OK I'll bite. As we are opening our souls
It's April 1980 and aged 17 and three quarters I've just passed my driving test at the first attempt despite knocking over a traffic cone and thinking I'd blown it (to be fair, it wasn't in a line with the others, honest guv). That evening I pop down to the Kings Arms in Wilmslow for a celebratory pint in my 1973 turquoise metallic 1303 Super Beetle with wolfrace alloys and park next a red 240Z. I am smitten, check it out from all angles inside and out and vow that one day I will have one.
From a young age I have always loved all things motoring and especially classics, which in those days meant something post-war from the 50/60s and usually British, Jaguars, Healeys, Triumphs, MGs etc. Aged 21 I bought my first classic - a 1966 MGB GT. A couple of years later I was left a smallish but decent enough sum in a relatives will that I could access when I was 25. In Classic Cars magazine adverts I had noticed just one or two dealers importing old British cars from the States and I had an Uncle in the deep South. I flew over the week after my 25th birthday and ended up buying two E types, a 1966 4.2 S1 Roadster in mint condition and a 1971 V12 Coupe which was all original and rust free but needed paint. I delivered them to Charleston port and eagerly awaited their arrival at Liverpool docks.
So began a business in classic cars that became full-time for a fantastic but all too brief a period between 1988 and 1992. In those days there was very little established trade in import/export of cars so it wasn't easy setting up the deals, email/internet did not exist, you had to fly over yourself to find the cars, beating the bushes as the Americans used to say or have honest reliable finders (difficult as most Americans would sell you their Granny - no offence Mike Sacyclone, you are excepted lol). Sometimes you had to wait for air mail pics of the cars to arrive from sellers. Fax was the quickest means of communication but black and white fax images were not much good to ascertain condition. Up until that point most trade had been the other way, UK to USA due to beneficial exchange rates for the Americans in the early/mid-80's so it was a trailblazing exercise and hence profits were very decent. So decent in fact that I gave up my regular 9-5 job in marketing with Ford Europe when given an ultimatum by the Sales Director. He hadn't taken kindly to me driving to work in E types and fielding sales calls from potential buyers lol - nice entreprenerial skills he said but not on our time! Make your choice - so I took the risk and left.
Over that 4/5 year period I imported/temporarily owned all kinds of classics, British, Italian, French but never anything Japanese. In fact I was exporting all kinds of weird classics to Japan via a friend with contacts. Mini's, Vanden Plas 1300's, Riley Elfs, Wolsey Hornets and especially Lotus - Climax Elites, Europa, Elans etc. I had forgotten all about the 240Z that I had vowed to buy the day I passed my driving test.
Back to 1992, anyone who was a classic car dealer back then will tell you it was carnage, annus horibillus or whatever it is called.
Mortgage interest rates hit 15% and I was living on beans on toast to make sure the mortgage was paid every month whilst many classic dealers lost their shirt in what was the last major recession. People were struggling to keep their houses and classic cars were way down the list on anyones priorities. Demand and business' literally fell off a cliff. The old adage applies, don't mix business and pleasure. I could hardly face looking at classic cars for a good while afterwards and I was lucky enough to develop other non-car related business'.
I had various classics over the intervening years, air cooled stuff, Porsche 911/912, Karmann Ghias, Triumph Stag (eek..it had two rear seats for the kids lol) VW Splitties (another family man's classic) when in 2012 I suddenly remembered about the 240Z from way back when, the excited feeling I had on seeing it and decided to find one. Most of the UK cars I saw were rot boxes or had dubious welding repairs along the way so naturally enough I went back to the States. In South Carolina found a beautiful 1971 car which had covered just 38,000 miles from new and had belonged to a car collector from when it was only a year old, it had loads of history including every fill up from new! Finally some 32 years later I had made that boyhood dream come true and I was not disappointed when it arrived and I got to drive a 240Z all those years later.
Whilst I have a few classics, I love this first Z that I bought and it is old faithful. I really can't think of too many other cars I would rather have instead.
Somehow the big Amercan stuff can be made to hussle along. I remember seeing the Galaxies when I was a kid.
