SEMA News—August 2020

LEGISLATIVE AND TECHNICAL AFFAIRS

Honorable Discharge

Four-Wheeled Veterans Welcomed Home With New Roles in the Hobby

By Colby Martin

The modern Humvee (aka High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle, HMMWV) has reached an age that technically qualifies it for vintage designation. Opportunities exist for the industry to serve enthusiasts seeking pure restoration as well as personalized equipment options beyond factory reproductions.

When it comes to the collector-vehicle market, military vehicles are not what first spring to mind. The notion of rides originally mass produced to aid the armed forces becoming collector’s items may seem rather strange. However, countless examples were manufactured by popular automakers such as the Big Three, whose iconic offerings are coveted to this day by brand loyalists. While getting one’s hands on one of those prized vehicles may be tough, titling and registering them for street use is often tougher.

Automobiles decommissioned by the U.S. government have captivated generations. Upon retirement from service, their ability to evoke national pride and serve as living history is undeniably powerful. These machines have been defined by most jurisdictions as vehicles manufactured by or under the direction of the U.S. Armed Forces for off-road use and later authorized for sale to civilians. Examples desired by collectors include the Pinzgauer, Kaiser Jeep M715, half-track and DUKW (Duck). Today, even the modern Humvee (also known as the High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle, HMMWV) has reached an age that technically qualifies it for vintage designation.

Although organized groups of hobbyists and publications dedicated to this segment have existed for decades, military collectibles have been on the rise in recent years. The internet has enabled instant global access to specialized information and support unthinkable not long ago. It should come as no surprise that there has been a surge of interest in the genre among the auto-enthusiast community. Enthusiasts know that acquiring such treasures is no easy feat but, if successful, can place them in a rare group of collectors who own the most unique vehicle on the block.

Still, military surplus vehicles are tougher to license than standard automobiles because each state government makes its own rules and regulations regarding titling. In several states, there is no allowance for any military vehicle registration and operation on public roads. Even when these vehicles can be titled, many states limit their use to special occasions such as parades, car shows, club activities, exhibits, tours and occasional pleasure driving.

Legislatures have responded to the recent trend by introducing proposals aimed at redefining existing laws to apply to vintage military surplus vehicles. Other proposals attempt to expand the number of types of military vehicles allowed to be registered or create ways for enthusiasts to increase often-limited personal usage allowances.

Ex-military offerings are favorites for the truck/SUV crowd as well as off-roaders and overlanders seeking to stand out from the pack. Originally built for the Swedish armed forces, this customized ’56 Volvo TP21 by Eddie’s Rod & Custom earned a top-40 spot in the 2019 SEMA Battle of the Builders at last year’s SEMA Show.

A fresh version of SEMA-model legislation has been drafted to aid the registration of former military vehicles. By way of background, the SEMA Action Network (SAN) has crafted unique solutions to combat common auto-related difficulties nationwide in the form of model bills, which are templates that offer turnkey legislative fixes to vehicle-related policies and laws suffering behind the times. As a result of success with proactive legislation, SEMA-model bills have created reasonable and practical solutions for specific issues like this topic. Enactment of pro-hobby model language into state law creates new opportunities for the growth of the market segment across the country and protects enthusiasts from outdated and unfriendly laws.

Pro-hobby legislation related to military vehicles was introduced this year in several state legislatures. Fans of former military vehicles in West Virginia celebrated the signing of a new law to display an alternate registration insignia as opposed to a traditional license plate. The law preserves the accurate display of these vehicles’ military design and markings and protects the aesthetic contours. Versions of SEMA-model legislation to allow for the titling and registration of former military vehicles were also pending in Kansas and Michigan at press time.

In addition, other military-vehicle initiatives were approved by state legislatures in 2019. The governors of Nebraska, Nevada and Texas each signed laws allowing qualified military vehicles to be registered and operated on public roadways. Tennessee passed a measure that exempts historic military vehicles from the requirement to display a traditional license plate. Other attempts were made in several state sessions last year that were ultimately
unsuccessful.

So how can businesses take advantage of the decommissioned surplus market? As in other facets of the hobby, vehicles are purchased for both pure restoration and personalized treatments. The specialty-parts industry is uniquely suited to offer components and services to bring back the former glory of these machines in addition to upgraded performance and personalized styling options. Common enhancements such as wheels and tires, specialized bumpers and guards, winches, light bars and other items are desirable equipment options beyond factory reproductions.

As vehicle owners and companies who are directly impacted by such proposals, SAN members are the most important source of knowledge on the subject. Local voices are the most effective in shaping efforts affecting their home turf. Help our industry’s efforts on legislative initiatives like this in your area by visiting www.semasan.com/join to stay informed. Encourage your friends and customers to follow suit. There is no cost or obligation to enlist in the SAN and help shape a bill’s future. SAN forces look forward to supporting more efforts to preserve and enjoy historic former military transport in the future.

PEOPLE

By Matt Pearson

2020 SEMA Hall of Fame

Welcome Rich Barsamian, Jack Chisenhall, John Gaines and Joe St. Lawrence

Rich Barsamian
Emcee for the Industry

Rich Barsamian

Rich Barsamian got word that he was indeed one of the 2020 SEMA Hall of Fame honorees, and he was still speechless one week later. “Yeah, I was trying to think—because I’m still sort of in shock,” he said.

The SEMA Hall of Fame will do that to you. It will take your breath away and leave you speechless, even if you’re Rich Barsamian. And that is saying something, because it takes quite a bit to see him speechless.

An innovative salesman, data marketer, musician and stand-up comic, Barsamian is a man with an unusual talent for making friends. His contribution spans many years and is, well, rich in service to the industry. In his long history as a volunteer, he succeeded in putting the welfare of the industry first and worked on numerous programs that benefitted the industry as a whole.

Barsamian got started in the automotive industry around 1982, when he was a teenager in high school and was hired to do automotive product demonstrations for a rep agency. Fast-forward a bit, and Barsamian connected with Grant Steering Wheels as its regional sales manager and started volunteering and working with SEMA in 1995. He worked for Grant for six years, left to put in three years at Edelbrock as national sales manager, then returned to Grant Products.

Barsamian discusses Edelbrock products with SEMA Show attendees Warehouse West owner Brad Blue (right) and R&R Marketing's Charlie Jensen (second from left).

As Grant’s vice president of sales and marketing, he was part of the team that helped rebuild the company. Then, after seven years, he went to work at ACT, where he is currently vice president of sales and marketing. He’s helped the company by authoring one of the industry’s strongest pricing policies and grown the business with a host of unique programs and data-driven decisions.

Along the way, Barsamian continued to volunteer in the Young Executives Network (YEN) and eventually served as chair. He then served for more than a decade on the Motorsports Parts Manufacturers Council (MPMC), also eventually serving as chair. He is known for his ability to listen to the issues and concerns of members, and he authored a great portion of what is known as the MPMC “Business Guidelines Manual.”

“My end goal in volunteering is simple,” Barsamian told us. “I want to leave things better than I found them and to be involved in projects that bring value to our industry.”

Barsamian performing with the band Led Foot at a SEMA Show.

As a marketer, Barsamian was one of the first to recognize and apply insights gained from the use of data, studying topics such as what people were looking up as well as turn rates at the warehouse distributor level, and he created reports that integrated multiple sources in order to illustrate order flows and overall company health.

As a volunteer in a leadership position, Barsamian then began to share insights he had developed for the benefit of the industry as a whole. Among those was his championing of the Vehicles In Operation (VIO) program, which makes vehicle data available to SEMA-member companies to enable a better understanding of what products to make, where to sell them, how to advertise them, and what technical training might be needed.

VIO was an opportunity for Barsamian to connect SEMA members in a whole new way and resulted in a program that provided industry-wide benefits. That achievement also demonstrated Barsamian’s knack for recognizing industry needs and his ability to pull together companies from different segments, even if they might be competitors.

Barsamian has mentored many in the industry over the years. When asked about his ability as a connector—putting people together to help them become stronger in their businesses, seeking solutions to problems or just increasing industry relationships by introducing people to each other—he credits his own teachers. “I am so grateful for the many mentors I have had,” he said.

As a marketer, Barsamian spent years pioneering and developing pricing policies. He educated the industry by organizing insightful seminars at SEMA since 2013, but he believes it will take many more years to truly educate the industry on this incredibly important topic.

Barsamian also chaired SEMA Cares from 2016–2018. He created the Industry Cup Challenge and worked to bring new life into the Pinewood Derby, helping set new records when it came to raising money for the SEMA Cares charities—Childhelp, Victory Junction and the Austin Hatcher Foundation.

If it’s possible to judge people based on the recognition they receive from their peers, Rich Barsamian stands out in the company of any group. The list of accolades he has collected include being named 2001 YEN Young Executive of the Year, receiving the 2010 YEN Vanguard Award, taking home both the 2011 and 2012 Performance Warehouse Association Person of the Year awards, receiving the 2012 Performance Warehouse Association Manufacturer of the Year (at ACT) as well as being named the 2014 SEMA Person of the Year.

Most recently he was inducted into the MPMC Hall of Fame in 2019. And now, Barsamian has been selected for induction into the SEMA Hall of Fame, class of 2020.

It’s been said that the industry bonded with Barsamian, his keen sense of humor and his ability to entertain. A persuasive speaker and popular emcee, he even appeared on stage with the band Led Foot at the SEMA Show and, over the years, raised funds for the SEMA Memorial Scholarship Fund. He is a ubiquitous presence at industry events, has led the worship service at the SEMA Show prayer breakfast, and never says no to emceeing any industry event.

“I’ve been able to use my sense of humor and personality to make friends, teach, and do what I do in the industry,” Barsamian said. “I guess that’s the hardest part: When you’re that person, you have to wonder, ‘Are you going to be taken seriously?’ Obviously, with this award, I know that my peers do take me seriously, and I’m really honored by that.”

Jack Chisenhall
The Hobby Shop

Jack Chisenhall.

Ask him if he considers himself an innovator and a leader of technology and he will probably echo the statements of his peers and say, well, yes.

“I’m very interested and always have been very interested in the technical field,” Chisenhall said. “Yeah, I like the technical world.”

According to Chisenhall, it was being a hot rodder at an early age that resulted in his interest in technology later in life.

He was a young military dependent, and his family didn’t settle down much until he was older. But as high school approached the family started to get settled. Chisenhall said his passion at the time was magazines, because he could get them anywhere.

“I got ahold of some car magazines—mainly Hot Rod in those days—and had just started learning the skills to build a car,” he said. “It all came from that.”

At age 13 Chisenhall took the skills he acquired and performed his first engine swap. He was lucky that his father was in the Air Force. All the bases had hobby shops and they were a place you could go work on your own car. He didn’t have a welder yet or enough tools to work on the car, so he took it to the hobby shop.

From left: Wally Parks, Chisenhall and Ak Miller at the races.

“I put a Mercury V8 in first and it wasn’t very pretty,” he said. “I got it in, and it actually drove. By the time I was 14 I put in an overhead-valve V8 and that was a whole new deal. I worked at the hobby shop a lot—it was a place where, even if you were working alone, there was always someone else there to help out.”

Chisenhall joined the Reserve Officers Training Corps while studying industrial design at what is now Texas State University and had already earned his pilot’s license before enlisting in the Air Force. He continued to work on cars while in the service and even attended his first Street Rod Nationals in Memphis.

Together with a couple partners, his brother Gordon and a family friend, Milton Jones, Chisenhall started an air-conditioning
company in 1976. The company put air conditioners in new cars. The shop wasn’t large and there was one room at the end that was barely big enough for a car. That’s where Vintage Air got started.

“I started getting guys to bring their own cars in, and we started putting air conditioning in the cars,” Chisenhall said. “It didn’t take long before I started making the molds to produce my first air-conditioning system. A lot of guys knew how to put on a compressor or knew how to do the mechanical stuff, but most guys didn’t know how to mold or work with plastics,” he added.

When he was a getting into the business, many of the guys didn’t want air conditioners. If the car had one, they would say it was too heavy and they’d want to throw it away.

Chisenhall and son Landis (left) getting ready to race in Indianapolis.

“If we as old guys wanted our family and our wives to go with us, there was no option—we had to install air conditioning,” said Chisenhall. “You can imagine asking your wife to drive cross country with you without air conditioning. How would that go?

“I guess the fact that so few of the musclecars and hot rods were equipped with air conditioning allowed us to create the segment,” he said. “The fall of that first year I took a unit to Tulsa, to the Street Rod Nationals.

Looking back, Chisenhall makes it sound easy. “We’ve been very fortunate. We are now building air conditioners for six or seven new-car companies,” said Chisenhall. “We didn’t really go looking for that business, but it came to us. We like it because it helps us gain the technology from the automotive OEM world.”

“I’m really proud of being part of the SEMA organization,” Chisenhall said. “I’m proud of the people I’ve come to know in the industry. Honestly, they become your best friends because you have the same interests. It’s an understatement to say it’s a huge honor to be associated with these guys,” he added.

“It’s all about that. The car is how we connect with other people that are doing things like we are. I think it’s all about that.”

John Gaines
Pioneer of Warehouse Distribution

John Gaines

From a very young age, John Gaines knew that he loved cars. How much did he love them? Well, growing up in the suburbs of Washington, D.C., he became a car enthusiast before he even got his driver’s license.

“I loved the whole look of the car,” Gaines said. “The wheels, rims, body and especially the sound of a hot rod.”

Gaines was born in Washington, D.C. He attended Bladensburg High School in Maryland and served in the Air Force. He went to a couple of races in Manassas, Virginia, where he hung out in a garage owned by Paul Osmond that was called Modifications Unlimited. He saw that Osmond was building a dragster, and Gaines wanted to do
the same.

In the late ’50s, Gaines began his pursuit of racing. By 1961, he was already racing dragsters, and he purchased his first dragster in 1962. Not even two years later, he bought another dragster, turned it into a Top Fuel car and was racing all over the East Coast.

Gaines went on to compete at the World Finals in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and Dallas, Texas. And whose Top Fuel dragster set top speed at Tulsa? You guessed it—it was Gaines’. In 1963, he also successfully raced his Top Fuel dragster at the Indy U.S. Nationals.

Next generation: Gaines’ son and grandson taking it all in at a recent Gatornationals.

Continuing to live his dream, Gaines and his racing partner, Fausto Marino, opened a two-bay retail speed shop in 1966 in Cottage City, Maryland, called Automotive Specialties. Gaines was purchasing more and more performance parts, and his need for parts was the birth of that shop.

Gaines’ automotive parts business was booming so much in the late ’60s that by 1969 he had given up racing to devote 100% of his time and effort to his growing business.

When Gaines was asked what he felt was his proudest accomplishment in racing, he answered without pause: “Winning!”

In 1970, Gaines realized that he had enough vendor lines to sustain a business, so he ventured into wholesale distribution at a time when aftermarket manufacturers could benefit from a service that could deliver parts directly to speed shops on demand. He hit the road and solicited business up and down the East Coast. Soon after, he was operating a fleet of 10 delivery trucks.

Gaines also changed the company name from Automotive Specialties to G&M Performance Parts to dedicate his business full-time to wholesale. He outgrew the retail speed shop business and knew that wholesale distribution was the path to the future.

Less than four years since first opening the doors of the small speed shop, G&M was doing $1 million in business.

In the early ’70s, G&M was the first performance parts company in the country to create an annual warehouse jobber show. The first show drew more than 100 vendors, and it eventually grew to attract more than 2,000 jobbers.

In 1966, Gaines (left) and his racing partner Fausto Marino, (right), opened a retail speed shop in Cottage City, Maryland.

Gaines designed and built an 80,000-sq.-ft. state-of-the-art warehouse and office space in Largo, Maryland. G&M was servicing more than 4,500 accounts up and down the East Coast and most of the Southeast. In 1982, G&M was recognized by SEMA with the Performance Warehouse of the Year award.

Gaines also knew it was time to expand into the western half of the United States. In 1983, he formed Three Star Industries with two other industry leaders, Ron Coppaken from Arrow Speed Warehouse and Steve Woomer from Competition Specialties.

The three of them knew that they would have a greater impact on the industry together, so they created a national retail program called Performance Corner for jobbers, speed shops, truck shops and dealerships that were not familiar with performance parts.

Performance Corner introduced traditional automotive parts stores to performance parts that they had never considered stocking in the past. Performance Corner also generated a 300-page catalog and retail national advertising for customers in several automotive trade publications.

Business at both G&M and Performance Corner continued to grow at a record pace, with G&M alone servicing more than 6,000 accounts through a fleet of more than 40 delivery trucks and nearly 300 employees.

Gaines attended his first SEMA Show in the late ’60s. He went on to attend the Show every year up until the early ’90s. He was very involved with SEMA and took great pride in serving on the Board of Directors and as a committee chairman; his many contributions over the years; and his business earning that recognition as Performance Warehouse of the Year

“It was very humbling knowing this group of esteemed colleagues and knowing that we were helping to determine the future health and growth of the industry,” he said. “I wish I could do it all over again. Dreams came true for a kid with nothing but a dream to reach what I feel is the pinnacle of the industry. To be elected into the SEMA Hall of Fame just tops it off and justifies the hard work and determination to be the best I could be.

Joe St. Lawrence
It’s Been a Great Ride

Joe St. Lawrence

Joe St. Lawrence is clearly excited at the prospect of talking about his passion for automotive television—as well he should be. He’s credited with pioneering the how-to automotive television shows that allowed aftermarket companies to reach hundreds of thousands of enthusiasts and create many new companies and even some industry icons.

“It’s been a great ride,” he said.

St. Lawrence was born in 1945 in Norfolk, Virginia. His father and mother were both on naval bases during the war, and he was born on a ship.

Before he became a television producer, Joe St. Lawrence raced motorcycles professionally.

The family moved to a suburb of New York City. His father was the football and track coach at a high school, and St. Lawrence and his brothers were involved in sports. But motorsports called to young Joe.

“I was kind of the black sheep of the family,” St. Lawrence said. “Everybody else was into football, water polo and swimming, and I was into motorcycles and cars. That was the genesis of my involvement with our industry and our sport.”

When he was old enough to get a license, he got a motor scooter. That turned into a motorcycle, which turned into a racing motorcycle. Ultimately, he started racing motorcycles professionally in 1962 and opened a Harley-Davidson dealership in Rockland County, New York.

It wasn’t long before St. Lawrence started making parts in the back room of the dealership. He manufactured and distributed motorcycle performance parts under the name Powerband, and that evolved into St. Lawrence selling the small business to a Fortune 500 company that owned the Accel performance division.

“I stayed there for about eight years and had worked my way up to vice president of sales and marketing by 1986,” St. Lawrence said. “My wife Patty and I decided that television had been so successful for Accel back in the early ’80s that we should start doing TV.”

They also decided that Nashville was the place to be, thanks in part to it being the home of The Nashville Network (TNN), which featured the NHRA, NASCAR and World of Outlaws. They weren’t how-to shows, but it was auto-centric programing.

According to St. Lawrence, there was a small group of those automotive shows that ran on weekends in addition to a bunch of anthology programs, and the ads were so successful that the couple decided to start a television broadcast company. They formed RTM Productions, and their first show was called “Road Test Magazine” (hence the name RTM). The first show featured Don Garlits as host of what was basically a car-review program.

By 2011, St. Lawrence’s (right) Powerblock Show had attracted huge audiences and key sponsors, including (from left) SEMA Hall of Famer Corky Coker; Kevin King, president of Year One; and SEMA Hall of Famer Vic Edelbrock Jr.

At one point, St. Lawrence reached out to his friend and colleague Robert Petersen. He suggested that Petersen needed a broadcast extension for his most powerful magazine, Motor Trend, and they could build it together.

“We shook hands on it,” St. Lawrence said. “He allowed me to take his proudest asset, which was Motor Trend, the brand, and take it into television.”

St. Lawrence felt that Motor Trend Television was working but wasn’t really serving the aftermarket to its full potential. St. Lawrence spoke to Petersen again, and he agreed. So they looked to Hot Rod to reach enthusiasts.

“We were very faithful to what Petersen’s publishers and editors were doing—and those shows were a success,” St. Lawrence said. “It was quite a run in producing shows. I think we produced just under 2,300 automotive shows during that 30-year period, and just under 1,000 commercials for our clients. We typically had about 100 clients a year. At one time, we had more than 10 million people watching our programming on the weekends. That’s a tremendous audience to reach. That was an unduplicated audience on Saturday and Sunday of 10 million people on Spike TV. That was the high point of it all.”

St. Lawrence also worked with SEMA and its member companies by providing production of legislative videos and the airing of SEMA public-service commercials as well as providing more than 29 years of coverage from the SEMA Show.

He sold the company to a large media group from France in 2001. He and his wife Patty worked with the group for about five years until its principals decided to return to France. The couple bought back the business with plans to expand it.

“We did that for another 10 years,” St. Lawrence said. “When I hit 70, I told my wife that it’s time to stop. So we sold the business again—this time to a larger company out of Montgomery, Alabama.

PEOPLE

By Matt Pearson

2020 SEMA Hall of Fame

Welcome Rich Barsamian, Jack Chisenhall, John Gaines and Joe St. Lawrence

Rich Barsamian
Emcee for the Industry

Rich Barsamian

Rich Barsamian got word that he was indeed one of the 2020 SEMA Hall of Fame honorees, and he was still speechless one week later. “Yeah, I was trying to think—because I’m still sort of in shock,” he said.

The SEMA Hall of Fame will do that to you. It will take your breath away and leave you speechless, even if you’re Rich Barsamian. And that is saying something, because it takes quite a bit to see him speechless.

An innovative salesman, data marketer, musician and stand-up comic, Barsamian is a man with an unusual talent for making friends. His contribution spans many years and is, well, rich in service to the industry. In his long history as a volunteer, he succeeded in putting the welfare of the industry first and worked on numerous programs that benefitted the industry as a whole.

Barsamian got started in the automotive industry around 1982, when he was a teenager in high school and was hired to do automotive product demonstrations for a rep agency. Fast-forward a bit, and Barsamian connected with Grant Steering Wheels as its regional sales manager and started volunteering and working with SEMA in 1995. He worked for Grant for six years, left to put in three years at Edelbrock as national sales manager, then returned to Grant Products.

Barsamian discusses Edelbrock products with SEMA Show attendees Warehouse West owner Brad Blue (right) and R&R Marketing's Charlie Jensen (second from left).

As Grant’s vice president of sales and marketing, he was part of the team that helped rebuild the company. Then, after seven years, he went to work at ACT, where he is currently vice president of sales and marketing. He’s helped the company by authoring one of the industry’s strongest pricing policies and grown the business with a host of unique programs and data-driven decisions.

Along the way, Barsamian continued to volunteer in the Young Executives Network (YEN) and eventually served as chair. He then served for more than a decade on the Motorsports Parts Manufacturers Council (MPMC), also eventually serving as chair. He is known for his ability to listen to the issues and concerns of members, and he authored a great portion of what is known as the MPMC “Business Guidelines Manual.”

“My end goal in volunteering is simple,” Barsamian told us. “I want to leave things better than I found them and to be involved in projects that bring value to our industry.”

Barsamian performing with the band Led Foot at a SEMA Show.

As a marketer, Barsamian was one of the first to recognize and apply insights gained from the use of data, studying topics such as what people were looking up as well as turn rates at the warehouse distributor level, and he created reports that integrated multiple sources in order to illustrate order flows and overall company health.

As a volunteer in a leadership position, Barsamian then began to share insights he had developed for the benefit of the industry as a whole. Among those was his championing of the Vehicles In Operation (VIO) program, which makes vehicle data available to SEMA-member companies to enable a better understanding of what products to make, where to sell them, how to advertise them, and what technical training might be needed.

VIO was an opportunity for Barsamian to connect SEMA members in a whole new way and resulted in a program that provided industry-wide benefits. That achievement also demonstrated Barsamian’s knack for recognizing industry needs and his ability to pull together companies from different segments, even if they might be competitors.

Barsamian has mentored many in the industry over the years. When asked about his ability as a connector—putting people together to help them become stronger in their businesses, seeking solutions to problems or just increasing industry relationships by introducing people to each other—he credits his own teachers. “I am so grateful for the many mentors I have had,” he said.

As a marketer, Barsamian spent years pioneering and developing pricing policies. He educated the industry by organizing insightful seminars at SEMA since 2013, but he believes it will take many more years to truly educate the industry on this incredibly important topic.

Barsamian also chaired SEMA Cares from 2016–2018. He created the Industry Cup Challenge and worked to bring new life into the Pinewood Derby, helping set new records when it came to raising money for the SEMA Cares charities—Childhelp, Victory Junction and the Austin Hatcher Foundation.

If it’s possible to judge people based on the recognition they receive from their peers, Rich Barsamian stands out in the company of any group. The list of accolades he has collected include being named 2001 YEN Young Executive of the Year, receiving the 2010 YEN Vanguard Award, taking home both the 2011 and 2012 Performance Warehouse Association Person of the Year awards, receiving the 2012 Performance Warehouse Association Manufacturer of the Year (at ACT) as well as being named the 2014 SEMA Person of the Year.

Most recently he was inducted into the MPMC Hall of Fame in 2019. And now, Barsamian has been selected for induction into the SEMA Hall of Fame, class of 2020.

It’s been said that the industry bonded with Barsamian, his keen sense of humor and his ability to entertain. A persuasive speaker and popular emcee, he even appeared on stage with the band Led Foot at the SEMA Show and, over the years, raised funds for the SEMA Memorial Scholarship Fund. He is a ubiquitous presence at industry events, has led the worship service at the SEMA Show prayer breakfast, and never says no to emceeing any industry event.

“I’ve been able to use my sense of humor and personality to make friends, teach, and do what I do in the industry,” Barsamian said. “I guess that’s the hardest part: When you’re that person, you have to wonder, ‘Are you going to be taken seriously?’ Obviously, with this award, I know that my peers do take me seriously, and I’m really honored by that.”

Jack Chisenhall
The Hobby Shop

Jack Chisenhall.

Ask him if he considers himself an innovator and a leader of technology and he will probably echo the statements of his peers and say, well, yes.

“I’m very interested and always have been very interested in the technical field,” Chisenhall said. “Yeah, I like the technical world.”

According to Chisenhall, it was being a hot rodder at an early age that resulted in his interest in technology later in life.

He was a young military dependent, and his family didn’t settle down much until he was older. But as high school approached the family started to get settled. Chisenhall said his passion at the time was magazines, because he could get them anywhere.

“I got ahold of some car magazines—mainly Hot Rod in those days—and had just started learning the skills to build a car,” he said. “It all came from that.”

At age 13 Chisenhall took the skills he acquired and performed his first engine swap. He was lucky that his father was in the Air Force. All the bases had hobby shops and they were a place you could go work on your own car. He didn’t have a welder yet or enough tools to work on the car, so he took it to the hobby shop.

From left: Wally Parks, Chisenhall and Ak Miller at the races.

“I put a Mercury V8 in first and it wasn’t very pretty,” he said. “I got it in, and it actually drove. By the time I was 14 I put in an overhead-valve V8 and that was a whole new deal. I worked at the hobby shop a lot—it was a place where, even if you were working alone, there was always someone else there to help out.”

Chisenhall joined the Reserve Officers Training Corps while studying industrial design at what is now Texas State University and had already earned his pilot’s license before enlisting in the Air Force. He continued to work on cars while in the service and even attended his first Street Rod Nationals in Memphis.

Together with a couple partners, his brother Gordon and a family friend, Milton Jones, Chisenhall started an air-conditioning
company in 1976. The company put air conditioners in new cars. The shop wasn’t large and there was one room at the end that was barely big enough for a car. That’s where Vintage Air got started.

“I started getting guys to bring their own cars in, and we started putting air conditioning in the cars,” Chisenhall said. “It didn’t take long before I started making the molds to produce my first air-conditioning system. A lot of guys knew how to put on a compressor or knew how to do the mechanical stuff, but most guys didn’t know how to mold or work with plastics,” he added.

When he was a getting into the business, many of the guys didn’t want air conditioners. If the car had one, they would say it was too heavy and they’d want to throw it away.

Chisenhall and son Landis (left) getting ready to race in Indianapolis.

“If we as old guys wanted our family and our wives to go with us, there was no option—we had to install air conditioning,” said Chisenhall. “You can imagine asking your wife to drive cross country with you without air conditioning. How would that go?

“I guess the fact that so few of the musclecars and hot rods were equipped with air conditioning allowed us to create the segment,” he said. “The fall of that first year I took a unit to Tulsa, to the Street Rod Nationals.

Looking back, Chisenhall makes it sound easy. “We’ve been very fortunate. We are now building air conditioners for six or seven new-car companies,” said Chisenhall. “We didn’t really go looking for that business, but it came to us. We like it because it helps us gain the technology from the automotive OEM world.”

“I’m really proud of being part of the SEMA organization,” Chisenhall said. “I’m proud of the people I’ve come to know in the industry. Honestly, they become your best friends because you have the same interests. It’s an understatement to say it’s a huge honor to be associated with these guys,” he added.

“It’s all about that. The car is how we connect with other people that are doing things like we are. I think it’s all about that.”

John Gaines
Pioneer of Warehouse Distribution

John Gaines

From a very young age, John Gaines knew that he loved cars. How much did he love them? Well, growing up in the suburbs of Washington, D.C., he became a car enthusiast before he even got his driver’s license.

“I loved the whole look of the car,” Gaines said. “The wheels, rims, body and especially the sound of a hot rod.”

Gaines was born in Washington, D.C. He attended Bladensburg High School in Maryland and served in the Air Force. He went to a couple of races in Manassas, Virginia, where he hung out in a garage owned by Paul Osmond that was called Modifications Unlimited. He saw that Osmond was building a dragster, and Gaines wanted to do
the same.

In the late ’50s, Gaines began his pursuit of racing. By 1961, he was already racing dragsters, and he purchased his first dragster in 1962. Not even two years later, he bought another dragster, turned it into a Top Fuel car and was racing all over the East Coast.

Gaines went on to compete at the World Finals in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and Dallas, Texas. And whose Top Fuel dragster set top speed at Tulsa? You guessed it—it was Gaines’. In 1963, he also successfully raced his Top Fuel dragster at the Indy U.S. Nationals.

Next generation: Gaines’ son and grandson taking it all in at a recent Gatornationals.

Continuing to live his dream, Gaines and his racing partner, Fausto Marino, opened a two-bay retail speed shop in 1966 in Cottage City, Maryland, called Automotive Specialties. Gaines was purchasing more and more performance parts, and his need for parts was the birth of that shop.

Gaines’ automotive parts business was booming so much in the late ’60s that by 1969 he had given up racing to devote 100% of his time and effort to his growing business.

When Gaines was asked what he felt was his proudest accomplishment in racing, he answered without pause: “Winning!”

In 1970, Gaines realized that he had enough vendor lines to sustain a business, so he ventured into wholesale distribution at a time when aftermarket manufacturers could benefit from a service that could deliver parts directly to speed shops on demand. He hit the road and solicited business up and down the East Coast. Soon after, he was operating a fleet of 10 delivery trucks.

Gaines also changed the company name from Automotive Specialties to G&M Performance Parts to dedicate his business full-time to wholesale. He outgrew the retail speed shop business and knew that wholesale distribution was the path to the future.

Less than four years since first opening the doors of the small speed shop, G&M was doing $1 million in business.

In the early ’70s, G&M was the first performance parts company in the country to create an annual warehouse jobber show. The first show drew more than 100 vendors, and it eventually grew to attract more than 2,000 jobbers.

In 1966, Gaines (left) and his racing partner Fausto Marino, (right), opened a retail speed shop in Cottage City, Maryland.

Gaines designed and built an 80,000-sq.-ft. state-of-the-art warehouse and office space in Largo, Maryland. G&M was servicing more than 4,500 accounts up and down the East Coast and most of the Southeast. In 1982, G&M was recognized by SEMA with the Performance Warehouse of the Year award.

Gaines also knew it was time to expand into the western half of the United States. In 1983, he formed Three Star Industries with two other industry leaders, Ron Coppaken from Arrow Speed Warehouse and Steve Woomer from Competition Specialties.

The three of them knew that they would have a greater impact on the industry together, so they created a national retail program called Performance Corner for jobbers, speed shops, truck shops and dealerships that were not familiar with performance parts.

Performance Corner introduced traditional automotive parts stores to performance parts that they had never considered stocking in the past. Performance Corner also generated a 300-page catalog and retail national advertising for customers in several automotive trade publications.

Business at both G&M and Performance Corner continued to grow at a record pace, with G&M alone servicing more than 6,000 accounts through a fleet of more than 40 delivery trucks and nearly 300 employees.

Gaines attended his first SEMA Show in the late ’60s. He went on to attend the Show every year up until the early ’90s. He was very involved with SEMA and took great pride in serving on the Board of Directors and as a committee chairman; his many contributions over the years; and his business earning that recognition as Performance Warehouse of the Year

“It was very humbling knowing this group of esteemed colleagues and knowing that we were helping to determine the future health and growth of the industry,” he said. “I wish I could do it all over again. Dreams came true for a kid with nothing but a dream to reach what I feel is the pinnacle of the industry. To be elected into the SEMA Hall of Fame just tops it off and justifies the hard work and determination to be the best I could be.

Joe St. Lawrence
It’s Been a Great Ride

Joe St. Lawrence

Joe St. Lawrence is clearly excited at the prospect of talking about his passion for automotive television—as well he should be. He’s credited with pioneering the how-to automotive television shows that allowed aftermarket companies to reach hundreds of thousands of enthusiasts and create many new companies and even some industry icons.

“It’s been a great ride,” he said.

St. Lawrence was born in 1945 in Norfolk, Virginia. His father and mother were both on naval bases during the war, and he was born on a ship.

Before he became a television producer, Joe St. Lawrence raced motorcycles professionally.

The family moved to a suburb of New York City. His father was the football and track coach at a high school, and St. Lawrence and his brothers were involved in sports. But motorsports called to young Joe.

“I was kind of the black sheep of the family,” St. Lawrence said. “Everybody else was into football, water polo and swimming, and I was into motorcycles and cars. That was the genesis of my involvement with our industry and our sport.”

When he was old enough to get a license, he got a motor scooter. That turned into a motorcycle, which turned into a racing motorcycle. Ultimately, he started racing motorcycles professionally in 1962 and opened a Harley-Davidson dealership in Rockland County, New York.

It wasn’t long before St. Lawrence started making parts in the back room of the dealership. He manufactured and distributed motorcycle performance parts under the name Powerband, and that evolved into St. Lawrence selling the small business to a Fortune 500 company that owned the Accel performance division.

“I stayed there for about eight years and had worked my way up to vice president of sales and marketing by 1986,” St. Lawrence said. “My wife Patty and I decided that television had been so successful for Accel back in the early ’80s that we should start doing TV.”

They also decided that Nashville was the place to be, thanks in part to it being the home of The Nashville Network (TNN), which featured the NHRA, NASCAR and World of Outlaws. They weren’t how-to shows, but it was auto-centric programing.

According to St. Lawrence, there was a small group of those automotive shows that ran on weekends in addition to a bunch of anthology programs, and the ads were so successful that the couple decided to start a television broadcast company. They formed RTM Productions, and their first show was called “Road Test Magazine” (hence the name RTM). The first show featured Don Garlits as host of what was basically a car-review program.

By 2011, St. Lawrence’s (right) Powerblock Show had attracted huge audiences and key sponsors, including (from left) SEMA Hall of Famer Corky Coker; Kevin King, president of Year One; and SEMA Hall of Famer Vic Edelbrock Jr.

At one point, St. Lawrence reached out to his friend and colleague Robert Petersen. He suggested that Petersen needed a broadcast extension for his most powerful magazine, Motor Trend, and they could build it together.

“We shook hands on it,” St. Lawrence said. “He allowed me to take his proudest asset, which was Motor Trend, the brand, and take it into television.”

St. Lawrence felt that Motor Trend Television was working but wasn’t really serving the aftermarket to its full potential. St. Lawrence spoke to Petersen again, and he agreed. So they looked to Hot Rod to reach enthusiasts.

“We were very faithful to what Petersen’s publishers and editors were doing—and those shows were a success,” St. Lawrence said. “It was quite a run in producing shows. I think we produced just under 2,300 automotive shows during that 30-year period, and just under 1,000 commercials for our clients. We typically had about 100 clients a year. At one time, we had more than 10 million people watching our programming on the weekends. That’s a tremendous audience to reach. That was an unduplicated audience on Saturday and Sunday of 10 million people on Spike TV. That was the high point of it all.”

St. Lawrence also worked with SEMA and its member companies by providing production of legislative videos and the airing of SEMA public-service commercials as well as providing more than 29 years of coverage from the SEMA Show.

He sold the company to a large media group from France in 2001. He and his wife Patty worked with the group for about five years until its principals decided to return to France. The couple bought back the business with plans to expand it.

“We did that for another 10 years,” St. Lawrence said. “When I hit 70, I told my wife that it’s time to stop. So we sold the business again—this time to a larger company out of Montgomery, Alabama.

SEMA News—August 2020

LEGISLATIVE AND TECHNICAL AFFAIRS

Industry Stamps Out State-Level Threats

By Colby Martin

“Old cars” have steadily become synonymous with dollar signs in the eyes of many public officials. Proposals aimed at bankrolling vintage vehicle owners are often drafted without regard for nuance—such as the contrast between a Concours-level Delahaye (above) and a hand-me-down El Camino. Courtesy: Shutterstock.com

Protecting the automotive hobby’s faithful from unreasonable restrictions is always good for business. Nationwide, states are constantly wrenching with America’s car laws. Some states seek to promote the growth of the collector-car community, while others hope to stop it in its tracks.

Attacks from anti-hobby laws can leave a lasting impact on any portion of the ever-evolving collector market. Legislative threats to enthusiasts may not directly affect your company, but there is potential for devastation to your customer base—now and in the future. Whatever the issue, the automotive community is constantly looking to trusted industry brands like yours for political influence.

While 2020 may have begun as expected for the state legislative sessions, global health concerns significantly impacted how lawmakers went about business. For much of the spring, only eight legislatures remained active; all others suspended their sessions, adjourned on schedule or, in many cases, adjourned early. Those that remained in session or plan to return are focusing their attention on emergency responses to the most critical tasks at hand. Because of that, legislation not directly related to emergency relief or a state’s budget will likely be delayed until 2021. Those circumstances will continue to substantially affect much of the legislation facing the industry this year.

In light of recent challenges, the automotive community has reasons to rejoice despite shortened sessions across the nation. Several key triumphs have already been achieved this year, with help from SEMA Action Network (SAN) advocates. Threats to collector vehicles—particularly on the vintage side—were defeated in several states. Thanks to the age of digital media, reaching legislatures has never been easier. Consequently, lawmakers have become increasingly aware of collectors and the economic opportunities they represent.

Unfortunately, true enthusiasts have had to pay the price for those misusing laws pertaining to the privilege of specialty tags. Instances of abuse of the special registration categories intended for hobby cars and trucks have increased in some places, and sweeping corrective action has been sought by various states for years. Such proposals are often aimed at punishing offenders seeking lower registration fees for older daily drivers or attempting to avoid emissions and safety inspections. When confronted with a measure that will unfairly affect and inconvenience owners of legitimate classic vehicles, SAN forces go into action. The latest efforts targeting classic automobiles included Maryland, Washington and Wisconsin.

In Maryland, legislation was introduced to impose an emissions-inspection requirement on historic vehicles less than 40 years old, where all such vehicles are currently exempt. Based on a strong outpouring of enthusiast opposition to the measure, the bill was given an unfavorable report, its hearing was canceled, and it happily died an early death.

States have debated for years on whether to allow the display of only a single, rear-mounted license plate. If single-plate repeals are enacted, such laws fail to accommodate classic and special-interest vehicles, many of which are not originally equipped with a designated place to display a front plate. Courtesy: Betto Rodrigues/Shutterstock.com

Wisconsin proposed restricting eligibility and raising fees for collector and hobbyist vehicle registration. Here again, SAN mobilized, and the bill failed to pass prior to the required legislative deadline.

Finally, Washington state was poised to significantly restrict eligibility of collector vehicles and horseless carriages, raise the initial registration fee for collector vehicles, and restrict the use of “year of manufacture” license plates. Those bills died as the legislature adjourned, marking another significant win.

As of press time, the fates of additional anti-industry bills remain undecided. Ohio introduced legislation to repeal a single-license-plate law that is awaiting further action. Thankfully, a similar bill in Oklahoma failed to meet the required legislative deadline earlier this year. Currently, all vehicles in Oklahoma are required to display only a single, rear-mounted plate. Last year, the Ohio legislature passed a bill that removed the front plate requirement beginning in July of this year, a change that is that is expected to save the state more than $1 million per year. If enacted, these laws would fail to accommodate classic and special-interest vehicles, many of which are not originally equipped with a designated place to display a front plate. SAN-opposed legislation in Minnesota to increase the state’s standard biofuel blend from 10%–15% ethanol is also awaiting consideration.

Before this year’s session concludes, more good news potentially awaits the old-fashioned end of the industry. Fans of former military vehicles in West Virginia have already celebrated the signing of a new law to display an alternate registration insignia as opposed to a traditional license plate. Versions of SEMA-model legislation to allow for the titling and registration of former military vehicles are pending in Kansas and Michigan. SAN-sponsored legislation in Kansas clarifying the definition of antique vehicles to allow for modifications passed the House and is pending in the Senate. Previously introduced pro-industry bills benefiting collector-car and street-rod enthusiasts also await further consideration in several other states.

As state houses reopen again from coast to coast, watchful eyes will be waiting. For the latest updates on current initiatives, visit www.semasan.com/alerts. In the meantime, special thanks and congratulations are due to those who participated in supporting successful efforts thus far. Keep in mind that while anti-industry bills may not be a threat now, they can be reintroduced in the 2021 session or beyond. Therefore, please get involved now by signing-up for the SAN without cost or obligation at www.semasan.com/join. Encourage others to follow suit.

SEMA News—August 2020

LEGISLATIVE AND TECHNICAL AFFAIRS

Industry Stamps Out State-Level Threats

By Colby Martin

“Old cars” have steadily become synonymous with dollar signs in the eyes of many public officials. Proposals aimed at bankrolling vintage vehicle owners are often drafted without regard for nuance—such as the contrast between a Concours-level Delahaye (above) and a hand-me-down El Camino. Courtesy: Shutterstock.com

Protecting the automotive hobby’s faithful from unreasonable restrictions is always good for business. Nationwide, states are constantly wrenching with America’s car laws. Some states seek to promote the growth of the collector-car community, while others hope to stop it in its tracks.

Attacks from anti-hobby laws can leave a lasting impact on any portion of the ever-evolving collector market. Legislative threats to enthusiasts may not directly affect your company, but there is potential for devastation to your customer base—now and in the future. Whatever the issue, the automotive community is constantly looking to trusted industry brands like yours for political influence.

While 2020 may have begun as expected for the state legislative sessions, global health concerns significantly impacted how lawmakers went about business. For much of the spring, only eight legislatures remained active; all others suspended their sessions, adjourned on schedule or, in many cases, adjourned early. Those that remained in session or plan to return are focusing their attention on emergency responses to the most critical tasks at hand. Because of that, legislation not directly related to emergency relief or a state’s budget will likely be delayed until 2021. Those circumstances will continue to substantially affect much of the legislation facing the industry this year.

In light of recent challenges, the automotive community has reasons to rejoice despite shortened sessions across the nation. Several key triumphs have already been achieved this year, with help from SEMA Action Network (SAN) advocates. Threats to collector vehicles—particularly on the vintage side—were defeated in several states. Thanks to the age of digital media, reaching legislatures has never been easier. Consequently, lawmakers have become increasingly aware of collectors and the economic opportunities they represent.

Unfortunately, true enthusiasts have had to pay the price for those misusing laws pertaining to the privilege of specialty tags. Instances of abuse of the special registration categories intended for hobby cars and trucks have increased in some places, and sweeping corrective action has been sought by various states for years. Such proposals are often aimed at punishing offenders seeking lower registration fees for older daily drivers or attempting to avoid emissions and safety inspections. When confronted with a measure that will unfairly affect and inconvenience owners of legitimate classic vehicles, SAN forces go into action. The latest efforts targeting classic automobiles included Maryland, Washington and Wisconsin.

In Maryland, legislation was introduced to impose an emissions-inspection requirement on historic vehicles less than 40 years old, where all such vehicles are currently exempt. Based on a strong outpouring of enthusiast opposition to the measure, the bill was given an unfavorable report, its hearing was canceled, and it happily died an early death.

States have debated for years on whether to allow the display of only a single, rear-mounted license plate. If single-plate repeals are enacted, such laws fail to accommodate classic and special-interest vehicles, many of which are not originally equipped with a designated place to display a front plate. Courtesy: Betto Rodrigues/Shutterstock.com

Wisconsin proposed restricting eligibility and raising fees for collector and hobbyist vehicle registration. Here again, SAN mobilized, and the bill failed to pass prior to the required legislative deadline.

Finally, Washington state was poised to significantly restrict eligibility of collector vehicles and horseless carriages, raise the initial registration fee for collector vehicles, and restrict the use of “year of manufacture” license plates. Those bills died as the legislature adjourned, marking another significant win.

As of press time, the fates of additional anti-industry bills remain undecided. Ohio introduced legislation to repeal a single-license-plate law that is awaiting further action. Thankfully, a similar bill in Oklahoma failed to meet the required legislative deadline earlier this year. Currently, all vehicles in Oklahoma are required to display only a single, rear-mounted plate. Last year, the Ohio legislature passed a bill that removed the front plate requirement beginning in July of this year, a change that is that is expected to save the state more than $1 million per year. If enacted, these laws would fail to accommodate classic and special-interest vehicles, many of which are not originally equipped with a designated place to display a front plate. SAN-opposed legislation in Minnesota to increase the state’s standard biofuel blend from 10%–15% ethanol is also awaiting consideration.

Before this year’s session concludes, more good news potentially awaits the old-fashioned end of the industry. Fans of former military vehicles in West Virginia have already celebrated the signing of a new law to display an alternate registration insignia as opposed to a traditional license plate. Versions of SEMA-model legislation to allow for the titling and registration of former military vehicles are pending in Kansas and Michigan. SAN-sponsored legislation in Kansas clarifying the definition of antique vehicles to allow for modifications passed the House and is pending in the Senate. Previously introduced pro-industry bills benefiting collector-car and street-rod enthusiasts also await further consideration in several other states.

As state houses reopen again from coast to coast, watchful eyes will be waiting. For the latest updates on current initiatives, visit www.semasan.com/alerts. In the meantime, special thanks and congratulations are due to those who participated in supporting successful efforts thus far. Keep in mind that while anti-industry bills may not be a threat now, they can be reintroduced in the 2021 session or beyond. Therefore, please get involved now by signing-up for the SAN without cost or obligation at www.semasan.com/join. Encourage others to follow suit.

SEMA News—August 2020

LEGISLATIVE AND TECHNICAL AFFAIRS

Industry Stamps Out State-Level Threats

By Colby Martin

“Old cars” have steadily become synonymous with dollar signs in the eyes of many public officials. Proposals aimed at bankrolling vintage vehicle owners are often drafted without regard for nuance—such as the contrast between a Concours-level Delahaye (above) and a hand-me-down El Camino. Courtesy: Shutterstock.com

Protecting the automotive hobby’s faithful from unreasonable restrictions is always good for business. Nationwide, states are constantly wrenching with America’s car laws. Some states seek to promote the growth of the collector-car community, while others hope to stop it in its tracks.

Attacks from anti-hobby laws can leave a lasting impact on any portion of the ever-evolving collector market. Legislative threats to enthusiasts may not directly affect your company, but there is potential for devastation to your customer base—now and in the future. Whatever the issue, the automotive community is constantly looking to trusted industry brands like yours for political influence.

While 2020 may have begun as expected for the state legislative sessions, global health concerns significantly impacted how lawmakers went about business. For much of the spring, only eight legislatures remained active; all others suspended their sessions, adjourned on schedule or, in many cases, adjourned early. Those that remained in session or plan to return are focusing their attention on emergency responses to the most critical tasks at hand. Because of that, legislation not directly related to emergency relief or a state’s budget will likely be delayed until 2021. Those circumstances will continue to substantially affect much of the legislation facing the industry this year.

In light of recent challenges, the automotive community has reasons to rejoice despite shortened sessions across the nation. Several key triumphs have already been achieved this year, with help from SEMA Action Network (SAN) advocates. Threats to collector vehicles—particularly on the vintage side—were defeated in several states. Thanks to the age of digital media, reaching legislatures has never been easier. Consequently, lawmakers have become increasingly aware of collectors and the economic opportunities they represent.

Unfortunately, true enthusiasts have had to pay the price for those misusing laws pertaining to the privilege of specialty tags. Instances of abuse of the special registration categories intended for hobby cars and trucks have increased in some places, and sweeping corrective action has been sought by various states for years. Such proposals are often aimed at punishing offenders seeking lower registration fees for older daily drivers or attempting to avoid emissions and safety inspections. When confronted with a measure that will unfairly affect and inconvenience owners of legitimate classic vehicles, SAN forces go into action. The latest efforts targeting classic automobiles included Maryland, Washington and Wisconsin.

In Maryland, legislation was introduced to impose an emissions-inspection requirement on historic vehicles less than 40 years old, where all such vehicles are currently exempt. Based on a strong outpouring of enthusiast opposition to the measure, the bill was given an unfavorable report, its hearing was canceled, and it happily died an early death.

States have debated for years on whether to allow the display of only a single, rear-mounted license plate. If single-plate repeals are enacted, such laws fail to accommodate classic and special-interest vehicles, many of which are not originally equipped with a designated place to display a front plate. Courtesy: Betto Rodrigues/Shutterstock.com

Wisconsin proposed restricting eligibility and raising fees for collector and hobbyist vehicle registration. Here again, SAN mobilized, and the bill failed to pass prior to the required legislative deadline.

Finally, Washington state was poised to significantly restrict eligibility of collector vehicles and horseless carriages, raise the initial registration fee for collector vehicles, and restrict the use of “year of manufacture” license plates. Those bills died as the legislature adjourned, marking another significant win.

As of press time, the fates of additional anti-industry bills remain undecided. Ohio introduced legislation to repeal a single-license-plate law that is awaiting further action. Thankfully, a similar bill in Oklahoma failed to meet the required legislative deadline earlier this year. Currently, all vehicles in Oklahoma are required to display only a single, rear-mounted plate. Last year, the Ohio legislature passed a bill that removed the front plate requirement beginning in July of this year, a change that is that is expected to save the state more than $1 million per year. If enacted, these laws would fail to accommodate classic and special-interest vehicles, many of which are not originally equipped with a designated place to display a front plate. SAN-opposed legislation in Minnesota to increase the state’s standard biofuel blend from 10%–15% ethanol is also awaiting consideration.

Before this year’s session concludes, more good news potentially awaits the old-fashioned end of the industry. Fans of former military vehicles in West Virginia have already celebrated the signing of a new law to display an alternate registration insignia as opposed to a traditional license plate. Versions of SEMA-model legislation to allow for the titling and registration of former military vehicles are pending in Kansas and Michigan. SAN-sponsored legislation in Kansas clarifying the definition of antique vehicles to allow for modifications passed the House and is pending in the Senate. Previously introduced pro-industry bills benefiting collector-car and street-rod enthusiasts also await further consideration in several other states.

As state houses reopen again from coast to coast, watchful eyes will be waiting. For the latest updates on current initiatives, visit www.semasan.com/alerts. In the meantime, special thanks and congratulations are due to those who participated in supporting successful efforts thus far. Keep in mind that while anti-industry bills may not be a threat now, they can be reintroduced in the 2021 session or beyond. Therefore, please get involved now by signing-up for the SAN without cost or obligation at www.semasan.com/join. Encourage others to follow suit.

SEMA News—August 2020

LEGISLATIVE AND TECHNICAL AFFAIRS

Industry Stamps Out State-Level Threats

By Colby Martin

“Old cars” have steadily become synonymous with dollar signs in the eyes of many public officials. Proposals aimed at bankrolling vintage vehicle owners are often drafted without regard for nuance—such as the contrast between a Concours-level Delahaye (above) and a hand-me-down El Camino. Courtesy: Shutterstock.com

Protecting the automotive hobby’s faithful from unreasonable restrictions is always good for business. Nationwide, states are constantly wrenching with America’s car laws. Some states seek to promote the growth of the collector-car community, while others hope to stop it in its tracks.

Attacks from anti-hobby laws can leave a lasting impact on any portion of the ever-evolving collector market. Legislative threats to enthusiasts may not directly affect your company, but there is potential for devastation to your customer base—now and in the future. Whatever the issue, the automotive community is constantly looking to trusted industry brands like yours for political influence.

While 2020 may have begun as expected for the state legislative sessions, global health concerns significantly impacted how lawmakers went about business. For much of the spring, only eight legislatures remained active; all others suspended their sessions, adjourned on schedule or, in many cases, adjourned early. Those that remained in session or plan to return are focusing their attention on emergency responses to the most critical tasks at hand. Because of that, legislation not directly related to emergency relief or a state’s budget will likely be delayed until 2021. Those circumstances will continue to substantially affect much of the legislation facing the industry this year.

In light of recent challenges, the automotive community has reasons to rejoice despite shortened sessions across the nation. Several key triumphs have already been achieved this year, with help from SEMA Action Network (SAN) advocates. Threats to collector vehicles—particularly on the vintage side—were defeated in several states. Thanks to the age of digital media, reaching legislatures has never been easier. Consequently, lawmakers have become increasingly aware of collectors and the economic opportunities they represent.

Unfortunately, true enthusiasts have had to pay the price for those misusing laws pertaining to the privilege of specialty tags. Instances of abuse of the special registration categories intended for hobby cars and trucks have increased in some places, and sweeping corrective action has been sought by various states for years. Such proposals are often aimed at punishing offenders seeking lower registration fees for older daily drivers or attempting to avoid emissions and safety inspections. When confronted with a measure that will unfairly affect and inconvenience owners of legitimate classic vehicles, SAN forces go into action. The latest efforts targeting classic automobiles included Maryland, Washington and Wisconsin.

In Maryland, legislation was introduced to impose an emissions-inspection requirement on historic vehicles less than 40 years old, where all such vehicles are currently exempt. Based on a strong outpouring of enthusiast opposition to the measure, the bill was given an unfavorable report, its hearing was canceled, and it happily died an early death.

States have debated for years on whether to allow the display of only a single, rear-mounted license plate. If single-plate repeals are enacted, such laws fail to accommodate classic and special-interest vehicles, many of which are not originally equipped with a designated place to display a front plate. Courtesy: Betto Rodrigues/Shutterstock.com

Wisconsin proposed restricting eligibility and raising fees for collector and hobbyist vehicle registration. Here again, SAN mobilized, and the bill failed to pass prior to the required legislative deadline.

Finally, Washington state was poised to significantly restrict eligibility of collector vehicles and horseless carriages, raise the initial registration fee for collector vehicles, and restrict the use of “year of manufacture” license plates. Those bills died as the legislature adjourned, marking another significant win.

As of press time, the fates of additional anti-industry bills remain undecided. Ohio introduced legislation to repeal a single-license-plate law that is awaiting further action. Thankfully, a similar bill in Oklahoma failed to meet the required legislative deadline earlier this year. Currently, all vehicles in Oklahoma are required to display only a single, rear-mounted plate. Last year, the Ohio legislature passed a bill that removed the front plate requirement beginning in July of this year, a change that is that is expected to save the state more than $1 million per year. If enacted, these laws would fail to accommodate classic and special-interest vehicles, many of which are not originally equipped with a designated place to display a front plate. SAN-opposed legislation in Minnesota to increase the state’s standard biofuel blend from 10%–15% ethanol is also awaiting consideration.

Before this year’s session concludes, more good news potentially awaits the old-fashioned end of the industry. Fans of former military vehicles in West Virginia have already celebrated the signing of a new law to display an alternate registration insignia as opposed to a traditional license plate. Versions of SEMA-model legislation to allow for the titling and registration of former military vehicles are pending in Kansas and Michigan. SAN-sponsored legislation in Kansas clarifying the definition of antique vehicles to allow for modifications passed the House and is pending in the Senate. Previously introduced pro-industry bills benefiting collector-car and street-rod enthusiasts also await further consideration in several other states.

As state houses reopen again from coast to coast, watchful eyes will be waiting. For the latest updates on current initiatives, visit www.semasan.com/alerts. In the meantime, special thanks and congratulations are due to those who participated in supporting successful efforts thus far. Keep in mind that while anti-industry bills may not be a threat now, they can be reintroduced in the 2021 session or beyond. Therefore, please get involved now by signing-up for the SAN without cost or obligation at www.semasan.com/join. Encourage others to follow suit.

SEMA News—August 2020

BUSINESS

State of the Restomod Market

Transforming Old Classics Into Modern-Day Machines

By Chad Simon

The newest Icon Reformer presents a completely reimagined ’70 Ford Ranger and is powered by a 426hp Ford 5.0L Coyote V8 engine paired to a Ford automatic transmission.

Undeterred by a sluggish economy brought on by COVID-19, demand for classic-car restoration is still soaring, and it’s likely to continue as long as parts suppliers can keep up. The clients are typically “car people” and are faithful to a particular make and model. While there are still those who insist on accurate restoration of classic cars, growth is to be found in those who want to retain the classic-car look but are thirsty for modern performance upgrades that improve drivability and promote individualism.

We spoke with three leading companies in the restomod segment to find out who their clients are, how they built their reputations, what the latest industry trends are and how they source their parts and establish partnerships. Here’s what they had to say.

Weathering the Storm

There’s still a lot of interest in one-off custom classics right now, but ensuring that customers have enough funds is another thing, according to Mike Ring of Ringbrothers. The Rings thought business would slow down due to COVID-19, but it’s actually been the opposite because people are getting anxious and just want to buy.

Jonathan Ward, CEO and lead designer for Icon, echoed that sentiment.

“We actually find that demand is far greater than our capability to provide it, meaning we try and focus most of our efforts on our production models, like the Bronco and FJ Series,” Ward said. “We purposely limit the scale of projects we do in this one-off series of vehicles to either the Derelict or Reformer style and only deliver maybe three or four of those a year.”

Despite COVID-19, the shop has stayed open, and clients are keeping up with their commitments. However, Ward has some concerns about Icon’s smaller sublet partners and whether they are going to be able to help them keep up with demand.

David Miller II, vice president of marketing for R3 Performance Products—a producer of body shells—shares Ward’s concern regarding the ability to continue purchasing parts from his suppliers, some of whom might not have fared so well in recent months.

“We’ve been able to get parts so far, but if everybody else shuts down, can we still get fenders and engines?” he asked. “We’re finally starting to see the ripple where we’re getting a little bit longer lead times on parts, but people are beginning to open back up, so hopefully that won’t last long.”

Mike (right) and Jim Ring held their trophies after capturing top honors at the 2019 SEMA Battle of the Builders. Their reimagined ’69 Camaro was judged best in show by their fellow finalists at the 2019 SEMA Show.

Survival of the Fittest

Many shops want to do one-off custom restorations, but when it comes down to it, most don’t realize that it takes a large team and even more industry partners to pull it off and then be able to feel comfortable with the finished product, according to Ringbrothers.

“What really kills you in these jobs is that there’s no money left to warranty them when they’re done,” said Mike Ring. “It all comes out of your own pocket.”

There have always been shops that do custom one-off restorations, but interest in the vintage aesthetic has significantly increased, based on Ward’s experience.

“People don’t necessarily want to be a martyr to a vintage vehicle,” he said. “They have a strong affinity to the classic design style and continuity but no patience for the archaic mechanical experience. So probably the most notable segment of growth I’ve seen is to a more thoroughly reengineered and restored vehicle.”

On the other hand, Miller believes that there are 30% fewer shops doing custom restoration since the year 2000, largely because the paint and body shop world is consolidating. Most restoration is done in the back of a collision shop, and they do collision work because it’s steady and pays the bills.

“When collision slows down, the next thing you know they’re building a GTO out in the back,” Miller said. “Collision techs and restoration techs are two very different skill sets, but there are some shops that do great work.”

However, Miller lamented that when those types of shops get busy, they throw a tarp on the project and it collects dust. “That’s where you hear horror stories where a guy takes his car in and a one-year restoration project turns into four years. It’s bad for business, and it’s the reason why R3 no longer does collision,” according to Miller.

Ringbrothers unveiled a ’69 Chevrolet Camaro known as “Valkyrja” at the 2019 SEMA Show in Las Vegas. The 890hp musclecar was developed using the latest technology, including 3-D scanning and CAD design, and was assembled with modern materials, such as carbon fiber. Custom parts were created using a combination of 3-D printing and CNC machining.

The Car-Faithful Resto Client

Icon generally builds one-offs for clients who have already gone down that road and have no interest in a conventional luxury vehicle. For instance, instead of building a Raptor with aftermarket accessories or a Rolls-Royce or a Ferrari, they’re looking for something that’s a bit more under the radar and a lot more individual.

“For the most part, our clients are self-made people who’ve gotten to where they are financially in their own career path by being sort of hands-on,” Ward said. “I think they respect and understand what we do on a much deeper level. The one-offs that we have built run anywhere from $200,000 to upwards of $1 million, so they range greatly in their design, priorities, style and era to pretty much run
the gamut.”

According to Miller, his restomod clients are typically older men with some extra money to spend. They’re car-faithful and knowledgeable about their vehicles. More often than not, the build clients aren’t car people; they’re wealthy and the project is their latest toy.

“The restomod customers who are Camaro or Mustang aficionados usually have some idea of what they want, and they’ll do their research on the Internet,” he said. “They’ll tell us that they’re thinking of getting a certain kind of brakes and will ask us what we think and if it will work, so they still need some help.”

This officially licensed ’69 Yenko Camaro 427 S/C Continuation Car was built from start to finish on the Velocity Channel in fall 2018. It was the first new Yenko built in more than 40 years.

Building a Reputation

Hailing from the small town of Spring Green, Wisconsin, the Ringbrothers brand is known throughout the world, but it’s fair to say the company built its reputation at the SEMA Show. Winner of the 2019 SEMA Battle of the Builders competition, Ringbrothers’ intent is to debut everything it’s worked on at the SEMA Show because the brothers feel that the exposure is much greater than any normal car show could ever give them.

“[The SEMA Show] is like the Super Bowl for us because of the media presence,” said Mike Ring. “When you’re in Los Angeles, there’s media everywhere, and you can shoot TV shows, but out here, clients have to take multiple flights, and it takes all day to get here. That’s why SEMA is so important for us. We throw everything we have at the SEMA Show.”

When you’re just starting out, it’s difficult to establish yourself as a standalone resto-only or build-only shop and convince potential clients to trust you, according to Miller. You can’t just rent a facility, spend money on equipment, hire technicians, and then expect clients to walk in the door.

“You have to draw clients from all over unless you’re in Los Angeles or New York,” Miller said. “So the question is, how did they find you? How do you develop a reputation? Even if they do find you online, how do you stack up to the other 10 guys doing it? I’ve been banging my head against that wall for decades, and business is just
now steady.”

Miller believes that his involvement in television shows representing one of his brands (Brand New Muscle Car) on Velocity and Motor Trend Network provides some evidence that he’s legit. R3 also exhibits at the SEMA Show, and Miller estimates that 30% of his business comes from repeat clients.

“I’ve done as many as 11 restos for one person,” Miller said. “Once you treat them right, they come back, because most of them have been burned before. We don’t even ask for a deposit. Give us the car, tell us what you want done, and we’ll just take it week by week, pay as you go.”

David Miller II stands in front of the officially licensed Gone in 60 Seconds Eleanor built by Brand New Muscle Car. This particular car features a brand-new R3 Performance Products Ford-licensed replacement body, R3PP front and rear suspension, a 5.0 Coyote engine, and a 6R80 automatic transmission.

Prominent Restomod Candidates

The types of vehicles that are getting the resto treatment range from classic American muscle to four-wheel-drive trucks, particularly K5 Blazers, and Ringbrothers plans to bring an iteration of a K5 to the 2020 SEMA Show.

“We built a ’72 for ourselves and sold it for $305,000 on [digital auction platform] Bring a Trailer, but we don’t typically roll the dice like that,” said Jim Ring. “We always have a client we build for, and we don’t like to repeat something we’ve done already or even be similar. We like to change it up.”

Icon’s projects range anywhere from model years ’32–’75. Many people have personal relationships or attractions to particular vintage vehicles from their own life experiences or favorite movies, according to Ward.

“We like to do ’70s and older, where the quality foundation for the vehicles are such that they warrant the scale of work and reengineering that we like versus later-model vehicles where there’s really not much to work with,” Ward said. “Our interest starts to wane past that when you get into eras where the simplicity, quality and continuity of the design is arguably lacking, at least from our perspective.”

According to Miller, Mustangs represent about two-thirds of his business because it was the first pony car and also people are influenced by the Shelbys and Eleanors that are widely represented in movies and popular culture.

R3 Performance Products, located in Tulsa, Oklahoma, produces body and chassis solutions for ’65–’70 convertible and fastback Mustangs.

Getting to the Source

The relationships Ringbrothers forges at the SEMA Show help the company to decide whom to work with. They tend to be companies that have been around and will continue to be around and have serviced or warrantied parts that went wrong.

“Over the years, you figure out what works and what doesn’t, and you stick with the ones that work and use those products and brands in your builds,” Jim Ring said.

There are many companies that sell parts, but it’s important to find one that knows how its parts work.

“It seems funny, but there are parts out there that are made by people who don’t have a clue about how their parts work,” Mike Ring said. “We understand our products. People who steal our parts, they have no idea. They just reengineer it, but they really don’t know how to answer questions. For us, that’s what it’s about—having people who will be there to help us out when we have issues, because everybody is going to have them.”

According to Ward, shops often take the approach that they can work on anything and everything, whereas Icon keeps an open mind about what platforms they work on.

“We are decidedly opinionated about how we do what we do, so we clearly define our build styles and the fundamental priorities that are basically revisiting classic transportation in a modern context,” Ward said. “If somebody were to come to us and say, ‘I want a ’57 Chevy just like it came off the showroom floor,’ we would tell him there’s probably a specialist out there better suited. We’re all about evolving the mechanical and electrical engineering to provide the most contemporary driving experience possible married to the traditional aesthetic.”

For Icon, the decision to become involved in a project is based on how excited Ward and his team are to do it. Ideally, it’s something that hasn’t been overdone. It’s also about the relationship with the pending client.

“We’ve been fortunate over the years as our reputation has become more firmly established to create some key relationships with top suppliers,” Ward said. “When it comes to sourcing aftermarket restoration parts, we’ll generally go to the best reputed licensee of those traditional parts. But we increasingly are designing and manufacturing our own solutions, because in general, the business models for those components have to lean more toward a one-size-fits-
all approach.”

What’s Trending

People want something unique, so they’re looking for different textures and colors—anything to stand out, according to Jim Ring. They want cars that look and feel different, but unless you actually manufacture the parts yourself, most people buy from the same hot-rod parts retailers.

“There’s no disrespect in that, but if everybody buys parts from the same company and nobody is creative in actually manufacturing different stuff, then everything looks the same,” Jim Ring said.

Ward is seeing more interest in electric powertrains. Icon has also released new editions of its old-school production vehicles in response to the clients’ desire to fly under the radar.

“Less social baggage, less obvious mods and more subtlety,” Ward said. “At first glance, you can’t even tell that something has been altered unless you intimately know that platform.”

Trends that Miller sees include clients who bring in an original car and want it blown apart and restored with all-new parts.

“It used to be the coolest, most unusual unique thing ever,” Miller said. “Now it’s the majority, where everybody who comes in has a list of the work they want done. There are fewer straight restorations. It’s been happening for a while, but it’s really peaking now where it’s actually become normal, and the clients don’t think they’re ruining their cars’ value. They pick and choose what they want like an à la carte menu.”

However, when a resto customer comes in with a stock car and wants to just do a straight restoration, that’s now special where it used to be the norm, according to Miller. He has also found that, in some cases, as more clients rebuild their classic cars with modern components, restomods have a higher value at auction than their original counterparts.

Like Ward, Miller is also seeing a prevalence of electric cars and people who make electric classics, including ’67 Mustangs and ’69 Camaros.

“Electric classics are just now starting,” Miller said. “Some guys are freaking out, thinking it’s the end of the world, but if it looks cool and it goes fast, I’m okay with it. Gasoline cars aren’t going away. Even if every soccer mom in the world is driving an electric minivan, somebody will still have an old gas-powered Mustang. They’ll be toys; they won’t be daily drivers. But they’re not going away—not in my lifetime.”

SEMA News—August 2020

BUSINESS

State of the Restomod Market

Transforming Old Classics Into Modern-Day Machines

By Chad Simon

The newest Icon Reformer presents a completely reimagined ’70 Ford Ranger and is powered by a 426hp Ford 5.0L Coyote V8 engine paired to a Ford automatic transmission.

Undeterred by a sluggish economy brought on by COVID-19, demand for classic-car restoration is still soaring, and it’s likely to continue as long as parts suppliers can keep up. The clients are typically “car people” and are faithful to a particular make and model. While there are still those who insist on accurate restoration of classic cars, growth is to be found in those who want to retain the classic-car look but are thirsty for modern performance upgrades that improve drivability and promote individualism.

We spoke with three leading companies in the restomod segment to find out who their clients are, how they built their reputations, what the latest industry trends are and how they source their parts and establish partnerships. Here’s what they had to say.

Weathering the Storm

There’s still a lot of interest in one-off custom classics right now, but ensuring that customers have enough funds is another thing, according to Mike Ring of Ringbrothers. The Rings thought business would slow down due to COVID-19, but it’s actually been the opposite because people are getting anxious and just want to buy.

Jonathan Ward, CEO and lead designer for Icon, echoed that sentiment.

“We actually find that demand is far greater than our capability to provide it, meaning we try and focus most of our efforts on our production models, like the Bronco and FJ Series,” Ward said. “We purposely limit the scale of projects we do in this one-off series of vehicles to either the Derelict or Reformer style and only deliver maybe three or four of those a year.”

Despite COVID-19, the shop has stayed open, and clients are keeping up with their commitments. However, Ward has some concerns about Icon’s smaller sublet partners and whether they are going to be able to help them keep up with demand.

David Miller II, vice president of marketing for R3 Performance Products—a producer of body shells—shares Ward’s concern regarding the ability to continue purchasing parts from his suppliers, some of whom might not have fared so well in recent months.

“We’ve been able to get parts so far, but if everybody else shuts down, can we still get fenders and engines?” he asked. “We’re finally starting to see the ripple where we’re getting a little bit longer lead times on parts, but people are beginning to open back up, so hopefully that won’t last long.”

Mike (right) and Jim Ring held their trophies after capturing top honors at the 2019 SEMA Battle of the Builders. Their reimagined ’69 Camaro was judged best in show by their fellow finalists at the 2019 SEMA Show.

Survival of the Fittest

Many shops want to do one-off custom restorations, but when it comes down to it, most don’t realize that it takes a large team and even more industry partners to pull it off and then be able to feel comfortable with the finished product, according to Ringbrothers.

“What really kills you in these jobs is that there’s no money left to warranty them when they’re done,” said Mike Ring. “It all comes out of your own pocket.”

There have always been shops that do custom one-off restorations, but interest in the vintage aesthetic has significantly increased, based on Ward’s experience.

“People don’t necessarily want to be a martyr to a vintage vehicle,” he said. “They have a strong affinity to the classic design style and continuity but no patience for the archaic mechanical experience. So probably the most notable segment of growth I’ve seen is to a more thoroughly reengineered and restored vehicle.”

On the other hand, Miller believes that there are 30% fewer shops doing custom restoration since the year 2000, largely because the paint and body shop world is consolidating. Most restoration is done in the back of a collision shop, and they do collision work because it’s steady and pays the bills.

“When collision slows down, the next thing you know they’re building a GTO out in the back,” Miller said. “Collision techs and restoration techs are two very different skill sets, but there are some shops that do great work.”

However, Miller lamented that when those types of shops get busy, they throw a tarp on the project and it collects dust. “That’s where you hear horror stories where a guy takes his car in and a one-year restoration project turns into four years. It’s bad for business, and it’s the reason why R3 no longer does collision,” according to Miller.

Ringbrothers unveiled a ’69 Chevrolet Camaro known as “Valkyrja” at the 2019 SEMA Show in Las Vegas. The 890hp musclecar was developed using the latest technology, including 3-D scanning and CAD design, and was assembled with modern materials, such as carbon fiber. Custom parts were created using a combination of 3-D printing and CNC machining.

The Car-Faithful Resto Client

Icon generally builds one-offs for clients who have already gone down that road and have no interest in a conventional luxury vehicle. For instance, instead of building a Raptor with aftermarket accessories or a Rolls-Royce or a Ferrari, they’re looking for something that’s a bit more under the radar and a lot more individual.

“For the most part, our clients are self-made people who’ve gotten to where they are financially in their own career path by being sort of hands-on,” Ward said. “I think they respect and understand what we do on a much deeper level. The one-offs that we have built run anywhere from $200,000 to upwards of $1 million, so they range greatly in their design, priorities, style and era to pretty much run
the gamut.”

According to Miller, his restomod clients are typically older men with some extra money to spend. They’re car-faithful and knowledgeable about their vehicles. More often than not, the build clients aren’t car people; they’re wealthy and the project is their latest toy.

“The restomod customers who are Camaro or Mustang aficionados usually have some idea of what they want, and they’ll do their research on the Internet,” he said. “They’ll tell us that they’re thinking of getting a certain kind of brakes and will ask us what we think and if it will work, so they still need some help.”

This officially licensed ’69 Yenko Camaro 427 S/C Continuation Car was built from start to finish on the Velocity Channel in fall 2018. It was the first new Yenko built in more than 40 years.

Building a Reputation

Hailing from the small town of Spring Green, Wisconsin, the Ringbrothers brand is known throughout the world, but it’s fair to say the company built its reputation at the SEMA Show. Winner of the 2019 SEMA Battle of the Builders competition, Ringbrothers’ intent is to debut everything it’s worked on at the SEMA Show because the brothers feel that the exposure is much greater than any normal car show could ever give them.

“[The SEMA Show] is like the Super Bowl for us because of the media presence,” said Mike Ring. “When you’re in Los Angeles, there’s media everywhere, and you can shoot TV shows, but out here, clients have to take multiple flights, and it takes all day to get here. That’s why SEMA is so important for us. We throw everything we have at the SEMA Show.”

When you’re just starting out, it’s difficult to establish yourself as a standalone resto-only or build-only shop and convince potential clients to trust you, according to Miller. You can’t just rent a facility, spend money on equipment, hire technicians, and then expect clients to walk in the door.

“You have to draw clients from all over unless you’re in Los Angeles or New York,” Miller said. “So the question is, how did they find you? How do you develop a reputation? Even if they do find you online, how do you stack up to the other 10 guys doing it? I’ve been banging my head against that wall for decades, and business is just
now steady.”

Miller believes that his involvement in television shows representing one of his brands (Brand New Muscle Car) on Velocity and Motor Trend Network provides some evidence that he’s legit. R3 also exhibits at the SEMA Show, and Miller estimates that 30% of his business comes from repeat clients.

“I’ve done as many as 11 restos for one person,” Miller said. “Once you treat them right, they come back, because most of them have been burned before. We don’t even ask for a deposit. Give us the car, tell us what you want done, and we’ll just take it week by week, pay as you go.”

David Miller II stands in front of the officially licensed Gone in 60 Seconds Eleanor built by Brand New Muscle Car. This particular car features a brand-new R3 Performance Products Ford-licensed replacement body, R3PP front and rear suspension, a 5.0 Coyote engine, and a 6R80 automatic transmission.

Prominent Restomod Candidates

The types of vehicles that are getting the resto treatment range from classic American muscle to four-wheel-drive trucks, particularly K5 Blazers, and Ringbrothers plans to bring an iteration of a K5 to the 2020 SEMA Show.

“We built a ’72 for ourselves and sold it for $305,000 on [digital auction platform] Bring a Trailer, but we don’t typically roll the dice like that,” said Jim Ring. “We always have a client we build for, and we don’t like to repeat something we’ve done already or even be similar. We like to change it up.”

Icon’s projects range anywhere from model years ’32–’75. Many people have personal relationships or attractions to particular vintage vehicles from their own life experiences or favorite movies, according to Ward.

“We like to do ’70s and older, where the quality foundation for the vehicles are such that they warrant the scale of work and reengineering that we like versus later-model vehicles where there’s really not much to work with,” Ward said. “Our interest starts to wane past that when you get into eras where the simplicity, quality and continuity of the design is arguably lacking, at least from our perspective.”

According to Miller, Mustangs represent about two-thirds of his business because it was the first pony car and also people are influenced by the Shelbys and Eleanors that are widely represented in movies and popular culture.

R3 Performance Products, located in Tulsa, Oklahoma, produces body and chassis solutions for ’65–’70 convertible and fastback Mustangs.

Getting to the Source

The relationships Ringbrothers forges at the SEMA Show help the company to decide whom to work with. They tend to be companies that have been around and will continue to be around and have serviced or warrantied parts that went wrong.

“Over the years, you figure out what works and what doesn’t, and you stick with the ones that work and use those products and brands in your builds,” Jim Ring said.

There are many companies that sell parts, but it’s important to find one that knows how its parts work.

“It seems funny, but there are parts out there that are made by people who don’t have a clue about how their parts work,” Mike Ring said. “We understand our products. People who steal our parts, they have no idea. They just reengineer it, but they really don’t know how to answer questions. For us, that’s what it’s about—having people who will be there to help us out when we have issues, because everybody is going to have them.”

According to Ward, shops often take the approach that they can work on anything and everything, whereas Icon keeps an open mind about what platforms they work on.

“We are decidedly opinionated about how we do what we do, so we clearly define our build styles and the fundamental priorities that are basically revisiting classic transportation in a modern context,” Ward said. “If somebody were to come to us and say, ‘I want a ’57 Chevy just like it came off the showroom floor,’ we would tell him there’s probably a specialist out there better suited. We’re all about evolving the mechanical and electrical engineering to provide the most contemporary driving experience possible married to the traditional aesthetic.”

For Icon, the decision to become involved in a project is based on how excited Ward and his team are to do it. Ideally, it’s something that hasn’t been overdone. It’s also about the relationship with the pending client.

“We’ve been fortunate over the years as our reputation has become more firmly established to create some key relationships with top suppliers,” Ward said. “When it comes to sourcing aftermarket restoration parts, we’ll generally go to the best reputed licensee of those traditional parts. But we increasingly are designing and manufacturing our own solutions, because in general, the business models for those components have to lean more toward a one-size-fits-
all approach.”

What’s Trending

People want something unique, so they’re looking for different textures and colors—anything to stand out, according to Jim Ring. They want cars that look and feel different, but unless you actually manufacture the parts yourself, most people buy from the same hot-rod parts retailers.

“There’s no disrespect in that, but if everybody buys parts from the same company and nobody is creative in actually manufacturing different stuff, then everything looks the same,” Jim Ring said.

Ward is seeing more interest in electric powertrains. Icon has also released new editions of its old-school production vehicles in response to the clients’ desire to fly under the radar.

“Less social baggage, less obvious mods and more subtlety,” Ward said. “At first glance, you can’t even tell that something has been altered unless you intimately know that platform.”

Trends that Miller sees include clients who bring in an original car and want it blown apart and restored with all-new parts.

“It used to be the coolest, most unusual unique thing ever,” Miller said. “Now it’s the majority, where everybody who comes in has a list of the work they want done. There are fewer straight restorations. It’s been happening for a while, but it’s really peaking now where it’s actually become normal, and the clients don’t think they’re ruining their cars’ value. They pick and choose what they want like an à la carte menu.”

However, when a resto customer comes in with a stock car and wants to just do a straight restoration, that’s now special where it used to be the norm, according to Miller. He has also found that, in some cases, as more clients rebuild their classic cars with modern components, restomods have a higher value at auction than their original counterparts.

Like Ward, Miller is also seeing a prevalence of electric cars and people who make electric classics, including ’67 Mustangs and ’69 Camaros.

“Electric classics are just now starting,” Miller said. “Some guys are freaking out, thinking it’s the end of the world, but if it looks cool and it goes fast, I’m okay with it. Gasoline cars aren’t going away. Even if every soccer mom in the world is driving an electric minivan, somebody will still have an old gas-powered Mustang. They’ll be toys; they won’t be daily drivers. But they’re not going away—not in my lifetime.”

SEMA News—August 2020

INDUSTRY NEWS

Fast Facts

Jonathan Mill

Power Automedia announced that accomplished automotive executive Jonathan Mill joined the company. Mill accepted a role as executive producer and general manager of Alloy Studios—Power Automedia’s video production company. Prior to joining Power Automedia, Mill developed the award-winning E-Stopp—a pushbutton emergency brake and an antitheft unit for custom and classic cars—and he soon found himself in the entertainment side of automotive, leading integrated marketing and sales for broadcast. Mill later became publisher of Hot Rod and was honored as a SEMA Gen-III Innovator.

Morgan Lucas

Lucas Oil Products, the California-based distributor and manufacturer of motor oils and additives, announced that Morgan Lucas, senior vice president of Lucas Oil Products, will take over as president of Lucas Oil. Lucas’ career started with his professional racing debut in 2004. He soon established his own race team, Morgan Lucas Racing, where he won multiple event championships. In his new position as president, Lucas will report directly to his father, CEO Forrest Lucas.

Hopkins Manufacturing Corp. announced that it and its subsidiary, Hopkins Canada Inc., have acquired the retail automotive splashguard product lines from NuVue Products Inc. of Buffalo, New York, and NuVue Products Ltd. of Ontario, Canada, formerly known as Powerflow. The acquisition includes the established brand names RoadSport, Big Mudder, ProFit, BadgeZ, RoadGuard and Defender Tow Guard, plus the inventory, patents and intellectual property for the splashguard and mud-flap lines.

Yamaha Motor Corp. USA launched an all-new “Deliver Your Ride” program supporting Yamaha dealers that are able to complete vehicle purchases remotely and then deliver the product directly to customers. The new program includes ATV, side-by-side, motorcycle and snowmobile products and is available nationwide wherever dealers can legally and safely participate. Interested customers can contact their local Yamaha dealer or visit www.yamahamotorsports.com.

Joe Kerick

Dura-Bond Bearing named Joe Kerick its new product development manager. Kerick is a veteran of the transmission and aftermarket replacement parts industries and most recently was director of product management for Restoration Parts Unlimited. Prior to that, he was a senior category manager at Transtar Industries and a senior product manager with Standard Motor Products.

Sean Lannoo

Continental named Sean Lannoo sales technical training supervisor for the company’s VDO, Redi-Sensor, ATE, Autodiagnos and ClearContact aftermarket product lines. Lannoo leads a team of 11 training specialists who provide technical support and education on Continental aftermarket product lines to customer sales personnel and professional technicians throughout the United States and Canada. Lannoo joined Continental in 2013 as sales technical training specialist for the company’s VDO-branded aftermarket product lines. Lannoo was previously with Continental from 1997–2010 and played a key technical support role, serving as both an engineering analyst and product manager.

Ashley Khan

Permatex named Ashley Khan marketing manager for the Permatex and Versachem portfolio of products. Paco Agrafojo, Permatex director of marketing, made the announcement and noted that Khan will be based in Hartford, Connecticut. Khan joins Permatex in her third role with Illinois Tool Works, most recently serving as the brand marketing manager for Permatex Canada Inc., where she managed the company’s Rain-X, Slime, Fix-A-Flat, Black Magic and Gumout brands.

Dani Boudreau

Martin & Company announced the addition of Dani Boudreau as traffic and communications manager. Boudreau previously served in numerous communication management roles in the wedding industry, logistics and the Tennessee state park system. With a B.A. degree in public relations from Austin Peay University, Boudreau is highly skilled in the areas of event planning, social-media strategy, campaign planning, written and verbal communication, crisis management and creative production. As traffic and communications manager, she will be responsible for ensuring that all projects are completed according to budget and the client’s timetable and will assist in internal and external communications.

Brenton Productions’ series “FourWheeler” has been picked up for a second season with MotorTrend TV and the MotorTrend app. With 10 new episodes, “FourWheeler” concentrates on aggressive off-road builds with the extreme off-roader in mind. At the end of each build, host Ian Johnson (Extreme 4X4) tests its capabilities in the ultimate off-road environment.