Catching up with the Wheeler Dealer himself, Mike Brewer at the Big E in Springfield Massachusetts

Hello, everybody. I am Jay Ward. And I'm Wayne Carini and this is Talking Classic Cars.

So Jay, what's going on in Jay's world? Well, I just got back from Radner Hunt Concord

and that's out in the Philadelphia area. And for those who don't know, Radner Hunt is

the oldest fox hunting organization, non-stop running fox hunting organization in the US.

They started in 1889, I think, still doing fox hunting three times a week. They do not

kill the fox. They chase it down. They let it go. It's sort of catch and release. But

pretty cool. They've kept this tradition alive. And out of this, they've grown

a pretty cool little Concord elegance on the grounds of Radner Hunt.

Yeah, I've been once myself and it was a really wonderful show. I like the place it's at and

sort of those three levels of the grounds there where they park the cars on one level and next

level up. And of course, it includes a lot of motorcycles too, which you know that I'm a

big fan of bikes. So it's a wonderful show. Unfortunately, they seem to have it every

year when I've got something else going on that I've committed to through my relationships

with all other companies. So I'm not been able to go, but I hear it's just a fabulous show.

What was there? Yeah, this year they featured Pierce Arrow, which I know you would have been a big

fan of. Little British car called the FRW. I can't think of the name of this little British

little British car. There's only five or six in the US and they were all there.

There was a number of neat things. Here was the tragic part. They had a tremendous

amount of rain this year. So I'd say about 40% of the cars stayed in trailers or stayed out in

the parking lot and did not set up their cars. So that was unfortunate. That's a shame.

That's a shame. Yeah. The good news is I was able to go visit the Three Dog Garage in Boyertown.

So Ross Meyers Hot Rod Collection, which is mind-blowingly good. Ross walked me through

the entire collection. All three floors of the main building and new building he added with

the race cars and the Mike Smith Ford Collection and his Pierce Arrows, all in this other mega

building. I mean, you've been there. You can eat off the floor how clean and perfect and cool this

place is with vintage neon everywhere and an amazing, amazing collection of cars.

Unfortunately, I got a report that I've never been there. I've tried several times,

but never fits into the schedule. But Ross is always so pleasant and inviting me back,

even though that I can't make it. He keeps trying. So hopefully we're going to make that happen.

I'm going to be doing something in the near future that Ian Lee out in Sparks, Nevada,

invited me to see her collection for years and years. Well, it's finally going to come true

in November. I've got to speak to the engagement and Sacramento and I'm going to

make the trip over to see Ian Lee. So these are things on my bucket list that I've really

got to visit. Ross is such a great guy and a great collector. Of course, you and I are

so interested in hot rods. Well, he's got the creme de la creme of hot rods in his collection.

Honestly, the best stuff outside of Peterson. If you're going to be in Sacramento and up in Reno,

you're going to be in my neck of the woods. Maybe we can try and connect and go see Ian

together. I'm happy to carry your luggage or wait out in the car with the air conditioning on

just to be in the presence of her amazing collection. I'd be thrilled.

We're going to go there on Thursday. I'm flying in to Reno and we're going to go there. So, yeah,

you're in. Okay. I love it. Can you count me in? So, I was at Radner Hut. Tell me,

tell me were you and what is this thing called the big E? I don't even know what that is.

Yeah. So I was at the big E. The big E is the Eastern States exposition, which is the largest

fair in New England. So all of the states in New England put together this huge fair. It's held

in West Springfield, Massachusetts every year in September and it goes until October. It's

like a three week fair and it's really fabulous. And so a few years ago, Mike Brewer started

coming over and doing a thing called Collector Car Alive. He did that for a couple of years

and then they invited me to be part of that. Mike and I have done it together for probably

eight years now and it is a ball. We basically have a car show and we talk to people about their

cars. It used to be that we brought them up on stage and we introduced them to the audience.

In the past, we've had five and 600 people in the audience. They're working on a new

location for us for next year, but it's a lot of fun. Ernie Bach Jr. was our honored guest

this year and Ernie, of course, is a huge collector of Italian sports cars and being involved with

Subaru, his dad was the United States importer for Subaru at one time. And so we had a Subaru

race car out of a shop up in Vermont where our friend Matt there lives. And it's the wildest

speed shop I think I've ever seen. It's so clean and spotless and they make every

Subaru race car that's raced around the world is made right there in Vermont. So very,

very cool. And we just got up on some chairs and we had some conversations with the audience

for about an hour. I'd love Mike to death. Enos wife Michelle run some of my favorite people.

But we had the opportunity to go into a quiet room before the show began and we did a little

interview. So let's listen to that now. Fantastic.

We're at the biggie. I'm here with Mike Brewer, Michelle. Nice to see you guys. Wayne is always

a pleasure. Yeah, we always have fun here at the biggie. We certainly do. And this is my

10th year at a biggie. And I think you come and join me about five or six years ago. Yeah.

And it's the one part of the year that's in my calendar that I always get excited

on the build up tip because I know I'm going to come and hang with you. Well, you know, hanging

out with you guys is spectacular. Coming to the biggie is such a big thing for me because I came

here as a child and every every fall with my family. So it's great to be part of this.

And then we have such a good time talking to people and talking to our crowds.

You know, your show, my show, you've been on 20 plus years. Yeah. 20 years of

waiting. That is what just celebrates in that mail. Yeah. And we were on for 18 seasons

of chasing classic cars. I'm off doing some new projects now. So we're doing some stuff in a

podcast, which is this recording is going to be on the podcast. I can't believe I'm a guest of

your podcast, Wayne. So we just want to know what's been going on with you guys. You know,

it's been so long. Well, not really. Last time we saw each other was what, May?

Was it May this year? Yes. We were together in May this year. Yeah. Riverside, California for

McGuire's. Yeah. So depending on Castle, Concord, D'Elegans, which is always a wonderful show,

it's to raise money for Teen Challenge. Yeah. Both myself and you and Chick-Foose and other

celebrities. We give up our time for free to go and support McGuire family and raise money.

To really recognize Nicole. Yeah. McGuire is being the person to put this together. And

unfortunately she's passed. And so we go to support both the family and the cause.

Certainly do. Weird, though. This was the first time we've done it without Nicole, all of us.

Right. But she was so very much there. Yes.

Every way you turned, you could feel the presence of Nicole. Right. At that event,

I thought it was really lovely. And it was a wonderful stage show, too, that, you know,

we had all these great celebrities, Iskie. Iskie. 102 years old. Yeah. Colky.

It's one of them. Colky had a moustache. They got in the crowd.

So John, you had the best moustache. You and her last week.

It was quite funny, wasn't it? I think he just cleaned. He was the winner,

but I still think yours is better. Well, I call it a tie. Yeah. I call it a tie.

But to be honest, I think you got better moustache. But no, that was really good.

But in the interim period, Wayne, since we're all senior,

Barossa becomes show season. So after we did the show in Benedict Castle,

we're back over to the Motherland, to England's, and we've got a whole range of shows we do

throughout the summer. We did the Silverstone Festival, previously called the Silverstone Classic.

So there's a full motor racing event with historic cars, really going for it and racing.

And in between every race, I'm there on a live stage to entertain the crowd.

Oh, that must be fun. It's great, fun. Yeah, there's,

I think there's over 100,000 people turn up over each day.

And this year, we see some amazing racing.

Turing Kandak, who's one of the former one drivers, was driving some other guy's 40 million

pound short-wheelbase Ferrari 250, and it exploded into flames and caught fire.

Oh, my. And you're thinking, wow, you know, you will want to be the one responsible for that.

Somebody's asked you to drive their car. And you come back with a set of keys and

you know, and that's about it. But no, they managed to get the fire out. So that was a good one.

And then from there, we host a British car show, which is this huge event of Farbrough Airport

across four days. I'm the host of the show in the live arena and all the action. There's

stunts and world record events and classic car parades and super car parades. And I host

all of that. That's four extreme, that is, it's cruciating days. And then after that, it's we

whofer here to come and do the big E. And then we're back to go and do the big one of the year,

which is the classic car show at the NEC in Birmingham. Yeah, that's the one I've got to

come to hopefully next year. We're trying to get you there as quickly as we can.

I'm on the same schedule. You know, you just went to Pebble Beach and that takes

up 10 of my days, going to Pebble and then preparing to go. So we took an AdWords America,

we took second in our class and won the Briggs Cunningham Award there with that car.

Yeah, thanks. We brought an Aston Martin to the quail and so just have a great time.

Next year will probably be my last year for a little while. It'll be my 40th straight here

at Pebble. So when I see the Pebble down there, I'm like, if you don't turn up,

I'm going to royalty every picture that anyone ever post of Pebble or quail,

anyone on social media has got a picture giving it. It's because of everywhere.

You're literally everywhere. I don't know this person, but there's Wayne. I don't know this person,

but there's Wayne. So if you don't turn up, it's not the right one. I mean, I'll go back,

but I just want a little break, you know, so 40 straight years is a long time. And now I

want to go on over to Goodwood. I want to do some things in Europe,

Villa Desk. I want to go to Goodwood, you know, the Hill Climb as well as the Festival of Speed.

Fantastic. And so after this, I'm in Detroit next weekend, the following weekend of a Newport

Rhode Island. I'm in Chattanooga in Birmingham, SEMA. And then I go to California again to

give a speech. And then we do several things with the Savoy Museum down in Georgia.

I'm all over the place and I tried to slow down. You know, I was usually 190 days on the road.

And I wanted to slow down and maybe bring it down to 110 days. But like today here at the Biggie,

it's going to be so much fun going out there talking to people. We're going to have Erie

Bach, Jr. with us. Erie's a great guy. And we're going to be speaking to him about how he got

involved with cars. And of course, his dad became the Subaru distributor for the United

States back when no one wanted to even talk about Subaru. So it's a great story about cars in his

family too. Fantastic. I'm glad you're still enjoying it. We enjoy it. And you know, I work for Hagerty,

so Hagerty has me doing certain things. I'll be in Sacramento at the Sacramento Car Museum,

giving a speech there. I'm talking to Wheeler Thelers on tour. We're actually doing a Wheeler

Thelers on tour at the moment. So we're making a new series where we're taking the program

to the territories where we've got a big presence. So Germany, France, Italy, obviously the UK,

Poland, we're kind of massive in Poland. And we're also making four episodes in Australia. So

down under as well. So it's going to be quite exciting. I can't wait to go to Europe and visit

my fans. You know, I've been stuck here because of my business. And then of course,

my book is coming out in January. My life with cars is the name of the book. There's a whole

chapter in there, by the way, dedicated to me. I'm like Michelle Grover. Absolutely. Absolutely.

It's a very short chapter, but it's a chapter. It's full of push and not many words. But

we have so much fun together. That's the key to that. And it's about lies. And it's so

weird because what we do when we do Benedict Castle, I always think when we're meaning we're

professionally on stage together for the last 10 years, the upfront events and at SEMA for Discovery

Channel and shows like the Big E. And I always think it's the cars, isn't it? It's not so much

us. It's the cars that bring these people together. And it's the universal love that

we all have for the same thing. We couldn't be collecting stamps. You know, and there's

cults of that, but we chose cars where she flew. Exactly. A much more exciting thing than stamps.

And I think it was words that I'm going to steal from Barry McGuire. He once said,

I've never met a bad car guy. You know, every car guy ever me is a, he seems to be good,

nice people. Absolutely. And I totally agree with that. You know, I'm just the people

who got good cars tend to be really good people. They're lovely people to be around.

And of course, as Barry says, every person is a car guy, not women included. Yeah, called gal.

Right. Yeah. I mean, my daughter, Lindsey, I introduced her to Barry when she was 13 years

old. And he says, are you a good car guy? And she goes, I'm a car girl. Well, no, come on.

Everybody's a car guy. So we have the reaction. I think that had resonated with him because

email calls them called gals. Okay, that's good. It must be from Lindsey. It must have resonated.

That's right. So we're going to go out there. We're going to pick some cars. So they've got

four trophies plus best in show. And so I think it's time to get out there and do some

judging. And then we'll be on stage from 1230 to 130 and then 130 to about 215 or so.

Sign some autographs. I, unfortunately, I'm missing my grandson's birthday party today,

but it's three o'clock. They're giving them this, this quad that his dad bought for him.

So, so I have to be there to see his face when they give it that away. So I'm going to stick with

it until about 215. And then you're going to hide. I'm going to get that hot rod and I'm going to

blast off. Okay, so make sure he's wearing a crush helmet. First time he gets on that

cot. Well, he doesn't really wears that all the time. He and I are go-kart racing now.

I've seen it. Yes, I've seen that. It's fantastic. I mean, what a way to have some time with your

grandchild that you can really get involved with giving them a step into our world of motor in

motorsport and to get them in a go-kart van. On his fifth birthday, I asked him what he wanted

more than anything in the world. And he says, I want to go for riding a Peercero. We have a 16

Peercero. So we're out on that ride and he says, you know, pop up, this is my favorite

car in the world. I love this car. And I said, pretty happy birthday, Connor. It's your car.

I gave it to him for his birthday. That's amazing. So every year now, he pulls in the

driver on his birthday and he says, which one am I getting this year? Well, he'll get one for

Christmas. He has a trust with several cars in it. That's fantastic. Yeah, he is. And I'm

very fortunate, just so fortunate that he is. But we'll take him no matter what they are

because I'm just so special. We have a granddaughter now, Caroline and Caroline.

All she does is take the little cars and go room, room around the room where

this drives the school bus. There must be something in the N2. She'll be three in December.

It must be something in the DNA. Yeah, the Corini DNA. It must be that. I mean, you have,

you know, tennis players, the kids become tennis players, former one-drivers,

kids become former one-drivers. The Corini family must have just been born to love cars

and do deals. I think so. It's Corini. So there's cars in the DNA. Yeah, of course there is.

He's got so much knowledge, though, isn't he? Of course, yeah. I mean, he's got it because

he soaks everything in. You know, he just talks about cars. He listens. I always told him that.

Just listen and you'll learn a lot. Encourage that, you know. Yeah, just encourage it. If

they love cars, encourage it as much as they can. If they're not good at math,

don't worry about it. Encourage them to love cars because look at what he's done

for me in years. You know, I love him from a college experience, giving us this amazing life.

We were, you know, we were lucky at the right place, at the right time, with the right knowledge,

you know. And luck is, preparation meets opportunity. And that's what I agree.

And hard work. And hard work. Yeah, but we were prepared when somebody offered us these deals.

Yeah. And looked how it worked out. I mean, you know, and so we've touched so many lives

all over the world, but they've touched our lives, too. Certainly have, yeah.

Let's go out and judge some cars. Well, thank you very much, Wayne. Thank you.

Appreciate being on your podcast and good luck. All right. Thanks, bud.

Wow, that was an absolutely great interview. Well, I'm still in the afterglow of Pebble Beach,

what an awesome time we have. What did you think, Wayne, the whole opportunity we had

to get up on the stage during the forums? You know, the forum was really great having

Adam Corolla there. And, of course, Danny Sullivan, really fantastic. And the new voice of the

Pebble Beach Concor. Man of struggle. Yeah, she was great. And it was so great to see so many

people come out and enjoy the seminar we did. So, you know, that was a lot of fun. Of course,

Pebble is Pebble. It's really fantastic. I showed the Edwards America. We came in

second in our class, which we're thrilled about and then won the Briggs Cunningham

Award. So, the car performed well on the show field as well as driving it on the tour.

It was always a big plus. And I think Pebble was pretty special this year in that we got to see

some unbelievable cars that I've never seen before. And that's why we go there. And I saw

so many more Europeans there this year than I have in the past few years since COVID. So,

everything's turned the corner and Pebble's back to its normal self again.

Yeah, I think you're absolutely right. You know, you had a number of collectors who either couldn't

come over because of COVID restrictions or couldn't get their cars over because there was so many

container and transportation and shipping issues. You know, people forget how bad it

screwed up shipping around the world for a few years to untangle the mess of

container ships that were backed up. Yeah, nobody wants their car sitting out in the

ocean in a container ship, you know, and floating around for months. I mean, sometimes that happened.

Yeah, and they were paying double and triple what they normally would pay to have their car

sitting out in the ocean. So, it was absolutely terrible. I get it. And it's so good to see

that the show's bringing back its international flavor. So, Wayne Pebble was awesome. Your

time at the Big E was great. I had a great time at Radner Hunt despite the rain because of the

Ross Meyer 3Dog Garage tour. What are you up to next? Where are you off to? I know you're

in Detroit right now for the Concord with Hagerty. Tell me a quick bit about what you're

doing this weekend and then where you're off to from there. Yes. So, where we've got tonight

on Friday, you've been here in Detroit. We've got a cars and community, a little get-together,

a little party out at the Detroit Institute. So, the Art Institute is a wonderful building,

great, great area of Detroit. Detroit's really making a great comeback where we went to dinner

last night at a fabulous new restaurant. So, everything's cooking here. And then, I'll be

judging tomorrow and then on a plane at about 7 o'clock going home, trying to make it to another

show of our good friend Philip with the Turtle Show. Then, let's see, I'm off to a drain the

week after. I'm in Birmingham at the Barber Museum the weekend after that to do a little talk

down at the museum and go to the motorcycle races. Fabulous time I have down there every

year. If everyone that's listening hasn't been to the Barber Museum, please take a trip down there.

You'll be blown away by the museum and the grounds and everything that George Barber

does down there. And then, I'm off to, let's see, Chattanooga or I'm going to see you

on the 13th, 14th of October. We'll be down at Chattanooga together with some great friends

that's becoming a really wonderful concor down there. They do such a great job putting that

thing together with some racing and a concor on Sunday. It's a really great event.

Yeah, I'm looking forward to it. It's my first time going and I'm super excited to be there.

And it's really an all-star list of people that go to this thing. In fact, the B-52s are

playing on Friday night, which I was shocked to see. And they're honoring Brian Redman.

They've got just a ton of really great things going. And Luigi Kinetti Jr.

They're honoring him too. And I said, when I asked them if I could still come and they said,

absolutely, we'd love to have you. I said, well, as long as they get to go up on stage and sing

Love Shack with the B-52s, that's one thing I really needed to do. So I'm looking forward

to that. I think they're going to put me backstage, really, a far backstage to do that.

Yeah, way off microphone. One of the things that I brought to Radnor Hunt was our life-size

Lightning McQueen. We only have one life-size Lightning McQueen that's not in Disney Park on

the East Coast. It lives at the NASCAR Hall of Fame. And I was able to cajole them to bring

it up to Radnor Hunt. And the other event they're going to bring you to is to Chattanooga.

So if you go to the Chattanooga Motorcar Festival, you will see the one and only

life-size Lightning McQueen on the entire Eastern Seaboard. You can walk right up to it

and I'll be there and happy to do little McQueen drawings for people and say hi to folks and take

pictures with the kids. So that will be there. That's fabulous. I was thinking of you yesterday

when I saw a little film with you talking about Lightning McQueen in the Henry Ford Museum. So

I visited the Henry Ford Museum yesterday, came around the corner and bigger than life,

there you were on the screen talking about Lightning McQueen. That's right. That was for

the Doc Hudson. You know, the Hudson Hornet was just inducted into the HVA, the Historic Vehicle

Association because the Hudson Hornet is really considered an iconic car. And I think we helped

the movie Cars help bring the Hudson Hornet's recognition to a younger generation that

otherwise had really no interest in that car. So that was the part that we got to play,

which was really fun. And I really thank you for that because I have a 53 Hudson Hornet

myself. And so every time my grandson looks at it, he calls it Doc Hudson. And of course,

the voice of that was Paul Newman. And so having that put together means a lot to us. That's for

sure. Absolutely. So cool. So cool. The reason I can't join you at the Audrain is because

I'll be out here on the West Coast at the Wren Sport Reunion. Oh, wow. That's cool. So that

is Porsche's four day festival. Only happens once every four years. Wow. So it's been a while,

but they are going to have a tremendous gathering of Porsche race cars and road cars and famous drivers.

And everybody in the world that's ever touched the world of Porsche will be there. In fact,

I think they're forecasting about 80,000 people to show up to Laguna Seca that weekend.

Wow. Well, that's going to be a fabulous event. That's for sure. Wish I could make it. But

we can't be at two, three places at the same time. So you cover the West Coast. I'll cover

the East Coast. And we'll see if we can meet together in Chattanooga and trade notes.

Yeah. And if I find somebody interesting to talk to, I'll try to bring my recorder along and

get some interviews and we can talk about them later. I think that's a great idea. I'm going to

be doing the same thing this afternoon here in Detroit with Ed Wellburn. We're going to be

sitting down and talking about his career and what he's been doing since his retirement.

Great. All right, guys, I will see you later on. I'm off to look at new Corvettes here

in Detroit up at Maddox Chevrolet. So I'll be doing that. And I look forward to seeing

you guys and talk to you later. Sounds great. Give my best to Ed Wellburn and

McKeil Haggerty and everybody over in Detroit. We'll see you soon. All right. Thanks, guys.

Thanks, man. Take care.

Catching up with the Wheeler Dealer himself, Mike Brewer at the Big E in Springfield Massachusetts

About this episode

Radnor Hunt

Concord Elegance

Pierce-Arrow

hot rod

Ford

Eastern States Exposition (The Big E)

Subaru

race car

speed shop

Silverstone Festival

Ferrari 250

hill climb

Goodwood Festival of Speed

SEMA

Hagerty

crush helmet

go-kart racing

Pebble Beach

Briggs Cunningham Award

container shipping issues

NASCAR Hall of Fame

Ford F-150 Lightning

Hudson Hornet

Historic Vehicle Association (HVA)

Wren Sport Reunion

Laguna Seca

Chevrolet Corvette

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