#73 - Hybrid Broncos, Hyundai’s Boulder Concept, Special Edition Jeeps, Manufactures Future Problems, & Much More
Clutch Culture Podcast
#73 - Hybrid Broncos, Hyundai’s Boulder Concept, Special Edition Jeeps, Manufactures Future Problems, & Much More
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72:43
Concept
tuning
Tuning means adjusting a car to make it feel different—usually faster or more responsive. People might change settings or add parts so the car drives the way they want.
Concept
cars and coffees
Cars and coffees are casual meetups where car people gather, usually in the morning, to hang out and look at each other’s cars. It’s a good place to see what normal enthusiasts actually do.
Concept
Amelia Island
Amelia Island is a well-known car event where people bring some of the best classic cars. It’s used as a reference point for cars that are cared for and finished at a very high level.
Concept
paint peeling off the hood
Peeling paint is a major red flag for restoration quality and paint preparation—often indicating poor surface prep, incorrect coatings, or inadequate curing. In collector-car discussions, this kind of defect undermines the “meticulous” standard the speaker is describing.
Concept
Facebook Marketplace
Facebook Marketplace is like an online classifieds section. People post cars for sale there, so you have to be careful because not every listing is accurate or well-documented.
Concept
SEMA
SEMA is a big car show in the U.S. that’s mostly about performance parts and custom builds. If someone’s always going, it usually means they’re really into cars and upgrades.
Concept
online auction platforms
Online auction platforms make it easier to buy and sell cars without being in the same physical location. They also accelerate the “investment” mindset by exposing more buyers to market pricing and frequent listings.
Concept
depreciation
Depreciation is how much your car loses value as years go by. Even if nothing breaks, your car can still be costing you money because it’s worth less later.
Term
Apple CarPlay
Apple CarPlay lets you use your iPhone through the car’s screen. If a car loses CarPlay support, you may have fewer easy ways to use navigation and music.
Term
recall
A recall means the company admits something might be wrong with the car. They ask you to get it fixed, usually at no cost, because it could be unsafe or cause problems.
Term
axles
The axle is what helps the wheels roll by connecting them to the powertrain. If a recall mentions axles, it means there may be a risk that the wheel connection could fail.
Brand
Ford
Ford is a major car company. In this segment, they’re talking about how Ford has been run and how recalls can become a big public issue.
Brand
Hyundai
Hyundai is a big car company. When they do a big “reveal,” it usually means they’re showing something new—like a concept car or a future direction for their vehicles.
Brand
BMW
BMW is a popular car brand with a big community of people who like modifying their cars. The speaker is linking AC Schnitzer’s situation to how BMW tuning culture might be impacted.
Concept
car clubs
Car clubs are groups of people who like the same kinds of cars. They help members meet others and learn what to do with their vehicles.
Term
275,000 miles
That’s a lot of miles—275,000. The point is that the truck still looks great, which suggests it’s been cared for well.
Concept
preservation vs. just low miles
They’re making a point that a car isn’t valuable just because it has low miles. It’s more impressive when it’s been well cared for and still got used, not left sitting.
Concept
body on frame
“Body on frame” means the car’s body sits on a separate metal frame, like a truck. Off-road vehicles often use this because it’s sturdy for bumps and rough trails.
Term
Hot Wheels
Hot Wheels is a toy car brand. If they say something looks like it came from Hot Wheels, they mean it looks super stylized and “toy-cool.”
Term
tow hitch mirror
A tow hitch mirror is an auxiliary mirror that mounts to the trailer hitch area to improve rear visibility while towing. It helps drivers see around the trailer, which can block the view in the regular side mirrors.
Term
center console
The center console is the area between the two front seats. It usually has buttons, storage, and sometimes a screen, and they’re saying this one looks especially well-designed.
Term
heads up display
A heads-up display is a screen that shows driving info on the windshield. It’s meant to help you see things like speed without looking down at the dashboard.
Term
blinker
“Blinker” here means the turn signal. Modern vehicles often monitor turn-signal use and can trigger warnings if you appear to change lanes without signaling.
Concept
30th anniversary edition
A 30th anniversary edition is a special version of a vehicle made to celebrate a milestone. It usually comes with unique styling details like paint and wheels to make it stand out.
Term
crank up windows
“Crank up windows” means the windows go up and down by turning a handle by hand. Some cars have power windows with buttons, but these are manual.
Concept
$1,800 cheaper
A price difference like “$1,800 cheaper” is a common way automakers position trims or updated versions against competitors. In this context, the hosts suggest the change is a “move,” meaning the lower price may be intended to improve sales even if the redesign isn’t universally liked.
Term
new fascia
“Fascia” refers to the front-end bodywork—typically the bumper cover, grille area, and surrounding trim. A “new fascia” can be mostly cosmetic, but it can also accompany cooling, lighting, or crash-structure changes.
Term
Vespa
A Vespa is a type of small scooter. People sometimes say “Vespa” even when they mean scooters in general.
Term
tires and wheels
Tires and wheels work together to help the car grip the road and ride smoothly. The speaker is saying this is already well-understood technology, so it shouldn’t need to be “re-invented.”
LIVE
All right, you know what I've realized?
We've curated or created this large batch of car enthusiasts,
but what I've learned is they like to make jokes,
like to be cool, but they also just like to be like adults,
mature, if that makes sense.
When we talk about tuning and doing stuff to cars,
they're all for it, but they're not like,
that's not on the forefront of what they like to do
with their cars.
I actually just like to enjoy driving
and sometimes the most modern stuff,
but really just whatever they enjoy.
They don't, they're not huge tinkers.
And I know it's not everybody,
but I don't know if you've seen this, man.
I feel like they're just not a lot of them
into heavy mod to the moon type stuff.
No, I mean, and that's what we've kind of told people
is what is presented on social media from creators
isn't really what the car enthusiast is doing, right?
It's not really what they're a part of.
They're not, you know, they're not ripping their car down
and putting all these modifications in their garage.
There's a certain segment of it,
but you can go to cars and coffees for what?
Well, over a decade now and see that wasn't true,
which I think is why we're seeing a shift
in so many creators saying, you know, my views are down,
things aren't going as well.
Look, man, I mean, the days of these heavy modified channels,
you know, people started to realize none of it was good.
Like I said, all you got to do is walk SEMA one time
with any kind of keen eye and go,
yeah, this shit on the internet's not real.
Have you ever, when's the last time you missed a SEMA?
Got to be close to like 10 years.
So you've been going consistently for a decade.
Well, I mean, 15 years, I mean,
maybe I missed one or two in there in 15 years.
Now, if you were to explain to the listeners,
because I don't think they know just how close it is
to your shop, how often you do go
and how long you do spend when you're there,
what's in a one sentence elevator pitch,
what could you tell people that you've seen
like the most drastic or the most even interesting change
over the last 10, 15 years?
The fact that the work is still bad.
I mean, that's the most astonishing thing to me.
And then there's going to be people in the comments
that have never been there.
And they see stuff online, they're like, well, it's great.
Or they go in person and you find out when they make a comment
that they don't really have a keen eye to what great is.
Right, so for anybody that's never been around
truly great cars, they don't know what that level looks like.
And a truly great car means top to bottom,
everything is great.
Every little piece is meticulous.
That is .0000001% of modified cars.
Like it's not to throw shade at somebody or to say,
hey, man, if you love your car and you did it,
that's all individual.
But just judging, I always tell people,
if you go to Pebble Beach, you go to Amelia Island,
you go to Car Week in Scottsdale,
the vast majority of stuff you see is not great.
It is cool, it's good, there's a lot of overlooked parts of it.
I tell people this all the time, we got this,
what was supposed to be one of the best vintage Broncos
ever done, and one of my clients bought it.
You could literally take a fingernail
and peel the paint off the hood.
Oh, no way, how much did you pay for it?
I want to say at the time when things were unheard of
in the twos, we were probably in the twos.
Yeah, which was unheard of back then.
I mean, it was a great shop and a famous shop,
and I hear all that stuff all the time.
And for those that don't know, that's my world.
My world is going into somebody's collection
and going, oh no, look what we got here.
I've seen it in Ferrari collections,
I've seen it in classic muscle car collections.
And again, it's not a judgment thing.
They're asking me my opinion and I go,
yeah, you got a problem here.
You know what I've never asked you?
Yeah.
If somebody were to call you in, how often has it been
where you're assessing a collection
that maybe is exchanging just hands
to another collector, for instance,
and you're having to give them the honest truth of like,
bro, this is not worth what you think it's gonna be worth.
So, I mean, almost every one of them.
I mean, almost 100% of the time.
I mean, it's, I would say it is 100% of the time.
So, we do reports on collections.
So, each car gets a report, we go through it.
I mean, we go through, I think of it like a 10X PPI.
I was gonna say, okay, just okay.
Okay.
We give a report on each car.
I've never been in, by the time we get called
into a collection usually,
unless somebody's becoming a new collector
and we're sort of there to be a part of it,
if I'm going into an existing collection,
I don't name the price.
I mean, say it's a $50 million collection.
No, I mean, it's very rare that they have cars
that are in pristine condition.
Do you ever have anybody come back and say,
hey, man, I'm really glad you talked to me
out of something or guided me?
Well, I get, you get one of two people.
It's sort of like what we see in comment sections
on everybody's stuff.
When you say stuff, the problem is,
is you're dealing with a lot of people
that have never seen what the elite level looks like, right?
So if you make a comment on a car that they own,
they're already convinced theirs is in pristine condition.
You guys can all see that, everybody watching us.
I mean, go to a Facebook marketplace, sales post,
go, you know, bring a trailer, cars and bids.
The amount of people that are convinced
that they have something that's pristine
is way out of whack with how many things
are actually pristine.
And this is the collector world,
the average daily driver, all of that.
So yeah, it's, you find out very quickly
after you sort of do a report on people's collections,
how serious they are about getting their collection
to great, and that's even a small number.
I mean, it's a small number that really wanna do
what it takes to get their collection back into shape
and to the pristine condition.
It's just very rare.
And I know a lot of people think
because somebody has a car collection,
that means they're gonna take care of their cars.
And that's the furthest thing from the truth.
They're just able to afford a lot of cars in most cases.
This might be a weird question, it doesn't have an answer,
but in the last 10 or 15 years,
we'll just use like the consistently going to SEMA.
And I would imagine the other big auctions as well.
Have you seen either an increase or decreasing
the amount of people that are actually going out
and trying to gobble up cars and start collections?
No, that's probably gone up a little bit
because we're now seeing it,
people are being presented that this is an asset class.
So it's sort of like this.
I mean, if you go back to 2008, 2009,
the only people that were thinking about investing
in real estate were people that were hardcore
into real estate.
If you fast forward now with eight zillion people
talking on the internet,
everybody thinks they're gonna build
a real estate portfolio.
So it's the same thing with cars now.
And that started, let's say it, during the pandemic.
Everybody's sitting at home.
You have these online auction platforms,
everybody that's creating any type of content like we are
that doesn't have any experience
is starting to call cars an asset class.
When not thinking about,
I told a story on here.
I mean, there's a Ferrari situation we have here
in Las Vegas that it's gonna cost somebody 400 grand
to get the car running.
Like on a classic Ferrari?
Yes.
It's gonna cost 400 grand to get this thing
just running again.
And it's in rough shape after that.
And it's worth a lot of money, quote unquote.
By the time we all get said and done,
him storing it all these years,
him moving it around all these years,
you look at it, man, the money dries up pretty quick, right?
So all of this mythical stuff around cars
being an asset class,
those of us that have been around longer than five minutes,
we go 99% of the stories you guys are hearing
about it being an asset class isn't really true.
And I think there are some YouTubers
who are liquidating their collections
who bought things like SF90
and clipped 400 grand out of their pocket
the minute they bought it.
I mean, they just lost 400 grand, just lit it on fire.
Okay, so now you're 400 grand negative,
you got to put that through the rest of the collection
that you're probably close to break even on.
You're 400 grand in the hole.
And you haven't maintained any,
you haven't sent any to the shop,
you haven't done a PPF,
you haven't had all your collection serviced,
you haven't stored it, which is a big thing
people don't think about,
you haven't insured the cars.
Which- I haven't even driven the cars maybe, right?
Yeah, I mean, which insurance
is going through the roof on these things
because you're doing a lot of stated insurance
through companies like Hagerty.
It can look like a deal if you have three or four cars,
but go to somebody that has 50 cars with real value,
that number's pretty big.
And so all of the sudden,
people with no experience don't understand
the minor things that we're talking about
because they've never been exposed to it.
Just like, I think the last time we talked about SEMA,
we had a couple guys that,
I think it was the first SEMA they went to
and they're like, well, these cars were in great shape.
Oh yeah.
You just don't have the eye.
You don't know what you don't know.
And by the way,
I also wouldn't have known 15, 16, 17 years ago.
So it's not a judgment on my part.
It's that the more you're exposed to elite
and what is actually great
and what is actually in that 1%, 3%,
whatever number you wanna use,
that's when you start to understand
that the perspective is what matters.
And most builders that we've worked with on customs
or refurbishing an exotic or whatever,
when they get called out,
they didn't realize they were doing it wrong.
And that's a fact.
What was the, if you had to just guess,
what was the projected value of this car
that they still had to put 400 plus K into?
Oh, it's every bit of three and a half,
three and a half mil.
But the problem is it's estimates right now,
it's gonna be like a 1.1 or 1.2 million dollar bill
to get it right.
And again, he put over a million to buy in it
and he stored it all these years.
So you're looking at his cost basis
of being somewhere around three to three and a half million
and just to get his three and a half million out.
Now, what people are gonna say is,
well, then he broke even, exactly right.
I don't think that's bad.
But if you broke even after, let's call it 25 years
on the S&P, you would think it's a bad investment.
Yeah.
Okay.
So that is an asset class is not what people think.
Now, we are big fans and let me make this clear.
If you can break even on your car, that's great.
Yes.
That's fantastic.
But that's not an asset class.
Okay, an asset class is something you go,
I'm gonna put my money in here for 25 years,
it's gonna grow and it's gonna grow massively
over what I invested.
So if I put a million dollars into the S&P 25 years ago,
I wouldn't have to worry whether or not
I gained a lot of money.
I mean, you guys can go ahead and plug that into AI
and it'll tell you what a million dollars
would have turned into in the S&P.
You're probably in some insane territory
with the returns we've seen over the last 25 years.
Same thing with real estate if you did it 25 years ago.
So we gotta be careful with the word asset
and the way it's being set around cars
because really good car ownership
is getting free mileage at a break-even point.
Right, and you know what you don't hear a lot?
At least I have it and I watch over the last 10,
12, 13 years a slew of different people.
You don't really hear the term phantom cost in cars,
whether it's a car or a small collection,
like you wouldn't real estate for instance.
Like you just, you don't hear that at all.
No one ever divulges what that could be.
Well, and I'll say this, very rarely have I walked into
detailed balance sheets of collections.
That makes sense.
That makes sense.
Let's all be fair about it.
When you start giving them the details,
you start to get a lot of pushback and they go,
well, I didn't realize this and I didn't realize that.
I didn't, I know you did.
You took it into account.
You would have known if you took it into account.
You didn't ever put a spreadsheet together
on this specific car.
And when we do that in people's collection,
first of all, most people are thankful
because now they actually know
what it's costing them to keep their cars.
That may cause some people to dig further in
and go buy more cars because they have that kind of wealth.
Or somebody may say, hey, I need to liquidate some of this.
I didn't realize I was kind of bleeding money
through all of these little different avenues.
Like one of the things that people don't realize is,
you know, if you start up a car and it never really moves,
you're gonna still have to change the oil.
Just because it didn't move doesn't mean
that that oil is healthy in that engine, right?
Like because you have all kinds of moisture buildup
in that oil and you don't get to burn it off
and you don't get it out working through all of it.
So one of the things is,
is that a lot of people that own collections
or just own four or five cars
and some of them don't get driven,
is that you still gotta do oil changes.
You still gotta look through it.
You still gotta realize there's gonna be a cost to all of this.
And it amazes me, it has from the beginning,
how many people just don't realize, like you said,
there's all of these little nickel and dime moments
that the more expensive the car,
they're not nickels and dimes anymore.
Yeah, it compounds quickly.
Like we dealt with a Ferrari,
we've dealt with this a few times.
I mean, we shared it on here,
where somebody just had a transmission go out on a Ferrari
and Ferrari's like, yeah, that's on you.
Like, I don't care what you think.
Get the peace sign and disappear.
I don't think, I don't care what you think
and what you think we should cover, we don't care.
And right there, you could have a $290,000 car
that has a $50,000 transmission bill.
Now, what do you think that balance sheet
on that car looks like?
It's not real healthy, right?
It's, you're in the negative pretty quick.
And that's not a bad thing.
One of the things that I say all of the time,
and I hope we get across here,
guys, there's people that can lose money on cars,
it's never a thought.
And that's a lot of people that I deal with.
It's never a thought, it's never a worry.
They can write the check, they'll never miss the money.
What we see from the average buyer that's become concerning
is how many people buy platforms that they lose,
where they used to lose 10 to 12% a year,
they're losing 30% in the first year.
And now they're losing it on a number
they've never really been in before.
They've bought an $85,000 truck,
they've gone to trade it in, and it's 55 grand.
So you have that, right?
The depreciation set.
So if we were to compare the two,
we have a lot of regular, schmagular,
average enthusiasts alike, like I said,
to buy new cars every once in a while
or just hang on to old stuff, or even buy older stuff,
versus the collectors you're talking about
in the upper echelon of I buy a car
or I collect a bunch of cars.
The depreciation for the average consumer,
we'll just say like ourselves or our listeners,
and then the repair cost,
and then all those little phantom costs,
like there is, I was just thinking about this earlier
this week, like what are the core pillars
of the things that the average consumer
should be worrying about?
Because I came across this randomly delivered,
or I'm not delivered, but it was shown to me
this mechanic, and he was talking about
how he's been observing, he's been a mechanic for years,
he owns a shop somewhere in South Dakota,
North Dakota, something like that.
And the amount of parts that are just not being produced
is the timeline is shrinking.
Like before they used to produce for platforms,
10, 12, 15 plus years, 20 years,
now it's shrinking to like six to seven years.
And then the parts are gone.
So the idea was, if people are buying older cars,
that's great, but when today's current cars
become the older cars, people are gonna be screwed
between tech stacks inside and then all the other components,
dude, people are gonna be screwed.
Well, you're gonna have to,
you could see a real revitalization of quote unquote,
audio shops to go in and rewire infotainment systems,
that could become, I'm not saying it's going to,
but you could see where you have,
I think we did an accurate story or accurate,
like, yeah, we're just not gonna support
the old tech system anymore.
And so like good luck.
Right, right, right.
Well, for those cars to work,
somebody at an audio shop is gonna have to go in
and rewire all of that tech and put a new system in.
So you could see a real revitalization around that
as we probably have to get some ways down the road here.
I think the one you have to be scared about is GM.
Yeah.
You know, GM, if I'm not mistaken, their plan is this,
you're basically gonna get everything for free
for like seven to eight years.
And then at that time,
you're gonna have to pay for navigation,
you're gonna have to pay,
like it's some type of plan like that.
I don't, guys don't quote me on that,
but it's some type of plan of,
you're gonna buy it with their new system
because they're getting rid of Apple CarPlay.
And then there's gonna be some cutoff time
where the subscription thing is going to be a necessity
to keep running that car.
Yeah.
I think we did cover that around like Thanksgiving last year.
But I don't think all the details were out there.
I think it's starting to leak out,
whether that's internal memos
or they've actually made the announcement.
So guys, if they've made the announcement,
I just, you know, I just, let's be clear,
not real worried about GM tech.
It's not like high on my list.
You know, I just think that you're going to see
a lot of things, like you said,
tech stacking is going to have a real effect
at the 10 year, the 15 year,
because now if you go back and you look at my like 2003 LX
or my 2008 BMW, the tech is outdated,
but the tech is not destructive to the car
and the way that it operates.
So if everybody's thinking like,
well, we've had tech for a long time.
Yeah, but we haven't been running sensor systems
through the infotainment, through the entire car,
through the windshield, through the side mirrors,
through that hasn't been as long as you think.
And as they abandon platforms,
they're just not going to invest in them.
So they're going to go, like Acura said,
hey, good luck, we're not doing this anymore.
They're not going to be the last one to do that.
They were just kind of the first one that said,
yeah, we're good.
All right, good luck to you.
If you bought an MDX from these years,
whatever happens, bud, I mean, I hope it works out for you.
And that's in reference to like Acura Honda,
which is like known for reliability, right?
I've been saying some videos
where some of the more domestic brands,
I'll give you an example, Challengers.
The current iteration,
I know they just change your chargers even,
but for the longest time, it had that same style,
the same platform.
And now that they're getting miles put on them
and they're being driven a certain way
that we can all kind of guess,
there's this one notorious thing where it's a sensor
essentially in the transmission
where it won't go in and out of gear
and you got to drop transmission, the whole thing,
but to source the part and then have the labor,
it's thousands of dollars, right?
And there's so many of those on the road.
Yeah, so I have a, and if anybody is in this sector,
I'm pretty interested.
I wonder if or when the government steps in here.
Yeah, I was thinking the same thing.
Like if you guys work in this type of regulatory environment,
I'd love to hear from you because a lot of the rules
of parts and parts availability
has largely been sort of government regulated.
You got to produce parts for 10 years
after the last model year.
And all of that kind of stuff has sort of been
through a regulatory system.
I wonder if this gets to a breaking point.
You know, that's what I really want to talk about.
You know, and when I say I want people to chime in
where the government's going to have to step in and say,
first of all, you guys aren't producing enough parts.
Something's going on here.
And it's just going to have to get to a breaking point.
And I know a lot of us feel like we're there,
but evidently we aren't,
or the government's asleep at the wheel,
which look, that's what 99.9% of everything
in the government, they're asleep at the wheel.
For as long as we can track history.
For as long as the world has existed
and government has existed, they're asleep at the wheel.
So ironically, we want smaller government,
but at the same time, sometimes they need to intervene
somewhere.
Well, they're going to, because you know,
companies get to a point where
they don't have to do anything they don't want to do.
Right, so to be pro-small government,
which I think anybody is,
the problem is for these bigger companies,
you sort of need people to step in
that are bigger than them and more powerful
than them to make a change.
Because Rob and Nick and everybody that listens,
we don't have that kind of power to go,
hey Ford or hey GM, you should do this.
So you got to look at the government as,
it's the only one on the block that's bigger
than these people.
True, but you know what, if you go to Clutch.Clough,
we can make the pool big enough
that we can really make some change.
Yeah, there we go.
Let's go.
All right, this is the one plug for the show.
There's another one actually, Flying Wrenches.
Good old Southern boy, it's got a good channel.
He's a tech, I think used to work for Ford.
And he was showcasing, he was doing some old work
and there's some actual issues with like 21 to 23 F-150s.
There's over 70,000 of these units and need this recall.
And you're seven to 10 months out
because the parts are on backwater.
So a lot of these people still have loans out on these trucks.
They're pretty modern fucking trucks.
They're low mileage trucks.
And you are just shit out of luck.
Yeah, I mean, that's kind of that insane Subaru deal
that I did where I found a mistake on a dealer website.
Same thing happened to us.
I mean, a control module goes out
and they're like, look in the back lot.
And I'm like, why are they all here?
They're like, we got no idea when we're getting the part.
So I had to go to a buddies.
We had to get it so it would work.
Get it to a place like CarMax and go,
let's hope it runs while it's here, which it did.
And we got the check and moved on.
So I think the pandemic shifted something
inside these buildings for much longer
than the pandemic went on.
Because one of the things that's been the hidden secret
of the pandemic in the auto business
is they only had a six month interruption.
They didn't have a three and four year interruption.
Now, if we had automotive, quote unquote, journalists,
somebody would have covered this,
but people in the chip space that I have connections to
who are very high up in the chip space,
they're like, it was six months.
It was six months.
They were not down.
They were not highly affected for three and four years.
That's what you were told.
That's what the consumer was told.
That's what all these little phantom articles
that were written and going,
oh, there's fields and fields and fields of cars
with no chips.
They had access to the chips.
They just didn't do it.
Where's that 10 full clutch hat everybody?
Put it on.
Yeah, here's the deal.
It's not 10 foil.
No, no, but no one heard about it.
So when you tell them, they're like, no way,
you're telling me, you're telling me.
It was a six month problem.
And so they got interrupted
because they don't know how to run inventory.
And you look at a company like Ford who struggles
and struggles and struggles with input into their business.
They've struggled with it.
They are the worst car manufacturer with input cost.
I mean, it's been known for decades.
Do you see your boy, Farley got an 11% pay increase?
It was in one of these stories I have up.
I don't know how many will get to him today,
but it was always because of the recall I just mentioned
the axles, all these parts on back order.
And the first comment was, hey,
but we got raises for the leadership, right?
So the funniest thing about his raise
that they released about his raise
was it was all done on these metrics of reliability.
Oh God, okay.
Okay, reliability.
They had the most recalls in the world.
That's insane, bro, come on.
Hey, where's the cameras at everybody?
Where's the, this is a Truman show fucking
type of story.
And I'm not a big like, you gotta reduce pet, you know,
I just don't get into that
because there's so much that people don't know
about contracts and boards.
And so I don't get really deep down
the rabbit hole with people
that just don't have an understanding.
But what an odd time to do this.
Odd time, odd time.
And then put out the metrics that he's supposed to.
Now, for those that don't know,
Jim Farley in particular was put into this job
to basically completely reorganize the company.
And that's not as easy as everybody thinks
because Ford has been largely pretty mismanaged
for decades on end with input into the business
and efficiency and all of these different things.
So I wanna be clear that I'm not sitting here
having this conversation unaware of why Jim Farley,
you know, probably got a raise.
I just think I would have worded it differently.
I probably wouldn't have talked about reliability
of our cars while we're, you know what,
the two or three time leader in recalls globally.
Maybe wait to like let all this, you know,
become public also.
Or just use different talking points.
True, there's that, you know.
You know, say, hey, he really reorganized
this part of the business.
He revitalized these segments.
Like I would have been way more like gray area
about why we gave him a raise
so nobody could put it together.
But no, they just went right into the tornado there
and go, yeah man, I mean,
he's improved our reliability exponentially.
It's like, ah, well, those recalls tell a different story.
That's so funny.
You know what, I'm gonna move this story up
because we're talking about them.
They could have at least led maybe with this
as being one of the reasons, right?
So Ford CEO Jim Farley confirms
that a Bronco hybrid is coming.
So fulfilling on their 2018 promise
that the Blue Oval would basically offer
a hybrid version for every model.
Why not go that route?
You know, people are all about hybrids.
Like make that an umbrella statement for why.
I wanna tell people what they think
is fast in the car business.
That's eight years ago.
That's eight years ago.
That's eight years ago.
Like, I mean, it's not easy to build a car.
We have to say that.
I understand eight years ago,
fulfilling on our promise from 2008.
I mean, it's just ludicrous.
It is so funny.
I just, I don't understand any of that.
I really don't.
By the way, you already had capabilities
of putting hybrids into vehicles long ago.
Yeah.
Why did it take so long to get into a Bronco?
Who knows?
I mean, they were selling well, the pandemic,
you know, boosted sales.
It was a hot platform.
So they just didn't do it.
Why bring up the fact that you guys announced it in 2018?
Look at what we did eight years later.
That is, it's so funny when it's like,
it kind of, it's lost on whoever's writing the story
that it's kind of ludicrous what you're writing.
Like, yeah, shouldn't the first paragraph be like,
I can't believe I'm writing this?
You know what I'm saying?
If you were an honest publication,
you might believe that.
I can't believe I'm having to say this.
Eight years later.
I mean, I don't mean.
Well, I mean, that's also, there's news, that news,
if you're interested in it,
like there's hybrids coming to all of the Blue Oval's models,
if that interests you.
And in the middle of recalls, you're really,
you're really hype about them putting a new platform.
This is sounding a lot like Dodge right now,
for being honest, you're trying to release too many things,
you're electric, you're hybrid now.
Yeah.
Well, they've already written down billions, bud.
They're like, what's the difference?
What's another few billion?
Yeah, yeah.
And then when they scrap Mustang,
they'll have a lot more time to work on other stuff.
Dude, you're going to get a lot of hate for that, boy.
People are not going to like that.
But let me circle back to the top of the show,
what I mentioned, you know, tuning and modifying
and that kind of stuff.
I thought the top of the show was,
I just thought it was going to be something else.
I mean,
I mean, if you'd like to interject.
I thought Hyundai, I thought the Hyundai reveal was,
I mean, that's the story of the week.
It is, but as a BMW guy,
I figured maybe I would just ask you
if you had any input on AC Schnitzer going out of business
and what that means for the BMW and tuner world
and does it matter and the culture of it all.
Because I've been reading a lot about it
and I just find it interesting.
You know, we've been talking about it for a year.
The whole world is kind of reshaping
with the level of demand for even somebody
that's that long standing in the business, right?
The tuning, the aftermarket.
I think people have to come to grips with
a lot of these businesses have been hanging on
for a very long time.
They haven't really been doing well.
They've also, and I'm not saying this one in particular,
they may have taken investments.
They may have had management changes
and massive management changes.
I just think this is going to become the norm.
You and I are really talking to a lot of people
in the off-road world the last year.
You look at a lot of the way people do business
and you go, this isn't going to last.
You know, this company that everybody loves
is probably going to go under at some point.
You don't love feeling that way,
but the automotive business, for everybody that thinks,
everybody in the automotive business
is making all this money off the consumer.
I can promise you, the majority of automotive businesses
don't work.
They don't make a lot of money.
They've never made a lot of money
and you just have a view from the consumer side
and not the other side.
I go, you know, most mechanic shops
are hanging on by a thread.
Most companies like this are hanging on by a thread
and they have been for a long time.
So what is the reasoning?
I would guess, like any failing business,
it comes down to they weren't making a lot of money.
Basically, yeah.
I think there was a couple of posts about it on social,
like different car publications, news publications
and at the very bottom, there was a quote that said,
the last one, let's see, the culture gap.
We have not succeeded in inspiring young customers
to enjoy sporty driving with our brand the same,
to the same extent that we, you know,
enthused their fathers, essentially, like.
Yeah, well, the internet was this wave
in the automotive business
that largely most of the people making parts,
making cars had no voice.
And so it was left up to independent content creators
that largely didn't put the best parts,
didn't put the highest quality stuff
because they couldn't afford it.
Like it's not because they were trying to be, you know,
cheap, they just didn't have the money.
So if you look at some of the most popular build channels,
how many of those men and women have the money
or the skill set to do the highest level builds,
it's not there, right?
The money's not there, the expertise is not there.
And for the men and women that do have that expertise,
their channels grow slowly,
they do more methodical builds,
those builds don't do as well.
Like these people in the automotive business
who own these parts companies,
who own these manufacturers,
they were way behind on getting the story out
on social media.
Yeah, as a matter of fact.
And so the store, and then the story got told
by other people.
Right, as a matter of fact,
that was one of the things that kept coming up
is some of the older, longstanding brands,
especially famous tuners for something like BMW,
they kind of just, they could lean on their experience
or the word of mouth from the father's generation
as they quoted it.
And they didn't have to be out there advertising
because they were the go-to.
But when the younger generation
isn't really being shown that,
you have to show it to them.
Yep, because they only know what they see, right?
And the word of mouth became slower, right?
Because if you were in a BMW club,
which again, used to be a bigger thing,
that's the way you will kind of hung out with other BMW guys
or Ford guys or whatever.
And the internet became that space.
If those companies weren't in that space
or actively doing more and more in that space,
they were just being forgotten
because the word of mouth slowed down.
Speaking of car clubs, I was on the north side of Austin
running an errand for Nick, we'll call it.
And on the way back,
I stopped in a small town in a meat market,
there was a shiny red lightning in the parking lot.
So I stopped, go in, I checked it out,
I'd heard good things about this place,
got some meat there from the butcher,
fresh kind of stuff.
The little lady, the little old lady behind the counter
was her husband's lighting, she was driving it, right?
So she was like, you want to see it?
And I was like, yeah.
So she takes me out there, 275,000 miles,
but it looked brand new, it still looked like pristine.
The old guy just drives it, he's retired,
but she's like, he lets me drive every once in a while
to work because we don't live too far from here.
And she was just going on and on,
she was probably every bit of like 65, 66.
Nothing cooler than seeing a cool truck,
cool car that has miles that's been cared for.
Dude, it was the best.
To me, that is the pinnacle of all of this.
Agreed.
Right?
The pinnacle of all this to me
is not seeing a low mileage example.
It's cool to see those things online.
We even talk about, I remember that low mileage Astro van
and we see all this crazy low mileage suburban's
and you go, that's cool.
What's actually cooler is that if that Astro van
was in pristine condition
and had been driven the entire time.
For sure.
Like for guys like us, and I hope all of you out there,
I love seeing somebody enjoyed the vehicle,
but they also cared for the vehicle.
And so you still have the preservation,
but you know, somebody enjoyed whatever vehicle that is.
Yeah, and then go back to the car club thing.
Like, yeah, she's like, yeah, every once in a while,
they'll take it out to, you know,
go cruising around Central Texas or Austin
and their SVT club and in my mind, I'm like, that's so cool.
They're in their 60s and they're still in like car clubs
where every once in a while they go drive them around.
And she's like, he even turned it on for me.
She popped the hood and everything.
She's like, look how clean it is.
I was like, this is the coolest thing ever.
Yep.
And it will always be the pinnacle of all this.
Somebody having a cool platform.
And by the way, I don't mean cool like,
you know, a Ford Lightning cool.
I don't care what you own.
Like we have a guy in my neighborhood
that has like a 1995 Honda Civic.
Love it.
I think it's like 350 or 375,000 miles.
Looks like the day it came off.
Love it.
And he's like, yeah, man, I just, you know,
it's my weekend car.
I drive it around, I go to this, I go to that.
I've never not driven it since I've owned it.
He's owned it the entire time.
It's not some special Civic.
It's not some, but you go, man, that's kind of what
I think is cool.
Yeah, I agree.
Well, I did have this as a first story,
but we got on some really good convo here for the show.
I did learn from Nick about this
and then all the stories started coming out.
So we have to talk about this
because I think this shows what the future's gonna look like
for a lot of brands.
Hyundai's bolder concept reveal.
The Bro Fender.
The, the Bro Fender.
Why didn't you send that in the text?
That's hilarious.
I mean, the Bro Fenders here.
I mean, does anything say unoriginal design more than this?
I'm trying to find.
And by the way, if you guys haven't seen the 2004 Bronco
concept, boy, this took a lot of inspiration from that.
I mean, this took inspiration from,
you could shoot a dart at an old school.
I mean, and maybe a Ramcharger lights.
We got obviously Bronco looks here.
You got a little bit of Wrangler.
You got Defender.
You got Bronco.
You got, I mean, there is not one of the,
anything about this vehicle that says,
we did this on our own.
I mean, by the way, the interior.
Well, even then,
I don't know who's put this out there.
Somebody sent me a text or something,
maybe a day or two ago that Hyundai brought in,
quote unquote, automotive journalists at some point
to talk to them about a body on frame,
you know, like some type of off-roader.
And this, this is what, by the way,
I'm glad Hyundai's doing this.
Oh yeah.
They're going, they're doing, they're doing their thing,
but buddy, this is in no way anything other than taking
the front end, the side profile and the back end
from like two or three different brands
and sticking it together.
Honestly, this drawing,
I have a Hot Wheels that is exactly like this drawing
right here.
Maybe they got it from Hot Wheels.
They absolutely got this from a Hot Wheel.
Got tow, tow hitch mirror, like tow mirrors as well
on the, on the renderings.
That's kind of, kind of cool.
I think, I think everybody that is kind of,
I don't want to miss the point here is that
Hyundai just keeps throwing its name in the hat
in these places where they know they need to be.
And that needs to be celebrated
because so many car brands don't do this.
You know, like so many car brands just let like forerunner
dominate that market with really no answer to it
for a long period of time.
And some of them still don't have anything that rivals,
you know, and goes after that marketplace.
So you have to, I mean, the suicide doors,
doors is an interesting concept.
Mm-hmm.
It doesn't have suicide doors?
I haven't even seen the suicide doors.
I mean, I'm pretty sure I see suicide doors there.
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, you're right.
That's how, that's how you would get to
I was like, is this like an FJ model?
Like where it doesn't even open,
it's more like a grab handle.
And look, there's some FJ in here.
There's a lot in here that looks like they quote,
I think in this type of position,
you call it inspiration.
We took inspiration from a lot of different parts.
A lot of inspo here, a lot of inspo.
I don't think they call it theft in the car business.
Great artist feel after all, you know.
Yeah, I will say this.
This is a, from this photo you have pulled up right now,
this is a well done center console.
I'm actually surprised.
Look at that center, look at that center part
compared to what we see from a lot of brands.
That's a lot cleaner.
It is, I kind of would have liked
that this would have been one screen,
but I do like what like, the whole look is cool.
Okay, here, one to 10, Nick.
Give us the one to 10, how you rate it.
10 being amazing, one being atrocious.
I think this is like a seven or eight.
I'm one, two.
For what we see in modern, that is well done.
They deserve a lot of credit.
If this is how it comes out on the interior,
this is a lot better than almost any other company
in that space.
I mean, so it's clean, it's small,
meaning like the center piece is small.
It's not some big iPad type size thing.
It's kind of thought out.
They do deserve credit for that.
They deserve credit for doing this
because they're a brand really on the rise
and global sales and they just keep reinvesting the money
into these things they don't have.
This is obviously gonna lead to a body on frame truck,
which I think they've already pretty much denounced,
but this means that this is gonna be an easy transition
for them into doing that.
I know they have some things globally
that says that they're already down that road,
but for the US market, this is the right move.
And you might as well just pick the best of all the platforms
and stick them together, I guess.
I mean, it's not a bad strategy if we really...
It's not a bad strategy
because you don't have any inventiveness, but I mean...
I just noticed on the glass,
I mean, obviously there's just a rendering,
but the whole windshield is kind of like BMW-esque.
There's like a heads up display across the entire bottom.
I hope that's not a trend that we just see more and more of.
Yeah, heads up display.
Going like corner to corner is very strange.
Is one of those things that...
Let's hope you can turn it off in every platform if you want.
I know there's people that love heads up display.
I personally don't, to be honest.
It's gotta be done right, man.
It's really hard to get right.
And I think also when I say done right, it's really focused.
It's in a small part of the windshield.
And you have things like speed in your gas gauge
or something like that, oil temp,
whatever is important, but you have like a really small square.
Just concentrated right there.
It just kind of disappears into everything.
And you need it, then you can see it.
But yeah, I'm with you.
I mean, the broad heads up display
is probably not something I'm totally into.
So funny enough, the CX-5 that we have,
I don't mind it.
It's kind of like yours.
It's not intrusive.
It's just right where it needs to be
when you need to look at it.
But it's in the shop getting some schedule maintenance done.
So I got a CX-30.
Bro, this thing has the loudest blinker sound
I've ever heard in my life.
I'm telling you, this is what I tell everybody
about driving my 2003.
When you go from cars that don't have any intrusiveness,
like barely have the seatbelt thing into a modern car,
it's like rattling.
Bro, I had the radio up and I hit the turn signal
and I was like, oh my God, what's breaking?
Like something's falling apart on this car
and I turned the mute down like, it's the, duh, duh.
But it's the loudest, most atrocious sound
I've ever heard in a car.
Like if you ever played sports,
like there was certain bats in baseball
that had a good sound and then bats had a bad sound.
If you played hoops, you had a certain brand of ball
you like better than the other.
I think cars are that way.
It's like, what's this blinker sound?
Like I know I hit the thing,
like I don't need it like chiming in my ear.
I just don't need, that little like click, click, click
that we had for decades worked perfectly.
Don't overthink it.
Don't overthink it.
And what was weird too, there's other little things
that you realize, oh, that's kind of nice.
So instead of the flashing light,
it was almost like a sequential
where like the arrow would kind of light up and go away
and like, that was great.
Had you tied that to a regular sounding blinker,
it would have been out of the ballpark.
Well, so you're getting to drive, what, a 2010?
Is that what your Raptor is?
What is it?
14.
Okay, so yours is a 14.
You're at the end of the life cycle of that.
Yeah.
If you were to get into a 2023 or four Raptor,
I think you'd have the experience like,
what is all this stuff?
Yeah, no, you're absolutely right.
Right?
And you really, for a lot of people listening to us,
many of you do own some type of older platform usually,
like that's usually like the people
that come and listen to us.
They have something modern, but they got this other.
I'm just a guy that finds it unsettling.
Like I drove my GX460 a lot last weekend,
and I'm like, I'm out.
And it doesn't even have a ton of it.
But I just go, great platform.
I'm glad my family has it.
I just rather be in my 2003.
Really?
Yeah.
What about it specifically you think really
has set you over the edge?
Let me tell you the thing that really is one of those things
that they have a take a break thing that dings at you
when you've changed lanes without your blinker
so many times during the drive.
Okay.
And there's just parts of the drives we all do
where you're not really in traffic,
but you go, I know I turned into this left lane.
I'm gonna get right over to this right lane.
There's nobody around.
I'm not driving like a jackass.
But if you do that a certain amount of times,
and I forget what it is, let's call it three times
or four times or whatever it is,
then this thing comes up and says,
there's a cup of coffee and it says take a break under
and it dings at you.
And the first thing in my head is I'm like, how dare you?
I'll trade you in right now.
I will trade you right now.
If you tell me.
I own the car.
If you tell me how to drive.
I own you.
I own the car.
Oh man, just taking out the weeks struggles on this car.
Like, you know what?
I will sell you today.
Yeah.
Act like I won't put this into a bridge in bank.
Come on.
I will end your life.
Like it's, and I get it.
A lot of that stuff doesn't bother people.
This is kind of the thing that we say
that I get why people like all the tech.
I know there's a lot of us to go.
There's just too much tech.
Well, for the average person, it isn't too much tech.
That's what we have to keep reminding ourselves.
The reason they're tech stacking
is to get people into believing all of this dinging
and binging and all that this is value.
And they wouldn't be doing that
if they didn't have the data saying
there's a large percentage of people that think it's value.
Like how many people do you think
think that blinkers too loud?
Not very many.
Yeah, but I would go the direction of like,
I just don't think enough people pay attention
to enough stuff in general.
But hold on, that's my point.
Yeah, I know.
So something that's bothering you or me
and you go, why is this like this?
You are a tiny percentage of people that buy a car.
And all of our listeners who go,
I want this, you know, raw torn down truck.
Cool, man.
You're like 0.5% of the population
that's gonna buy that thing.
Hey, bro, I'll tell you what.
The rest of the people are gonna be like,
no, I don't want that.
When they pulled around this loner
around from the fucking dealership,
I get in the car and I just go, right?
I'm like, oh, that's cool.
This would be fun, those smaller crossover, whatever.
They had put the floor mat over the pedals.
So as I'm rolling up to a stop sign, I'm freaking out.
And I'm like, oh my God,
and the carpet's on top of the pedals.
So I'm like reaching down
and I just instinctively just rank.
I just yank the mat off
and I just like throw it in the passenger side.
And I'm like, it was on, I was freaking out.
That's Vince McMahon's music.
Yeah, exactly.
I was like, hey, if this goes into an embankment
to quote you, it wouldn't be my fault.
Like, dude, you gave it to me
with a rug on top of the pedals.
Details are not the dealership's forte.
Oh God.
Let's say that.
But yeah, I mean, we got to always say
and remind our crowd, hey man, the things that,
like that thing popping up on my GX,
that doesn't bother 99% of people.
No, how about this one?
How about this one?
A two intrusive lane keep assist.
Oh, I hate it.
Okay, so there's some roads,
depending on what neighborhoods you know you guys live in,
where the roads will eventually like merge
when you get to a stop sign.
Well, as the lines start to disappear
and it starts coming together,
the car just all, especially the Mazda is very safe.
It'll start blinking at you like brake or whatever.
It won't, luckily it won't break for you at that point.
Do you have like the one button
that you can turn lane assist off on the steering wheel?
Yeah, on the, yeah, on the fucking clicker,
what do you call it there?
Okay, so yeah, for, I believe in my GX,
it's just a button right on the steering wheel.
So when I get in, there's like a whole launch sequence
of like turning things off.
And nobody in my family understands that
because they don't do that.
But I just go, yeah, man, I think lane assist,
I'm sure there's somebody
that's gonna give me some safety number.
I see the purpose in it.
I think lane assist is probably more important
on longer drives.
Yeah, for sure.
You know, where, you know, you're kind of,
sometimes you can go in and out,
you can lose some focus.
When you're driving around your city,
and there's been some aggressive ones over the years,
where, I mean, that wheel jerks your hand.
This is very aggressive.
And it becomes unsettling.
It's definitely gotten better.
Those early years of lane assist,
there were several platforms that would just be like,
I mean, you'd have to fight the steering wheel
to get over.
Yeah, I'll tell you what.
So having driven the Raptor for a while,
when I jumped back into the GTI not long ago,
the sequence for me is always turn off auto start stop
because you have to turn it off
every time you get back in the car.
Yeah, I just don't own cars with that.
Dude, I couldn't avoid it.
I love that one and I had to get it right.
And I could, I could obviously program it to-
Yeah, I mean, some of us have standards
and some don't.
Yeah, you could program it out of it,
but I was like, you know, I get to it eventually.
And I was at a light.
I was at a light and you know,
you're like, I'm gonna switch lanes real quick.
I did not realizing because I had the music on
that it had turned off.
So like, there's a split second where it doesn't start on,
right?
So like, yank the wheel and I go and I'm like,
you son of a bitch, start of the shit out of me.
Like, I hate those little intrusive things, but-
The most wild auto start stop ever is the G63 G-Wagon.
It is, it, you think your car died
because it's a loud vehicle, right?
You got side pipes.
I mean, it's meant to be a mean sounding car.
You go to a light, it just shuts off.
You're like, what the hell just happened to my car?
Just die?
Is that a Mercedes thing you think?
Cause like, even the cars, like you feel the whole thing
kind of come to a shut off.
I think it just matters on the engine, right?
If the engine has that kind of bubble to it,
which the G63s have, yeah, man, it's unsettling.
And by the way, everybody at the light, here's it go off.
You know what I mean?
Unless they're really rocking out, they're like,
what, this guy, $250,000 car just died.
They're looking over at you like, what a peasant.
You're like, hey-
Yeah, no, I mean, and I drove a lot.
I've driven a lot of those.
Like that is your launch sequence
and that is definitely hit that button
and turn that shit off.
At that point you're going from 13 miles a gallon
down to 12 and a half.
So, I mean, who cares?
God, good times.
Well, hopefully they've gotten all that stuff
dialed in in the future.
Do you see any of those things like going away?
No, right?
Like they're not going to take these safety features
everywhere.
Well, auto start, stop is going away.
Well, that's true.
And it's cylinder deactivation is another huge one.
Yeah, that stuff's going away.
I just don't think tech's going to go backwards, guys.
Like I think, I think there's a reason
all of these older platforms are catching fire.
A lot of it is nostalgia.
Let's say that's the main driver of this,
is that people just want to own stuff
they couldn't afford back in the day.
The other part of it is kind of what I said,
which is, you know, man, there's a lot of people
that just want to drive down the road
and have a calm, chill experience without all the stuff.
And that is also a percentage of these purchases.
Now, when you're into manuals and things like that,
there's obviously the engaging conversation, whatever.
But there's just a lot of this that you go,
I don't know, man.
I was just happier once upon a time with my commute.
This is not what I want.
We also have to say it's a small percentage of us.
So I don't think tech's going backwards, man.
Do you find yourself saying once upon a time
more often these days as you get older?
Once upon a time, I was-
Yeah, you know, I have this guy that crosses my social media
from time.
He's a great fast food reviewer.
And I've noticed that some of the clips I see now,
he is talking to the younger generation about
you don't really understand what fast food was in the 90s.
You know what I mean?
I think you should have said this to me next time.
Yeah, I got it.
Cause here's the thing.
He's great at talking about the food,
but then he also added this,
like this isn't what fast food used to be.
Like this wasn't, you know,
they weren't trying to lower quality.
They were who they were.
They were, you know-
He has like a little idiom, like some wisdom in there.
Yeah, cause he talks about, cause that's when he was a kid.
He's like, you know, even when I talk to my parents,
they'll say, you know,
some of our memories of going to the Wendy's,
you know, salad bar or whatever,
like Wendy's wasn't trying to cut a corner
and make their stock price go up.
And the way he presents it, I go,
yeah, man, I think that's how we feel about a lot of stuff.
Wow, that's really insightful for a fast food critic.
Dude, it's crazy.
Like, but he still reviews the food, right?
So that's like kind of the interesting thing.
He's way more talented than I am.
Because how he weaves all this together,
I'm just like, you know what?
You know what?
There's nothing more talented than a good weave.
If you can weave your words.
Yeah, I'm like, that guy, that guy's,
and you go, yeah, he's right.
And the most glaring one that he brought up
in one of the videos was like,
that Pizza Hut pan pizza inside the old Pizza Hut?
The personal pan pizzas?
No, no, remember they bring it out on the black skillet?
Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.
And you know, you'd be like-
With the red cups.
I mean, it was an experience.
Yeah.
And it wasn't that expensive.
Now you get a Pizza Hut pizza,
you order it to your house for your family.
It costs you $58.
And you go, ah, pizza's not that good.
Bro, you're not lying.
It was like, we did that the other day
after a baseball game.
It was like $44.
Oh yeah, it's, I have a Shake Shack story that-
Please.
It rattled me to the core.
Please, because I have a similar water bridge.
So they built a Shake Shack brand new construction
near my home.
I'm like, I like Shake Shack.
Stop in there.
I got two small kids, a significant other and myself.
It was like $73.
And I'm like, we didn't even get that much food.
You know, it's not like I ate three burgers
and they ate four burgers and there were fries everywhere.
Everyone got a double double.
I just go, all right, man.
I mean, I'm here now.
I guess if I was a little bit more
in a different financial position,
I probably would have just pulled through the drive-thru
and not, not, not paid.
But, and then by the way,
I had to pull into one of those spots
where they had to bring the food.
So I paid $72 and waited longer than normal fast food.
And I go, I just don't know I'm coming back.
Yeah.
Yeah, I feel you.
I just don't, I just don't know that I'm coming back.
It's like the guys that bitch about five guys pricing,
but a Whopper meal is like $14 now.
It's like, I don't know, man.
All in, I can get, you know, a meal for 19 bucks
at five guys, I might as well go there.
I don't know where fast food fits in anymore.
I completely agree.
You know, obviously the staple down here is water burger,
but you can't with the same, I got twins.
So two, the spouse, myself,
you can't leave there between less than 55, 60 bucks
at water burger, brother.
And it just doesn't feel right.
No, it feels like I'm being taken advantage of.
And I'm assuming you guys like it.
Of course.
Like I like Shake Shack.
I'm like, I like water burger.
I like Wendy's, $50.
Yeah.
Doesn't feel right.
You just go, well, I could have just sat down somewhere.
Yeah.
It feels so wrong that I much rather pay for someone else
to eat than me spending $50 for myself to eat.
I'm like, this doesn't feel right.
Yeah.
And then you're eating it and you're going $50.
Then you take another bite, you go 50 bucks.
It's just like, it's just in your head.
And it's really not because like you don't have the money
or something.
No, it's just like a pure economics thing.
You go 50 bucks.
And that's kind of what this guy says all the time.
He goes, I don't know, man, this is pretty expensive.
Like, let me tell you about what it was.
I think we're just losing, and this goes back to the car
part thing you talked about with BMW.
It seems like we're finding more and more companies
and fast food would be a place that's like,
that don't know their place in the ecosystem, right?
And I would say the same thing about where
you're going to get with Hyundai as they keep building
these more and more expensive platforms
is that once upon a time, we're all going to talk about
when you bought a Hyundai, it was this, it cost this.
They were at the bottom of the market.
They were an entry point.
We are losing so many of these placeholders
that fast food's an example.
Hey, I wanted to go get some stuff.
There's a dollar menu.
I'll order six sandwiches for the family, a couple fries.
I'm out of there for 12, 13, 15 bucks.
That was the placeholder they were, right?
And that's where when people ask me
why I don't recommend things like Hyundai today,
is I go, well, they're not that far off
from established brands with better reliability
that you are already going to pay the hire.
Where do they fit for me as a purchaser?
That whole concept is so fascinating to me
because I don't know that across the board,
a lot of people know where they fit right now.
Like fast food, treats, like I've seen some places
that are like Italian ice or fro-yos,
they don't last long, even in like booming areas
because at some point it has to make sense.
The math has to math for the establishment
to stay open in these nice business trades.
Dude, I'll tell you a crazy thing.
Have you had this two bears ice cream?
No.
But everybody out there, if you haven't had this ice cream,
because I can't eat ice cream.
What?
Yeah, lactose or what?
Yeah, it's always been a problem.
Something tells me you didn't care this time.
Well, there's two bears ice cream,
but I'm gonna give everybody,
what is it, the pint?
Is that what they're called, pints?
Dude, it's like $9.
Oh, shit, they used to be a gallon.
Well, now that's a gallon price before, wait a minute.
I'll pay $9.
But here's the thing, there's nothing,
they got this vanilla honey one.
But that whole thing, you will look down and go, wow.
What have I done?
That went real fast because it's only like three ingredients.
So it doesn't affect me like some other ice creams,
because let me tell you something,
your boy gets something in front of him,
he likes food-wise, it's a wrap.
It's gone, no sharing, don't ask Friday.
We'll get you one, okay?
I'm real big on, tell me what you want,
I'll spend the money, but if I like this,
it's going down.
We'll get you one, it's hilarious.
But buddy, eight, nine, sometimes it's 10 bucks,
and you go, hey man, this is the world we live in.
And I'm not saying any of this as a complaint.
I think, again, going back to where do you fit in?
Yeah.
And it seems like now everybody wants to fit in
at the top end of the market,
and I don't know how much room is up there.
I got one.
The car business is a real conversation about that.
You're right, and I want to get back to that,
but now I'm stuck on this because you made it sound so good.
There's one 30 miles away, is it worth a 30 mile drive?
No, I wouldn't do 30 miles.
Damn it.
Look, 30 miles in your Volkswagen, maybe.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm not taking the Raptor
to an ice cream shop.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, you're going to buy some ice cream.
It's going to cost you $60 to get this ice cream.
If you're in the area, for all of you, it's worth it.
Okay, I'll be in this area again.
It's literally in downtown Austin, I'm not, okay.
Is it out of Sprouts or something?
It's in a really nice strip.
It's literally right off of the river.
So we have this, maybe everybody doesn't have it,
it's a grocery store called Sprouts.
Oh yeah, love Sprouts.
Sprouts actually has some of the best ice cream selection ever.
Two bears, bud.
Is it there?
Oh yeah.
It's in Sprouts, oh, oh, okay.
For us, that's where ours is.
All right, good to know.
I've never, and I've never, look, I'm not,
I haven't been in a grocery store in, I don't know, how long?
So I'm not the best source of, I don't do that.
Sure.
Like I'm not, you know, I've told you,
I go into Costco like twice a year,
I'm like, how the hell do people do this?
Like it's really an unsettling place for a guy
that hasn't been in those places in a long time.
But yeah, Sprouts is where our,
I gotta tell you what, this episode's been so fun
because we've talked a lot about cars,
but also like real life relatable things.
It makes my father visually upset
when I let him know how often I or most families,
my siblings will be at a grocery store.
Makes him visually angry.
Well, I would say I'm more in your father's boat.
I'm more of like, why are there so many charges in a week?
Let's just maybe write the list a little bit more completely
and do it once.
That's also true.
He's like, how do you forget something five times?
I'm like, you know, I wish I could tell you,
it's not me, I don't make the list, by the way.
Yeah, so I think your dad's got a point here, right?
Yeah.
And I think Dave Ramsey has proven to everybody,
maybe those trips are adding up, you know?
Yeah, cause it's never just with the follow-up trip.
Never.
Well, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, so I would say to bring this back to cars,
one of the things we probably don't voice enough is,
I'm getting confused why everybody thinks they fit
in this small pocket of buyers.
Because I know why they're doing it.
They wanna go for higher margin vehicles.
The problem is that if everybody's in that price point,
then all you have is more and more intense competition.
Can you get, and I guess maybe Slate is trying to do this,
but can you get back to a volume first model?
Well, we've had some interesting conversations
with people, DMI's that work in some of these buildings
that work for some of these companies.
And they obviously say, hey, look,
we're pivoting towards, you know, higher margin business.
Like that, they won't, we'll sell less,
but it's higher margin.
I think a lot of it is just a manufacturing shift
in philosophy.
I think that's kind of what Ford has shown
is they have a real shift in this idea of,
we can't do volume the way we once did.
So we're just gonna kind of start cutting things
that need to be volume related.
And I think that's important to know
is that it's an active decision these companies are making.
And I'm not here to say that they're wrong
because I don't know the ins and outs
of everybody's business.
But making one segment of purchasers
all in one exact price point.
Like basically now from 50 to 80 grand
is where everybody is at.
Right.
I mean, it's just stiff competition there.
So, you know, a 32,000, a 35,000, a 37,000 would go a long way
but there's a reason they're not doing it
and that's chasing higher margin.
Man, it's crazy.
I wonder if I can show you this.
Maybe we'll wrap with this car story
just because we talked about this vehicle.
I can't, I see we're having internet maybe issues.
Can you still hear me?
I can still hear you.
Okay, cool.
It won't let me share, unfortunately,
but the 2027 Ford Expedition,
did you see the 30th anniversary vehicle?
Damn, I can't pull it up for you
because it's, oh, there it goes.
All right.
Yeah.
So we were having, yeah.
Let's get a look.
Let's see if it'll, let's see if it'll stick.
I don't know what's going on.
Yeah.
What's going on here?
Yeah, that's some Vegas internet.
Can you, no.
No.
No, not working.
You can still hear me though, right?
Yeah, I can hear you.
Oh, there you go.
Yeah, it won't let me.
Damn, all right.
Okay, well, that might be the last story we share,
but the Expedition, it made such a fucking splash
with the black rear end thing, right?
So there's a 30th anniversary edition
that's gonna have like Mustang inspired paint
and wheels and all kinds of stuff.
And it's gonna be right under $90,000.
And I'm like, what, what?
And it's just got 30th anniversary logos
and some different paint.
Yeah, I just, I think today's topic
that we could put out for the comments is really simple.
Everybody in this higher price point.
What is gonna, what is gonna shake out from this?
Who's gonna be the first company to probably move back
to the downside?
Yeah.
You know, and who's gonna do it the quickest,
which we know nothing in the automotive business
is really all that quick.
I think there comes a point in time
and it's probably gonna be economic situation.
You know, obviously we see the economy
turning a little tougher.
Do you start to see some moves?
But then you look at the Hyundai launch this week
and you're like, they ain't moving back down.
Which is actually, it's fun to see
because that's gonna push people to maybe find their spot.
Are you gonna find your spot in the upper echelon?
Are you like, you know what?
I actually don't wanna throw this many things at the wall.
Like if you take their truck, the Kia truck
or the Kia, you know, boulder,
you see some manufacturers like,
we are not gonna try to compete
throwing this stuff at the wall.
It's too expensive.
There's not enough volume
or there's not enough desire, I guess.
Yeah, I mean, that's the one thing
you have to celebrate about Hyundai with this launch is
they're going for it.
Absolutely.
You know, and for us as consumers
who always say, why aren't people doing X, Y and Z?
We can all make the jokes of they stole the design
from a multitude of platforms,
but the reality is they're going for it.
They're like, hey, we're gonna throw this against the wall.
Maybe some of you buy it.
Maybe some of you don't.
We'll see how this shakes out.
And they deserve a lot of credit for doing that now
for an extended period of time.
I mean, the last decade of this brand as a whole
has been throwing a lot of stuff against the wall
that people told them not to do,
including guys like you and I.
I mean, we'd be like, who's,
but you know, look man,
they're what the third biggest automaker in the world now.
If you ever drove those original Hyundai accents,
you'd never thought they would be here.
Oh dude, those were terrible.
Terrible, terrible.
Those were terrible cars,
but they served the purpose in the marketplace.
They let them, the catapulted them
into the direction they are now.
And they have managed all of this really well.
And all of a sudden you look up and you go,
they're how big?
Yeah, they're big, man.
I had a Jeep store.
You know how Jeep's releasing
a bunch of special editions this year?
Yeah, is it like once a month?
I think it is.
So the Easter one was this Anvil,
like Jeep something Anvil.
And it's a fixed roof.
It looks pretty cool.
You basically have to put what looked like your own iPad
as the infotainment though.
There's no actual like screen or anything.
Was this the one that they brought out
of the shipping container
and it just had some special stickers?
No, that was a different one.
That was actually, that was like the colorful one though,
right?
Yeah, yeah.
It's like another retro one.
But it's funny enough,
I was looking at Slate stuff
and then Gladiator Jeep and all that stuff.
Jeep was the last brand to actually include
crank up windows in their vehicles not too long ago.
Fits the platform.
It fits the platform.
If it fits the platform.
And I would say this,
it's probably time for a company like Jeep
who is struggling to think about the downside price wise.
What are some options we can get to the downside
and not go up to this $60,000, $80,000 range?
How do we get something out into the market
that people like?
This is the important part.
You can't get the 40 grand with a terrible platform
and go, well, we made a $40,000 car and it didn't work.
No, give me a really, really, really good Cherokee,
a really, really good Wrangler at 40 that people would like.
I know it's not gonna have all the bells and whistles
and I know things cost money,
but there's brands that need,
just like we talked about before,
Aston Martin, Maserati,
they should be going all in on manual transmission.
Just to create excitement and getting people to go,
look what they're doing, look what they're,
nobody's looking at your brand.
Jeep, you guys are in a hole.
You gotta get something that goes,
hey, look at this for 40.
Look at this for 42.
I wonder who's gonna be the company that pulls the trigger
because it's gonna be somebody.
Who knows who it's gonna be, but it's gonna be somebody.
Did you see the Pacifica redesign?
Don't tell me they ruined it.
Brother, okay, I think we have a stable internet.
If it crashes, we will come back to you guys,
don't you worry, but I have to show Nick this
and then we're gonna go out on a funny story
that was emailed to us.
So I'm gonna try this one more time.
Damn, why is the internet not stable enough
to share right now?
I don't know.
Can't do it, damn it.
Wait, wait, is it coming to me?
There we go.
Well, that front end does not look better.
It's the first time it's been redesigned since like 16,
I think.
There you go, we have another key on our hands.
Everybody's just trying to be key at EVs.
I don't get this.
This is so bad.
I don't get this at all.
It's cheaper though, it's $1,800,
it starts $1,800 cheaper.
It's a move.
It is a move.
I mean, I know, and here's what everybody's gonna say
when they listen to this.
Well, it needs to be 50%, that's not happening.
Look at that, look at the previous one.
Previous one's way better.
Versus this, month's trust.
Design-wise.
Design-wise, of course.
Well, we imagine it's probably still gonna be the same.
Well, here's the thing we gotta wonder.
Did you fix any of the engine issues?
That would be a nice, that would be,
that may be what you'd wanna lead with, right?
Yeah, no, look at the new fascia, we have a new bumper.
No, it's not it.
We're gonna fail that class.
Straight to jail.
All right, Luke, he sent this in,
so he said, after your scooter rant,
it made him think of this bit, and I wanna pull it up,
and then also maybe get a follow-up,
cause listeners were like,
is the scooter really that bad in Vegas?
So maybe you can tell us, but here, check this out.
The other day I saw a guy,
he was like legit 45 years old going to work on a scooter.
He was on a scooter.
You've probably seen these people.
Suit, helmet, scooter.
Grown man, probably with a family.
Not a Vespa.
Are you guys thinking I'm saying,
I'm not talking about machinery,
I'm talking about a f***ing scooter.
Just doing this, grown man, like this, smiling,
just gliding down the street.
I was like, do you think your wife's not cheating on you?
Hey, the best bit that that guy was ever a part of forever
is tub-aware.
Do you remember that?
When that guy goes, what are you saying?
He goes, tub-aware.
He goes, no, it's pee, my guy.
It's Tupperware.
Was that not Shob?
No, no, that was the stuff.
No, it was the 7-O, but he wasn't.
No, no, it was another guy that was on, I forget.
I think he was like the guy from Impractical Jokers.
Oh, yes, yes, yes, yes, you're right.
He goes, tub-aware.
What are you saying?
Tub-aware.
He goes, no, no, no, no, it's Tupperware.
Funny story.
So I got to podcast with Chrissy D.
A couple of years ago when he was doing shows
at the Houston Improv, I was producing another show
and he was on that show.
He is an electric personality, man.
He is one of my favorite, if you guys remember-
Do you have a doctorate?
He does, he's a PT, a doctorate in physical therapy.
Super smart, super funny, but when you see him
on History Hyenas or that Impractical Jokers show
or his standup, that is him all the time.
He is so electric, he is so funny, man.
He is funny, man.
That tub-aware thing, dude, is it's Tupperware.
I think he was Sal, I think he was Sal Volcano.
I don't know, man, it was hilarious.
Okay, I got to look that one up later and laugh at it.
All right, that was a great show.
Oh, but hold on, you didn't finish the email.
He just said he had to send this to us
and make sure that we watched it.
That was it, he just wanted you to watch it
if you'd never seen it before.
Yeah, but scooters are that bad out here.
Oh, right.
I think areas with better year-round weather
are experiencing something
that you can't explain to other people.
It's everywhere and all I'm saying,
because I got a lot of questions about this,
I'm gonna say, I don't care if they exist, right?
I'm cool with them existing,
but most of them are riding in places
that don't make sense for the speed they go
and then when they get on the road,
there's no insurance license and registration
that everybody else on the road is paying.
That becomes problematic.
And some people said, well, there's laws on the books.
I go, not really.
I mean, sort of, but not really.
There's very few laws specifically targeting
the new technology.
And so there's a lot of loopholes
that have to be tightened up.
Yeah, that is definitely something that local,
obviously just citizens are gonna have to go
to the city councils and whatever.
We talked about it to change it
because you can't expect the federal government
to do something about it.
No, no, no, agree, agree.
Yeah, no, there's no question.
And we also don't want them to do that, right?
Yeah, no, no, let's maybe handle some of the big issues.
We're all federalized out right now for being honest.
We're good with that.
Let me see if we have any more that I wanted to fire at you.
Oh, okay, this will be the last actual car story
before we land the plane.
We talked about the yolks on that
like really sporty, you know, concept, whatever,
from Mercedes-Benz last week.
Did you see what they're doing with the EQS?
No, please tell me it's not getting worse.
Yeah, boy, 2026 Mercedes EQS adopts new steering by wire
and a yolk.
I could not, I thought this was AI.
I was like, holy shit, they're actually doing this
in regular consumer cars.
There also could be 50% of it, could be AI.
Steer by wire on the rabbit layer.
There's just a lot of messing around with things that work.
I'm waiting for one of these people
to put different wheels on it
and say, look, we got these new triangular wheels.
We're gonna promise you it's a better experience.
Triangular, so they're just going on it.
Yeah, I'm saying like, it's just like,
aren't we all prepared for them to just reinvent things
that don't need reinventing?
I don't think the steering wheel needed to be reinvented.
Not a yolk either on something like this.
No, I just don't think it needed to be at all thought about
except for minimizing the amount of buttons
that some of these have.
And they're just like, no, let's rethink the whole thing.
It's like, okay, man.
Maybe like we lost the technology to go to the moon,
we're gonna lose the technology to make circular things
like tires and wheels,
and then later we just have to rediscover it again
and then make it a new in the future.
And there's gonna be somebody on like a Joe Rogan podcast
talking about like, hey, we dug up this back from 1987.
Do you ever with steering wheels are around
and you just put your hands at 10 and two
instead of like a nine and three or whatever?
Yeah, you remember when you could turn your steering wheel
really easily?
Those days are long gone,
but we found the technology again.
Roodle, this is just seems all made up.
All right guys, this was a fantastic show.
Enjoy the rest of your week
and we'll see you guys next week.
All right guys.
About this episode
The hosts dig into what “real” car culture looks like versus the heavy-mod fantasy sold online, arguing most enthusiasts are more about driving and preservation than ripping cars apart. A collector/inspection perspective follows: most high-end cars aren’t truly pristine, and “asset class” talk ignores phantom costs like maintenance, storage, insurance, and repair bills. They also debate modern tech overload (lane keep, auto start/stop, intrusive alerts), parts availability shrinking, and how manufacturers are shifting toward higher-margin pricing. Hyundai’s “Boulder” concept and Bronco hybrid news spark discussion, along with tuning-shop business struggles and a few offbeat scooter/food-price rants.
Original notes
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Clutch Culture Podcast
Robert Garza & Nick Walters
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72:43