent 20 minutes on was just gravel and was heavy with potholes. They said, don’t come down here. You’re gonna tear all the instrumentation off. So we had to improvise a plan B or plan C. At this point, co-driver and I decide we’re gonna head east along the Wyoming, Colorado border and then head south.

And so, We climbed up over eight, nine, 10,000 feet. A couple times. We [00:20:00] crossed the border eight times. This particular road does that we’re up in a national forest for hours. It was foggy, it was sunny. It snowed. It rained. We had hail, we had everything. A lot like my Pikes Peak experience. And then finally we are committed into Colorado and we’re headed south.

That continental divide and the Rockies, I crossed it like five times. I just really didn’t know that was possible, and especially not in a semi-truck. So I mentioned that first trip that I took where the clerk mistook me for someone else, not a truck driver. I think I was in maybe South Dakota or something.

I had gone in to have the pump activated. So she recognizes that. I’m out on the commercial aisle. I’m not on the regular car aisle, and she’s like, are you one of those truckers? What’s that show? Ice Road Truckers? It just kind of blew my mind, like you see hundreds of truckers a day. I’m like one young female, and you decide to ask me if I’m [00:21:00] my ice road trucker.

I mean, I thought it was kind of cool. Unfortunately, I had to say no, but eventually, seven years later, I would become the closest thing to an ice road trucker that I was gonna become, which I mean, I wouldn’t say I necessarily pursued becoming an ice road trucker. If it happened, it would be awesome. Right?

So winter test with my current employer, they go to Yellowknife in the Northwest Territories of Canada. It’s on the Great Slave Lake. It takes four days to get there. Four days to get back. Didn’t have a lot of snow that year. It was 2020. The first Covid patient died in Washington while I was gone. Spent about a week and a half there.

Came back and they weren’t the same for quite a while. I saw the Northern Lights for the first time. You know, I spent the longest stint on the road in some of the craziest remote places. You know, not seeing cars for a really long time, never had to chain up. Like I said, we got pretty lucky with the weather, which was a huge blessing [00:22:00] ’cause it just, you know, it’s less stress and less cause for issue that creates delays and whatnot.

I did get within about a mile and a half of the entrance to the Ice Road where the first episode of Ice Road Truckers was filmed and it was just super exciting for me.

Crew Chief Eric: Well, I’m glad you brought that up. Shows like Ice Road Truckers and World’s Most Dangerous Roads and other programs like that that you see on History Channel have made trucking more popular in the last decade.

And so how real is that?

Keri Weishaar: I think they really are embellished and add drama. No doubt. It’s definitely dangerous. I just feel in today’s world you can’t be that dangerous and keep your job. It’s kind of stylized for tv.

Mountain Man Dan: So I’ve noticed over the past decade or so, a lot more females getting into driving, being in industry, have you noticed it being more approachable of a job for females to pursue?

Keri Weishaar: have not necessarily noticed more women on the [00:23:00] road. I still feel like it’s pretty rare.

Mountain Man Dan: Here on the East coast, I see it quite often. There’s a lot more than what I used to see like a decade ago, and I know quite a few women who have done it as well. So it’s, maybe it’s starting here and it’ll filter its way out your way and

Crew Chief Eric: yeah, I gotta agree with Dan on this one.

When I look up at a trucker’s cabin, when I’m on the highways here in the D M V, I’m always like, ah, it’s another lady trucker that’s. Cool. Like it, it’s awesome. But at the same time you’re like, wow. Like it used to be like once in a blue moon and it, it is kind of more often than not, and maybe it’s because we do a lot more commercial trucking in the sense that there’s a lot more Amazon trucks and a lot more u p s trucks ’cause everybody’s ordering everything nowadays.

And so you see a lot more of those in our area where they’re moving people’s stuff around, you know, the brown boxes that need to be delivered to your house. So maybe it still hasn’t reached the west coast yet,

Keri Weishaar: maybe. But more and more, you’re seeing a lot of corporations. So you mentioned Amazon or U P s, they’re pretty big.

They’re all about inclusivity [00:24:00] and being diverse. So could be that they’re really pursuing alternate genders besides males and races and all that,

Crew Chief Eric: the way the country’s built. We still need truckers that we have not found a way to replace that yet, although we do have these things called trains. But that’s a conversation for another day.

Right. But let’s talk a little bit more about. The trucks themselves. So just like cars, not all the trucks are the same. I kind of wanna ask another almost pit stop style question. Do you have a favorite or least favorite? Is there such thing as the prettiest or ugliest semi-truck?

Keri Weishaar: Well, I really like my peterbilts Western star is not that great looking.

Mountain Man Dan: I’m with you on that.

Keri Weishaar: I, uh, started my career managing the very first six Cascadia. And tested on us roads. So I do kind of have a strong connection and love for the Cascadia, although I don’t work for Freightliner anymore.

Crew Chief Eric: So what makes one, let’s say [00:25:00] better looking than another with cars? It’s, I don’t wanna say it’s a lot easier if you like the style of a Porsche, you like it, versus a Ferrari versus a Corvette.

But with the trucks, for those of us that aren’t in the business, it’s hard to tell ’em apart.

Keri Weishaar: Oh yeah, absolutely. I completely agree with you. It wasn’t until I got into the industry that I started to realize, okay, I can really recognize some differences before it’s just a truck. To me, they look all the same, right?

People definitely have their preferences for different reasons. There’s some people that can’t stand the look of new trucks. They like the old boxy ones that are lowered frames are stretched, painted, all fancy colors. Monochrome everywhere and,

Mountain Man Dan: and I’m not familiar with many manufacturers putting out any cab overs anymore or flat nose trucks.

What are your thoughts in comparison to the traditional cabs to the older cab overlooking flat nose trucks?

Keri Weishaar: I never drove a cab over. They still have those. Exclusively, pretty much in Europe because of length [00:26:00] restrictions. They just can’t have that extra space in the truck. Taking away from space hauling freight.

Crew Chief Eric: Mercedes makes a lot of those still.

Keri Weishaar: Yeah. My company owns a company in Europe that makes those as well. So we’re all partnered together. Yeah, I don’t care for the way they look, not my specialty. Just I really love new trucks. You know, they’ve come a long way. I like the comfort of them. Not that I want them to be more like a car, but there are definitely

Crew Chief Eric: some creature

Keri Weishaar: comforts and some fancy things about them that.

I really enjoy

Mountain Man Dan: the amenities on a lot of the newer ones are way better than the ones from like 20 years ago. Yeah, like simple things. I remember my introduction to semis was my stepfather’s dad was a truck driver from the day he started driving to the day he stopped driving. He always ran Mack trucks.

Every truck he ever got rid of, he pulled the emblem off the front of it and kept it where he had probably 30 of these Mack truck dogs, you know, on display in his house. And I remember riding in one of those when I was a kid and it was a rigid [00:27:00] seat going from that one to front of the family. Had one that had the air rights suspension seat in it.

I was like, this is so much smoother and it’s just continually progressed. Where compared to how rigid, where you would feel every bump in the road to nowadays. It’s like riding a Cadillac compared to the old ones.

Crew Chief Eric: And Dan was reading my mind because you know, there is that old saying, nothing drives like a Cadillac.

So I wonder, is that true of the trucks too? You have your favorite from, let’s say an aesthetics perspective. Have you gotten behind the wheel of a semi and said, man, this really drives. Nicely.

Keri Weishaar: Okay, so this is hard to say because I’ve never worked for this manufacturer. I worked for two others, but I did appreciate driving a Volvo because semi-truck have four suspensions.

Regular cars have two is what I like to say. So the tires are a little bit of suspension, and then you have, you know, the leaf spring and shocks and all that. Well, semi-trucks also have CAD suspension. And then they have seat suspension too. So the way this Volvo [00:28:00] performed on the road, including taking off from a stop and coming to a stop, it just was super smooth and really nice.

Crew Chief Eric: As I walk up and down the paddocks at racetracks, a lot of the team haulers are Volvos. Is it because they’re so comfortable? Is there something about them that makes them maybe more desirable to race teams to use?

Keri Weishaar: They’re a premium truck and they’re gonna last longer. I know that Freightliner has a reputation of being called a freight shaker, and they’re a lot cheaper truck.

You’ll see ’em all over for a long haul because you can get one for 80,000. The Kenworth and Peterbilt are more premium brands. They’re gonna be at least 150,000, summer over 300,000.

Mountain Man Dan: A big thing that’s come to change in recent years is a lot of the semis are starting to have automatic transmissions put in ’em.

What is your thought on automatic transmissions compared to the manual transmissions?

Keri Weishaar: I mean, it’s too bad. Manuals are a lot of fun. You get a lot of choice with them. But [00:29:00] yeah, automatics are more fuel efficient. Fleet owners are gonna choose them and they can have a lot more variety of drivers because they’re easier.

Mountain Man Dan: So I’m surprised you said that. Fuel efficient, I would’ve imagined because in normal automotive vehicles, the automatics tend to have less fuel economy than the manuals. I’d be interested in seeing how the automatics and the semis are making them

Keri Weishaar: more economical. I do believe with all the different.

Calibrations that they have, they can be more fuel efficient. Yeah. There’s other mechanisms on the truck they can drop to neutral while you’re traveling down the road. So consumer cars, they’ll shut off the engine when your foot’s on the brake. But we do have a neutral coast feature. There’s things like driver reward where there’s signals on the dash that guide you how to break and accelerate to be more fuel efficient.

Sometimes it’s just an overall effect of the whole system. I do believe the automatics can be more fuel [00:30:00] efficient

Crew Chief Eric: programming, and the automatics have gotten a lot better too. And if they’re borrowing any technology from the passenger car world or even the racing world where there’s more of a continuously variable transmission type of setup, or what would be the equivalent to a flappy paddle gearbox.

In our world where the gear ratios are quick and fast, it’s hard to beat that. Having written in the one semi, yes, you can shift gears without a clutch and rev match and all that kind of stuff, but it’s very slow and it’s very deliberate versus the automatic. It’s always thinking about the optimal rev range and where you are and all these other kinds of things.

The computer, in this case, I. Can outbeat the driver versus in a passenger car. It’s a lot more nuanced in the difference between the automatic and the manual.

Mountain Man Dan: Yeah. Race car, we’ll call ’em nannies that they have on for the computers doing a lot of stuff. So it sounds like they’ve started to put a lot of technology into these trucks to make them to where they are more efficient.

And if anything, they just. The to be more efficient

Keri Weishaar: and safety too. Safety is really big. We are implementing a lot [00:31:00] of safety features. We have cameras on the external of the truck, looking at the side, the front detecting objects, checking, following distance, and alerting you if. You’re approaching too quickly, and in fact, I have been what I call a crash test dummy at work, exercising these features and making sure that the warnings are responding at the appropriate time with the appropriate warning on the dash, because you can’t push a semi with the cruise control set to a collision.

Behind another vehicle, you have to trick it so you go really fast. You hit cruise at the last second to get that most dire warning. And so I’ve done that a lot on the test track. At work, I have to have an engineer ride with me so they can verify some of the warnings and some of the things that are happening on the computer when they’re plugged in because I’m busy driving.

I’ve slammed a few people into the dash, I’m sorry. And I’m also scared a few people, but they always get [00:32:00] back in.

Crew Chief Eric: Have the trucks adopted adaptive cruise control now? Yes, absolutely. And that’s good that the trucks are continuing to evolve, incorporate new technologies, things that we take for granted in the passenger cars.

But you start to think about the trucking industry and go, well, trucks are trucks or trucks. There’s not a huge disruptor in that industry. But then there’s this one name that sticks out kind of everywhere you turn around these days. And that’s Tesla. So what do you think about the introduction of the quote unquote EV semi,

Keri Weishaar: all the manufacturers are working, well, I guess maybe not all the big ones are working on that right now, and you’re gonna see a lot coming up.

The company I work for is a little bit more conservative. We’re not first to the game, but we’re gonna come up behind with a better product. Overall, it doesn’t take too much Googling on semi EV trucks to see kind of where we’re at and where we’re headed. I think it’s controversial, and I’m not sure if there’s a net gain for [00:33:00] the environment or the consumer.

Crew Chief Eric: So I’ve always argued the way to do it was to adopt. The train technology, which is diesel electric hybrid in the sense that the diesel is used as a generator to build electricity for the rest of the system without divulging too much information. Is that something that’s being looked into in the trucking industry to go that route versus.

Just a straight ev.

Keri Weishaar: Yeah, it’s been tested. We had two alternate configurations built and tested at Los Angeles ports. That was actually partially managed by my department directly. Everything everyone is wondering about is happening. We’re just not ready to come out with it.

Mountain Man Dan: So other than the like hybrid or the EV aspect.

Cummins was doing the hydrogen diesel engine. What are your thoughts on concepts like that?

Keri Weishaar: That’s under development too. It’s in the universities, it’s in the manufacturers. I’m not directly [00:34:00] involved, but I know that things are happening.

Crew Chief Eric: Well, we’ll just have to wait and see Dan. Well, like we say in the intro of the show, We’re always fixing to get into something motors sports related, and you fit that category as well.

As we look through the photos on your website, there is evidence of super truck racing. There is evidence of Monster Jam, king of Hammers, Pikes Peak, and more. So let’s dive into that a little bit. How did you go from working at the test center and doing all these other things in research and everything you’ve been talking about?

Into the world of racing these trucks.

Keri Weishaar: Racing was my first love, and that’s what really led me to my college education and then my career choice. My father was a volunteer for Sports Car Club of America Racing. He took me a lot of weekends. From Northern California, and when I say Northern California, I mean about an hour and a half south of Oregon, so this is still four [00:35:00] hours north of San Francisco.

He would take me all the way down to what I consider Southern California Laguna Seca at the time in Monterey Sea Point, miss Sonoma area. We were basically course marshals. The tire crew, every volunteer group on the track had t-shirts. There was the fire guys, their t-shirts said, you smoke it, we soak it.

We had responsibility for restocking the tires at the wall. So you whack it, we stack it. There was another one. You blow it, we tow it. Every kind of volunteer group had these funny shirts and I really thought that was a lot of fun. And the noise and the power and the speed and the sunny days I thought was really awesome.

So at one of the races we volunteered at, I found out that my high school had. A racing team where I knew we had Auto shop, but I wasn’t to the point of taking electives and exploring what those were. So as soon as I got into electives my junior and senior year, I [00:36:00] took auto shop, joined the auto club, ended up being nominated for Homecoming Queen by the Auto Club.

There was a parade. The auto shop teacher had his own tow home and towed me on top of the race car in town in the parade, and I thought that was the coolest thing ever out of all racing. I had always really admired the long distance desert truck racers. I saw a documentary where, They had spare transmissions and motors out in the desert and they could replace that in the pits and keep going.

And I thought that was the coolest, biggest commitment and effort and so much fun. So I always just kind of had my sights set on maybe getting into that kind of rum someday. I eventually was able to do that. I spent the whole season with a team. Racing in the best in the Desert Series in Nevada in 2008, and I got a pre-runner, mid travel suspension truck shortly after that.

One thing led to another. I did end up [00:37:00] racing it, and then the whole Pikes Peak thing was somewhat accidental. So Pikes Peak, I just decided I needed to go. It was an event I needed to attend. I was working for Freightliner at the time, and Freightliner had a team in the past and then ended up giving Mike Ryan a, a newer Cascadia cab to go on his.

Old Starling chassis. So it was still a Starling truck, but it had this Cascadia cab. I ended up telling one of my coworkers who was on the team originally and supported Mike that I was gonna go. He is like, Hey, you know, Mike always sends a personal invite. Would you like to be hooked up with him? I’m not gonna go.

I said, yeah, that sounds great. So I got to hang out with Mike’s team now. The way Pikes Peak works is during the week before race day, which is Sunday, every year, last Sunday in June, they practice the mountain Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday is a day off, and then Sunday’s race day. So the whole fleet of race [00:38:00] vehicles gets split up into three groups.

They stick together each of the three days and practice one third of the mountain. So they have cones at an inline and then a little bit further up. They have a new start line, and then they’ll an inline and then a new start line. So over the three days, he usually committed to getting all of his crew and support people in a fire suit in the passenger seat to do these practice runs.

But no one had ever rode on race day, so it was the last and final day, and it was supposed to be my turn coming up. Of course, I was the newbie. Everyone else got to write first, which I was totally cool with. But he started having a slipping issue that he thought was the transmission, and so he called it for the day and it was third day, so my heart was a little broken.

I didn’t get a ride, but there was always another year, right? On Saturday, he had like a team barbecue at his hotel and I was there. He started kind of asking me, you know, how was it that I was there? You know, what was I doing there? I said, well, you know, I’ve just. Always been into motor [00:39:00] sports. This is a race I need to attend in my lifetime, and so I decided this was the year, and here I am.

He’s like, wow, that’s really interesting. He’s like, you know, since he didn’t get to ride during practice, I wonder if you want to, if they’d let you ride on race day. I was like, well, heck yeah. I do that. And so he is like, all right, I’ll talk to the officials in the team. It’s. Midnight 3:00 AM deal. You get up on the mountain, set up your pit, and other spectators are getting on the mountain at that time as well.

He comes back with a waiver on a clipboard, says, all right, just sign your name here and you’re in. So I got in the truck with Mike and he even, you know, mentioned it in his interview at the start line. This was the first time he’d ever had a co-driver. The thing that scared me the most outta the whole thing was he is like, you know, I won’t even let my son ride with me.

I was like, well, what does that mean? Honestly, it was one of the most incredible experiences of my life. I was just elated and brought [00:40:00] to tears over it, literally to tears for a few different reasons, and I really couldn’t spill the beans or elaborate about it for several days. I did eventually tell my parents within like a day that what I had done, I didn’t tell them beforehand and they weren’t on the trip with me, you know, so they weren’t too surprised.

I, I would usually call and tell them about crazy things I had just done, I was on a Jeep Forum before the Facebook group days. I just had mentioned and posted a few pictures and about like the fifth response down, someone just said something as simple as, That must have been really awesome. The thoughts and emotions came back and the words started flowing and I wrote like three paragraphs about it.

This particular forum online had regular participation by, at the time, John Herrick and Larry Nickol, owners of Crawl Magazine. So John Harrick sent me a message. He said, Hey, we have a series in the magazine right now called Women in the Dirt. Would you like to submit an [00:41:00] article about your experience?

And I was like, yeah, that’d be great. So like, how long should it be? He’s like, oh, just do whatever. We’ll pare it down. So single space and word. I wrote out seven pages, but you know, it’s my story. I own it. It’ll always be mine. If you want the whole thing. It’s on my website. But he paired it down to about three pages of print and then a full page graphic.

For the beginning of the article. And so that was the first time I was really published, and that was a lot of fun. I hung out with them a lot, appeared in photos, on trail rides and whatnot. And then with trophy girl designs, I’ve had two of my products appear in the magazine as well. So yeah, you know, I felt like sitting in that passenger seat.

I wasn’t writing for myself, I was writing for every single person that had ever been a fan. That would ever dream of being in that seat. I dedicated it to everyone that would ever want to be in that seat. My feet didn’t even touch any kind of platform or the floor. My heels were just banging underneath [00:42:00] the seat.

I felt like a little tiny kid just having a joy ride of my life. We had all kinds of weather. It started out sunny. We had sleet, we had rain, we had snow, we had hail, and this is the end of June. So, All summer long in Colorado Springs, which the mountain is about 45 minutes outside of that town, thunderstorms roll in about 1:00 PM You’ll get some rain, you’ll get lot of thunderstorms.

We’re climbing from about eight to 9,000 feet up just over 14,000 feet to the finish line. And so I’m looking out at the horizon and above and so. As we’re climbing the mountain, we’re climbing to the bottom of these thunderstorm clouds. I’ve been watching lightning, literally go down to earth is what it feels like.

’cause you’re so high up. The slope of the mountain just goes away so quickly down into the valley, like Colorado Springs, you really feel like you’re just kind of flying in the [00:43:00] thunderstorms. And I could watch the lightning and I could see rain in different spots falling and. It was just so surreal and it brought me to tears.

So you get to the finish line and then everyone comes down as a group ’cause they don’t let any competitors down in between. Everyone just goes up, up, up all day long and then all the fans come out onto the road and they’re cheering you on and it’s raining in spots, it’s snowing in spots. They literally have their children over their heads to keep them dry.

And get their children higher above the crowds so they can cheer you on and wave at you. And a couple times Mike lost complete electrical power, which means he had to drive his back of his shoulders into his seat, and both his feet as hard as he could on the brake pedal to stop that giant machine around some of those tight turns coming down the hill.

I wasn’t scared because I go into things for the first time with no expectations. Yeah, everything’s gravy. It’s not till the next time that I start to get nervous ’cause I’ve experienced this [00:44:00] thing or that thing, and I know a little bit more what to expect. So I was cool as a cucumber, but man, he was kind of freaking out a couple times and luckily everything turned out okay.

Years later, he went off course during practice and ended up 20 feet in a tree just because the mountain gave way so quickly. But he was by himself at that time. And yeah, really, really, really good first and probably last experience.

Crew Chief Eric: How different was his racing truck versus the trucks you were used to?

Like how much power was he making? How was it decked out, the safety? Like tell us a little bit more about the truck itself.

Keri Weishaar: So he had an old, old series 60 Detroit diesel series 60 marine engine with two turbos over 2000 horsepower. He had just a single rear axle, single tire on each side. I think three and a half inch king shocks back there.

An amazing machine. It sounds amazing. So I knew that they put like GoPros on the truck, but it wasn’t till like a year [00:45:00] later, I happened to cross a video of our run on YouTube. I think it was published by his son. I watched that and that’s when I got scared, seeing how close we were to the edge of the road where there’s no guardrail.

That was before the paved. Saliva. It was gravel. I was amazed how much steering wheel movement there was while seemingly going straight. He did let me flip one switch one time, which was pretty cool. And then I watched the speedometer a few times. At one point we were going over 90 miles an hour,

Crew Chief Eric: which for a vehicle that big is fast.

Keri Weishaar: Yeah, a diesel truck, 90 miles an hour.

Mountain Man Dan: I watched the video you have on your website. That’s the one. It’s an awesome video. And to any of the listeners, Go to our website, check it out. It is worth the watch. I had my daughter watch it and one thing that she noticed is like you’re saying, the wheel turning a lot to keep it straight.

There’s one corner. You guys are going around and a guy like steps out onto the course a little bit to get closer to get like a better video of you guys as you go by. [00:46:00] She’s like, what is that guy doing?

Crew Chief Eric: That’s the world of rally baby. It’s like the wild west. I love it.

Mountain Man Dan: So, and that’s like, I told her, I was like, Eric loves this kind of stuff.

With you having ridden on that before they paved the whole thing out there, do you think would be different? Riding now with a fully paved,

Keri Weishaar: the drifting would be a lot different. Right. Still just as exhilarating and just as infamous, but yeah, it’d be a different ride.

Crew Chief Eric: Question is where did he get slicks that big?

That’s what I wanna know.

Keri Weishaar: Yeah. Well, they’re called. Super singles, they have some traction.

Crew Chief Eric: No, that’s awesome. And, and obviously you’ve had experience with other disciplines of motorsport, always involving trucks, like we mentioned, monster jam, king of Hammers, things like that.

Keri Weishaar: Now that I’ve conquered to a certain point of satisfaction, long distance truck desert racing, I would love to go to a Hill Climb event and be involved in that.

Crew Chief Eric: So tell us about your time in the desert.

Keri Weishaar: So I spent that one season invest in the desert with Roma goat racing. They were stock mini with a Ford [00:47:00] Ranger, excellent group of guys. Just an excellent time, and that’s really where I fell in love with the sport. So I had watched that documentary, but that was my first exposure to it.

That’s what led to me getting my pre-runner style track, which I ended up racing short course, and I was the 2012 series winner at a somewhat local track. Just a little track.

Crew Chief Eric: Very nice. Congratulations.

Keri Weishaar: Well, two of the crew guys with Mike Ryan are James Smith. He is a Hollywood stunt driver as well. And then Sam I got in touch with to be my first co-driver for short course, and he did a great job.

I didn’t have anybody holding my hand or giving me tips. Everything was just observation at this point. So he really taught me a few things, and I think he kind of had low expectations. The very first jump, he was really holding onto his seat and kind of nervous that I was going so fast. We launch off this jump and have a really soft landing.

He’s like, wow, that wasn’t bad at all. By the time we got done with our race, [00:48:00] I had probably been hyperventilating. It was a crazy race. I ended up getting past a couple guys that had sandbagged during qualifying so that they would get placed in the front and I had to pass ’em all. Gave me a lot of, lot more work.

But we got around and we got first place. I felt like I had ran a marathon. We were just hitting and hollering and screaming the whole time, and it was just a blast. So making connections at races has really led to a lot more personal satisfaction in my life and a lot more opportunities that sometimes my eyes were open too, but a lot of times it brought me outta my comfort zone so I could initiate a lot of networking or.

Seek out opportunities to participate in things that I was interested in, and really ultimately led to a lot of these really unique experiences that a lot of people won’t have unless they are a real go-getter and get out there and get involved. I also made a personal contact with the late Jesse Combs, and she was the [00:49:00] one that emailed me and referred me to Monster Jam.

So I got to try out for three days in a grave digger. I won’t tell you how many there are, but there’s more than one. During that three days of training, I broke my tailbone, which you can’t really break it, but essentially like breaking a bone. Couldn’t sit straight for six months. But I also got to see the very first trial of the Forward Flip by Tom Mince, which is now done in stadium shows.

That was also super awesome experience once in a Lifetime. Dwayne the Rock Johnson, he openly talks about. How devastated he was over not making it into the N F L. I can relate to that a little bit. Not near the same kind of athletic level or anything, but for a year I was heartbroken and had nightmares and good dreams and bad dreams about.

Never being called by Monster Jam and being placed in my own truck, but I’m over it now and just [00:50:00] like everyone says, at least I got to do that. At least I gotta try. I’m just grateful for that. Now,

Crew Chief Eric: with all your Motorsport experience, always again around trucks. Is that what inspired you to break out and found and start trophy girls design?

Is that where all your safety gear and your products are coming from or was there some other inspiration?

Keri Weishaar: Yeah. When I bought my ranger pre-runner, my mid travel truck that I ended up racing, I needed stuff for it. I would find products online. I was like, oh, well I could make that for cheaper. And so it all started with the fire extinguisher mount.

I made one for myself. I used a local laser cutting shop with my own CAD designs. ’cause I have CAD at home. Posted it on that Jeep form where John Harris saw me talk about Pikes Peak and offered space in the magazine. I had like nine orders overnight. I was like, oh, well maybe there’s something to this.

I’ve sold probably three to [00:51:00] 400 now. It’s not something I advertise, it’s really just word of mouth. If you Google the right terms, you can come across me or you can see me on social media a little bit. I’ve been focusing on my family. I have two kids. I’ve been married almost 10 years now, so. Things have definitely slowed down in the motor sports world.

But yeah, I still exist and I can do any custom laser cutting too.

Crew Chief Eric: Anything else you’re designing or manufacturing or have been commissioned to make?

Keri Weishaar: Yeah, on my Facebook business page, I have posted a lot of past projects. A lot of them are automotive, just because I participate in those online discussions, I’m present in that world online.

But you know, there’s kind of arts and craftsy stuff too, like yard signs for your garden or whatever. But another one of my main products is a plane of bend bracket for when you’re bending tubing on more than one plane,

Crew Chief Eric: all the welders are now suddenly just church nodding. They’re like, yep, that, yep, we need that.

Exactly. Yep. [00:52:00]

Mountain Man Dan: As your children get older, are you planning to hopefully accelerate the motor sports side of stuff?

Keri Weishaar: Definitely more of a hobby type thing. Now, every day is kind of a new day. I’m known to not really do the same thing more than once too often, so I have been to Pikes Peak three times. I don’t know if I’ll go again, but I’m always looking for the next new adventure, something new, something bigger.

I’m not sure what’s next. I’m doing some off-road recovery training, which I’ve never done before. I’ve experienced lots of recovery operations, but I would have no idea what I’m doing.

Crew Chief Eric: Well, that’s why you go to learn, right? Yeah. It segues into a great question, which is if a young lady came up to you and said, Keri, why?

Why trucks? Why motorsport? Why engineering? What would you say to them?

Keri Weishaar: In high school, I just decided that my passions were. Art and auto shop class. I remember my parents were always super supportive. I [00:53:00] was raised a little bit of a tomboy. We were a hunting family. I didn’t do team sports. I tried, didn’t care for it.

So hunting’s a sport too. I’ve done competitive shooting in the range before as well. I. So automotive was new to me at some point, but not foreign as a girl. But yeah, I was just encouraged to explore all things and do whatever interested me. And for whatever reason, I always had a brain that wanted to know why something was designed the way it was.

I didn’t necessarily take things apart to see how they worked, but it was more of like from a design perspective and like functionality. Analyzing the requirements and meeting those requirements, solving a problem. So the artwork, the drawing class and the auto shop class was really what drove me to mechanical engineering and wanting to be in the automotive industry.

But that racing certainly helped. Getting involved with volunteering at the track definitely had some adversity along the [00:54:00] way, and it’s hard being a female in engineering. It’s hard to be a female in racing, but. You’ll always find somebody that’s gonna cheer you on and you just kind of have to have the mentality to keep an eye out for that.

Keep your ears open and accept the love that you’re gonna get from the good people.

Crew Chief Eric: We’ve reached that point of the episode where I get to ask you if you have any shout outs, promotions, or anything else you’d like to share that we haven’t covered thus far.

Keri Weishaar: I just wanna thank my tribe, my. People, my family, that’s always been there and supported me.

Thank you, Carl Magazine. You know we’ve had a lot of fun times over the years. Jeff, thanks for my connection. Love you.

Mountain Man Dan: As a talented mechanical engineer racer and a professional in the semi-truck world, Keris a true trailblazer breaking down barriers and aspiring others, especially women and young ladies to pursue their passions no matter how unconventional they may be.

If you want to keep up with Keri’s journey and stay tuned on her latest projects, be sure to check out [00:55:00] the website, trophy girl designs.com. You can find her at Trophy Girl Designs.

Crew Chief Eric: Harry, I cannot thank you enough for coming on Break Fix for our previous guest and friend of the show, Jeff Willis, for introducing us.

You know, this is a really interesting look into the automotive industry, especially from the world of. Big trucks. It’s exciting to see more women behind the wheel of big trucks, but also for you being involved in the mechanical side of this, in the testing of this, in the production, the manufacturer, and I’m really excited to see where the future of big trucks goes, especially in the next couple of years here.

So thank you for sharing your knowledge with us, sharing your story with us, and it’s been an absolute pleasure.

Keri Weishaar: Well, I was happy to do it and really grateful for the experience, so thank you too. I feel like it’s an interesting story and unique. Hopefully everyone else thinks so too.

Mountain Man Dan: It a pleasure to meet you and talk to you.

Keri Weishaar: Bye guys.

Mountain Man Dan: Have a good night.

Crew Chief Brad: If you like what you’ve heard and [00:56:00] want to learn more about G T M, 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 or text us at (202) 630-1770 or send us an email at Crew chief@gtmotorsports.org.

We’d love to hear from you.

For as little as $2 and 50 cents a month, you can keep our developers, writers, editors, casters, and other volunteers fed on their strict diet of fig Newton’s, gummy bears, and monster. Consider [00:57:00] signing up for Patreon today at www.patreon.com/gt motorsports. And remember, without fans, supporters, and members like you, none of this would be possible.

Highlights

Skip ahead if you must… Here’s the highlights from this episode you might be most interested in and their corresponding time stamps.

00:00 Meet Keri: A Journey in Trucking
02:57 Life on the Road: Challenges and Experiences
06:29 Training and Endorsements
15:14 Best and Worst Moments in Trucking
22:46 Women in Trucking
24:16 Favorite Trucks and Driving Experiences
28:07 The Popularity of Volvo Haulers
28:42 Manual vs. Automatic Transmissions in Semis
29:11 Fuel Efficiency Innovations
30:55 Safety Features in Modern Trucks
32:25 The Rise of EV Semis
34:05 Keri’s Journey into Truck Racing
37:04 The Pikes Peak Experience
46:50 Desert Racing Adventures
50:10 Founding Trophy Girl Designs
52:40 Advice for Aspiring Female Engineers
54:18 Final Thoughts and Acknowledgements

Bonus Content

There's more to this story!

All of our BEHIND THE SCENES (BTS) Break/Fix episodes are raw and unedited, and expressly shared with the permission and consent of our guests.

Learn More

Impressive Motorsports Resume!

SCCA Laguna Seca
Sears Point
Nasport high school team
Auto shop
Homecoming
Mechanical engineering degree 2005
Mini Baja
Kinetic sculpture 2005
Daimler 2007 CDL, winter test, cross country
CRAWL Easter Jeep Safari 2008
Rumblegoat Racing BITD 2009
Porsche 1
First Las Vegas Barrett Jackson SEMA
Ranger 2010
Trophy Girl Designs
Porsche 2
Pikes Peak 2010
NHRA
Central Oregon Off-road Race Park
PACCAR 2012
Ultra4 2011, 2012, 2013
Monster Jam
King of the hammers 2014
Pikes Peak 2015
VORRA
Yellowknife 2019
Pikes Peak 2022
Bendix, J turns and collision avoidance, and GVFs on site
Ram Runner pace truck
Fass Racing
Parasailing
Power wagon x2
Parallel park semi
Loveland pass and I70 highest roads in US
Crossed the continental divide like 5 times in one day, over 10k feet
Trailer backing training

If you want to keep up with Keri’s journey and stay updated on her latest projects be sure to check out her website www.trophygirldesigns.com – You can find her on @TrophyGirlDesigns where she shares behind-the-scenes glimpses into her life on and off the track.

Keri’s CDL training was rigorous – mountain driving with a 52-foot trailer, mastering pre-trip inspections, and learning to parallel park a truck and trailer. She skipped the usual Class B stepping stone and went straight for Class A, impressing her trainer with her focus and humility. “I’ve heard it over and over again—women make great students because we don’t have an ego. We just listen and do what we’re told,” she says. Her forklift instructor echoed the sentiment, calling her the best student in 15 years.

Ice Roads and Northern Lights

One of Keri’s most memorable adventures came in 2020, during winter testing in Yellowknife, Northwest Territories. Driving across the Great Slave Lake, she experienced fog, sun, snow, hail, and even saw the Northern Lights. “I got within a mile and a half of the entrance to the Ice Road where the first episode of Ice Road Truckers was filmed,” she beams.

Though she never pursued reality TV fame, Keri became the closest thing to an Ice Road Trucker in real life – logging thousands of miles in extreme conditions, all while collecting data for vehicle development.

Truck Talk: Favorites, Features, and Flat-Nose Nostalgia

Her worst moment? Losing engine brakes on a steep grade after a co-driver’s programming error. “I had to do an emergency stop and smoke the brakes a little bit,” she says. Her best? The first time she fueled up solo and the clerk couldn’t believe she was the driver. “He kept asking, ‘Are they getting oil or a truck wash?’ I said, ‘I’m the driver.’”

Keri’s favorite trucks? Peterbilts and the Freightliner Cascadia, which she helped test early in her career. She’s not a fan of cab-over designs, though she acknowledges their necessity in Europe due to length restrictions.

She appreciates modern trucks for their comfort and suspension. “Semi-trucks have four suspensions,” she explains – tire, chassis, cab, and seat. Her favorite to drive? A Volvo, for its smooth ride and premium feel.

Women in Trucking: A Growing Presence

While Keri hasn’t seen a dramatic increase in female truckers on the West Coast, her co-hosts note a rise in the East. She credits companies like Amazon and UPS for promoting inclusivity and diversity in the industry. “We still need truckers,” she says. “We haven’t found a way to replace that yet.”

Keri’s journey also includes co-driving with stuntman Mike Ryan at the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb. Today, she designs safety equipment for trophy roll cages – bringing her full circle from engineering to endurance. Her story is a testament to grit, growth, and the power of listening – on the road and in life.

As a talented mechanical engineer, racer and a professional in the semi-truck world, Keri is a true trailblazer breaking down barriers and inspiring others – especially women and young ladies- to pursue their passions, no matter how unconventional they may be.

Guest Co-Host: Daniel Stauffer

In case you missed it... be sure to check out the Break/Fix episode with our co-host.

This content has been brought to you in-part by sponsorship through...

From Beltway Builds to Boulder Dreams: Brian Crider’s Journey into Van Life Mastery

Daniel S

October 24, 2023

From Beltway Builds to Boulder Dreams: Brian Crider’s Journey into Van Life Mastery

What happens when a Fast & Furious-era car modder from Maryland discovers the off-grid magic of Colorado’s camper van culture? You get Boulder Camper Vans – a custom van conversion company that blends artistry, adventure, and engineering into every build. Founder Brian Crider joined the Break/Fix podcast to share his origin story, his philosophy on van life, and what makes Boulder Camper Vans one of the top builders in the country.

Brian’s journey began in the woods and driveways of Annapolis, Maryland. As a kid, he was always outdoors – climbing trees, skiing, and exploring. But his passion for vehicles started with customizing cars in true early-2000s style: neon lights, booming sound systems, and tricked-out dashboards. “That was our era,” Brian recalls. “Fast and the Furious was the vibe.”

Tune in everywhere you stream, download or listen!

His first van – a Ford E350 – was a modest setup with a bed and cooler, but it sparked something deeper. “I realized I could modify vehicles to get me deeper into the woods and still feel at home,” he says. Helping a friend build out a similar van planted the seed for what would become Boulder Camper Vans.

When Brian moved to Colorado in 2013, he quickly noticed a cultural shift. “Fast and Furious isn’t out here,” he jokes. “The camper van is the Ferrari of Colorado.” With his modding skills and a newfound appreciation for off-grid living, he saw an opportunity to build something special.

Camper vans weren’t just about sleeping in a vehicle anymore – they were about creating mobile sanctuaries with heaters, solar panels, and battery systems that could keep you off-grid for weeks. “It’s like comparing a Mazda Miata to a Porsche 911 Turbo,” Brian says. “We’ve come a long way from foot-pump faucets.”

Spotlight

Synopsis

In this episode of the Break/Fix, we interview Brian Crider, co-founder of Boulder Camper Vans, an expert custom camper van conversion company based in Boulder, Colorado. The discussion covers Brian’s journey from a childhood fascination with modifying vehicles to founding Boulder Camper Vans. Brian emphasizes the importance of creativity, innovation, and the use of cutting-edge technology in their van builds. He shares insights into their detailed build process, which includes an initial consultation, CAD drawings, and customer involvement throughout the build. The conversation also explores the importance of having a four-wheel-drive vehicle for adventurous travels, the integration of advanced electrical systems for off-grid living, and the benefits of using high-quality components. Brian touches on catering to customers with unique requirements, such as mobile tattoo studios and disability accommodations. The episode wraps up with a look at Boulder Camper Vans’ future projects and tips for those interested in #VanLife.

The who/what/where/when/how of Boulder Camper Vans. As a co-founder, let’s dig into your history Brian!
Let’s talk about the Build Process – what does that entail?
Is it BYOV (Bring your own Van?)
Explain the “EV upgrades” or ideas especially for off-grid living.
We had Joey Jordan IV on a previous episode, and he talked about living out of a Toyota Hi-Ace he imported from Japan and took on a 35k mile journey from LA to Patagonia – How would you prep your vans for a journey like that? Recommendations? Suspension/Tire mods, etc?
Tips/Tricks to living in your van long term?
Climate – how are they prepped for extreme hot/cold conditions
Sleeping arrangements? How many people, how does it work?
Is there a market for used Vans? Do you act as a reseller or broker? What does the market look like?
What’s next for Boulder Camp Vans?

Transcript

The road to success is paved by all of us because everyone has a story.

Crew Chief Eric: Unwavering creativity, innovation, and the artistry are at the forefront of every build they can conceive. Their team uses leading edge technology to construct a durable and truly unique vehicle. They work in a highly competitive field, constantly investing in technology and research to make sure that they stay ahead of the curve.

And tonight, Brian Crider joins us from Boulder Camper Vans, and he’s part of a team of artists, adventurers, innovators, and perfectionists whose passion is to create a one of a kind hamper van for you. So with that, let’s welcome [00:01:00] Brian to break Fix. Hello. Hello. Thanks for having me and my co-host Tonight is the one and only mountain man.

Dan,

Mountain Man Dan: glad to have you here.

Crew Chief Eric: Like all good break fix stories. Everybody’s got a superhero origin, but yours is a special one because it’s kind of rare that we have folks who originated from the D M V, that’s the DC, Maryland, Virginia area On this show, let’s kind of dig into your past. Let’s talk about the who, what, when and where of you Brian, and how you founded Boulder Camper Vans.

Brian Crider: Yeah, what a story. You know, I grew up adventuring the blood. As a young kid. I was out in the yard or out in the woods climbing trees and climbing mountains and going skiing, and just as much outdoors as I possibly could have. I was trying to grab as much as I possibly could. Leading into the camper van business is, I’ve always been into automobiles and modifying automobiles and grew up in the East coast, it was more of like a pimp my ride kind of vibe where you’re doing the subwoofers and the exhaust.

You know, I could be driving at night and look behind me and know what [00:02:00] kind of headlights of that vehicle were much like. I’m sure that you guys could, so you understand where I’m coming from. That’s the beltway game. Exactly. So, ’cause camper vans really weren’t a thing back when I was growing up, but, Of my first vehicles that I had was a regular E three 50 van and decked it out in the most basic way where it just had a little bed in the back, a little cooler and a little hangout zone for me and my friends.

Whenever we would go camping, they’d be pitching their tents and I would just have a little comfortable space to sleep in in the camper van. So, Really, I started from modifying vehicles to modifying vehicles that could get me deep into the woods. Have some of those amenities that I felt comfortable as if I were at home.

Nice comfort above bed to sleep on a little heater that was in there. Next thing you know, I’m helping one of my good friends back in Maryland where I grew up in Annapolis, helping him kind of do the same thing for his van. So that’s really where the inception started.

Mountain Man Dan: You’d started to modify your own van and then one of your.[00:03:00]

Friends, had you help him modify his, was that one of the first times you’re like, Hey, this is something that people would be interested in? Or did you think prior to that that it was something people would be interested in?

Brian Crider: Van Life word didn’t even exist, so I was one of the first people to have the van in the East coast.

I feel like, I mean, there wasn’t, I didn’t know anybody and I had a big, big friend group growing up on the East Coast. But all of my friends and the people I would hang out with knew that I was the person to come to if you wanted to do something to your car. And as we all know, putting the neon lights underneath the subwoofers in the back, painting little pieces of the dash and putting a head unit in and doing all these things, that was our era.

You know, I’m 39 years old now. I just think back that was where it was at the Fast and the Furious. You know what I mean? That was the time. And so when I moved to Colorado back in 2013, 14, I realized that. Hey, fast and Furious isn’t out here. The camper van is the Ferrari of Colorado. Something that I quickly recognized that I could feel [00:04:00] comfortable modifying these vehicles and starting a business out here that would be successful.

But I think when my friend first asked me, when I built my first camper van and he asked me to help him, it was definitely a spark, but I had no idea on the East Coast because. It just wasn’t a thing back when I was up. We’re talking about, you know, mid nineties, late nineties, early two thousands when I was doing this, and it just gave me the confidence to be able to help people do the type of work that I’m doing today.

But I wouldn’t say that anything to do with camper vans had sparked when I was really, really younger. It was more just the confidence of helping people modify their vehicles, which is in the general sense of what I’m doing now, no matter what vehicle it is. People come to me because they put the trust and the confidence in me that I’m gonna be able to make their dreams come true.

Crew Chief Eric: You were just talking about getting closer to 40, being a petrolhead of a certain age as we all are here and coming from the east coast. I remember in the late eighties, early nineties that. It Camper van, if that was even a term in those [00:05:00] times, was the VW van again, or the early Euro vans, the Westie, the West Flia.

Those are the kinds of vans that we looked up to. And if you had a unicorn, you could get the synchro with a manual transmission, right? Ooh, ah. You know, that kinda deal. But they were super rare, like nobody really had them. I only know of like a handful of people that had them. So I’m wondering, is that what you’ve been striving to bring back or bring to the masses?

Is those Van Agans that West Flia, the things that we craved as kids that was the pinnacle of these camper vans?

Brian Crider: I’ve spent time in those. I’ve rented those. I’ve been around those. And you know, just to kind of be blunt, my only issue with that was. You couldn’t stand up in those. I think the idea of those were that you could drive out into the woods and sleep in a pop top and have a nice little couch in the back, have a little bit of running water.

So I think that was really the foundation that brought these more sophisticated, more tech forward style of van that I build today.

Mountain Man Dan: So when you were growing up, [00:06:00] did any of the. Older Dodge or Chevy or Ford, like conversion vans that had the seats that could turn around, had a little table and like little 13 inch TV in ’em.

Were any of those like inspirations for getting to where you’re at now?

Brian Crider: Totally. The Ford E three 50 that I had, it was four wheel drive. I had a four inch lift on it. It was, I. Super capable of getting me out there. And you know, I definitely came across a bunch of different, more RV manufactured vehicles that were, in my opinion, put together poorly.

And I traveled with my grandparents when I was younger in their 40 foot rv, and I’m sitting in a van right now that doesn’t have a generator, that doesn’t have a black tank, more of a all electric vehicle when it comes to running the ac. Running the water pump, you don’t gotta be plugged into campsite.

It was a stepping stone for most, and I just think that it was a great iteration into the camping world as far as being in a van. But compared to where we are fast forwarding, like with most vehicles that we look at today, [00:07:00] it pales in comparison to where the technology is. And because when I think about the ultimate vehicle, and I owe homage to the West Philia, but I’m gonna be off.

Right. I want to be for season, I don’t want my water to be freezing. I wanna have a big enough battery system to be out there for weeks on end. I wanna have solar panels and, and they didn’t have those kind of concepts back when they created that, right? It was just, Hey, here’s a vehicle that you can sleep in and.

Have a foot pump that shoots water out of the faucet, but it still wasn’t there. And so like me, and there’s a couple other companies out there that have really kind of pushed it as far as electronics go, but a functional standpoint, stuff not rattling, going down the road, not having to have a gasoline generator running off the back and annoying everybody else in the campground.

So, Definitely homage to the West Felia, but at this point, like comparing a Mazda Miata versus a Porsche nine 11 turbo. You know what I mean? Yeah. So much [00:08:00] different world now, and I’m excited with all of the technology that has come out today because until I. 10 years ago, there was never a battery that could keep you off grid for, you know, a week or two.

There wasn’t the solar capacity that you could put on top of a camper van that could, you know, recharge your batteries the way that you wanted to. So there is finally now a foundation to where you can actually really get out there for the real people that like to travel and be on the road for extended periods of time.

Everything exists in order to do that. You know, I think all of this experience that I went through from the pit, my ride kind of exhaust, subwoofers, rims, tires, suspensions, all this really led up to the confidence of me being able to start my own company and being able to modify a brand new, at the time, 2016 Sprinter and cutting holes in the side of it and so on and so forth.

Yeah, so I, I think all of it played an inspiration of where I’m at today, the love that I have. For taking something like a Ford or [00:09:00] a Dodge or a Mercedes from the stock, not very exciting vehicle to turning it into something that is much more capable of whatever it is that you’re trying to do. But when you make modifications to it, it makes it unique to the person that you’re working for or unique to who you are.

All of it was an inspiration. My life ever since I first started driving when I was 16, my first job again was for, you know, an auto manufacturer that kind. I made modifications to vehicles and that’s always been a love of mine. So there’s not one specific point in my life where I can say, oh, that was the inspiration, but it’s really been a multiple event that’s led me to where I’m at today, and it gave me the confidence to be one of the top five builders in the country.

Crew Chief Eric: You mentioned in the early days, you know, there’s a lot of D I y, a lot of figuring it out. Probably a lot of trial and error, but then you hooked up with this automotive manufacturer. Did you find yourself becoming a fabricator? Did you go formally through training or schooling to do this kind of stuff, or did you sort of just figure it [00:10:00] out over time?

Brian Crider: You know, I’ve always been torn between schooling and street smarts. The short answer is I figured it out on my own. I. Laying down beads of welding or hooking up electrical systems and learning my lessons on where I went wrong. So I’m really a self-taught person that was able to quickly learn from my mistakes and become a really well-versed jack of all trades, where I know how to be a fine woodworker.

I know how to be a master electrician, um, as they would say a master of none, but really good at just about everything. I really pride myself on the kind of knowledge that I’ve taken in over the course that I’ve been ever since I was young of just being able to do what I do. Never went to a formal school.

I went to a community college for a while. Did a year or two at University of Maryland, but it wasn’t for me. I just wanted to kind of be out. In the thick of it, just learning on the streets and actually putting down my foot to what I specifically wanted to learn. And for [00:11:00] me, school was almost a diversion, kind of just being where I wanted to be

Crew Chief Eric: already.

You mentioned growing up in Annapolis, which is the capital of our fine state of Maryland. So I gotta ask a very Maryland centric question. What high school did you go to?

Brian Crider: I went to Srna Park High School. There you go. There you go. Yeah. Yep. Srna Park. Grew up in Annapolis for a long time. That’s where all my family’s at, and I spent 28 years in Maryland and never, ever left.

So that’s where a lot of my roots have been put down. Being a van guy, what’s the best van in your opinion? Well, you know, there’s really only three vans on the market that could really, in my opinion, ever be considered. It’s the. Mercedes Sprinter, the Ford Transit and the Dodge Pro Master, and really the Dodge Pro Master, I don’t even offer to build on because it just strictly doesn’t have four wheel drive or all wheel drive.

So it’s like building on a foundation that just can’t handle. The adventure that I seek and our clients seek. So really it [00:12:00] narrows it down to two, which is the Mercedes Sprinter and the Ford Transit, because both of these vehicles, just like a home, have a very solid foundation in, in terms of solid foundation, I mean a really good chassis, but a chassis that offers the ability to be able to get you out there into those dispersed campgrounds to get deep to where nobody’s at, because.

I don’t want to be at the KOAs. I’m not a blacktop type of guy, so my ultimate favorite and what I’m in now and what I had a choice to choose from is the Mercedes Sprinter. When I think about the vehicle that I chose, I think about ground clearance. I think about aftermarket accessibility. I think about all these different factors that go into getting ready to spend 50 to a hundred thousand dollars on converting this vehicle.

And in my opinion, German engineering has been a really solid foundation to build on. And so the Mercedes-Benz Sprinter is definitely my favorite. My guys that I work with, favorite and a fan favorite of most of the clients that we [00:13:00] get.

Crew Chief Eric: This is actually a really great segue into talking about your build process.

And what that entails for folks that are interested in getting into quote unquote Camper Van Life or Van Life. You know, we all know that this exploded during Covid. You know, you couldn’t get an RV or an Airstream or anything. It’s very, very difficult and the prices went through the roof. Looking at what you guys do at Boulder Camper Vans, is this what I like to call B Y O V, which is bring your own van, in this case, a sprinter, pro master, or so on down the line.

How does it all work? So yeah, it’s

Brian Crider: definitely a B Y O V. For sure. Since the beginning of our company, we’ve never supplied the van. There’s so many different options out there when it comes to just the two chassis that I’m really talking about, which is the Ford and the Mercedes. There’s low roof, medium roof, high roof in both versions of the Mercedes Sprinter and the.

Ford Transit. There’s the 1 44, which is the shortest Mercedes, the one 70 and the one 70 extended. Then there’s 15 different colors and there’s leather [00:14:00] seats versus having navigation and different safety features. So it really doesn’t make sense for us as a company to have 10 random vans sitting on the lot that we’re not gonna know if it fits the person’s build.

Mountain Man Dan: So do you guys have any like preferences for like gas or diesel chassis or two-wheel or all-wheel drive chassis, or is it whatever the customer decides and brings to you?

Brian Crider: Out of all the vans that I’ve ever done, I’ve only built on one two-wheel drive vehicle. It just doesn’t make any sense to me, especially being out in the state of Colorado to build a van.

On a two-wheel drive, you’re very limited on what you can do when you’ve got two-wheel drive. Got a lot of clients that want to go skiing, they want to go deep offroading, and between the ground clearance of a two-wheel drive vehicle and the drivetrain, it just doesn’t make sense. So I stay super hyperfocused and 99% of our stuff is four-wheel drive or all wheel drive and the Mercedes Sprinter and the Ford Transit just because.

Our company believes in [00:15:00] building on a solid foundation, and really that comes from the drive train of the vehicle and the Ford Transit and the Mercedes sprinters are the only ones that offer all-wheel drive or four-wheel drive. I think that our clients have a sense for that, and that’s what we’re geared towards.

Yes, I would build it on a two-wheel drive vehicle. I’ve done it very rarely. I wouldn’t turn somebody away, but I think that after the initial conversation, they understand the importance of having all-wheel drive or four-wheel drive, especially being out here in the state of Colorado.

Mountain Man Dan: Say one of our listeners here’s this and is like, you know what?

This is something I’d be interesting, but they have no clue about the different vans. Do you guys offer like a consultation call where you would get input from them of what they’re looking to do and give recommendations of what chassis

Brian Crider: to go by? Absolutely. So yeah, a lot of the initial conversations, people haven’t even researched the vans yet.

They don’t have a van, they don’t know about the vans, and so most certainly go through a spec sheet of some of the things that we find as qualities and pros in vans to [00:16:00] build on that foundation and then send them out and make recommendations on where they could go to find these chassis. We ask them to obtain the chassis, whatever chassis they want, and they can deal with the dealership at that point in regards to what chassis they want.

And then they either have the van shipped to us or they will buy it locally and we’ll just go pick it up from, you know, a dealership that’s 20 minutes away. They obtain the cha and that obviously can be done with cash or just financing the vehicle like a regular vehicle. They come in with the initial conversation and asking us some questions, and if they like us, we ask ’em to put that on deposit of five grand and that five grand goes towards their invoice when we start.

But we keep a super tight schedule, right? We’re currently booked out right now until April of next year with custom builds specifically to each client. So we’ll have a design meeting, we’ll do CAD drawings. We have our engineer there. We have me there. We have our ordering specialist there so they can put all these things together after we talk to them.

It usually takes anywhere [00:17:00] from about hour and a half to two and a half hours of talking about, Hey, where do you want your kitchen galley, or What exterior components are you looking for? What type of floor? And so we choose all these different materials. Then at that point, once we know what. We’re looking for, we’ll put it into a very high-end CAD drawing that almost look very realistic.

So we have a proprietary software that we use that allows us to give them very good visuals to make sure that we’re all on the same page, they’re getting ready to spend a decent amount of money, and they wanna make sure that the person that they’re building with has a really good understanding and ideal on what they’re wanting.

Not only between the visuals down to you can see the wood grain and the wood, and the faucets, and the knobs and the floor and the rims, and you know, we also provide them with blueprints, more of your flat page blueprints that you’d see when you’re building a house that shows, hey, here’s how big this room is, here’s how big this cabinet is, here’s the space between the hallway.

And so they have a really good. Understanding that we understand what they want down to the [00:18:00] eighth. So after we have their design meeting, we get their blueprints to them, they sign off on their blueprints, then that’s when we make the invoice. And because we’re a custom company and not a model-based company, that’s when that happens, right?

We don’t understand everything you want. Until we’re done with that design meeting, now we can make your invoice and you know, most of our invoices fall in between the a hundred k to 180 range as far as the work that we do. There’s three different places that a camper van company could put themselves.

Really low end build, middle end, and then high end. And I’ve just always been an automotive guy and really appreciate good quality components, good engineering behind the components that I pick, and in, in most cases, that costs more money in order to get that quality. We are definitely in the high end, not always necessarily financially, but just in the high end of.

Of the way and the style and the components and the craftsmanship that we do behind our vans. So the client will then [00:19:00] make a 75% deposit on their invoice three months prior to us starting, because we don’t just keep inventory, right? For the more basic stuff we do. But we’ve gotta order all those things specifically for the client three months in advance, because some things take eight to 12 weeks to get.

So we wanna make sure everything that’s landed before we start the van, so we’re not waiting for things that disrupts the delivery date of the van.

Mountain Man Dan: Now, when you guys are doing the buildout process, do you guys offer the option of like, say some pictures and stuff of the process for the owners to see the progress as it goes?

Or is it a surprise when they show up to see it all done?

Brian Crider: It takes us about anywhere from two to three months to build a van. A lot of our clients are all over the country and sometimes outta the country, and so client comes and they get photos or they come into the shop and they see every entire process, which we’re proud of between the, the wiring or the insulation or the floor or the wall panels or the furniture being built so they can really feel confident about every layer.

We [00:20:00] understand that this client wants to see the process, so every two weeks. We take snapshots and videos or FaceTime and keeping them highly involved. So you know, if we’re midway through the build and they’re seeing something that they might wanna change, we’re able to do that. And that’s because we’re not taking on too much, we’re not growing too fast to, we’re able to concentrate on satisfying that client.

That’s been our MO and the reason why we’ve got the reviews that we have and. The reason why we crank out the vans that we do is because we stay super concentrated on quality our client and what they want, and giving them the capability of, you know, it’s not always fun, but making changes midway through.

But that’s why we work with those type of clients, and that’s why the clients work with us is because just like there’s plenty of people that want to build custom homes out there. We’re the very last builder out there that builds to the quality that we do that would be willing to give it to you the exactly the way that you want it to be given to you.

Very nice. Then they come pick [00:21:00] up their van and there’s obviously a tour of that and a lot of excitement and manuals that are handed over, and obviously the rest of the 25% payment that they owe. And

Mountain Man Dan: when you’re meeting with a customer and everything after they buy one, do you give them like a list of recommended maintenance and things like that for them to do to help keep the van in good quality

Brian Crider: as far as what we do?

Yes. But most of that maintenance comes from Mercedes or Ford Oil changes and rotating your tires and luing up the transmission. All that comes from Ford or Mercedes. But as in regards to winterization and maintaining your batteries and. Maintaining the things that we do in the house portion of the vehicle.

Yeah, we give them a ton of education when it comes to that so they can make sure the thing is all tuned and lubed and ready to go.

Crew Chief Eric: So Dan brings up a really good and interesting point. If you’re buying a new van, it’s gonna be under factory warranty. Does any of the work you do in any way void the factory warranty?

Or does Mercedes and Ford accept what’s being done to the van and say, you know what, we’re not really [00:22:00] messing with the drivetrain. We’re not messing with the engine. So the warranty is still in place.

Brian Crider: 99.9% of the time, we don’t mess with any of the factory components of the vehicle just because most of the vehicles that we get are pretty much fresh off the lot.

You know, there’s still that factory warranty and we don’t wanna mess with that. And if there’s any issues that arise throughout the process, we handle it very professionally. Know we’ve got a one year warranty. Like most RVs do, but we offer a three year upgrade warranty for seven grand that you can put down that will cover your, everything that we do for another three years on top of what you have, just to make the client feel confident that they’ve got that coverage and if anything happens, but our service bays are very slow just because we don’t have a ton of issues, just because we take the time to do everything right, so we can avoid having anything coming back to us

Mountain Man Dan: after an individual buys it.

You guys also are basically tech support as well, it seems like.

Brian Crider: Oh yeah, absolutely. You know, think about all these different manufacturers. They got service base for a reason. Even these [00:23:00] high quality manufacturers, there are things that go wrong and people that need things done, and so no different for us.

Every van that we put out there, Is potential for that person needing assistance on something. So yeah, we most certainly offer tech support and I really think that’s where people appreciate us. You know, I had some clients come in today, we’ve had their van for over a year now, and we only offer a one year warranty, but they left water in their water lines throughout the winter.

They didn’t winterize their van properly and they kind of fully admitted to that. And some of these water lines had busted. Took me about 45 minutes to replace some of these water lines. Like, oh, what do we owe you? And I’m like, man, don’t worry about it. As it stands right now and been operating for, how is I long?

That goes a really long way by not saying, oh, well that costs you three or 400 bucks. You know? It’s all about putting a good taste in your mouth, creating a good quality van, and understanding and dealing with that person on an individual basis like they made a mistake.

Mountain Man Dan: [00:24:00] Definitely because that’s something they’re gonna tell all their friends and people they know about and every place they go camping.

Positive work like that is huge and customer service is a huge thing.

Brian Crider: Yeah. Yeah. And, and you know, not necessarily my intention when I do that, but just because that’s how I’d want it done for me. So I operate this company based on how I’d want to be treated and how I’d want to be understood. So do I understand that that comes full circle?

Absolutely. I don’t do it with the intent of anything coming back to me, but I understand that. It feels good when somebody takes care of you that way, and hopefully again, it comes full circle to just him. Yeah, them telling a friend about it and then next thing you know, we could be getting a build out of it, which would be tenfold, but that’s just how it goes.

Crew Chief Eric: So let’s switch gears a little bit. We’ve talked about how the vans are put together and how that process works, but let’s talk a little bit more about some of the options that are available for these camper vans.

Mountain Man Dan: When you guys do your builds, are there any modular items or removable items? Or I’ve seen some newer [00:25:00] campers where they even have like grilling stations you can hook up outside and they like, do you guys offer that sort of stuff with your builds as well?

Brian Crider: There’s really nothing we can’t do. Right. We’ve had people do, we’ve got these black boxes on the back doors that are about two to three feet wide by three feet tall. That where when you open it up, it drops down a shelf and there’s a propane grill in the back. So yes, the capability of us being who we are, there’s something, a new idea that a client has.

That’s where we get excited, right? Like we come across a guy like you that wants a little mini barbecue pit off the back, or a rooftop a. Deck with a sun umbrella, take a kitchen, get out and put extra heat in. Have we done a smoker barbecue to pit off the back of the van? No. But next month, for the first time, we’re doing a mobile tattoo studio in a van where it’s got a shower where clients can clean up before their tattoo and it’s got massage table that folds up against the wall or comes down so their clients can lay on and get their [00:26:00] tattoo.

Twos, it’s got a ton of power in it so they can run their tattoo equipment and cool toolboxes that pull out with all of their inks and their different needles. So not everything that we do is strictly for living in, we’re working with different businesses, we’re working with retailers. We’ve done all different sort of things where I can tell you from my perspective and my team’s perspective, it makes us really excited to be challenged with something new.

So if somebody came to us, And they wanted a mobile coffee shop or a mobile smokehouse, I’d be all in on that. ’cause it’s exciting to be challenged with different things and that’s how we grow as a company and get the confidence to be able to take on anything is doing new things and new adventures and new vans.

Mountain Man Dan: Like what sort of stuff is a common setup for like a bathroom and water and sinks and things like that within your builds?

Brian Crider: You know, from a water standpoint, we put all the water tanks. Inside the vehicle, which takes up just a little bit of space. But you know, I’m coming from a place to where it can get down in the [00:27:00] single digits, and we offer up to 36 gallons of water on demand hot water systems, to where it’s just constant hot water heating pads on everything.

As far as the bathrooms go, we do outdoor showers off the back of the vehicle with a magnetic shower curtain when the back doors are open. But for those that like a little bit more privacy, we weld up a fully stainless steel aluminum enclosure. That goes into the van and, and it’s got a nice teak floor in it, a toilet in it, a quick connect for the shower hose, a mixing valve, fan lights, and so it’s a full wet bath.

One of the biggest things that a builder has to be concerned with is any water getting out and ruining any, any, any of the stuff. Outside of the shower. So, and something that doesn’t make noise. So when you get these kind of RV shower doors, they tend to rattle going down the road a lot. So this is why we kind of do this roll-up shower door that then comes down with waterproof zippers, and it’s a pretty thick canvas type of [00:28:00] material.

We’ve definitely dialed in the indoor bathroom. As far as camper vans

Mountain Man Dan: go, you mentioned like instant heat. I’m assuming you guys are using some sort of like inline tankless heaters.

Brian Crider: Yeah, because anything that holds water, like a water tank that’s in your house, it’s just gonna freeze and and bust open. So yeah, tankless is the way to go.

I agree with that. Even in houses too,

Crew Chief Eric: vans aren’t well known for being, let’s say, insulated. How do you guys protect people from the elements when they’re not just using this for the weekend and they, you know, park somewhere, you know, like you said, at a K O A or an asphalt, they pull out their tent and they’re on the ground, that kind of thing.

When you’re really living out of it, how do you deal with extreme hot and extreme cold conditions? How are you modifying the van to take into account the weather?

Brian Crider: One of the biggest things that we tackle in really every van that we do, so it really starts with. The insulation, and we use all wool insulation, and it’s stuffed in every little nook and [00:29:00] cranny inside the van.

Every little hole, every little opening, it’s stuffed. And wool’s got a really great R-value. So that’s one of the first things that we do. Even when we put our wall panels on, there’s foam, there’s fabric, there’s a vapor barrier that we put on the back of every wall panel that kind of keeps. All that temperature change within the wall and not allowing it to come in the van, but then it comes to the components that we use.

We use a rooftop AC unit, kind of like you see on some of the bigger RVs and stuff. We work with a really great company called Nomadic, which offers a 12 volt air conditioner that draws very low power. You can set the temperature on it and it just like in your home, it comes on and off when it’s supposed to in order to keep that temperature in the van.

One of the big issues with an air conditioner is that when the sun is beating on it, if you’re in Moab, it just, it itself is getting very hot, which it’s trying to battle. Its. Itself before it can even put cold air out. We mount solar panels above the [00:30:00] ac, almost like an umbrella, which not only gives you an extra 200 watts of solar power, but also provides that shade for the air conditioner so it’s not overworking.

So AC that can run off of the batteries for eight to 10 hours. Constant. And then when you wake up the next morning, the sun comes out. You take a little couple hour drive to your next location. The batteries are fully recharged, and then you can run it again. And then when it comes to wintertime, we use a system that is tied into the diesel or the gasoline tank of the factory vehicle that pulls fuel from that gas tank and then goes to about a football size combustion engine that heats up radiator fluid glycol.

And then goes over into a radiator that a fan blows over and blows out super hot air. Depending upon the size of the vehicle, we’ll put four or five vents in the vehicle that can easily keep it at 80 or 90 degrees in single digits. You know, we have the option of electric [00:31:00] heater, but electric heat.

Really draws a lot of power and this radiating style of heat draws very low power, but it’s just about cycling that hot glycol through the radiator and having a small fan blow over it, which draws very low power, which is what our goal is in order to create that really warm van.

Mountain Man Dan: What about individuals that have like disabilities?

Do you guys have ways to cater to them to help them out?

Brian Crider: We just got done building a van for a gentleman that his wife had ms, and she really just couldn’t move whatsoever. Had a really nice wheelchair lift that we put in very specific, even to cutting some of the dash and the Mercedes sprinter so she could get in there properly.

But yes, we’re more than happy and capable of helping people with disabilities. Not to be cheesy, but just because you have a disability doesn’t mean that a van can’t be built for you to still enjoy the outdoors. We’ve [00:32:00] crossed that bridge a couple of times, not many, but the times that we have done it, our clients have been ecstatic and they are.

Fully stoked on their van. They’ve been traveling, sending us pictures all the time, left us a really good review and it feels good to be able to even tackle for a person like that.

Mountain Man Dan: With us being track rats and staying at the track is becoming more and more common because some tracks don’t have hotels and stuff close by, and then guys who are like myself, don’t like to pay for a hotel and waste of time going to a hotel and coming back to track following morning, something like your guys’ build is ideal.

Deal first us with your vehicles. Do you know what sort of like towing capacity they have to where they can pull a race car behind them?

Brian Crider: They can pull wake boarding boats, which are about 10,000 pounds, 12,000 pounds and most certainly can pull a race car. If you’re gonna be considering towing something, I would definitely go with a dually, which as you guys know, is the four wheels in the back because they have a stouter chassis and more towing capacity.

So you know, if you guys or anybody is considering wanting to. Tow [00:33:00] something. I would definitely look at the 3,500 XD Mercedes Sprinter. It’s just a much more stout suspension, much more beefier tires, and more capability of towing power as well. So yeah, there’s no doubt, especially how light a race cars usually are that it could pull a trailer in a race car.

Mountain Man Dan: There’s a lot of dirt bikes and stuff out your way. Do you guys have a lot of motocross type guys buying vans and stuff or going out to the tracks with those?

Brian Crider: We’ve built a couple of vans for some motocross people where, you know, a lot of these guys like to have a garage in the back of the van with all their moto equipment, their helmets hanging up, all their tools, extra tires, and so on and so forth.

Not being a big part of our business building for motocross, but there’s no doubt in my mind that we couldn’t handle that. Just talking to the right person and going through their mind and what they see as a design, I’m confident that we have the skillset to build exactly what they want.

Mountain Man Dan: That’s awesome.

So it seems like you guys are, anything a customer comes to you with, you guys are trying to definitely make a way to make it [00:34:00] happen, which is an awesome thing to hear.

Brian Crider: Yeah, I mean, well said, and we do make it happen. There’s very few things that I’m not willing to do, but 99% of the time, let’s just. Have a design meeting around what you’re looking for.

You know, like I said, show you those blueprints and if it’s on par with what you think that you like, I wouldn’t put into blueprints or CAD drawings to what I didn’t think I couldn’t design. So if they are happy with the blueprints and the CAD drawings that come back to them, It’s within my wheelhouse.

Not to be cocky or overconfident, but when I think of the skillset that I have and the people that I have on what we can do, there’s really nothing we can’t do. That’s awesome.

Crew Chief Eric: Now we gotta switch gears a little bit. Talk a little bit more about hashtag van Life. On a previous episode of Break Fix, we had former touring car racer Joey Jordan iv, talk about his Epic 35,000 mile journey from Los Angeles to Patagonia, which he did in a van.

It wasn’t a sprinter and it wasn’t a [00:35:00] ProMaster and it wasn’t a transit, it wasn’t a Westie or anything like that. He actually imported a Toyota High Ace. From Japan sight unseen after doing some research because he realized, especially going to South America, that the high ace was one of these vehicles.

That parts were plentiful pretty much everywhere, but in North America. He talked about the trials and tribulations that he went through on this journey, how the terrain was, how rough it was, you know, ending up in. You know, jungles to deserts and all, everything in between as you made this journey. And so when you really prep these builds for, let’s say more extreme adventures, the people are really getting out in the middle of nowhere.

What are you doing? What are some of the recommendations? What about suspension mods, tire mods, things like that. How do you take the van, especially the sprinter, to the next level?

Brian Crider: The first and foremost is. All-wheel drive or four-wheel drive, that’s the first thing. So get a van that has that capability.

The second thing is, is that we have a partnership with Fox Shocks, where there’s not ever [00:36:00] been a van that has left our shop without a suspension upgrade. Not only to be able to. Really ride good going down the road with all the weight that we put in it, but still being able to have that capability of handling some really gnarly terrain suspension, most certainly, and suspension means for us.

You know, you’ve got your factory shocks up front. We switch those out, but then we add a secondary shock up front. So if you look at. Any of our vehicles, you’ve got two shocks on the front, wheels on each side, so we up that dampening on both the front and the rear. We upgrade the rear with fox shocks and all of these are adjustable, so they have like mode one, two, and three right on the shock itself for hard.

Medium soft, and then in the rear we upgrade the leaf springs, and I’m sure you guys know what those are. Also controlling some of the dampening and being able to hold the vehicle, depending upon the [00:37:00] weight that you put in the vehicle is the weight of the leaf springs and how many leaf springs that you put in that vehicle.

And it also gives it about a two, two and a half inch lift. As well. So the sprinter typically sits about 16 inches off the ground, up to almost 20 inches off the ground, just depending upon what you’re doing. But then on top of that, we’ve used BF Goodrich all-terrain tires, which have just been really godsend for us as far as no road noise, really good traction and snow mud, really, whatever situation you throw at them.

So we’ve been putting those on since the very beginning. That’s what I’ve got on my vehicle. I’ve never been stuck. You know, I’ve got the winch just in case that happens, which is another part of recovery process is having a winch on the front of the vehicles. Because if you’re out in the middle of nowhere and you gotta get towed out, that could cost you a grand getting towed outta the woods.

But you know, a winch could easily save you that money for sure. There’s not really much more than you could do other than changing the entire drive train, but that’s just not something you [00:38:00] mess with.

Crew Chief Eric: And in this particular instance, if you’re really gonna go extreme, Is this where you would say diesel is really the way to go?

Being able to go longer distances between Phillips

Brian Crider: diesel versus gas is 300 miles to 300 miles, whatever you’re getting in your gas tank. For some people diesel can be a little bit more scarce actually, right when you’re traveling in the middle of nowhere. You might not be able to find diesel. I personally have had diesel.

My entire van, life, for the most part, have had not many issues because most of my travel has been within the US personally. Why I like diesel, and maybe what you mean is that there’s this preconceived notion that diesel operated engines, you can push those into 300, 400, 500,000 miles. That’s why I’m a big fan of it, because unfortunately, at the end of the day, you’re making an investment onto something that will eventually not be working anymore.

Like at some point you’re gonna have to replace the [00:39:00] entire engine. So I think if you want to get the most longevity out of. Your investment and your investment is only as good as the engine is on the vehicle, then diesel is the way to go

Mountain Man Dan: for the build. You guys have done like the EV upgrades for the off grid living.

What sort of stuff have to install ’em?

Brian Crider: You know, so we use a company called viron. Viron is really the Apple iPhone of battery systems, not only from a visual standpoint. That’s very little to do with it, but I’ll start with that, is everything’s this really cool blue color. Really nicely designed.

Everything’s Bluetooth and communicates really well together. Some really proprietary stuff like, you know, when you go to plug your iPhone in, you’ve gotta use an iPhone cord. And some might find that annoying. But Tron is the company again, and they offer the batteries, they offer the solar panels, they offer the solar charge controllers, they offer the alternator charging.

So when you’re driving it charges the batteries in the back, or god forbid, You can’t start your car. You can hit a button on the side of [00:40:00] the seat and it’ll take power from the batteries in the back and jump your battery up front. You can be looking at their system and say, Hey, you know, I’ve got my starlink running.

I got my fridge running, I got my laptop plugged in, and it’s to the, the watt of. Hey, depending upon your usage, you can survive like this for 10 days, six hours, six minutes, and six seconds. It’s a very intuitive system that I think is very tech forward. They’re sending out updates every week just to make sure that everything is up to snuff when it comes to coexisting together between all of the equipment.

So as far as EV goes, Viron, in my opinion, is the best. I have got it in my van right now, but you know, as far as what I’m looking forward to, the future is an all electric van and you’re seeing these different Amazon vans go around that are all electric, but the only issue currently right now is they’re around town.

Right. Right. Screening, they can go from point A to point B and just kind of do small little circuits around town, but they don’t have the capability of being able to do a [00:41:00] 3, 4, 5, 600 mile trip. You know, because they’re carrying around boxes and packages. We’re talking about in our vans, 36 gallons of water, big battery systems, furniture, fridges, and so on and so forth.

So they would die out even faster. So the technology is really not there yet as far as electronic fans go, or electric fans go. Mercedes really has the leading edge as far as technology, safety, equipment aftermarket stability, so Mercedes-Benz definitely takes the cake.

Mountain Man Dan: You mentioned how the technology advancements have helped out tremendously.

What sort of batteries are you guys running in?

Brian Crider: So all lithium ion batteries and. Rarely, rarely have any issues with my batteries. I’ve had them in here for almost three years now. The same batteries, and I’ve got a ton of stuff. I never turn off my fridge In the wintertime, I’ve always got my heater running.

I’ve got an induction cooktop, I got a coffee maker, got my laptop plugged in. I’ve got starlink running and I have never been to a campsite to where I’ve had to be plugged in or having a generator [00:42:00] running, so, or their size. They’re probably 10 inches wide by. Six inches in depth by 10 inches in height, and they’re packing 200 amp hours in each battery, which is massive.

And we’re typically putting three or four of those in each camper van. They’re all Bluetooth capable, so you can log into every piece of equipment. In this battery system, okay, how are my batteries doing? What are the temperatures of my batteries? Well, how much solar am I getting? How many watts of power am I using with all the stuff that I have on in my van?

So for people that are techie, much like myself, they kind of like to dive into this data and look at that, but it’s also for the average consumer to where they make it really easy to understand and look at. Not only is there a five inch touchscreen in the van that kind of gives you all this information, but you can also do it from your phone, from their app that they’ve designed.

To me, the personal experience of using this equipment has really given me the confidence to be able to consistently put this in the vans that I’m building.

Crew Chief Eric: There’s other things you [00:43:00] have to think about when you’re living in a van long-term, like you’re doing yourself. So are there any tips and tricks that you can share with folks?

Things that maybe they haven’t thought about or maybe you’re constantly reminding a new buyer that they should be thinking about or adding? Just like you said, like having a winch on the front, some recovery gear, things like that that they may have not considered when they’re stepping. Into this van life.

Brian Crider: When I think about van life, I think about understanding the limitations of what the van can do. Don’t use a ton of water quickly. Wash your hands. Use paper plates that you can burn a fire so you don’t have to use water to wash all your silverware. Use Biodegraded silverware. Think about your, your waste.

You’re having to clean stuff so you’re not wasting your water. Think about using low voltage equipment so you’re not pulling a ton of power. It really comes with your off grid capability and being able to limit your consumption of both battery power and water. ’cause there’s no really tips and tricks when it comes to [00:44:00] furniture.

Right? And even though, The technology has gotten much more forward than what it was back in the day. You still have to be very self-consciously aware of where your batteries are at, how much power you’re pulling, and so other than the simple fact of just living in a small space and downsizing the things that you own, which my wife and I have done a very good job of.

Understanding the limitations of what a van has to offer, but appreciating those limitations at the same time. So when it comes to a WeCh, I most certainly recommend that when it comes to having a suspension and making an all electric vehicle versus having propane that could leak and kill you in your sleep.

Yeah, I, I most certainly recommend that. But personally, I don’t like an indoor shower because it takes up a ton of space to something. I’m only using 10 minutes every other day, so I’d rather have a little mini pullout toilet, which I have right here sitting underneath me. You can’t see it. It looks like [00:45:00] it’s a drawer, but a toilet pulls out.

I use it in front of my girl if I have to. Not a big deal. I’d rather shower off the back in nature if it’s freezing cold out. So what? I’m under hot water. I’ll hop back in the van real quick. The water’s going onto the ground. I’m not filling up any grade tanks or anything like that. Everybody’s a little different in regards to their capability of being in a small space.

It can be a challenge for a lot of people, right? I’ve had a ton of people that have come to me like, oh man, if I spent. A week with my wife in a van, we’d be done. Or I’ve had also people come to me and say, man, you know, if I could get out on the road with my wife and travel for weeks, we would thrive.

Crew Chief Eric: You bring up a really valid point.

The Sprinter in this case becomes basically a rolling tiny house as you’re describing what’s in there with you. It does take up a lot of room, you know. And you guys carefully measure everything out to maximize the amount of storage and, and all those things and the people space. And it makes me wonder though, if you [00:46:00] are living out of the van itself, how does sleeping work?

How are those arrangements? How many people can you sleep in the van and how comfortable is it?

Brian Crider: So I’m in the smallest they make. I’ve got a bed in the rear sideways sleeping my head on the driver’s side, feet going towards the passenger side, and that can sleep up to somebody that’s about six five in height.

Also work with a company called Luno, L U N O. That makes a really cool inflatable mattress that goes up in the front cab where the driver and passenger seat are. I can sleep up to three in my van, legit. Of course, there’s a hallway. There’s a space in the garage underneath the bed where somebody could sleep.

I mean, I’ve had a rack of people in here, but legitimately three most of the time, just two. And the bigger vans, because they get six and seven feet longer in the sprinter van than what I have. You can sleep up to five because there’s pop tops that where you can crawl through the ceiling, like the West Felia [00:47:00] pop top camper on the top of the van.

So there’s two up there, two in the bed in the back, and then the one bed that goes up in the front, up in the cab where you drive at. You can sleep up to a family of five seat, five sleep, five, have a kitchen galley, have a bathroom, and some of these bigger vans that we’ve done.

Mountain Man Dan: When you guys do that and deal with a customer, does it have to be a brand new van they bring to you or are you guys willing to convert older vans as well?

Brian Crider: 75% of our business has been new vans, but the other 25%, somebody will have something that’s already built out or they bought from another builder, or they’ve bought from some d i wire backyard Billy that’s built this van and we’ll most certainly help ’em out. Silly to not capitalize on people that want a la carte work done or to not work on other vans.

It doesn’t really change the mentality that we have just because it’s an older van. Right? The sprinter in Ford chassis hasn’t changed for almost 15 years. It doesn’t really bother us at all. We’re most certainly willing to work [00:48:00] on older vans or vans that have already been converted and having to do some demo to make it more up to snuff.

Like we just had a client come in last week. That had a 2015 Mercedes Sprinter that was built out and he just wasn’t happy. Stuff was rattling, going down the road and we came up with a game plan to remove some old things and put some new tech in and some new furniture in and kind of updated.

Mountain Man Dan: Is there a market out there for used vans?

Brian Crider: Yeah, there most certainly is. Absolutely. You know, if you go on RV Trader or Van Life Trader or even check out our website, we do consignment vans. There most certainly is to the people that kind of want to get into this first line of experience to see how they enjoy it. And then, you know, we typically get those people that have already had the experience of RV our van life that now know what they want.

And they know exactly how they want it to be built.

Mountain Man Dan: How does the market look right now for used vans and everything?

Brian Crider: I think it’s [00:49:00] pretty strong. Kind of stepping back a couple years ago when Covid was hitting and everybody was kind of diving into Van Life and all these people that were used to kind of traveling and doing all that first class stuff.

They bought something and now that Covid has settled down, they’re kind of coming into the market and selling some of those things. But I think the used camper van market, there’s plenty to choose from out there.

Mountain Man Dan: Like with the old Chevy and Ford conversion vans of like the eighties and nineties, that after a couple years, like lost their value.

Do you think the new camper vans are maintaining

Brian Crider: value better? Back in the day, those Chevys and those old Ford vans, They’ve gone up in value. I just sold a old Chevy van that the guy paid 30 grand, 40, got $90,000 for it. I think it’s the idea of having a converted van that draws the value up. Most of our clientele that have built a van that’ve actually sold it for more than what they’ve paid for it.

Not only can you get what you put into it, [00:50:00] but in some cases, depending upon the quality of the build, you could get more than what you paid for it. So I think that the market’s really strong still in regards to not depreciating like other vehicles. Your regular vehicles go.

Crew Chief Eric: We’ve talked a lot about your past.

We covered the present van life, but now let’s take a moment and talk about. What’s next for Boulder Camper Vans? Brian, you got any spoilers? Anything you can tell us? What’s on the horizon? Some new projects, something exciting that our audience should know that Boulder Camper Vans is embarking on.

Brian Crider: If I told you I’d have to kill you, but I’ll tell you no.

So. You know, a lot of our focus has been on just van chassis, but there has been some play and some ideas and some CAD drawings and some interest on box style vans where you buy a van that’s got no rear on it and you do a box style of camper van, which gives you much more space to build [00:51:00] within. Also, there has been some talks of competing with.

Or creating a Ford seven 50 and six 50 chassis into more of a extreme off-road rv. So yeah, I would definitely kind of be on the horizon in the next year or two of some of these bigger expedition vehicles coming out from us.

Crew Chief Eric: Well with that, Brian, we’ve reached that part of the episode where we get to wrap up with any shout outs, promotions, or anything else you’d like to share that we didn’t cover thus far.

Brian Crider: Automobiles and automobile engineering and automotive engineering have really been in my blood ever since I was a little kid, and so combining that with the adventure that I was super steeped in, it really just all came together in the inception of Boulder Camper vans. I wouldn’t be where I’m at today without the team that I’ve got.

So I really want to give a really big shout out to Reese, Mitch, Christian, Austin, Brooke, Maddie. You know, [00:52:00] I’m only one guy. I am only one brain. So, you know, I think as a collective, we’re a massive brain that makes everything happen the way that we do. Massive shout out to the team that I have. ’cause I wouldn’t be where I’m at today without the people and the love and the vibration that we have in the shop without them.

We’ve got an event coming up where every month we do a vans and coffee. So for the local community set of cars and coffee, which I’m sure that you guys are very familiar with, we do a vans and coffee, we’re doing donuts and coffee and. D i y builds come out, other van builders come out, and it’s just nothing but love for the van community.

We work with a bunch of really other good companies, Dometic, which we’ve got a giveaway coming out for one of their really cool 12 volt coolers to where you could travel in your vehicle or travel in your camper van. So Dometic a really big partner of ours, and we’re giving a giveaway to about a $1,200 cooler.

Check out our Instagram profile for that. Agile [00:53:00] offroad, Cali Bamboo, isotherm fridges. We’re hiring now, so if there’s anybody out there that’s in the Boulder area or Denver area, or somebody that wants to create some really badass fans, we’re hiring. We’re looking for woodworkers, electricians, plumbers, all these different kind of people.

You’re into a job. Yeah. Come check us out.

Mountain Man Dan: Boulder Camper Vans is a completely custom, highly detailed camper van conversion company, probably based in Boulder, Colorado since 2016. Interested in learning more about how to convert your van and take hashtag Van life to the next level. Be sure to check out their website, boulder camper vans.com or follow them on social media at Boulder Camper Vans on Instagram and Facebook, and some awesome videos on our YouTube channel.

Venture awaits.

Crew Chief Eric: Well, Dan’s absolutely right a venture awaits. All of this is super exciting. And Brian, I can’t thank you enough for coming on. Break Fix. This has been a topic that we’ve wanted to cover for such a long time, and a subject matter expert like yourself. I mean, the community of Van Lifers is huge, but [00:54:00] folks like yourself that.

Are passionate about these builds, these mods, this type of setup is pretty amazing and getting inside your head, even for an hour or so has been an absolute tremendous wealth of information. So I appreciate everything you’re doing for the community. Hopefully one day we’ll be pulling some of our race cars around with a boulder camper van.

This is super cool and, and thank you for coming on.

Brian Crider: Yeah, thanks for having us and appreciate your guys’ time as well and putting the word out about us and couldn’t appreciate you guys more. Yeah, I mean, just nothing but love for all the people that we work with.

Crew Chief Brad: If you like what you’ve heard and want to learn more about gtm, be sure to check us out on www.gt motorsports.org. You can also find us on Instagram at grantor motorsports. Also, if you want to get involved or have suggestions for future shows, you can call or text us at (202) 630-1770 or send us an email at crew [00:55:00] chief@gtmotorsports.org.

We’d love to hear from you.

Highlights

Skip ahead if you must… Here’s the highlights from this episode you might be most interested in and their corresponding time stamps.

00:00 Introduction to Break Fix Podcast
00:46 Meet Brian Crider from Boulder Camper Vans
01:08 Brian’s Early Adventures and Love for Automobiles
02:48 The Birth of Boulder Camper Vans
03:10 Van Life and the Evolution of Camper Vans
03:43 Moving to Colorado and Starting a Business
04:54 Building Custom Camper Vans
11:27 The Best Vans for Camper Conversions
13:00 The Build Process at Boulder Camper Vans
19:24 Customization and Client Interaction
24:43 Innovative and Unique Camper Van Features
28:47 Insulating and Modifying Vans for Extreme Weather
29:24 Air Conditioning and Solar Solutions
30:24 Heating Systems for Winter
31:22 Accommodating Individuals with Disabilities
32:34 Towing Capacity and Recommendations
33:21 Motocross and Custom Builds
34:10 Design Meetings and Customization
34:43 Van Life Adventures and Extreme Builds
35:45 Suspension and Tire Upgrades
38:00 Diesel vs. Gas for Long-Distance Travel
39:12 Electric Vehicle Upgrades
43:03 Living in a Van: Tips and Tricks
45:58 Sleeping Arrangements in Vans
47:17 Converting Older Vans
48:23 Market for Used Vans
50:16 Future Projects at Boulder Camper Vans
51:22 Shout Outs and Promotions
54:38 Conclusion and Contact Information

Bonus Content

There's more to this story!

All of our BEHIND THE SCENES (BTS) Break/Fix episodes are raw and unedited, and expressly shared with the permission and consent of our guests.

Learn More

Limitless combinations with the help of CAD!

If you’re looking to build a fully custom van conversion, Boulder Camper Vans has something for you! From fabric color, exterior features, and countertops, to flooring, windows, and cabinetry, our custom camper van builds allow you to tailor your van to your wants and needs.

Boulder Campervans is a completely custom, highly detailed camper van conversion company proudly based in Boulder, Colorado since 2016. If you’re interested in learning more about how to convert your van, and take #vanlife to the next level, be sure to check out their website bouldercampervans.com or follow them on social @bouldercampervans on IG and FB, and some awesome videos over on their YT channel. ADVENTURE AWAITS!

Brian didn’t go to trade school or study engineering formally. He learned by doing—welding, wiring, woodworking, and making mistakes. “I’m a jack-of-all-trades,” he says. “Master of none, but really good at just about everything.” That hands-on experience gave him the confidence to start cutting into brand-new Sprinters and building custom vans from the ground up.

Choosing the Right Chassis: Sprinter vs. Transit

When it comes to van builds, Boulder Camper Vans focuses on two platforms: the Mercedes-Benz Sprinter and the Ford Transit. “We don’t even offer builds on the Dodge ProMaster,” Brian explains. “It doesn’t have four-wheel or all-wheel drive, and that’s a dealbreaker for adventure seekers.”

Clients bring their own vans (BYOV), and Boulder Camper Vans takes it from there. Whether it’s a high-roof Sprinter or an all-wheel-drive Transit, the team ensures the foundation is solid before diving into the custom build.

Each build starts with a deep-dive design meeting. Clients work with engineers, ordering specialists, and Brian himself to map out every detail – from kitchen layout to flooring materials. Boulder Camper Vans uses proprietary CAD software to create realistic renderings and blueprints, ensuring every inch is accounted for.

Once the design is finalized, clients make a deposit and the team begins ordering parts. Builds typically take 2–3 months, and clients receive regular updates, photos, and even FaceTime calls to stay involved. “We keep it super concentrated on quality and client satisfaction,” Brian says.

While most builds are geared toward van life, Boulder Camper Vans also takes on unique projects. “We’re doing a mobile tattoo studio next month,” Brian shares. “It’ll have a shower, massage table, and power for all the equipment.” The team thrives on creative challenges, whether it’s a rooftop deck or a backdoor barbecue station.

Modern camper vans aren’t just cozy – they’re high-tech. Boulder Camper Vans installs up to 36-gallon water tanks, on-demand hot water systems, and heating pads to prevent freezing. Outdoor showers, magnetic curtains, and all-electric setups mean you don’t need a noisy generator or a campground hookup.

Customer service doesn’t end at delivery. Boulder Camper Vans offers a one-year warranty on all builds, with an optional three-year upgrade. They also provide tech support, maintenance education, and even free repairs when clients make honest mistakes. “I treat people how I’d want to be treated,” Brian says. “That goes a long way.”

Whether you’re dreaming of a weekend escape or a full-time mobile lifestyle, Boulder Camper Vans proves that van life is more than a trend – it’s a craft. And with Brian Crider at the helm, it’s a craft built on passion, precision, and a whole lot of heart.

Want to learn more or start your own build? Visit www.bouldercampervans.com to begin your journey.

Guest Co-Host: Daniel Stauffer

In case you missed it... be sure to check out the Break/Fix episode with our co-host.

This content has been brought to you in-part by sponsorship through...

Malcolm Bricklin: The Relentless Visionary Who Dared to Reinvent the Road

Don W

October 10, 2023

Malcolm Bricklin: The Relentless Visionary Who Dared to Reinvent the Road

From selling scooters out of Long Island to launching Subaru in the U.S., from building gullwing-doored safety sports cars in Canada to dreaming up hydrogen-powered revolutions, Malcolm Bricklin’s life reads like a screenplay too wild for Hollywood. But it’s all real – and he’s not done yet.

In this two-part Break/Fix podcast episode, we sat down with the man himself for a no-holds-barred conversation that spans six decades of automotive disruption, entrepreneurial improvisation, and unshakable belief in doing what you love- even when the world says you’re crazy. “You want to do something, do it. That’s all there is to it, kid.” says Malcolm.

Tune in everywhere you stream, download or listen!

Bricklin’s origin story doesn’t begin in a boardroom – it starts in a Corvette packed with three kids, a U-Haul, and a dream. After a chance encounter with a jukebox entrepreneur, Bricklin found himself in Italy, trying to sell a film-based music machine called the C Box. When that venture fizzled, he stumbled into a warehouse full of unsold motor scooters and somehow convinced the New York Police Department to buy thousands of them for meter maids and Central Park patrols.

That hustle led him to Japan, where he discovered a quirky little car called the Subaru 360. It was cute, cheap, and – thanks to a loophole in U.S. regulations—exempt from federal safety standards. Bricklin didn’t just import the car; he founded Subaru of America in 1968 and built a national dealer network from scratch. Despite a scathing Consumer Reports review that nearly tanked the brand, Bricklin’s tenacity helped secure a “perpetual” contract with Fuji Heavy Industries and laid the groundwork for Subaru’s future success.

Spotlight

Synopsis

In this two part Break/Fix podcast, we interview Malcolm Bricklin, a pioneering figure in the automotive industry. Bricklin discusses his journey from importing small cars from Europe and Japan in the 1960s to founding Subaru of America in 1968 and introducing the Subaru 360 to the American market. He also recounts his effort to create his own sports car, the Bricklin SV-1, renowned for its safety features and distinctive gullwing doors. Throughout the conversation, Bricklin shares anecdotes about his dealings with automotive giants and his ventures, including his involvement in the electric bike industry and his plans for a revolutionary hydrogen-powered vehicle. The discussion highlights Bricklin’s entrepreneurial spirit, his ability to navigate industry challenges, and his ongoing influence in the world of cars.

Growing Up in Philly – I can’t think of too many automotive titans that have their origins starting in Pennsylvania other than Lee Iacocca – What sparked your interest in cars? What was the path or paths you took to get out of PA and into the industry?
Why Subaru? Why not other brands, like Italians or French? What did you see in them?
What was the catalyst that made you say “I want to build my own car”
Why gullwings?
The Corvette was the only car at the time made from Fiberglass… Did that influence the SV-1 design?
Why Canada? How does the SV-1 story end?
Why start another car company? What was the driving force there? What were your plans for VV?
Let’s talk about the new car: The Bricklin 3EV – specs, details, etc that you can share. Why 3 wheels? Where did the design come from? Are there advantages/disadvantages?
What’s next for Malcolm Bricklin?

Transcript - Part 1

The road to success is paved by all of us because everyone has a story.

Crew Chief Eric: Our guest tonight began his career in the automotive industry in the early 1960s when he started importing small cars from Europe and Japan to sell in the United States. In 1968, he founded Subaru of America and helped introduce the Subaru 360 to the American market.

Don Weberg: The 1970s, Malcolm Bricklin turned his detention to creating his own sports car, the Bricklin Ssv one.

The car featured Gulling doors and a fiberglass body and was powered by a V engine. 2,854 units were sold before [00:01:00] production ceased in 1975. Today, Malcolm remains an active and influential figure in the automotive industry, continuing to explore new ideas and business ventures in the pursuit of his entrepreneurial vision.

And he’s here tonight to explain to us just exactly what he’s been up to.

Crew Chief Eric: Thanks Don. And with that Malcolm, welcome to Break Fix.

Malcolm Bricklin: Uh, well thank you very much.

Crew Chief Eric: So Malcolm, like all good break fix stories. Everybody has an origin. So let’s talk about how you got into this whole automotive industry growing up in Philly.

I mean, personally, I can’t think of too many automotive titans that have their origin stories starting in Pennsylvania other than Lee Iacocca. So what sparked your interest in cars and what was the path or paths you took to get out of Pennsylvania?

Malcolm Bricklin: Here’s the story. Once upon a time, I decided to move my family from Orlando, Florida, where my wife and my first three kids, a one year old, a three-year old and a five year old, decided we’re moving to Philadelphia where I was born and lived [00:02:00] till I was 10 years old, but I had relatives there.

I don’t know why I decided. I said, I’m, let’s do it now. My wife at the time was absolutely not interested on getting on an airplane. And we happened to have a Corvette with a hatch bath. So picture three kids in the back of the thing and a U-haul it, and of course they truck with all the furnitures coming behind it.

I traveled from Orlando, Florida to Philadelphia in a Corvette with my wife and three kids, three little kids. All right. How fun is that? So now we’re in Philadelphia and one of the people I get introduced to is a man by the name of David Rosen, who owns Coin operated machines, cigarette machines, jukebox, you name it, that kind of stuff.

He an old to me older man. I was in my early twenties and he in the worst way wanted me to, and I was not interested, but I used come by and have some coffee and we talk about stuff and one day he said, I got something and I think you’ll be interested in it. What is that? It’s a C Box machine. What’s the C Box Machine?

What it is is a big thing that looks like an egg painted red on the back, on the shell part. And the front [00:03:00] has a television set and it’s a jukebox. The television set. So now it’s M T V before M T V and we go to Corin, where we meet the Innocente Corporation, Innocente Corporation, big equipment, heavy presses.

Almost every car company had one or two or 10 or 50. And they also did Morris Minor with their license from England and they did, uh, Loretta Motor scooters and they were building this C Box machine, which they thought was going to be a big deal. Everybody who saw it thought it was a big deal. It was one little flaw, but we didn’t figure it out yet.

We ordered a dozen and they come, and then we realized we don’t have film. This is not M T V, we don’t have a platform to get any film. And without film, we don’t got a jukebox that chose film. So I went off to Hollywood to go get somebody to start paying attention. What a good idea. This is gonna be everywhere.

Well, they didn’t think so because nobody was gonna give us a hit team of any musicians that are gonna do it. And I got 12. That’s my distribution 12 and I’m never gonna get past 12 unless [00:04:00] I get somebody to do something and it’s gotta be more than one because you get bored pretty fast. The only solution to that was my guy who had all these pieces of equipment and also had a lot of R-rated film, which of course they like seeing in bars and I like seeing ’em too.

I just didn’t feel like being in the business. So I bowed out. But before I did, I got rid of the 12 with a company called Food Fair that was a food store that was popular in at least the Philadelphia and New York area. And I convinced them they ought to put these machines. On top of the checkout counter have the people who are selling their products, put their commercials in there, pay ’em, whatever the hell they can get from ’em.

And when people are waiting in line, they may see something they like and they go get it. That’s what point of sale advertising. So I got rid of my 12 and they seemed to like what they had, but that was the end of that program. Now I am sitting home on a Sunday, having a Sunday breakfast with my three kids and my wife eating a lox and bagel, as a matter of fact.

And I get a call and it’s from in corporation and in Medium English. [00:05:00] They tell me they want me to get on a plane tomorrow and come to Milan and don’t tell anybody. They’ll pick me up at the plane. I won’t be going through customs. I think that was before James Mo, but it for sure as hell felt like a James moment.

I couldn’t wait. I don’t know why I’m going. I have no idea why the hell they’d call me and why they’d go to all these secrecy, but I couldn’t wait. So I get on a plane and they pick me up and we go someplace and there’s a board of directors and a gorgeous room. And I go, what in the heck could this possibly be?

And they say to me, we have a problem. Okay, what’s your problem? We manufacture ated, a motor scooter. It was very popular one with in the United States because of the movie and all sorts of, yeah. But then mopeds came out and mopeds are now selling in. You forget about scooters are now happening in the United States.

We have 25,000 of ’em sitting in Long Island. Financially, it’s no big deal. I mean, you’re talking about scooters sold for a couple hundred dollars back then they said, that’s not our worry. But for some reason it has gotten out and it’s extremely embarrassing for us and the board. And it doesn’t matter what it takes.

We gotta get rid of ’em and we want you to do [00:06:00] it. And I said, well, you just picked the worst guy in the universe to go do that because I never had one. My parents wouldn’t let me have one. I couldn’t have a motorbike. And you’re telling me I should go help you sell the damn thing. I have zero knowledge except I wanted one.

That’s it. That’s as far as I go. Well, we have a problem. We don’t know Anybody else we can ask? I said, well, I, I’m telling you, you are asking the wrong guy. I would love to do it for, I just dunno where I would even start. Would you do us a favor? Would you go back and go look at the place? We have two guys working there.

Would you tell us what you recommend? Great. So I go out to Long Island. I meet two people who are nice gentlemen from Italy and speak. Broken English. I mean, they’re having a good time, but they’re not selling anything because if you want one, you gotta call ’em up and beg ’em just about if you can find them at all.

So I go back to Italy, I said, I have no other suggestion, but you’d be better off with nobody because it is not the way you sell vehicles in the United States when nobody wants ’em. I said, it’s more of a hard sell, and I, I wouldn’t email where to start to tell you the truth. And if there’s anything I can do for you, I’ll be very happy to do it for you.

[00:07:00] No, no, no, no. You can’t leave make us any kind of deal at all. I’m thinking, what can I say that would let them know it would be stupid for them to pursue me? Not that I didn’t wanna do it, I just didn’t have the slightest idea. So I said, okay, I want $5,000 a week and I want an office in new, a one year contract, no matter what happens.

Okay? I’m going, do you understand? I’m going to go to New York every day. We have an office in New York and we have a secretary, so you can have the secretary in the office. Great. So you know what I’m gonna do? I’m gonna read papers and then I’m gonna go to lunch and I’m gonna go back and I’m gonna try to figure out, I wonder what I would do if I, these were mine and I’m telling you I don’t have the slightest idea now.

Be clear. Okay, great. So I go out and I buy myself a used rolls for about 67,000 new ones. Cost about 29, 30 plus. I bought one for that price off the showroom for, and I got myself a driver. And every morning in Philadelphia, I’d come down in my pajamas with the pillow and my suit and tie in, go to sleep in the back of the rolls.

When they got at the end of the freeway near Dozi Freeway, I would, they would pull into a gator [00:08:00] station. I would go and put my suit and tie, go to the time and life building. That’s where he would park. Hello, Mr. Brooklyn. Now I was living my novels that I used to read. You’d go into a big building in New York and the guy would know who you are.

I go upstairs to the office, a very nice Italian young lady is my secretary, and I read all the papers. Now it’s time for lunch. Where am I gonna go to lunch? 21. A little more than I wanna do stuffing park just because, but right next door is a place called Tch Shores. And Tut Shores had a table, table in their restaurant, a round table, and anybody could sit at that round table.

But when you sat there, you sat there because you wanted to talk to other people. People like Chairman General Motors would get how the real man thinks about things. It was a good place for people to be very comfortable, to ask people of different experiences, answers, questions, or just talk to. It was a very cool place in that regard.

Well, I sat next to a guy that had an office across the street from the office. We were at time and life building because his customer was across the street next to [00:09:00] me, JC Penney’s. He sold furniture. He represented a North Carolina furniture place, and he sat next to me and this guy was a police groupie.

He loved the badge. He loved talking to everybody in the police force. He just loved everything about being a policeman or helping them or being involved with them, or being able to talk to them. After about two weeks after we talked about crap, he said, give me three librettos. I said, great. What? Four? He said, I’m giving them to the New York Police Department.

They’re gonna use it for their meter maids. Okay. I guess for the meter maids, it’s not a bad idea, but I wasn’t sure. But anyhow, it didn’t matter. So we gave ’em three and one week later. It comes in with a letter that says, we have come to the conclusion that this replaces five meter MAs, but rather than fire anybody, we’re gonna be moving them up.

Those that are not gonna be meter MAs any longer, and let them start to become more police women. And we’re very excited. Everything. And we want a thousand. So I work out a commission. I called in and I say, listen, we just sold a thousand. I’m gonna have to pay the man [00:10:00] 5% of the whatever the bill is for that.

Is that okay? Yeah. Okay, good. Can we’re gonna be able to ship it tomorrow. Who do? And I tell him, oh, they’re all very excited. Okay, well, I just sold a thousand things go wrong. A week goes by now, remember, this guy’s excited. He’s making money and he’s dealing with the police. He’s the happiest human being ever happened.

The next thing I got is I need, uh, three more scooters, but four. Well, at that time, central Park was not a safe place to be in day or night. Lot of little petty robberies. Running after people on this terrain was not the coolest thing ever happened. And the truth of the matter is a small wheel vehicle was not the ideal choice.

It should have been a bigger wheel if you’re gonna be running over these rocks and all the other crap. Nobody asked them. This guy is out selling all the time because now he had an end. They just bought a thousand things and he’s getting excited about making money. So we give him three. And about a week later, there’s an article in the paper how the scooter patrol has made a portion of Central Park safe and the police department is buying a thousand.

It’s 2000 we have [00:11:00] just sold and we’re getting credit for cleaning up Central Park and increasing the people who are getting kicked up in their jobs because of the Scoot Patrol. So everybody is about as happy as can be. I’m not doing anything, having lunch and reading my papers. Everything is going again.

Pretty good now. I sold 2000, but enough is enough. This is not gonna happen in every city in America. They made one, two, or three. And that’s a long run to get rid of another 23, other thousand of these things. And I gotta get rid of them because I don’t wanna have to think about this anymore and I’m realizing this is how I’m gonna sell it.

I’m just gonna come to this round table and talk to this nice guy and he’s gonna figure it out. ’cause he just couldn’t make you happier. Then he comes back to me and says, gimme 15,000. Okay, what do you want it for? We’re running an ad in the police Gazette and both people in charge of the park and in charge of the meter maids are gonna allow to put their names on it and their phone numbers.

And you, the police department can call them up and they’ll tell ’em what happened. And we set out all for them brothers. Now I got about, I don’t know, [00:12:00] eight, nine months to go. I got nothing to do, but I’m liking what I’m doing, so I’m gonna keep doing it. But I start reading specifically what’s going on in the scooter world and I find something is starting to happen called rental scooters for $15 an hour, $15 an hour to rent a scooter that cost you maybe $300.

That’s unbelievable. So I go and I check ’em out and I start traveling around a little, and I come to the interesting conclusion that the fallacy in what’s happening is nobody can get insurance. So what happens when you are now renting a scooter that nobody’s been on that has to have a shift while you balance is probably the most dangerous thing, you can probably rent for $15 an hour because you’re gonna get in an accident or you’re gonna drop it on, or something’s gonna happen because you gotta do too many new things.

And where you’re going, you’re going out in the street. And that’s what happened. They rent ’em like crazy and you know, making money. And then somebody would get hurt and that goes down because they didn’t have insurance. So I went, oh, isn’t this interesting? So I went out and I went to State Farm and I [00:13:00] made a deal that I would pay them a dollar an hour for every rental if I decided to get into the scooter rental business.

So now I had insurance and now I had to find a scooter. The world umbrellas that’s over. They sold their factory. There’s no more them in there. I gotta find a scooter and I’m reading my paper. And in the Wall Street Journal, it was a little thing about a guy in Boston who was 450 rabbit motor scooters that are on rental, but he needs a $75,000 guarantee.

And the story was he was overdue to pay a 75,000 loan to New England Merchants Bank. That was an S B A loan that they guaranteed but is now due. So I fly to go see him and his story is he makes a fortune renting the scooters out because they have an automatic transmission. Oh my God, I have insurance and an automatic transmission and he rents ’em out.

But now come fall or winter, you gotta put ’em in storage. It ain’t so good. Rent those things out in the snow and the ice and the other. So one, he has to pay for it instead of an income coming in. [00:14:00] He is the distributor for the United States. So he has parts he has to take care of warehousing, and he has a airplane that he loves.

I say, okay, let’s go to the bank. We go to the bank and I say, listen, I’m willing to make a deal. I’ll guarantee the 75,000. If it’s not paid off and what we’re gonna do, then I’ll personally pay it off. I tell him he can keep the airplane and he keep the 450 scooters too. I said, all I want is the new inventory you have, and all I want is the parts which I’ll take care of and I’ll guarantee the loan.

And he was a happy camper. Oh, and what other little condition? The contract you have to bring him into the United States has to be assigned to my company. Call me when you got that. Bank calls me, we got it. And I come in and sign the note and I proceed to put together a little package to sell a dozen of these things to gas stations because they have the cash to put in it.

They have the people to fix it, they have the location to rent it from it. None of that do they think cost them any money. So it’s all profit as far as I’m concerned. And there were a lot of people who owned their place so they could borrow against the place. And it was an inch in cash. No, by the way, we got insurance.

You don’t have to close in case you got an accident. So we had a couple [00:15:00] hundred of the thing and I sold em out in about a week. Now I need a whole bunch. I find out the address and I buy a telex machine and it telex the Fuji. Things are really good here. I wanna come over and talk about buying your whole supply of scooters, and I’d like to show up and they tell me, excuse me, who am I?

Didn’t they know that they are not building these scooters any longer? They sold it to Israel. I go call up the bank and say, excuse me, I have a small problem here. Oh yeah, we knew all about it, but we figured there wouldn’t be a problem You. Now let me go find out what I can talk them into is what I got.

So I got myself a ticket and I said, I’m coming over because we have a small problem here. I was told we have a contract. So now they’re on the defensive right away because, oh my God, United States, this is 1967. Everybody was cautious. The United States was a big, scary place to be from. So now I came over and I just had all my presentation, why I can sell everything.

Whatever deal you make, I’ll pay for it. I’m telling you everything you make I can buy, I’ll give you letters of credit [00:16:00] for it. And they then took me in their style to show me everything. They build up all over Japan. They build planes and they build cars. I was getting a little uncomfortable here. They were so nice.

Now, they were being nice because first of all, they thought I came from Mars. I had sideburns down to here. I had Peter Max ties and double breasted suits, and I’m 20 something years old. The youngest guy there is 50 something and they’re wearing gray and gray and gr and here I come waltzing in there with buy everything.

With my waving my hands around, they show me everything. And I see the bigger car and I see the little car, and I stole prices. Six 40 bucks and it sticks in my head. Boy, I’m sure I could sell that, but I didn’t want that. I wanted the bigger car. Now this is the only two other cars with Toyota and Datson out there.

And they’d come back and the quality here now was at this moment superlative. You could smell it. It looks so everything they we’re doing. So I think I’ve convinced ’em to open the factory ’cause they shake their head a lot us. So I forgot. I didn’t know that us so meant we understand not, yes, you got a [00:17:00] deal.

So I go back happy as can be. And two weeks later I got told really sorry. And they showed me the factory and it wasn’t being dismantled. So they weren’t lying to me at all. Okay. I can’t convince ’em, I can’t believe I didn’t convince ’em. So I said, okay, I’m coming back to talk to you about the little car.

And I fly back. Now they have a problem. What do they do with me? I have been very nice. There have been no threatening about anything. They’re still nervous and uh, they say, okay, we’ll be happy to, we don’t think you can sell ’em in the United States. You know, people are too big in the United States for a small car like that, ba blah blah.

They said, yeah, I know I fit in it. And I was a little bigger before I started shrinking over the years. But I fit really comfortable. I could put a hat on and sit in a silver stick. It was really well engineered.

Don Weberg: Malcolm, you’ve often said you didn’t know anything about the car industry when you brought Subaru over.

Right? When you go into that, I don’t understand. How is it that some guy walks in off the street and says, Hey, Subaru, that looks like a cute little car. I could sell those and brings them in here with the same alacrity of say, oh, I don’t know. I’m gonna import trash cans. I mean, how do you do that? That’s a major, [00:18:00] major step.

Malcolm Bricklin: Well, here’s how, if you saw a little car that you could sit in and be about six foot six in this little egg car, and it was cute as can be, and it had another interior and white wall tires and a radio and tinted glass, and you could buy it for 640 bucks, F o b Yoko helmet, and you know what? I’ll bet you I could do something for 30 or $40 a month.

I’ll bet you I could do something. And they wanted a million and a half dollars because the next year you start meeting the federal regulations. They ordered to meet ’em. They, and they never would’ve met ’em. But besides that, of course I’m not giving them money. I’d never been in the car business. I don’t remember even buying a car.

Somebody already leased it for me. He gave it back to them. And so I had the least experience in retail. What I learned was how the world works in the import world. And I was able to get whatever the hell I wanted when I wanted a country or a car that I thought I could do something with. And I learned how to make sure that met all the regulations.

Crew Chief Eric: To dovetail off of what Don said. He said the Subaru was a small car, it was cute, whitewall tires, radio, all this kind of thing. But in 19 66, 67, 68, there were a lot of choices there. You had the [00:19:00] Fiat 500, the Mini Coopers were out the Doche Vott,

Malcolm Bricklin: well wait, wait, wait. Not in 68. In 60 out the Honda. No, not the Honda.

They came in fourth. The, uh, Datson and the Toyota had had a bad reputation. They came in a couple years beforehand. The quality was really funny. That’s when Japan was known for funny quality. But the year I brought the Subaru in is the year Japan changed from having ah, To incredible the highlight of the world on quality.

I have to correct, not correct exactly, but add onto something that just annoys me when I read it incorrectly. Everybody goes from, I brought the 360 into the United States. We were selling like crazy and consumer report killed us. Oh, it was terrible. It was unsafe because we got here without having to meet the regulations.

’cause it was under a thousand pound. That wasn’t my first choice. My first choice was I wished I’d gotten the front wheel drive and then the all wheel drive that they were developing, but they didn’t wanna give it to me. So they said, okay, finally. And this was to put [00:20:00] me off, give us a million and a half dollars and we’ll converted to meet the regulations for 1968.

I said, wait, stop. Let me go find out about the regulations and I’ll be back. And I fly to Washington. I go to n Gimme the rules on the regulations that come out next year. They gave a book about three inches stick and I started reading the first couple pages and I put it down after myself. I don’t understand what heck I’m reading and I’ll never, this is not the way to go.

But I go to the first page and it says, these regulations apply to all cars over a thousand pounds. Curb weight. Back in, excuse me. What’s curb weight? Oh, that’s all the fluids in your car when it’s sitting at the curb, your air conditioning fluid in there, windshield wiper fluid and your gasoline sitting in.

But the brochure says nine 60. How fast can you change the law? Here’s how it works. First, we have to have a lot of complaints. After we have a lot of complaints, then we have to have hearings. After the hearings. If we decide to make a change, it takes two years. I said, what I’m hearing is no matter what happens, I got two years.

No, what you’re not hearing is you probably got, [00:21:00] maybe never will we change it, but at earliest, if everything went really terrible, it’s five or six years. No kidding. What do I do? Take that brochure down to the I R S, they’ll give you an exemption. So I do, and I now have a paper that says the Subaru 360 I bring in does not have to meet the regulations.

I tell ex Fuji and said, I’m coming over with one of my team and I had no team by the way, and I hired a guy that was 55 years old. His job was to be old. Don’t open his mouth, don’t say anything, just be old. And we go there. It was snowing in Tokyo, which was a big rare deal. So now I go there. I had asked for the board to show up, they have the board there.

And I said, listen, I wanna tell you a thank you all for your incredible hospitality. I know you were just trying to appease me because he didn’t know what the liability is. You have no liability. No matter what happens today, you have no liability. You had nothing to do with it. It was a defrauded by the bank.

And even that didn’t actually hurt me and brought me here. So as far as I’m concerned, thank you. It was really a pleasure [00:22:00] meeting you. But I didn’t tell you one thing and I tried to not, but I’m going to, In the United States. I’m very powerful politically, and I know you think I’m full of shit because I’m too young for that.

So here’s the deal I’d like to make. And by the way, I’ll give you a thing in writing saying you have no liability to make now or any date from here down. I said, if I have what I just said, I have from the United States government, you tell me you’ll gimme the car. ’cause you don’t have to meet the regulations.

So you don’t need the million and a half dollars, they said. Absolutely. And I pulled out the paper. Subaru of America was born and we did all that and met all the regulations in 14 months. And they gave me the little car figuring I’m not gonna sell that many anyhow. And they would make nights. I figured if I brought the 360 in, they’re gonna have to gimme the bigger car.

’cause I’m setting up Subaru dealers. You can’t set up two sets of Subaru dealers. Well, what happened was right in the middle of it all consumer report in effect, killed us because all the banks read it and they cut off the floor planning. So now I had no car, but I had plenty of cars coming in [00:23:00] on letters of credit.

One I had to get rid of them, and two, I needed the bigger car. So I went to Japan and I spent a week with everybody telling me no. And I had a meeting with the chairman of the board as my last resort at dinner and the next day I was leaving because I didn’t know what else to do. They, everybody said no.

They were polite. They listened to the story of why, how important it was, but they said no.

Don Weberg: Are you still involved with Subaru?

Malcolm Bricklin: We got a contract. We asked for a perpetual contract because that would get us when we came back, millions of dollars from an investment banker who said if we came back with a 25 year contract, we would have the money with the contract.

So I decided to push it and say, I’m coming back with a perpetual contract. Well, they didn’t want to even hear about that, but because I got it with the chairman of the board, changing his mind, it appeared as if we had more strength than we had. And so after all sorts of incredible things in negotiations, like, we’ll give you $10 and we’ll put it in the bank in Tokyo.

And I said, we’ll all go to jail. Because you can’t do that legally when [00:24:00] you’re a public company. So I said that doesn’t go anywhere. Well, how about if we give you the word perpetual, but we, you can’t tell anybody I said we’re a public company. Every year it’s gonna be on the first paragraph of every financial statement we ever put out.

The end of the story is they gave me perpetual, and it was in the front first paragraph of everything that came out financially on the year end report. So now, 20 years later, not right after the 360 started to fail, 20 years later, Fuji Heavy Industries bought out the stockholders and it became a private company.

What’s interesting in my life, I’ve been an importer five times. If you put all the other people in the last century to put it together as zero Hoffman in the late forties, early fifties, sort of got everybody in Europe and they had all the brands, but he never sold brands, you know, two or three BMWs. He sold the companies back to the companies because the truth of the matter, major companies in the car business do not wanna have another importer.

They wanna be the [00:25:00] importer, and they set up distributors. Volkswagen did that, Toyota did that, SHA did that. And then after everybody’s successful, they buy ’em all back. Audibly wonderful prices, as a matter of fact. And two of my Subaru distributors refuse to sell Northeast and uh, new England, and they’re making so much money they have to shovel it.

Two Toyota distributors also didn’t sell and they were offered billions, and Moran is out there having a good time not doing that. So being a distributor is a big deal, but being an importer sets up the distributors, and that’s what I was five times. The least equipped human being on the planet from a car point of view to be.

That was me starting off and I got all the distributors because I didn’t know how or what dealers were the best in the area, and they did, and I made them buy stock. Split 10 for one went to 300. Every car we sold, whether it be a Brooklyn or a Hugo, made money as a dealer.

Don Weberg: Why Hugo

Malcolm Bricklin: and the Hugo from Yugos Savia, that was about as bad a factor as you’ll imagine in the world with grease.

About a foot and a half in the [00:26:00] first piece of equipment was a quarter of a million dollars to get a machine to clean the grease off the floor and everybody smoking and putting in the cars and of course that burns everything in there. Had to get the not to smoke and they were welding without goggles and burning their eyes out because on top of that, they had 50,000 people in the factory that needed 2,500.

Isn’t that nice? And a hundred percent of the cars that came off the line did not meet our qualifications. So we had to build a little factory outside the factory where our people did it, and then clean the rust off the trucks to the trains and take them, pave the ports into the port, bring in unleaded gas ’cause they didn’t have any, and get ships to go to Yugoslavia to pick up cars, car carriers.

We did all that.

Crew Chief Eric: Alright, there you go. So as we switch gears now, you’re becoming deeper invested into the automotive world, whether you liked it or not, coming from the scooters and through the Subarus and even the Yugos later, how did you get to the point where you were building your own car?

Malcolm Bricklin: Now remember, as I started bringing in these cars, the thing that put me in the worst jeopardy was [00:27:00] consumer report saying it was unsafe.

So I decided, because I’m reading now Automotive news, I’m reading everything I can read about that has anything to do with the world of automobiles because I am now gonna become the expert on the world on how the world works in importing cars, because that’s my new business. So if I might not know about how you fix a car, but I should know how to bring a car in and meet the regulations and deal with the people over there and get the shipping and make sure everything is there and make sure I have distributors that put money into the company that finances them and get letters of credit that stretch out.

So I have five or six months to pay for ’em, even though they’re always guaranteed. So I can negotiate with the banks to get lots of ’em because they’re gonna have cash for a whole bunch of time, on and on. And that I knew better than anybody in the universe. What happened next was unexpected because they wrote this article and all of a sudden floor planning drained up and I was dead.

Now that forced me to convince them to gimme a bigger car, and once I had the bigger car, now everything started to smooth out. There was no more of this craziness. I found a way with a thing [00:28:00] called Fast Track. I built a little track and ripped the cars apart, made ’em into race cars racing against the clock, and people went and paid a dollar a ride that took about 35 seconds and they couldn’t get enough, and I had ’em all over the place until I finally got paid for all my things in a dollar a piece all over the country.

I then met John Doan, who loved the idea, and I said, I’m only in it to get rid of the cars, and he said, he and Penske would love to do copy of it. Be my guest. They did Malibu Grand Prix. So that got me comfortable and friendly with John Horian, who I had great admiration for. So now by getting the bigger car, all of a sudden we’re in a different position.

Now, my executive Vice President, Harvey Lamb, who was actually running the company, company, one of the best managers in the U universe, he came from having a furniture store that his peak sale was, they financed the hell out of it. That’s where he came from. When he would go with me with Japan and tell them the safety regulations.

All the things I don’t want to do. He did fabulously. So it was a good partnership. He was really important, and then he ended up running the company.

Don Weberg: What [00:29:00] was the catalyst that made you say, I wanna build my own car?

Malcolm Bricklin: Because I decided I’m gonna show them a mount not safe. I’m gonna build the most gorgeous, absolute safest car I can imagine with 10 mile an hour bumpers, no damage to the body.

An acrylic body, you could not dent. It would be the same 40 years from the day, and it’s 50 years from the day as good as it came off the line, because it’s an eighth ty of solid paint. You can’t dent it, but you can make a hole, but you can put the hole back in and it just buffet. It’s amazing.

Don Weberg: The Corvette was the only car at the time, made of fiberglass.

Did that influence the SV one’s design in construction? What was the SV one designed to compete against? Was it the Corvette? Was it the nine 11? Who was the intended target? The number one competitor

Malcolm Bricklin: when I was still in the prototype phase in Livonia. The and her grass ended up taking the original design that I had done.

For one, it made it really cool. Hell, and did the clay and all the stuff you do back then took care of the 200 engineers we had drawing. Every day I get a call [00:30:00] from John. He’d already done the Malibu Grand period, and he calls me up and he said, Hey, next time you come into Detroit, let me pick you up. Okay, great.

It was another couple days and I’m there and he picks me up in a stretch Chevy and he says, do you have a problem if I go see what you’re doing with the prototype? And he said, not at all. In fact, you’ll probably know everybody there. I stole ’em all from Corvette. Okay, great. So we go and he spends about an hour talking to all the guys.

He knew all the guys and it looked like he was in heaven. I mean, he loved watching that to me. I thought it was interesting. But I just wanted the car, come on, let’s get done. Let’s get the car. So afterwards he says, let’s go to lunch. Okay, great. He says, uh, Malcolm, what would you say if I told you I would leave General Motors and go to work for you as your president?

I said, John, I’d kiss your ass in Mason’s window. I don’t know what I’m doing, building a car. I would love it to have somebody like you. I mean you. No, that would be the best.

Crew Chief Eric: You were on MotorTrend, seduced by Speed, a series where you told a story on the DeLorean episode, which fills the gap between the book on a Clear day, which explains John’s departure from gm.

[00:31:00] And when he started, the D M C

Malcolm Bricklin: said, well, I leave General Motors, I’m gonna lose 1,000,006. I said, so you’re saying 1,000,006 buys me a quarterback, John, get your lawyer. Come to Philadelphia tomorrow. You’re gonna meet John Ing chairman of the first Pennsylvania bank. He said, I’ll put up some more in my super stock.

I’ll borrow 1,000,006. He said, you ready to move? I said, you wanna go slower? We can do a general motor style. How about next year you’ll show up and we’ll talk about it? He said, okay. He said, you’re serious? I said, yeah. So next day he met me in Philadelphia. John Bunning absolutely loved the idea. Malcolm, I love this idea.

Oh, Todd, oh my God. Couldn’t be better. I said, so I got the money. Yeah. So everybody shakes hands. John says to me, Malcolm, this is less than 24 hours since I talked to you. Yeah. I would like to keep moving fast. John. Only thing you need outta your head is we’re not moving at general motor speed. We’re moving at my speed.

My speed is you do everything and you get it done and you make decisions and you don’t keep on dragging it out. That’s all the difference. And you know what to do, so it shouldn’t be a problem. No, no. I love it. I love it. He goes [00:32:00] home and about eight o’clock that night I get a call. Malcolm, my attorney and I, we still can’t get over it.

We never heard of something so fast. We’re so excited about it. But he sort of told me that I should get the money after taxes. So I thought about it. I said, John, it’s a couple hundred thousand more. And to tell you the truth, it shouldn’t make any difference at all. I’m still getting you and that’s what I’m buying.

I got a problem. ’cause while I was thinking about it, I was thinking about we’re both sort of narcissists. And I think we’re gonna end up having a fight over whose name goes on the back of the car. And that’s not up for negotiation. So I have a feeling we should back off and see wherever it goes. And he agreed on the phone.

’cause I think he was getting nervous. I mean, he’s lived in a General Motors game and he realizes this is a different game. Completely. Okay. And he knew it was right. He wanted his name on the back.

Crew Chief Eric: Let’s dig a little bit deeper into your relationship with John DeLorean.

Malcolm Bricklin: How about dinner next time you’re here?

Absolutely. We sit down, said, uh, you wanna guess what we’re gonna talk about? I said, there’s no guessing you wanna build a car with your name on the back, Jeff, any suggestions? I said, well, you know ’em all. You need a paint factory. You can’t [00:33:00] afford $300 million, so you better find a material that allows you to not need a paint for, oh, I’ve been building out a stainless steel.

Wow, you can actually do it. Yep. I said, okay, I’m gonna give you a free piece of marketing. Take it for whatever you wanna take it. No matter how good you build anything and whatever color, in this case, stainless steel, once you start building a lot of them, everything loses. Its pizazz and all of a sudden you can’t sell what was the coolest thing in the world.

You can’t just do the same. If you’re going for volume, you going for no volume. You can get away with it. No, no. Stainless steel. We can anodize. You can’t anodize because anodize looks like shit for what people want. They want shiny. Mm-hmm. He said, yeah, you’re right. But I said, blah, blah. Okay, fine. He said, okay.

Last thing. Can I use your prototype in the film you use to raise some money? Be my guest. We have a gray car that’s in some museum I gave it to. And if you put it next to a DeLorean would almost look exactly, which was my permission. They did whatever he wanted to do fine, but took me two years and $30 million.

Took him six years and $300 [00:34:00] million. And the only difference is I had enough sales for four years from dealers who were, were getting deposits from people all over the place. And his problem after 5,000 vehicles was sales because they were bored of stainless steel and he tried to anodize and a looked like ship.

That’s when he got involved in the stupidity. That got ’em all in publicity with just eight. I mean, for a man that is as narcissistic as he was and he, he made me look like a humble person almost. For that to happen to him publicly ripped his insides out.

Don Weberg: Who designed the SV one?

Malcolm Bricklin: Irv bras. What a cool guy.

He was Dolly looking guy with a big shaggy beard and his wife was a stripper and he was just as happy as could be. A great couple really were, and I’m looking for designers in Detroit because I’ve been told that this prototype that I got Bruce Meyers to build for me, it looks pretty close to what I want.

Not one nutter bolt from that is gonna be in the real car that it had nothing to do with being engineer, nothing to do with nothing. It [00:35:00] looked like pretty close to what I wanted. So now I had to go find a designer and they tell me about a clay model. One 10,000 of an inch. It takes hundreds of hours. Oh my God.

And as soon as they pull the plaster, it’s all ruined. So I interviewed a number of designers, and by the way, I work at the office early in the morning, one or two o’clock in the morning. Sometimes I don’t go back. I sleep on the floor, herb grass. He says to me, ’cause I tell him I hardly sleep. He said, well, you can come visit at two o’clock.

He’d probably get me at the office. So one day at two o’clock I show up at his office and I walk into his office and there he is, sitting with his secretary and she’s naked and he is painting her, painting her. Not the canvas painting her and I go and I see him and I say, you know what? You’re just my kind of guy.

You’re hired. So that was the reason I hired her graph.

Don Weberg: It was the seventies. Know? Yeah. Oh

Malcolm Bricklin: no. Let me tell you. He did an incredible job and he did it fast. Remember from the day I woke up and said I’d do it to the day I came off with the false prototype to begin with, with the clay prototype, with all the tilling that had to be made and they shrink at different temperatures.

Oh [00:36:00] my God, what a thing. And it all got done.

Don Weberg: I was always curious, SV one, why go wing doors? Oh,

Malcolm Bricklin: the whole purpose of building the car was to go wing doors to show you how great things come from the silliest little things in the world. I had at the time, three kids. Three boys and on Saturday morning was cartoon time on television and that was a really wonderful time.

’cause they got ’em, they’re almost quiet. They didn’t have to break up fights with all the other happy horse shit. So we would always watch cartoons or various shows. And one of the shows that was on Saturday morning, I think it was called 99 a Space Odyssey, something like that. And every week what would happen is a car would silently pull up and the doors would go.

And that was about 15 seconds of the reel every time. And I went, I wanna build a car that looks like that. I went to doors and go. And that’s why I built a car. It was a cartoon. Well, it wasn’t exactly, it was an actual human show on the moon. Oh, on the moon. And that car was on the moon.

Don Weberg: That’s awesome.

Malcolm Bricklin: But I looked [00:37:00] forward every Saturday to look at the car.

It had trapped me, so it was obviously in my destiny. I mean, I didn’t think of it that way until one day I said, I gotta build a safety car. Car’s gonna look like that. And the go. That was the reason I wanted to build those doors. You understand Where the whole purpose of me deciding to build a car. Now we have all the engineers and all these people who are really car guys and they know they’re working for a guy Jetson, admitted doesn’t know cars.

The way they think. I had to know it in order to do it. So they would try to influence me in lots of things. One of ’em was, forget about the push button going doors. Forget about the window going up and down, because the physics out here and the physics here is way different in the door. Okay. And how much safety you sit as a safety thing.

What if you’re upside down? Oh my God, I said the glass going come down. You’re gonna have a hand grenade pin there so you can pull it and kick if you’re upside down. And.

There’s three ways to get out of this thing. The window, kick out the door, go behind it better than any car you ever had. I said to them, now [00:38:00] I want a push button door. I wanna be able to push it walking to the car and see the damn thing go up, whether the window’s up or down. And they kept telling me, we can’t do it.

We can’t do it. Remember, I’m doing it for the doors and I’m not getting the doors. That’s not gonna happen. I pulled everybody together. I said, here’s the story. I’m leaving back to Philadelphia. I’ll be back next week. If the doors work, great. If not, I’m closing down the. As I’m walking out to the car, one of the kids that works in the place comes out and says, Mr.

Bricklin, can I talk to you? Sure. He said, I know how to do the door, but they don’t wanna do it the way I, I know how to do it, and if they know I’m talking to you, they fire me. I said, no. First of all, you’re not getting fired. Second of all, tell me what you’re talking about. I said, well, just take the hydraulic thing off the convertible and put it on the B pillar, and you got a hydraulic belt and you’re gonna have a glass go up and back.

Nobody gives a damn. The hydraulic will take almost anyway, so I take him and I walk him back in. I said, gentlemen, this young man just told me the following story and I have now given him full charge. I’m coming back next week. If I push a button that the door opens, we stay [00:39:00] alive, and if not, we close it down and if anything happens to the kid, whoever had anything to do with, it was out.

I came back a week later and they had it out there and all I had to do is push the button and it opened up. There was a flock that I didn’t know about until we’re now selling the cars. I am in Philadelphia with a Brooklyn in my driveway with the galling doors up, so I can just sit and look at it, and it starts to rain, so I run out to close the door.

Well, the hydraulics, it takes six seconds to close. That means if I wanted to get in, it would take six seconds to open and six seconds to close in the rain. I’m dead. I am absolutely dead. What am I gonna do? I called my friend Frank Turner, a inventor in Graham, Texas, who’s the genius of the world. I said, Frank, I got a problem.

I don’t know how to solve it. I tell him what it is. He says, I’ll be right there. And he flies into Livonia and he tell, I’m taking one of the cars. I’ll be back next week. And about five days later, he calls me up. He said, I’ll be there in about half a day. I’m already on the way. I said, [00:40:00] and he said, and it’s fixed.

All right, now we come. Everybody comes out there and he says, push the button. I push the button. He goes, push the button and close. It goes, stop six inches above it and closes. Oh my God. That’s perfect. That’s absolutely amazingly perfect. And you can put your hand there. Unlike the hydraulic, it doesn’t go break your hand off.

It’s flexible. Oh my God, what did you do? How much is it gonna cost? How long is it gonna take? The tool? He said, nothing. You don’t have to do almost anything. You drain the hydraulic. I put air in it. The engine makes the air. You got a box frame, air doors end the story.

I loved it. And I loved him.

Crew Chief Eric: So it begs the question, why did John want gold wing doors?

Malcolm Bricklin: Because it’s cool. And I told him, if you build a car and he doesn’t have gold wing doors, God bless him. He’s gonna have to spend a lot of money on advertising. The Gold Wing doors will sell it. People like the gold wing doors.

It makes ’em feel they’re in a really special, rich car. It makes ’em feel rich, it makes it special. That’s why they buy the car. They didn’t buy the Delo and they didn’t buy the Brooklyn for [00:41:00] any other reason is they wanted it. Nobody needed either one of ’em.

Don Weberg: The seventies were seen as sort of a safety era.

There were no convertibles. There were issues with the Pintos blowing up. People were really concerned with safety. You’ve got Volvo and Saab out there. Mercedes is right there too. Was the intent to compete with those companies that were already lining themselves with the safety brand? Is that really where the SV one came from?

Malcolm Bricklin: From the day I woke up and said, I’m gonna build it to the day it came off the line with all the engineers in Livonia, 200 of them, no computers at that time, by the way. I did all of that in two years. Met more than all the safety regulations, and it was the safest car ever built. The Bricklin SV one, ingenious things that nobody ever copied, nobody wanted to do it because you lose money.

If you have a bumper, 10 miles an hour, no damage. That makes you a lot of money. So that’s why the factories didn’t jump on the five mile an hour, no damage. It was $1,200. They were gonna lose a car every time you bumped up the bank. So they didn’t want it. I didn’t wanna make money that way. I wanted to sell you something cool that [00:42:00] my kids would love.

Don Weberg: What did you envision for the future of the SV one? What was the long-term vision where other cars are designed in the work? Was there an ssv two?

Malcolm Bricklin: Nah, nah. The next car we were gonna build was called the chairman’s car. I wanted an all black car, which is a bitch, by the way, ’cause they didn’t have acrylic that way.

But I was trying to talk them into it with all silver trim, and it was gonna sell for $15,000 or something. No big deal. I mean, then it was a big deal and it was going to be called the chairman’s car, not to sell a whole bunch, you know? 50 a month. We were trying to get up to a thousand a month with the other thing to meet this four year supply of Wonders.

We have,

Don Weberg: what was the chairman? Was it a big four door or what?

Malcolm Bricklin: No, same. Same exact car painted, just black and silver. It was no big, it was just a, an upgrade of what you had.

Crew Chief Eric: Sort of like the John Player edition. Lotus’s. Same idea. The black and Gold outfit. Yeah,

Malcolm Bricklin: yeah, yeah. It was the acrylic that was gonna look and the silver everywhere you had the name, it was silver.

Every, I mean silver. So then you know every, the problem was everybody was gonna steal everything we had, but other than that small little problem,

Crew Chief Eric: because [00:43:00] at this time you’re talking about Henry Ford ii, who’s at the head of Ford. So did you also cross paths with Lee Iacocca?

Malcolm Bricklin: Oh, Lee Iacocca. I’ll tell you that story.

Alright.

Crew Chief Eric: You just made my day.

Malcolm Bricklin: You got me into the good stories. I’m about to build the car. I made a deal with American Motors. It’s been engineered with the American Motors four Barrel and we’ve done the 50,000 mile test, which is a royal fucking pain in the ass. And I, I mean, it is seriously a pain. I get a call, Mr.

Bricklin, we have a problem. The order we gave, the contract we have, they’re not gonna sell us yet. Ah, are you kidding me? No. And we just got a call from Berg’s office. I said, well call back the office and tell him I wanna be in his office tomorrow morning. And I get a call now the secretary tell the secretary he would like to see me tomorrow morning, or he can read about it in the paper.

Okay, I’ll be there nine o’clock. So I go there with a couple of my guys. He has a couple of his guys in there and he said, uh, I’m only seeing you because you made a threat and I don’t like threats. I said, no, you de broke a contract. You have a contract with me and I spent [00:44:00] $3 million engineering that car with your engine in there and you’re selling me.

You’re not gonna give it to me. I don’t think so. It’s not the way the world works, Mr. Gutenberg, you’re throwing me out the window. I’m going out hanging on your tie ’cause I’m leaning on your stomach because when I walk out here without an engine, I’m gonna Washington to talk about how the big three had decided they didn’t want me building safety car.

And let’s see how much fun that’s gonna be by not just honoring your contract, you.

It was pretty vulgar. He said, I’m gonna tell you why you’re not getting it. I’ve worked a long time to sell these cars and now I can sell every car I build, and every time I give you an it’s a car I can’t build, never going to happen. I said, okay. Then when I’m in Washington and you can start reading the papers about how you break contracts and how you’re looking to put me out of business, but you’re in collusion with all the other boys out there that they think you’re doing anyhow, then you’ll see whether it was worth breaking the contract with me to sell a few cars instead of keeping a word.

You okay? I’m gonna give you seven engines. Get the hell outta the office. Don’t call me again. Thank you, [00:45:00] sir. I’m sorry if I was rude, but you had put me in a position where you’re putting me out of business and it was really a little bit, let’s say uncomfortable. So please accept my a apology. Get the hell outta here.

You a little. Okay. Now I go back to the office, what am I gonna do? I gotta replace the engine in something that fits and do a 50,000 mile test again. Oh boy. So I walk into the office of Libo and Keith is sitting there and another guy that I don’t know. Come on back, Keith. He said, listen Malcolm, I’ve been asking you to do a story and not only don’t you do a story, but when my photographer tried to sneak into your place, your broke his camera.

Yep. We told everybody, don’t go on our property and start trying to sneak in. We’re not gonna do it. Malcolm, what is wrong with you? It’s Subaru. You knew our value. Did you forget? He said, no, I’m just not ready. I don’t know who you building it yet. I don’t know a whole bunch of stuff. And why would I go premature?

I can’t do anything with it if a lot of people start calling me up. I’m telling you, you’re making a mistake, Malcolm. And by the way, why is House Sperlock in your waiting room? I said, who’s Hal Sperlock? He said he is. I a cook’s right here, ma’am. No kidding. He’s out [00:46:00] there. Keith, tell you what, you got a story.

Gimme a call next week. I’ll give you whatever the hell you want. You can even take pictures as long as we are a little bit clear about what, where we’re at in the game. Thank you so much. And I push him out the door. How screw up comes in. Hey Halal, how are you? Uh, why are you here? Leon Coka sent me. Oh yeah.

How come? Well, he wants to know what you’re doing. Is it okay? Absolutely. You wanna go see it? Absolutely. I am so glad you came. Don’t you have a 3 51 Windsor in Canada? Yep. I need more Canadian content. What do you think about selling Maybe about a thousand engines a month. No problem. I’ll handle it. Great.

I’ll take it down. You can go look at whatever you wanna go look at. He does, and we get a contract. Fast forward, we’ve now re-engineered it. Not a hot, if it fits pretty good, it’s not as good as the American Motor 360. And we did the 50,000 mile test, and now we’re getting ready. It’s Christmas time. I’m in the LA airport with the kids and my wife and I get a call from my secretary.

Ford is not gonna ship us the engines. Oh my God. Here we go again. I call up Henry [00:47:00] Ford. He doesn’t take my call. I call up blue guy Coca. He doesn’t take my call. I call Hal Bur, he takes my call. Now, I can’t believe I’m gonna have to tell you this, but I’ve just been told you’re not gonna sell me the engines, and I want you to know where I am.

I’m in the LA airport, I’m about to get on the plane to fight Acapulco. If I don’t hear back that those engines are coming, like we have in the contract, I’m getting on a different plane. I’m going to Washington, and you know where it goes from there. He said Malcolm, I honestly did not know that they and anybody said that it had to be our lawyers.

And I certainly wasn’t. Let me get to the bottom of it. I said, but you gotta do it really fast ’cause I’m not going to apora. So he calls me back, he said, no problem. You got the answers said What happened? Oh, the lawyers came up with the following scenario, which by the way is not wrong. And they said, what are we doing?

We are selling ’em a thousand engines. If anything happens, we’re liable for what? We’re not making enough money to give a damn. So we’re doing something that doesn’t do anything that has a liability attached to it. We recommend you don’t go forward. He said, we made a deal. You got the deal. Don’t worry about it.

Thank you very much Al. And they, [00:48:00] they honored the deal. Now fast forward,

Don Weberg: how does the SV one story end

Malcolm Bricklin: The deal was real simple from the premier, who I thought was a great premier, his goal of why he financed the factory, which was an old paint factory they gave us that we had to turn into a real factory.

He funded the second part of the money. I put in the money for all the engineering and the prototypes. He put in the money for the factory and he did it because he wanted publicity for New Brunswick when nobody ever heard of. And they all considered they’re fishermen and woodcutters and they didn’t know anything else.

And this would put ’em right out there because this was about as outstanding as anything. And I brought him around with me everywhere TV shows, talking in the Harvard business. Well, he was with me and he loved the attention he was getting ’cause it gave him a bigger stage and a bigger voice. And he was a bachelor.

So we are now friends. They’re putting in money and one day he comes walking in and says, I need three brick ones. Okay, what color do you want? Tells me Where do you want ’em? Tells me, I said, what do you want ’em for? He said, oh, I’m calling an election. First car is gonna pull the crowd. The second car comes in with my [00:49:00] mother.

The third car comes in with me the day after the election. Front page of the papers is a cartoon character of him flying out of the top of a bricklin with the gold wing doors open and him in the Superman, and it says, Premier. Premier win the largest popular vote in the history of New Brunswick elections.

He wins the Bricklin election and I go, oh, I own this province da. Not that I was gonna do anything different, but I liked it. It sounded like somehow it said worked out to my favor. It is what I thought. Well, three months later, premier comes in to say hello with the Can I see your loan, Malcolm? Yeah. He said, I’m closing it down.

I said, excuse me. You do understand we got 46,000 back orders and we got 1200 people making more money than anybody ever made in the province. We’re happy as hell and you’re getting all the publicity ever want. Is that a bad joke? He said, no. Let me tell you what’s happening since the election. You know the one, the Bricklin election?

Well, when I come down every day to talk to the press, there’s only two questions they wanna hear from. [00:50:00] How’s Malcolm and how’s the car? That’s it. They have zero interest in anything else. I sold my political future and voice box because I used the car to win and I won’t. So big. So here’s what I’m going to do.

I thought about this for a long time and I really hate to do it, but I’m doing it. It’s either this or my political career. So I am gonna close you. I’m gonna get abused, but then I’m going to election and a year from now it’s gonna be my election and I’m gonna win. And he did. Everything you just said, and that was the end of that story.

Don Weberg: What did you learn from the experience? What could have been done differently? What would you have done differently? What would you, you know, what would you hope from the Canadian government?

Malcolm Bricklin: So we built that car and we did it inexpensively and we had 46,000 back orders. By the way, I learned that I can for $30 million, That was the penalty of ego.

Don Weberg: It be the great title of a book. The Penalty of Ego.

Malcolm Bricklin: I like that. Yeah. Oh boy. I bet you that kills a lot of people.

Crew Chief Eric: So obviously a lot of years passed from when the Brickland factory in Canada closed and things like that. So take us on a quick journey [00:51:00] between the years 1975 and 2000. What were you up to?

Malcolm Bricklin: Well, let’s see. In the end of the 79, I’m at the first automotive news that they had ever was at the Hyatt Hotel across from the Ford headquarters and Henry Ford was the guest speaker, and the next year I was the speaker. The next John De Hoan was the speaker I had my good friend, Turner. The inventor called me up and says, Malcolm, I need your help.

Anything you want, Frank. He said, I have built a new kind of engine that is beyond revolutionary. He said, it creates a hundred foot pounds of torque and a hundred R p m and goes up to over 7,500 R P M. I said, well, he said, at 500 RRP m I can get 500 horsepower. I got a 500 horsepower, a 200 horsepower, a 20 horsepower engine made on Dinos.

They’ll revolutionize the world. Malcolm U I know don’t know shit about an engine. You can take mine apart and put it back together in five minutes with the screwdriver and a fire. There’s only eight moving parts. [00:52:00] I said, that sounds great. He said, yeah, but I can’t get any publicity or anybody to talk to, so I wanna make a deal with you.

Put your name on the engine with me. Get me publicity. I’ll give you 50%. I said, stop. I’m not taking 50% and I don’t wanna put my name on something that you created That does not feel good, Malcolm. We’re not gonna get any attention any other way. I said, okay, here’s the deal. We’ll put my name on it. We’ll call it the Brooklyn Turner Power Plant.

Good enough, good. I’ll get your publicity. But publicity doesn’t count unless it turns into something. If it turns into something, I want 10%. You’ve helped me all along. I want to be able to say I do own a piece of it so I’m not lying about it. And then I am excited. I’ll be that when I come see it. So I fly down and boy, he puts it on the, the most amazing thing you ever saw a little one about this big as 20 horsepower beyond?

I didn’t know too much about anything, but I, when I saw this, I knew there was had something fabulous. So I called up and account illustrated it. I told ’em exactly what the story was and they came down and looked at it, put it on a thought and went nuts. Put it on the cover of the magazine. The only thing that they did that was hurtful, I thought they called it the Brickland Power Plant on the cover.

They [00:53:00] did call it the Brickland Turner when they wrote the article, but it did not make me feel good. An incredible, in fact, the article was basically saying unbelievable. But we saw it all work. So now I got the magazine, I got the guy, I have the film. That’s what my talk is about in automotive news. And I have a deal with Henry that when I’m finished talking, I go over there and say hello for a half hour.

I get finish my speak. I take the little engine and my wife at the time and we go up to the 14th floor to go meet Henry. Now the 14th floor was Henry’s floor. That was him. He had the floor five times as wide as the normal hallway. And everything was so quiet. All the people were men, secretaries wearing gray suits and white gloves.

And Henry Ford’s office was the corner office and I don’t know who the hell they were or the others, but nobody ever seemed to walk out in the hall. So I come there and we sit and talk. And of course my lovely wife, he definitely paid a lot of attention to, I take the 20 horsepower and I hand it to him.

I said, here’s the deal. Everything I’m about to tell you is absolute fact. When you read the article, here’s the magazine, I’m gonna give it to you. You own it for [00:54:00] five years. Whatever you get from it, it’s yours. But you have to promise you engineer it into a car with that engine. Henry, you could own the car business.

Oh, I couldn’t own the car business. Why Henry? He said, because I don’t have enough money. I smile. I said, Henry, you give me your name for a day and a half. I’ll get you all the money you want. Ha ha ha. I like the deal. Okay, great. What do we do next? I said to him, he said, I’m gonna send my head engineer down to Graham, Texas to see it for himself, even though it says it in the magazine.

I want him to come back and tell me. Fabulous. We make a date. I fly down to Graham and engineer is sitting in their office waiting for me. Comes over to me. Can I talk to you, Mr. Brooklyn? Yeah. He pulls me aside. He says, I’m here to invalidate the program. Whoa. Invalidate the program. And then I got it. It was like, what is wrong with me?

I’m asking this man, if it is all the things I say, he has to throw everything he owns away his, his transmissions, his bodies, his tooling, everything because it makes it all different, smaller, blah. The balance. It’s a whole new guy. He can’t do that. If he wanted to, they would fire [00:55:00] him before they’d throw everything their own away and then invest it over here.

And I went, that’s why nobody ever went for the engine. Nobody wants to replace what they got already. It cost him much damn money. And so I said out loud, the next time I have anything to do with an engine, I’m gonna put it in my car. Fast forward, Leon Coca retires. He lives in California. I’m living in Malibu.

I’m building electric bikes with Dr. Malcolm Curry, who had just retired as chairman of used aircraft and did the EV one for General Motors and hated it when they pulled ’em all back and start crushing ’em. And let’s figure out how to build cars and used cars. Well, we’ll put batteries in them. Oh, remember we have lead acid and nickel metal hydride.

That’s your choice. So we use little batteries that came from computers, but we got it really fine if you like 40 or 50 miles between charger. One day I’m driving and I realize, oh my God, what happens when all of a sudden I run out of electricity? There is nothing. Nobody gives a damn about electric cars.

So I tell Dr. Carr, you know what? We made a mistake. We’ve spent a year, so what? Nobody’s gonna buy it. I can’t sell this [00:56:00] crap. I won’t ride it. So he agrees with me and he says, we sat around. What can we do? Does something in transportation electrically? We came up with, and we started the electric bike industry in the United States with a.

To go to Google to see it. So Lehigh Coco is now retired. He is living there. He gives me a call, you know I’m retired, but I hate to be retired. I see you’re building electric bikes. Yep. He said, I wanna be in that business. I said, I think that’s great. I think you’re doing great with it. It’s an okay business.

It doesn’t turn me on by the way. I said to him, what would you like? He said, well, I’d like to know about it. Do you mind could come on over and saying, hi, come over. And he has a room. All four wars are filled with the front covers of him being on the front cover. He was on time thing 10,000 times in news.

I mean, that man really got publicity. So anyhow, we start talking about it and every day, for 30 days, I picked him up. We had breakfast in his house. He had somebody there serving it. And then we’d take, get my car, show ’em electric bikes and show ’em what happens and show ’em where we’re producing it at the Burbank Airport because every there they were looking to [00:57:00] have environmentally clean stuff in their facilities on the air.

Anyhow. So after 30 days, he says to me, okay, you’re saying I can use the guy you have in Taiwan to do the bike? Yeah. And you can get the batteries from Yeah. So I can actually copy anything I want. Yeah. What do I care? He said, there’s a guy who’s working for you. Turns out that guy was married to my first wife, still married to her by the way.

So I hired him ’cause I wanted them to be really happy. He said, can I hire him to be my president? Absolutely. He’d love to be away from me and be his own boss. And he knows everything He. Smart move. So they designed their bike and they do their bike and it’s starting to come in and one of the batteries catches fire and burns out a garage.

So it scares him as it should and he decides to get out of the bike industry. But here’s where it shows how smart this man is. Now he’s read up everything there is about electric and deaths and that and the government and the next thing you know, he is buying used golf carts and converting them to electric and giving them away and [00:58:00] getting $10,000 from the government and it cost him about $2,500 to buy and put this crap together.

I thought. Now there is a smart man that what a great recovery from a burn down. How cool is that?

Crew Chief Eric: So Malcolm, as we prepare ourselves for part two of this episode, when we talk more about visionary vehicles, any spoilers, shoutouts, promotions, anything else you’d like to share?

Malcolm Bricklin: Alright, so you’ve got my good stories.

Now I’m going to tell you something. I’m gonna leave you with it and I’ll give you a hint. I’m going to be building a four door of the car I have right now, and it’s gonna run on a new kind of hydrogen, a liquid hydrogen and room temperature that is combustible but not volatile. We are almost signed with all the paperwork to have it for the United States for vehicles, and I will say no more, and it will revolutionize the world as we know it.

Three minutes, you fill it up and oh, by the way, you’ll get a hundred to 150 miles to a gallon. Unbelievable. But it all works. And I went looking for it. Didn’t expect to find that, but I found it the most amazing, truly changed our world. It comes from [00:59:00] water, nothing’s put in it, and it turns into a liquid hydrogen at room temperature.

I mean, I have already tested this over thousands of people and 99.999 said, how do I buy it right now? But it’s getting better because what we’re about to do, we haven’t even told anybody, and it will change the world we know. How’s that one for a sort of modest

Don Weberg: exclusive? Yeah. Throughout his career, Malcolm Bricklin has been known for his unconventional ideas and his willingness to take risks.

While his ventures have not always been successful, he has remained a respected figure in the automotive industry and a symbol of American entrepreneurship. He has also been the subject of numerous books, documentaries, and articles, chronicling his many successes and setbacks in the business world. If you’d like to learn more about Malcolm and keep up with all the progress over at Visionary Vehicles, be sure to log on to www.vvcars.com.

Or follow him on social [01:00:00] via LinkedIn or Facebook.

Crew Chief Eric: Well, Malcolm, I’ll say this in closing. I’m really looking forward to part two of this story when we get to dig a little bit deeper into visionary vehicles and kind of expand on what you’re doing now. This has been a wonderful walk down. Well, I guess it’s a speedy walk down memory lane.

Thank you very much for all this insight and information.

Malcolm Bricklin: Go to vv cars.com and see the Brooklyn e v three and all that stuff and know, I’m not sure I will open my mouth or not, but I might tell you what we’re really gonna produce for the world. Not that after spending six years and millions of dollars, I found something that does not have to worry about electricity being not enough or that we don’t have enough chargers by about 2 million minus.

And if you don’t own a garage, charge your car. Don’t ever buy an electric vehicle ’cause you will hate it.

Crew Chief Eric: We’re prepared for part two. We’re prepared. Believe me, we’ve got questions.

Malcolm Bricklin: Oh good. Good, good guys. It was a pleasure talking to you.

Crew Chief Eric: Alright, very good. Thank you Malcolm.

Don Weberg: Bye. Thank you.[01:01:00]

Crew Chief Brad: If you like what you’ve heard and want to learn more about G T M, 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 us at (202) 630-1770 or send us an email at Crew chief@gtmotorsports.org.

We’d love to hear from you.

For as little as $2 and 50 cents a month, you can keep our developers, writers, editors, casters, and other volunteers fed on their strict [01:02:00] diet of fig Newton’s, gummy bears, and Monster. Consider signing up for Patreon today at www.patreon.com/gt motorsports. And remember, without fans, supporters, and members like you, none of this would be possible.

Transcript - Part 2

The road to success is paved by all of us because everyone has a story.

Don Weberg: The 1970s, Malcolm Bricklin turned his detention to creating his own sports car, the Bricklin SV one.

The car featured Gullwing doors and a fiberglass body and was powered by a V engine. 2,854 units were sold [00:01:00] before production ceased in 1975. Today, Malcolm remains an active and influential figure in the automotive industry, continuing to explore new ideas and business ventures in the pursuit of an entrepreneurial vision.

And he’s here tonight to explain to us just exactly what he’s been up to.

Crew Chief Eric: Thanks, Don. And with that, picking up where we left off in part one, welcome back, Malcolm. Thank you. We were somewhere in the middle of the late 1990s. You were talking about Lee Iacocca, electric bicycles, all sorts of stuff like that, kind of leading up to the founding of visionary vehicles.

Talk us through this, how and why did you start another car company?

Malcolm Bricklin: Well, this time I went around the world looking for a car company that would do exactly like I told them I would buy a hundred percent of their production with letters of credit and their job was only to do what I told them. Meaning, go to Pininfarina and Bertone for design, go to ABL for their engines, and let me approve the design that we’re willing to buy.

So I was going to [00:02:00] find a factory that was going to do everything I want, and for that they were going to have no responsibility. Just build a good quality car, and I was going to pay four letters of credit. I went all over the world, and one of my sons, who’s a filmmaker, Live with me for four years. He went everywhere I went and filmed every meeting I had during those four years.

And we had a group that edited in the company, and we sent out what I was doing to their potential dealers. Until we found China. And I found somebody at Cherry who said, I love it. Now, a little history of Cherry. When we got there, they had a brand new factory, but they had built their factory without asking the central government for a permit.

They got away with it because there were people in the province who were a part of the government old timers, and they had a lot of respect, so they sort of got away with it, sort of got away means they were punished. They had to give 20 percent of their stock to SAIC. SAIC was a definite owned by the [00:03:00] government and had Volkswagen and General Motors as two of their partners.

And they had to give 20 percent of the stock and the company was called SAIC charity. That was their penalty. We came there. We made a deal. The deal had two parts in it. We were redefining the price of luxury. We were going to build a car that looks like, feels like, and was a 35, 000 car, but we were going to sell it for 20, 000 to 25, 000.

Everybody was going to make money on it. Instead of a cheap Chinese car. Listen, a beautiful design doesn’t cost you one penny more than a ugly design. It’s just not the way they sell cars. Vanilla is under 30 and it goes up a little bit better as it goes up in price. We said to hell with that. We’re going to give you a great coming in.

Everything, no excuse. They loved it. They loved it so much that when we did our publicity in China, the central government loved that so much that SAIC gave back their 20 percent, it was now just called Cherry, and Mr. Yin won man of the year. We have him on film [00:04:00] saying, oh my god, it was Mr. Bricklin who did this, we went from the bastard tile to the favorite song blah blah blah, and bragged and bragged and bragged.

We brought our dealers to China in groups, they met with the people, they talked with the people, they saw the factory, they saw what we were building, they already had put in the AVL factory for the building of the engines, they were doing everything we said. One of the paragraphs that was in the contract, that delayed us by about two months because I refused to change a word, and they were having a problem putting it in like I said, and it said the following.

This paragraph is not negotiable. It cannot be changed. It is part of our total understanding that you do not ask visionary vehicles to invest in a factory in China. I am in the import business. I am in selling cars, designing cars. I am not in building cars. They got it. All right. Fast forward, we are now going out and talking to dealers and in order to [00:05:00] get a territory, a nice size territory, they had to buy $2 million worth of stock in our company and a $3 billion valuation.

What we had was a contract period that you could verify by going to China with us, we had $157 million in escrow in the bank. When I got notified by Cherry, they wanted 200 million for a factory in China. I told them, read the paragraph. They said, we never read it. We’re not doing anything. We’re just not going to do anything until you give it to us.

We’re not breaking any contracts. I said, you understand the reason? If I have to raise 200 million outside of the dealer’s money, I have to give away control. There’s no way in God’s earth I am going to stay when somebody who knows less than me is in charge because they put up the money. That’s the price you’re going to pay.

And believe me, that’s a serious price because it’s not going to be a success. That simple. No, they want their 200 million. So I said, okay. And the first person that agreed to give me my 200 million was [00:06:00] George Soros. Oh, my goodness. Not my favorite person. I was a little nervous taking his 200 million. But they put it in the escrow.

They wanted 60 days of due diligence. We agreed. And then we were all going to meet in Hong Kong when that was over. And each one of us would either say we’re going forward or we’re not. And so we met after 60 days in Hong Kong, and everybody said we’re moving forward. Everybody was excited, except me.

Friday, Saturday, Sunday, comes Monday, I am in Soros’s office in New York to talk about what they would like to do next before the money goes live. And Jonathan Soros, son of, comes out with his little troop and says, uh, we decided not to go forward. Now, that was four days before they had met in Hong Kong and said, we’re going forward.

I said, would you mind telling me what happened? No. Okay. They said, oh, we’re leaving the money in escrow. When you replace it, we’ll take it out. Now, that was pretty scary because George Soros and I are not buddies. [00:07:00] That’s number one. And that’s his not normal style of doing business. If he’s finished, he’s finished.

Give me my money and I’ll see you later. For him to leave it in there made me extremely nervous. Something of course happened, except that we don’t know what it is. We finally found out under deposition when we sued everybody, which was my second dumbest move, even though we won everywhere. That money went to attorneys and went to expenses for a 10 year suit in every country known to man.

But remember, we had films on every single meeting we had. There was no argument. There was no defense. We said you did it. And here’s you saying it. End of story. All right. What we had to do is go through all the baloney that lawyers make over a period of years that just cost money. We found out that they had made a deal with Cherry.

Brooklyn doesn’t get the money, you know, we’ll take over. All right. So now I have to find another 200 million. So I get introduced to the Afar brothers. Afar brothers, richest family in Israel. If not the number one, number two. Daddy came there when they, Israel just [00:08:00] starting and got the license for everything.

For oil, for shipping, for you name it. And the geniuses, Made a lot of money by having a monopoly on everything and they were not well liked in Israel. That being said, they sent in an ex executive vice president of Volkswagen who had a very bland career. Nothing good, nothing bad, just, it was there. And he came in to do his due diligence for them.

And we filmed everything, of course. And we made them sign everything, of course. Oh, don’t worry, these are honorable people. I said, we don’t care. You’re going to sign everything. You’re going to say everything on film. Under no circumstance, when we introduce you, no matter what the issue says, if we don’t do business, you don’t do business with them for five years.

Selling Mickey Mouse watches, you don’t do business with them. Oh, no problem. No problem. Okay, no problem. So now we fast forward, they’re doing their due diligence, everybody’s happy, they’re all excited about it. The Alford brothers are going to fly in on their airplane to China, and we’re going to have the big [00:09:00] meeting with the executives of Terry for some reason in my 65 years in the car business, this is the only time I said to myself, don’t be at that meeting.

Wow. That is an impossible scenario. For me not to be at the much less important meetings to be like that, that’s not even a consideration normally. But my gut said don’t be there. So I had my vice chairman who was a shipping magnate who arranged all our shipping, who was investor in the company, who they loved because of the shipping and his knowledge.

And he went and about four other of our staff went. Top guys. And in the meeting, the offers said to Jerry, why would you have to deal with the brick home? Why don’t we just go to the right? They said, yeah. And my guy gets up going, why are you out of your mind? We spent 30 million. We have all this, you’re out of your mouth.

And you know, you can’t break the car. And he says to him, come with me. And he takes them. Don’t worry about it. We’ll take care of you. Now, his choices were, do I lose my money because they’re going to fuck us, [00:10:00] or do I not lose my money and find a way to touch him? So he chose to calm down, which I think was a smart thing for him to do.

There’s nothing more he could have done no matter what. And they started offering us all sorts of deals, which were just totally stupid. That was the end of it. And then after about six months, I decided I couldn’t take it any longer. I had a suit everywhere, in Hong Kong, in Detroit, you name it. And what I found was the justice system in this world truly sucks.

Truly, truly sucks. I was once told something by a very wise man when I was much younger. He said, Malcolm, if you’re in the right, don’t sue. You could lose. But if you’re not, go ahead and sue. You might win. And that’s basically where the justice system is. We sued the Israelis in New York, because that’s where we held all our meetings, and that’s where our offices were.

And we had all the film to prove it. And we got venue in New York. They had the most expensive lawyers [00:11:00] in New York City. And for a year, we passed back and forth papers. That the judge asked for, that they asked for, that we asked for, and we had venue. We were waiting for about a week or two, and we were going to have our jury trial started, and we were going to just win billions.

Not maybe, positively, or at least hundreds of millions. We really lost a fortune, proven by the dealers that signed up already, and what they were going to order, and what that meant in profit. Two weeks before we’re ready to go to court, we get an announcement that the other side, the Offer Brothers, have added another law firm to their law firms.

They didn’t get rid of the older one, they added. This particular law firm was a one man law firm. That one man law firm took the judge out for lunch and the next day we lost venue. That’s impossible. That’s impossible. That’s an outright, no question, bribe or threat of some kind.

Don Weberg: Yep.

Malcolm Bricklin: And that was the end of it.

We couldn’t sue anywhere in the United States because of that [00:12:00] judge’s ruling after one year having met you and it being ready for a court case. What

Don Weberg: a surprise. You were probably winning. And the other side couldn’t stand that, so they played dirty pool. Oh no, of course nobody

Malcolm Bricklin: ever fought us. There was no such thing as we were losing.

How could we? We said they did this, and we showed them a film. There they are doing

Don Weberg: it.

Malcolm Bricklin: Right. Here’s what they said. Here’s the film doing it. Here’s what we said. Here’s the film doing it.

Don Weberg: But those guys

Malcolm Bricklin: couldn’t stand losing. It was a cut and dry. There was never any argument on the other side.

Crew Chief Eric: So now you find yourself in the early 2000s with the name of a company, but no car.

So where do you go from here?

Malcolm Bricklin: Visionary Vehicles was a company that was going to do what I had already done five times before, but this time not find a car that they were building, find a company that would build the car I want them to build. That was a major difference. And it took me four years to find this company.

I went everywhere. I talked to everybody. I got films as a chairman and board of Europe and a meeting in Switzerland with us. You name it. I was there. Tata in India. I [00:13:00] went everywhere.

Crew Chief Eric: So then let’s dive into the birth of the 3EV. Cause in part one of your story, you talked about how you got to ride an early EV car.

You were familiar with Dr. Curry, who designed the EV one, things like that. And you didn’t think there was a future in that. And obviously there were issues even with the electric bikes, as you mentioned in the first part of the story. So now you’ve turned your attention to the EV world. Because lithium

Malcolm Bricklin: ion batteries had come to the forefront.

Up to then the batteries were nickel metal hydride or lead acid. That’s what the difference was, and I saw it coming, even though I thought hybrids were the only thing that made sense, with the lack of charging stations and the lack of five minute charges. The only one that agreed with me and stuck to his guns as long as he could was Toyota.

So I played with fuel cells. I played with everything, except the Postal Laboratory. Trying to find what it was, and then came down real simple. If I could give them gorgeous at a great price, I would. That’s the only thing everybody was not doing. [00:14:00] And that’s how the three wheeler got there, when I got desperate and said, How much weight do you save if you take one wheel off?

I expected a couple of hundred pounds. It’s 1, 500 pounds with all the things that adjust to that one wheel. And that was half the kilowatts.

Crew Chief Eric: So let’s expand upon that for a second to get a little technical. So eliminating a wheel saved 1, 500 pounds. How much does the vehicle weigh in total?

Malcolm Bricklin: Our vehicle, when it’s in production, because remember things were made by hand and I put it.

Pieces of steel that won’t be there, et cetera, et cetera. Our car will weigh about 2, 200 pounds. The average car weighs with that battery about 3, 600 pounds.

Don Weberg: Malcolm, what I’m wondering about, you got three wheels, 2, 200 pounds. That is a lightweight car. Now I live in Texas. I live in the land of, you know, big trucks and scary drivers.

I think about a 2, 200 pound three wheel car going toe to toe with a big F three 50. And I think. Where’s the safety in that?

Malcolm Bricklin: Number one is the size of a regular car. It also is the widest you can make a car 80 inches wide. [00:15:00] So I have a wide front end. I got 800 pounds of batteries on the floor. It is the safest car you will ever drive.

It handles. Unbelievable. It does not bend in a curve. It stays flat. It’s unreal. So we made it and we did not have that big ass wheel in the back sticking up like they do in a three wheel car. I mean, it’s like they designed the front end and then they give you a wheel.

Crew Chief Eric: Yeah, like a Polaris slingshot.

Malcolm Bricklin: We have to tell people it’s a three wheel car, but the truth is nobody gives a damn.

They just see something that is extremely exciting, that is way out of their price range. That is not way out of their price range. And that is such a phenomenal piece of information that the people who look at this car, who start off with it, just beautiful. And they want to know about it because they can’t possibly own it.

And then when they guess the price and the average is 115, 000 guests, and we tell somebody it’s 29, 000. It’s like, how fast can I get money out of my pocket to make sure I get a reservation? I want one. This is not a car you need. [00:16:00] This is a car you’ll want.

Don Weberg: It’s a 2200 pounds. What’s the body? Fiberglass?

Malcolm Bricklin: Right now it is, but it’s going to be hemp.

Don Weberg: You’re building a hemp. No kidding.

Malcolm Bricklin: Well, it’s 10 times stronger than steel and it’s light as hell. And I can get three growth. Harvest a year.

Don Weberg: Yeah, you’re taking the Ford approach.

Malcolm Bricklin: They played with it. And of course, Henry played with it for sure. But it’s gotten a lot better since then.

Don Weberg: Is the chassis, the frame, everything is hemp? Or just the body?

Malcolm Bricklin: No, no, no, no, no, no, no. We first are starting from building everything I can to make it the safest car in the world.

Don Weberg: Now, I heard a rumor. Don’t know how true this is, so correct me if I’m wrong. You’ve got some sort of fancy seatbelt situation going on in that car.

Malcolm Bricklin: Once upon a time, I owned the Phoenix International Raceway. It was on wide motorsports twice a year. So the Andretti’s and the Answers, those are the people who raced in the speedway. And I got to know a whole bunch about racing. And I saw that harness belts were kept a lot of people safe in incredible kinds of accidents.

So I wanted to put harness belts in. I wanted to do that in the original Brooklyn 50 [00:17:00] years ago, but I couldn’t because the law says you put the strap in that you see in every car. That’s the way it is. That’s what you put in. I couldn’t put it in the harness belt, even though it’s better. You put it in that way or go change the law.

Well, I got a three wheel car, so I can put whatever I want in there. So I started with the harness belt. I’m putting in the harness belt. Why? I got kids and grandkids. I’m going to drive the car. That’s why I’m with Sandy Monroe and I’m talking about the car and talking about him getting involved in that and he said, Oh, you can’t use the harness belt and I’m ready to give him an argument why I’m going to use it and he says, I designed the belt for the airlines.

Really, it brings out the belt and all it is, is a belt, a regular seatbelt, and you’ll see on the airlines now in the newer airplanes. I’ve already been on the airplanes and seen them. One side is about an inch thick, and when the airbag goes out that’s in that seatbelt, it goes up and down. So it’s a full body airbag.

How cool is that? No [00:18:00] in your face from the steering wheel. This is perfect. That’s what I’m going to use. But if I put one more wheel on that car, I can’t use it.

Crew Chief Eric: And why is that?

Malcolm Bricklin: Because this is a three wheel car. It’s called a motorcycle or an auto cycle. So you don’t have to meet very many rules. You have a seatbelt on a motorcycle.

Crew Chief Eric: I get it. I’m curious, who is this car targeted for? Who’s the audience of a two seater with scissor doors and three wheels?

Malcolm Bricklin: Everybody. Anybody. Who wants to own cool for a really great price is our customer. A Lamborghini guy was right next to me at a light. He started yelling at me. So I pushed the button and the window goes down and said, can I help you?

Yeah. Oh my God. That’s gorgeous. What is it? And then we turned the light on the back cause the name changes colors on the back. And we said, I said, so what do you think it should sell for? Oh, I don’t know. 300, 000. Oh yeah. What would you say for 29, 000? I want 10 of them right now. This is a beautiful car.

My judgment on if [00:19:00] it’s beautiful is if I keep on wanting to look at it and I’m sure as hell no, it is always outstanding. The interior is beyond belief. It makes you feel rich and there’s stuff in there you’ve never seen before in any interior. That being said, it drives unbelievable. It takes corner without leaning.

It’s just. Amazing. And it’s faster than hell. So all that put together is something that 90 percent of the people cannot afford what that represents. That’s an expensive car that you’ve got to be rich to own, except you don’t. And that difference gets everybody who sees it, whether they’re interested in another car, whether they can afford another car, they don’t give a damn if it’s electric, they don’t give a damn if it’s three wheels, they want that car.

That’s all. And that’s what we built it for.

Crew Chief Eric: I’m intrigued. There’s definitely precedent for a three wheel car. Forget

Malcolm Bricklin: three wheel. It’s not a three wheel car. It’s a gorgeous car that’s out of everybody’s price range except it’s not. That’s all it is. Forget about everything else about it. How it [00:20:00] got there is not important.

Nobody gives a damn. This is a Bricklin vehicle. It doesn’t look like, it doesn’t smell like, it doesn’t feel like. This is an exotic car. This is a car of your dreams that you can now afford. Holy moly, that’s it.

Don Weberg: One thing I’m curious about, and this might be a dumb question. The rear tire on the EV3, how do you change that thing?

It’s a bitch. Yeah, okay. So is it like a motorcycle where you’ve got two pieces of frame? It’s worse than

Malcolm Bricklin: that. No, no, let me give you worse than that. I got two front tires that are a different size than the back tire. So if I needed to put in a spare tire, I’d have to put in two spare tires. So I’m not putting in a spare tire.

And what I’m doing is looking around to find anybody who’s building a tire that never gets flat. Not the 50 mile top. I’ll never get flat tire because if they don’t have it, I’m going to sponsor. I don’t ever want to fix the tire.

Don Weberg: What about using a run flat? Is that what you’ve got on there? You’re going to use a run flat.

Malcolm Bricklin: No, no, no, but I want better than [00:21:00] just the run flat. I want a tire that never gets flat.

Crew Chief Eric: Yeah I think he’s talking about like those solid core tires like they use on agricultural equipment

Malcolm Bricklin: solid. Yeah That number one, number two, I want to electrify the doors because they’re a pain in the ass for, I think a lot of people to pick up and lower.

I enjoy them, but I don’t think there’ll be a lot of people that will have the same joy that I have in there. And then I need a soundproof the car because what we do is we hear the tire noise that goes through the two holes where they. Big hinges that anchor the door. So it’s just too noisy for me.

Don Weberg: That’s your prototype car. Your production car will be a lot quieter, I’m sure. No, no,

Malcolm Bricklin: no. Not a lot quieter. It’s going to be.

Crew Chief Eric: As he mouths the quietest. Yeah, that good.

Don Weberg: What’s the range on this? It weighs 2200 pounds. It weighs nothing. You have a full size battery going on in there. The range must be pretty serious.

60 kilowatts.

Malcolm Bricklin: Yeah, yeah, yeah, it gets 350.

Don Weberg: 350.

Crew Chief Eric: Out of 16 kilowatt hours, that’s [00:22:00] really, really good because that’s about a half a, that’s about a half a gallon of gas equivalent. And as an example, my wife’s Pacifica Hybrid, it only gets. 36 miles or so on a full charge. Wow.

Malcolm Bricklin: Something’s wrong.

Crew Chief Eric: It’s a 5, 000 pound van.

Malcolm Bricklin: Oh, that’s what’s wrong. Yeah.

Don Weberg: Malcolm, your battery, what does that compare to? I mean, is that like a Tesla size battery? Is it smaller? Is it, what are we talking about here?

Malcolm Bricklin: It’s bigger than Tesla. Because everybody is not as advanced as Tesla is, and it’s actually LG.

Don Weberg: Oh, no kidding.

Malcolm Bricklin: Well, wait, there’s a but.

We are now talking to various people about building our car, because I do not want to build our car. And whoever we use will have their own platform, whether it’s Foxconn, or anybody else of the 14 different companies we found around the world, including in the United States, who will build cars for other people.

Electric cars, we’re talking about. Magna, I mean to name some of the big names in the game. [00:23:00] They all have skateboards, so whoever manufactures it, we have to re-engineer to match the skateboard that they got, which is not gonna be a big deal, but it is something that has to be done and whatever battery we’re using now, will probably not be the same battery, which I don’t care.

But I have looked at, as everybody who’s in the electric vehicle business has, and they know there are two glaring facts that cannot be ignored. Numero uno, there is not enough electricity. to handle all these cars charging, no matter what anybody says. And they can’t get more electricity as fast as you need.

There are no five minute charges, which makes this an adventure every goddamn time you want to charge the car. There’s not enough charging stations by two million. Forget about your garage. If you got a garage, you can buy the car. As long as you’re not planning on going big trips. And why? You may have enough miles to go to a big trip, but at the end of that trip, you’re talking about Four or five hours for 99 percent of the chargers that are [00:24:00] already out there.

So you got to go, go to sleep someplace. You got to go eat someplace to get the damn car charged. So you can go back. Oh, that really turns me on big time. I got to experience it. I’m in a rental home. They got 220 in the house, but not the one that fits the plug for the charger. So that meant I’m out there testing the car.

I got to go charge it and have my wife pick me up or sit in the car for a couple hours. What a wonderful way to hate your car. I hated my car. I was ready to trash it until I got somebody to come over and got permission from the owner to put 220 outlet that fits my thing on the outside of the garage.

And every time I come home, I just plug it in. That’s the only way to own an electric car. What a stupid thing that is. And when you have the millions of cars coming from the half a trillion dollars that had been invested by all the car companies, producing 300 different models, you are going to find a lot of people hate [00:25:00] their car.

After they own it for the first week and realize that you’re consumed by where the hell you charge this car 24 hours a day.

Crew Chief Eric: So why aren’t we making a shift then in the paradigm here to push EVs towards delivery, transit, mass transit, vehicles that currently now are either diesel or gas that just sit idling all day long, rather than foisting this upon the consumer market that needs to get around with basically unlimited range.

Malcolm Bricklin: That would have been very smart.

Crew Chief Eric: You said would have been past tense.

Malcolm Bricklin: But oh, it’s way too late. Everybody’s going down that road. They’re going off the cliff no matter what. Nobody’s going to stop them. Except I refuse to accept that I am going into a stupid situation. I’ll sell all my cars. I ain’t got no problem with that.

But this is a dumb industry, the way it’s all going. And people are going to fail big time. There’s nothing to stop them. They’re throwing away combustion cars and all those assets and all those sales. So the way I am, I can’t stand for things that don’t make [00:26:00] sense. So I start anytime somebody called me up with any technology that would either make a five minute charge or something else that could make sense, I went and looked at it and never found what I was looking for until I did.

Crew Chief Eric: So do you see the market coming back full circle? Like will ice power plants make a resurgence?

Malcolm Bricklin: With what I have, every car company in the world will continue making the cars they’re making now. It will cost them a little less, but they will have something that takes three minutes to fill up your tank.

The tank will go about 3, 000 miles before it needs to have another three minute refill. And our dealers can go to their house or their business and fill them up. Anytime they want for a 10 subscription,

Don Weberg: it sounds like you’re not on board with the electrification of cars.

Malcolm Bricklin: I’m not on board with that. It’s ready for all the amount of vehicles that they’re going to pour into the market That’s what i’m not on the board for

Don Weberg: now that being said toyota.

He’s the only one right? Yeah, toyota and [00:27:00] bmw They’re going hydrogen. They like that idea. Have you thought about? Doing that with the EV3.

Malcolm Bricklin: Their hydrogen is primitive. It’s all going through fuel cells.

Don Weberg: Did you think about this for the EV3?

Malcolm Bricklin: We will build a four wheel car that will look very similar to our three wheel car and it will run on something that nobody ever imagined.

It already does. It’s not a matter of conversation. It’s a matter of it works.

Don Weberg: Okay.

Malcolm Bricklin: And it’s readily available and nothing could be cleaner in the

Don Weberg: universe. So let’s shift gears. What I’ve been curious about, and you mentioned it just briefly, is the dealership network. How is that working out? Who is going to sell these cars?

Let’s say this. I want to buy one of your cars. Where do I go? How do I do this? What do I do?

Malcolm Bricklin: First of all, my history, whether it be Subaru, Pininfarina, Bertone, Yugo, whatever it is, Modis Operandi was set up as a distributor. Case of Subaru, 14 of them. By stocking the company, they therefore give cash. They set up dealers, the dealers buy stock in the company.

So everybody [00:28:00] has a reason to be successful besides just selling the car. And in every single situation, they all made money on that. So I set up the dealers and I set up the distributors and it always worked and I have thousands of people. Who the fathers I did business with a retired, but the kids are still working and the kids all know the name and the car is something that they know they’ll sell every single one they can get and they know they can bring in traffic and sell all the other stuff they got.

And we encourage that kind of thing soon as we decide on who’s going to manufacture it, then we will sign up our 10 distributors. And they will sign up 50 dealers each in their areas. Now, why do the dealers do the things that I want them to do? Because we treat them one with respect. Because we really respect them.

We really know you need service. We really know you need people. No matter how much you can sell on the internet, it gets to a point people would like to touch the car before they buy it. They would like to drive the car before they buy it. And they would like to know they’re going to get service tomorrow if it breaks down tomorrow.

[00:29:00] Not two months from now they’ll get an appointment. So all these people selling on the internet have a good time, wait till the numbers get big, and they find about what people do when they love a car and they can’t get it serviced. They start hating, and they go with venom, and the more they like the car, the more venom they come when they can’t have it.

And that’s going to start happening to Mr. Musk, who has the money and the brains to figure it out, but he better figure it out.

Crew Chief Eric: So what are your thoughts on the future? of Tesla. Do you think they will be absorbed into one of the other larger companies later on? Or do you see them being around perpetually?

Malcolm Bricklin: Tesla is a success because of Musk. The rest of the companies are not a success because they don’t have a Mr. Musk. They have all the people over here in that building that come from combustion engines. And they’re having to tell people who have an all different outlook on the world and the technology.

They’re not in charge. These people over here are in charge. And these people over here are used to [00:30:00] taking forever to make decisions. So they don’t make the wrong decision. Well, you’re going into a market where everybody’s moving too fast down the road. And they’re just like a bunch of sheep going off the other end.

It doesn’t work. It just doesn’t work. Nothing about it works. If EVs work, all the guys that are sitting in the offices get fired. If it doesn’t work, everybody gets fired. What a great position to be in. I’ll make you a bet that Mary Barra and everybody else who is CEOs of these car companies, sometimes around 2030 take retirement right before the shit really hits the fan watch.

It’s not like we know it and nobody knows it. Everybody knows everything I’m saying.

Crew Chief Eric: So there’s an argument to be made about the majors, the Toyotas and the Volkswagen’s and the Fords of the world. They know how to build quality cars. They’ve been building them for a hundred plus years. No, no, the

Malcolm Bricklin: Mustang cars.

They know how to build combustion cars.

Crew Chief Eric: Let’s delete the powertrain from the equation altogether. It’s not

Malcolm Bricklin: the powertrain, it’s everything. In electric, it’s only the powertrain.

Crew Chief Eric: Right. But do you see a [00:31:00] future where Tesla says, I stopped building a car, this object, and sell the drivetrains? To the Toyotas and the Fords and the VWs of the world.

And now it’s a marriage of the two, right? The fast moving technology with people that know how to build quality vehicles.

Malcolm Bricklin: I’m telling you, the people who build cars come from combustion. It’s a different game in electric. It’s a whole different game in electric. And their electric is moving from whatever the hell they invested in today.

Two years from now, they’re going to have to start changing because it’s going to be a better technology. And then they’re going to be, oh, I don’t know, I got too much invested over here. And then, oh my God, wait till you see what’s going to happen with that nonsense. All right, I’m telling you, it’s upside down, but with what I have found, they will be able to keep their factories open.

They will be able to keep building the cars they’re building, and it’ll actually cost them a little less. And those cars will be cleaner than the electric, so they’ll have both to sell. Electric [00:32:00] over here, and this over here, that’s a three minute fill your tank whenever they want.

Crew Chief Eric: So do you see the R& D that Porsche is doing as a threat to that with their synthetic fuels that they’ve been working on to keep ICE cars on the road?

Malcolm Bricklin: All the crap they’re working on are kindergarten compared to what we got. I promise you, I promise you, it’s something that nobody ever heard of before, but yet it’s everything everybody knows about. It’s crazy. At first they were scared to show the world at all, so they decided to use it, and they’re using it now to build a utility running on it, and we’re going to be using it for vehicles in the United States.

Don Weberg: I can see Eric is thinking about where is he going with this? What’s he going to make it power by? Malcolm, Who’s going to build the, you’re looking for somebody to build the car. It’ll be built here in America.

Malcolm Bricklin: We’re talking to two people that I can’t disclose yet.

Don Weberg: In Michigan. Will it be built in America?

Canada?

Malcolm Bricklin: Mexico? In America.

Don Weberg: I read somewhere or heard somewhere you’re looking to make sure that it’s a veteran workforce. Is that true? Or is that falling to the wayside? It

Malcolm Bricklin: will be heavily veteran. [00:33:00] Yes.

Don Weberg: And

Malcolm Bricklin: we have people who, like Tom Ridge, who was Secretary of Homeland Security, happens to be president of the Wounded Veterans of America.

Paul Buca was a Medal of Honor winner, and he was military advisor for Bush and Obama. Ken Fisher, the Fisher Houses, all those guys are involved in our company, and they are involved because they like the fact that we like To have veterans be building our cars as much as we can get. Why? Because these people are dedicated.

When they do something they love and get paid really well, you got people who are going to build it with love instead of just going to work. And that’s what I want.

Don Weberg: Who is helping you on the backside? Engineering, R& D, et cetera. Is that all coming from the mind of Malcolm? Oh,

Malcolm Bricklin: no, no, no. Forget me. I don’t know anything about cars.

I know everything about the car industry, but when it comes to technical, I listen, but I have people who are better than me that makes decisions on it for me. We have found a way to get the benefit of other people’s work. Like, for instance, do you know how many engineers that are hired to do the platform to get the batteries [00:34:00] and the motors and everything else in the car connected?

We don’t have one of them. We buy the whole thing and go bump.

Crew Chief Eric: So history sometimes tends to repeat itself, and you find yourself again crossing paths with the name. DeLorean. Any thoughts on the new car?

Malcolm Bricklin: Oh, absolutely. First of all, John and I were old friends before he died. John was going to be my president.

I think I told you that story. His daughter called me up and said, Dad told me before he died that I ought to meet with you. He did him lots of favors. I said, absolutely, be happy to. We came out, we had lunch, and now we communicate. She’s really after knowing everything about daddy and building a car or doing something for him.

Whatever it is, she’s out there to do it for John, her daddy.

Crew Chief Eric: Obviously, you’ve seen the new design. What do you think of the DNG?

Malcolm Bricklin: Uh, I don’t know that that’s her. There’s two other people that are building cars that both say they have DeLorean’s rights. And I asked her about that and she mumbled something.

I think she just doesn’t want to deal with the facts. But [00:35:00] somebody has bought it and somebody thinks they own it. God bless them. The one I saw, I thought was beautiful. Do you think Kat’s going to be able to build the car? Who cares? It’s a 175, 000 car. So if you, DeLorean people will buy it. God bless them.

Crew Chief Eric: I think there’s still room for more supercars in this world. I’m all in favor of something else to look at on the road, you know?

Malcolm Bricklin: Oh, I agree. I agree, and it would be nice if everybody started making a pretty car anyhow, but it’s not their sales pitch.

Crew Chief Eric: Too bad. Now we’ve gotten to the point where only one design cheats the wind.

You just put a different badge on the front of it, right? So I don’t get it.

Malcolm Bricklin: They’re still going to have the same problem. You got to charge that car every single day. It’s a different kind of animal. All of a sudden, that animal becomes part of your life, and I don’t want my car to be part of my life. I’m buying it, but they’re not intruded, and that car does.

Don Weberg: In your car, the EV3, you don’t have to charge it every single day.

Malcolm Bricklin: I do charge it every single day. I would dare not charge it. When it pulls into my house, a charger goes in the damn thing.

Don Weberg: When yours is in production, isn’t that what you were saying? It’s going to be powered by something very, very [00:36:00] different that you won’t have to charge?

Malcolm Bricklin: Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. The EV3 is an electric car. When we do the next thing, it’ll be a four wheel car. The four wheel car. Okay. Same look, same body. That I learned. When it’s a four wheel car, it’ll be four seats, not two seats. It’ll have all wheel drive.

Crew Chief Eric: We’ve talked about the 3EV. We’ve talked about, let’s call it the 4EV, or the four wheeled Bricklin that will be coming out after that.

But the bigger question is, at 84 years young, what’s next for Malcolm Bricklin? You’re a forward thinking guy. You never stop moving. What’s next?

Malcolm Bricklin: The stuff I’m talking about is next. The stuff I’m talking about will change the world as we know it. We will be able to clean up the world without being abusive, without making stupid rules, without pushing everybody down an industry that doesn’t make a lot of sense yet.

And it can be used everywhere for everything. And it’s a hundred percent clean. And it doesn’t need any special anything but a pump. So I can deliver it to your house with [00:37:00] a pump on the back of a truck and a subscription agreement without a problem. Picture. Hydrogen that comes from water and put into a turbine, and out comes something that you would call hydrogen, but doesn’t have two cells.

It has one, and it’s not on anybody’s chart. They call it a hydrogen, but it’s apparently something new, and here’s why it’s new. It’s combustible in a combustion engine, but it’s not volatile. It doesn’t go boom. In fact, if you pour it on the ground and you throw a match in, it doesn’t light. And it is supposed to get between 100 and 150 miles per gallon, which will cost retail about seven or eight dollars.

So liquid hydrogen at room temperature, it can go into every gas pump, every gas station, put in one pump and can have it at dealers. And you can take your combustion car and convert it. So the 289 million used cars out there, my dealers can start converting to hydrogen.

Crew Chief Eric: I like the chemical properties of that because it’s as safe as diesel in that [00:38:00] same respect.

It’s not volatile. You could throw a match of diesel, it won’t light, but only under compression does it combust. So this is really cool as an alternative fuel.

Malcolm Bricklin: And you can pour it on yourself and you can stick your hand in it, which I have, and you feel the energy. You feel it. It’s amazing. Truly amazing.

And all that comes out of course is paper. And I promise you, when you see the four wheeler and you see what it’s all about, it’ll be the first car on your list you’re going to want to have. That’s a car I want to have. That’s a car that you brag about the fuel, it doesn’t control you. And that’s the most important part of this whole damn thing.

That’s what I was looking for, and I found it, and I couldn’t imagine. I never thought that that’s what I would find. Because I played with hydrogen for two years with TREPA Pulsar Laboratory, and I nixed it. Because the gas goes boom. And the fluid… And the liquid has to be stored at minus 450 degrees, not too cool, either one, in my opinion.

So when I heard this was hydrogen, I almost didn’t want to go see it. So [00:39:00] there again, sometimes when you think you know too much, you can lose an opportunity because this was something just totally different. It’s not on anybody’s charts. And everybody else that’s playing with hydrogen is playing in kindergarten.

Crew Chief Eric: The one thing I wondered, carrying back from part one, is, would this be an opportune time to bring back the Bricklin Turner engine?

Malcolm Bricklin: Yes, I am. Wow. Well done. You’re gonna build two of those prototypes. One will use the Bricklin Turner hand built engine. I’m trying to find the relatives of Frank so that they benefit from what I’m about to do.

But it’s a bitch, because there’s a million Turners in Texas. The law firm we hired had three turners in it, none of them were related. Anyhow, hydrogen runs on simple engines. You have to take off the catalytic converter, you got to take off all the other controls, so it’s actually cheaper to build using the same combustion engine that you got right now.

And by giving them the rights, And putting up enough hydrogen places and letting them know that the dealers can have the subscription agreement and deliver it to anybody who buys a car from them, their [00:40:00] place of business or whatever, you know, they can do a hundred a day at three minutes and they got three hours of travel.

What a cool thing. Best way to have fuel is not to ever think about it.

Crew Chief Eric: Malcolm with 60 plus years in the automotive industry as an entrepreneur, as a businessman with all sorts of different listeners tuned into this right now, what kind of advice can you give aspiring entrepreneurs or people that want to get into this industry or maybe following your footsteps?

Some lessons learned that you can pass on for the younger generations.

Malcolm Bricklin: I think the best lesson learned is what a man by the name of Elon Musk did. He and Eberhardt asked to see me 13, 14 years ago. So I spent four hours with him. I, they were just asking for advice, which Musk actually didn’t want to hear.

He was building a car. He was not going to have a dealer network. He was going to do it like Apple. I tried to explain Apple is a cell phone and a car is not exactly a cell phone. That son of a gun came out and did the most remarkable job any human being could do in the world. And while he was doing that, he was sending [00:41:00] rockets up and he was putting things in people’s brains and he’s boring holes underneath the ground.

The man’s a damn genius and he’s a stubborn genius. And it was his stubbornness and his ability to never give up that got that company to be as successful as it is. And that’s the lack of somebody like that. And it’s making mincemeat of everybody else who’s trying to get into business because he makes decisions.

In the world out there, the goal is never make a decision. Don’t get blamed for anything. I mean, it’s a goddamn joke. That’s all.

Crew Chief Eric: So the moral to the story is…

Malcolm Bricklin: Follow what he wanted. He wanted to do it and he did it. That’s the only thing. You want to do something, do it. I said, that’s all there is to it, kid.

But only do what you really think you love doing. You put those three, love it.

Don Weberg: Throughout his career, Malcolm Bricklin has been known for his unconventional ideas and his willingness to take risks. While his ventures have not always been successful, he has remained a respected figure in the automotive industry and a symbol of American entrepreneurship.

He [00:42:00] has also been the subject of numerous books, documentaries, and articles chronicling his many successes and setbacks in the business world. If you’d like to learn more about Malcolm and keep up with all the progress over at Visionary Vehicles, be sure to log on to www. vvcars. com or follow him on social via LinkedIn or Facebook.

Malcolm, I would like to be able to get you back on the show and get you back on the phone and talk more about progress on the company, how it’s coming along. Is that possible?

Malcolm Bricklin: Of course it is. And I promise you, as soon as I’m able to talk, really talk about it, I can’t wait. Have a great day. I’ve enjoyed it.

Crew Chief Eric: You too. Thanks.

Malcolm Bricklin: Thank you, sir. Okay. Thanks, Malcolm.

Crew Chief Brad: If you like what you’ve heard and want to learn more about GTM, be sure to check us out on www. gtmotorsports. org. You can also find us on Instagram at grandtorymotorsports. Also, if you want to get [00:43:00] involved or have suggestions for future shows, you can call or text us at 202 630 1770 or send us an email at crewchief at gtmotorsports.

org. We’d love to hear from you.

Crew Chief Eric: Hey everybody, Crew Chief Eric here. We really hope you enjoyed this episode of BreakFix, and we wanted to remind you that GTM remains a no annual fees organization, and our goal is to continue to bring you quality episodes like this one at no charge. As a loyal listener, please consider subscribing to our Patreon for bonus and behind the scenes content, extra goodies, and GTM swag.

None of this would be possible.

Highlights

Skip ahead if you must… Here’s the highlights from this episode you might be most interested in and their corresponding time stamps.

Part 1

00:00 Malcolm Bricklin’s Early Career
01:02 The Subaru 360 and Beyond
02:37 The C Box Machine Venture
05:30 The Scooter Dilemma
09:23 Breakthrough with the New York Police
12:04 The Scooter Rental Business
15:37 Importing Subaru to the USA
22:49 Challenges with Consumer Reports
26:40 Building the Bricklin SV-1
30:35 Collaboration with John DeLorean
33:53 The Cost of Innovation
34:29 Hiring Irv Bras: A Unique Encounter
36:02 The Inspiration Behind the SV-1’s Gullwing Doors
37:16 Engineering Challenges and Breakthroughs
42:00 The Chairman’s Car: A New Vision
43:03 Battles with the Big Three
48:02 The End of the Bricklin SV-1
50:28 Lessons Learned and Future Plans
55:14 From Electric Bikes to Hydrogen Cars
58:12 Closing Remarks and Future Episodes

Part 2

00:00 Malcolm Bricklin’s Early Career
01:34 Founding Visionary Vehicles
02:24 Challenges with Cherry and George Soros
05:09 Legal Battles and New Partnerships
13:00 The Birth of the 3EV
14:36 Innovative Features of the 3EV
21:21 Soundproofing the Prototype Car
21:45 Discussing the Car’s Range and Battery
22:35 Challenges with Electric Vehicles
25:08 Future of Car Manufacturing
27:31 Dealership Network and Sales Strategy
29:24 Tesla’s Market Position
32:05 Innovative Fuel Solutions
40:08 Advice for Aspiring Entrepreneurs
41:45 Conclusion and Final Thoughts

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The new Visionary Vehicles 3EV

Pure Electric. 100% Electrifying – with a 275+ Mile Range. The 3EV is the leading edge in three-wheel, fully-enclosed, two-passenger, zero-emissions, eco-mobility personal transportation.

Engineered for safety and stability, the 3EV has a full complement of electronics and comforts for both driver and passenger. With its 275+ mile range and superb performance, you’ll enjoy an exhilarating, luxurious driving experience at an affordable price. MSRP $28,980 and $36,980* – LEARN MORE

If you’d like to learn more about Malcolm and keep up with all the progress over at Visionary Vehicles be sure to logon to www.vvcars.com or follow him on social via LinkedIn or Facebook.

Burned by the 360’s safety criticisms, Bricklin set out to build the safest sports car in the world. The result? The Bricklin SV-1 – a fiberglass-bodied, gullwing-doored marvel with 10-mph bumpers and a dent-proof acrylic finish. It was a car born from Saturday morning sci-fi shows and built with the help of 200 engineers, Irv Rybicki’s design team, and a whole lot of chutzpah.

But the SV-1’s story is also one of political intrigue. After convincing the Canadian province of New Brunswick to fund the factory, Bricklin found himself at the mercy of shifting political winds. The very premier who rode into office in a Bricklin shut the factory down months later to save his political career. The dream ended, but the legend was just beginning.

Visionary Vehicles, The 3EV and the Future of Fuel

Fast forward to the early 2000s. Bricklin launched Visionary Vehicles with a bold new plan: partner with a Chinese automaker to build luxury-level cars at economy prices. He found a willing partner in Chery, secured $157 million in escrow, and lined up U.S. dealers ready to invest.

But then came the betrayal. Chery demanded $200 million for a factory – despite a contract explicitly forbidding such a request. George Soros backed out. The Offer Brothers swooped in. Lawsuits flew. Bricklin had the receipts (and the video footage), but the legal system failed him. “If you’re in the right, don’t sue,” he quipped. “You could lose.”

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Undeterred, Bricklin turned his attention to electric vehicles. The result: the Bricklin 3EV, a stunning three-wheeled, scissor-doored electric car that looks like a $115,000 exotic but costs just $29,000. With a 60 kWh battery, 350-mile range, and a 2,200-pound curb weight, it’s as efficient as it is eye-catching.

But Bricklin isn’t stopping there. He’s already planning a four-wheeled follow-up powered by a revolutionary new fuel: a liquid hydrogen derivative that’s combustible but not volatile. It’s safe, clean, and promises 100–150 mpg with three-minute refueling. “It comes from water,” he says. “You can pour it on your hand. It doesn’t go boom.”

Built by Veterans, Backed by Belief

Bricklin’s next chapter includes a U.S.-based manufacturing plan with a veteran workforce, a nod to his belief in building not just cars, but communities. “When people do something they love and get paid well, they build with love,” he says.

He’s also bringing back the Bricklin-Turner engine – an ultra-simple, high-torque design from the 1980s – and pairing it with his new hydrogen fuel. It’s a full-circle moment for a man who’s always believed in doing things differently.

At 84, Malcolm Bricklin isn’t slowing down. If anything, he’s speeding up. His advice to the next generation of entrepreneurs? “Only do what you really think you love doing. That’s all there is to it.”

He’s lived that mantra through every twist and turn, every success and setback. And if his latest ventures are any indication, the road ahead is still wide open.

Guest Co-Host: Don Weberg

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GTMSpreading Motorsports Enthusiasm - since 2014

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