Kickin' Rocks

with Don Pennington

Big Money, Purple Boxes and Hot Rod Immortality

It seems that within every hot rodder, or guy that screws with cars, American cars, there is this gut drive to do your own deal. For many that drive pops up by building a car the way they want, or collecting old stuff regardless of how weird the stuff is to others, or being your own boss.  Owning a business that makes gobs of money has filtered through everybody's brain at one time or another. There are only about six million reasons why you will not be successful, or so they say, they being the guys that sit on the curb with a beer in one hand and their unemployment check in the other. Not to be the naysayer but it's a long hard climb pursuing your dream unless you are either lucky or the road to financial excess has been paved by Mom and Pop. There is something that happens to a guy when he takes the bit in his teeth and starts on the new path of great riches, he doesn't see the down side or any of the walls that others build to keep you in your place, this may be why so many screwy ideas are so successful. Puttin' on the down side blinders is rule number one in starting up your own deal.

Back in the day, so they say, it was a lot easier to hit the big gazonga. Many say that in the late 40s, after the war, it was a no brainer to hit the Mother Lode, you could make about anything and you'd start shoveling the dollaros. Just look at all the outfits that are huge today, outfits like Edelbrock and Hilborn and dozens more that are now part of bigger operations. Okay there were a lot of jackpots hit, but there were ten times as many that failed, just like today. Talking to the old guys the common denominator to any success is persistence, long hours and putting your financial neck on the line every day. If you want to start your own deal, you just gotta do it!

Okay let's get going! Already got the earth shaking idea, so let's rent a building, get a phone, open a bank account, pay lots of dollars for licenses and permits and stuff, deposits to the utility companies and don't forget the toilet paper, assuming your new world headquarters has a facility inside the building. Before you turn around, all the cash you had dedicated to run this little money maker for a year or so... is gone, and the VISA card is flashing around like Benjie Honna's blades. That is one big difference between today and then, the old guys didn't have credit cards. Yes that's true. For the benefit of you young whipper-snappers, this credit card hustle is not very old, there were none at all in 1950 or maybe even 1960, and there were very few ways to borrow money. Today all you need is your neighbor's SS number and mailing address and you can get fifteen or twenty cards with a million five at your fingertips. The reason you use your neighbors address is essential to the success of your new enterprises, if the hook's on him, then you don't have to pay the credit card freaks and your monthly nut is much lower. The only real requirement to this working is that you have a neighbor with a no lock mail box so you can get in there and skim off those VISA statements before he sees them.

All these entrepreneurs are absolutely positive that they have the best idea ever, whether it's a new slant on something that's already out there, or a revolutionary earth shattering new invention, or... in the case of some of our more prolific "gettin' jeggie with it" mail order companies, simply order a couple of those terrific items that… let's say Roy has thought up, done all the R&D on and pumped his last dollar into, send them over to the knock-off buddahs, they will come back at ten cents on the dollar so you can really screw Roy with these under priced edgy quality rippers, and you don't have to pay ol' Roy dime one or even give him an attaboy! Those glossy cover 1-800 catalogs should have Made in Chinna stickers on a large part of what they sell. There are so many of these import knockers that the sticker process alone would create a new cottage industry, Stickers R Us or some such nonsense.  If you look close, the imported car items are actually marked, but you gotta look close! If they import an item, many times the box is required to be labeled… not the part. There's your government in action again, protecting the homestead. The importers just repackage the item and… presto… no Chinna sticker! This import knock-off thing has put many a legit manufacturer and seller in a shadow, it has become common to think that the speed part you are considering buying is made overseas, when just the opposite is most likely true. Even the import mongers offer a selection of Made in USA parts, but the shadow still hurts those talented Roy guys and those that refuse to sell knock-offs. What gripes me about some of these big time rip-off guys is that when they were starting their businesses, if someone had done what they are doing, they would have been in the bankruptcy line long ago. Chances are they were on the "little guy getting started list", and many of the manufacturers they got their stuff from let them work on margin and bent over backwards to help them be successful. Anymore it's not about being successful, they are already there, it's about maxing out the profit, gettin' all the pocket change they can get no matter who's throat gets cut. You can have real good black figures without drawing blood, and the benefit of being respected for your ewthics too. Interesting concept.

Sometimes you don't actually have to come up with a good idea, you just need a groovy name and zippy packaging. This is linked closely with the "convenience" doctrine, it seems people buy eyeball first, then worry about making it work, or when they can't make it work because it's junk, they blame everybody but the freak in the mirror that bought it. Times have changed, so they tell me, and people want convenience. No... they don't really want convenience, people are just getting lazy and many just don't know how to make stuff, especially when they can buy it or pay someone else to bolt it together for them. So then the catalog deal is in itself a good business idea. Gather up all this stuff and put it in one book...with pictures because we really like looking at pictures... bingo, one stop shopping! 1-800-bang-my-card.

I've got to tell you this story. Roy is a real guy. He scratch built top fuel diggers in the 60s and has been coming up with very unique and original stuff since day one. He's got two very fast hand built Bonneville cars and proudly wears his Lions Drag Strip jacket most days.  Those chassis builder guys are really crafty. He also was the first guy to make a ‘32 rail…other than Henry, no names here but most of you know of  him and have probably bought parts from him or his kid Jay… but no names... liability and all that.  He came up with a tool for adjusting valves that was the cat's meow, probably through many hours of trial and error until the thing worked. So he started selling them, one customer was a catalog company, they bought from him for a couple of years, and then one of the kids of the guy that started the catalog place… no names… decided to maximize profit so they had it ripped off in Chinna. They still sell the item, but no money going Roy's way! I don't buy from these guys, mostly because of this deal and I don't like the color of their bee hive race cars. I guess that's the little guys ultimate power, voting yeah or nay, the power of VISA lives.

So, you can have a good idea, or steal one, or just sell somebody else's stuff, or do just about anything you can come up with. The big difference is, which idea has the best chance at success that let's you sleep at night? Usually the guys that sit and think about all the ups and downs usually don't win. It's the guy that is nuts about what he does and rattles every cage in sight and sells the hell out of the stuff then looks around one day and he is eyeball deep in cash. But for some people, selling a lot of stuff isn't what they are after, sometimes it just making something cool and selling enough to pay the phone bill, guys like Jocko and thousands others. These guys are the real rock of the hot rod world. We all know guys that come up with "why didn't I think of that" stuff and pretty soon this really slick little deal shows up on his car where other people look at it and measure it, and pretty soon it's in the catalogs. The very core of hot rodding is cuttin' stuff up and making it better, if you didn't cut up the car there wouldn't be any hot rods! If it wasn't for these guys the industry would have warehouses full of empty boxes, if they could even make the payment on the warehouse!        

The really fun thing about being your own boss and making all that money is spending it all on cool stuff. First we need a new truck to run around and pick-up stuff, probably new, with air and all the stuff, lower it, and a set of those one-off Foose wheels, maybe some cool striping and your name lettered in gold leaf on the doors... and it's only $683 a month, plus insurance. No problem, everybody knows these guys in business have gobs of cash. One thing that doesn't work too well… you really don't get to keep ALL the money, there are your partners. But wait… I don't got no stinkin' pardners! Yes you do! The Feds are your first partner, no investment on their part, but they want somewhere between 10 and 20% of your cash…  and maybe more depending on how many welfare checks are going out this month. Then there is Social Security, and umpteen state agencies that have their hands jammed in you pockets. There are partners you don't even know about. The one I like is the business license based on gross sales. Because you bring so much cash/business/jobs into your community, your license costs more that they guy that doesn't! Government financial intervention is so insidious that they appear to be spending 24 hours a day 7 days a week designing ways to strangle the very thing that feeds them! Not to worry, you've got a great idea…you'll make millions… there will be plenty of cash for everybody… full speed ahead!

So you've been going for about six months now, then one day you are taking a quiet break and it hits you! "What the hell am I doing? All these bills, all these obligations…haven't made a single widget yet, let alone sell one! Who knew?"   Oh shoot… or something like that…I just quit my job… maybe I can get it back, no seniority or vacation or good pay, but I can keep the truck, maybe get a night job to pay for it.  

Well enough of this stammering about someone else's hopes and dreams, I have things to do to keep the wolves away from MY door. The UPS guy is here dumping off some of those mail order Chinneeze parts, drop shipped direct from Hong Kong, I‘ve got to rewrite the instructions so it sounds like they were made here and repackage in my new zippy chartreuse and purple boxes. It's a new business and as a start up promotion I'm invoicing them out at cost less thirty, and toss them back in the UPS crummy for overnight delivery. (Maybe hold a few out to use on my ride, no time to build my own, besides there are those naps that cut into fab time.) The bottom line of my new industry shaking start-up doesn't look too good right now, but the customers are happy… maybe they'll come back when we go retail. That's the plan, sell at a loss to get customers and then raise the price, I‘m sure they will come back and buy more. Hope there'll be enough change left over to pay the lawyer, I got some blue papers, something about unauthorized infringement or some such garbage. I'm only sellin' a few of those bootlegged anodized billet flamed widgets, don't know why Roy is sending those papers to me, I only sold a few of those things, why is he picking on me?

Well this is it for the last four years of Gazette blathering. The powers-at-be seem to think my options elsewhere are to my best interest, maybe so. I have enjoyed, for the most part, grinding out my monthly sermons, but it doesn't appear that anyone cares. Feedback has been little to zero and the usual lip service you get after expounding your opinions on others, hasn't been heard of. Maybe nobody cares, hope not. So here's kickin' my last rock under the yellow Goodguys flag, I liked it, hope you did too. Kickin' Out!