Rory Carroll Stops by for Dinner

My first honest-to-goodness obsession with reading about cars

was Chlopnik, was when it started.

I don't know how I came across it,

but within a few months of it starting,

I had started reading every post.

And this is extremely embarrassing,

but for a period of, I will say, several years,

I read every single post that went up on the site.

This week on that car show, Rory Carroll, Rory, of course,

was editor-in-chief at Chlopnik.

Twice, he's also led auto week

and written for all the best car regs and websites

like Road and Track, Car and Driver,

and even the New York Times.

Rory's got something new to share,

and that's something as alloy mag,

which I promise you is the next big thing

in automotive journalism.

We talk Porsches and project cars,

what might be the world's fastest Lada,

and why your local retention pond

might hold the next big thing in the culinary world.

It's that car show.

That car show is brought to you by Sheffield Watches.

The Sheffield Watch brand has a long and storied history,

but it was revived a couple years back

by our good friend and true car guy, Jay Turkbuss.

Jay was gifted a Sheffield Watch by his parents

when he was a kid, and he still has it to this day.

Jay wanted to make the same experience

available to all of us,

a reasonably priced, high quality watch

that endures and that we enjoy sharing

with our fellow watch enthusiasts and car people.

From diver's watches to watches designed for travel

to collaboration with automated powers

like Spike Ferris than Jay Leno,

Sheffield has a watch for you.

Find your own Sheffield Watch at SheffieldWatches.com

and at Sheffield All Sport,

underscore watches on Instagram,

and let Jay know you heard about Sheffield Watches

from that car show.

We're also happy to welcome new sponsor,

Drake Motor Cars, to the show,

and if you are in the Denver area

on Saturday, October 11th, please join us

along with friends from Avans, cars and bids,

velocity restorations, Automobily Rally Hoffnley

and First Western Trust for the Drake Motor Cars Launch Party.

Saturday, October 11th, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.,

Drake Motor Cars is at 4840 Broadway in Denver,

4840 Broadway in Denver.

You can find them online at drakemotorcars.com.

It's gonna be a good time.

There's gonna be some cool cars on hand,

some good food, good drink,

and we look forward to seeing you there.

Welcome back to this week's That Car Show.

I'm Lindsay, and I'm here with Ryan.

Hi, Ryan.

Good to see you both.

Hi, and this week we have a guest with us, Rory Carroll.

Rory and I first met at a Subaru dinner

ahead of the LA Auto Show a few years ago.

That was a particularly memorable evening for me

because not only was that pouring rain

in Southern California,

but at one point at my end of the table,

there was an in-depth discussion

about swan being on restaurant menus.

So it was a fun group.

Rory and I got to say hi,

and then we've run into each other at events over the years.

We're lucky to have several mutual friends in the industry,

of course, including the Subaru team

and our dear friend of the show, Derek Powell,

who tipped us off to Rory's exciting new endeavor,

which we're looking forward to learning about.

And of course, a big thank you to Derek

for the heads up.

Rory has held a variety of leadership roles

in the automotive industry

and written for many of the big names,

including The New York Times, Washington Post,

Car and Driver, Road and Track,

Hagerty, Porsche Panorama Magazine, and Gizmodo,

just to name a few.

He ran Auto Week and a content studio called 1155.

Then he worked at Jalopnik and R.M. Sotheby's

before heading back to Jalopnik and Gizmodo,

which ultimately led to the new project

that is launching soon.

And he's here to tell us all about it.

He's joining us tonight

from his hometown of Traverse City, Michigan.

Welcome, Rory.

Hey, great to be here.

Thanks for having me and thanks, as always,

to Derek, our angel, what a sweet boy.

I know.

He's the best.

We love him so much.

He is the best, yeah.

He was on the show a few weeks ago

and we just had the best time.

And so we're so excited that you're here now.

Yeah, he's my favorite.

We send each other offender pictures all day long.

That's up to Michelle, we'll not be surprised to hear.

He is always sending me Colt Vista,

the captive import.

Oh, sure.

I told him five years ago that I really wanted one

and I still really do.

And every time he finds a clean one,

he sends it to me, as if to say like,

when are you actually going to do this?

You have to, at some point, own.

I mean, the commitment level is pretty low, right?

Like the bar, I mean, this can't be expensive, right?

It's probably the last cheap type of car you could buy.

Yeah, yeah.

It's like too ugly for anyone.

Right, yeah.

Like $3,500, I just need to do it.

And I think Derek excels at sort of like the with love nudge,

like every now and then he'll just drop like a bring a trailer,

like Defender or a regular trailer.

I don't want this, but you might, right?

Yeah, he's a total enemy of that.

He sent me, I will say, he sent me

one of the big Range Rovers the other day

and it was white with the black top 2020

and it had a blue interior, which was amazing.

And I'm like, I actually really love it.

And I told him that and he said, yeah, and they're really rare.

So, so we'll see, watch this space.

Love, love a vintage, not vintage,

but new used Range Rover purchase.

Exactly, yeah, I feel like that's the only way to go.

You know, let somebody else take the hit.

Yeah, yeah, speaking of rare, sorry,

tell me about the swan that was on the menu

because I guess I'm going to the wrong restaurants.

What, is this a thing?

No, it's not a thing, but people were talking about,

you know, different dietary programs

or if you're, if you have a dietary restriction

and trying to order at a restaurant

and then that kind of devolved into

if you go to a restaurant that has like a prefix,

pre-feed menu, you know, and usually the cuts of meat

are specified and you can get whatever,

but then they'll have the option to,

I think it's supplement, there's a restaurant term

and you can upgrade your cut of meat or you can change it.

And so one of the guys said,

I'm just going to start asking for swan,

just to see what they do.

Just to watch their faces, just with a straight face

as if this is totally normal, I'm just going to say,

I'm going to get the blah, blah, blah,

but I'd like the swan filet, medium rare.

You don't have it.

Pepper sauce on the side.

And it devolved into this whole thing of like,

is there anywhere that they do eat swan?

What would it taste like?

You know, how much meat do you actually get off

of the swan?

It's got to be like a goose, I would imagine.

That's what we were kind of thinking.

Like, kind of gave me probably some fat in the meat,

you know, like, but swans are so big,

you might actually get more yield.

It was very...

It is kind of a Russian roulette situation though,

because like in the tiny chance that you're at a place

and they actually do have the swan,

at that point you do have to eat it.

Right, you have to commit to the pit.

Yeah, you can't be like,

oh no, that's just a joke I've been doing for 10 years.

You have to...

Right, you're like, shoot.

What is it? You have to pay the piper?

You're like, man, I got a lot of mileage out of this joke.

Yeah, you got...

We have swan, but only swan tartar.

Right.

Yeah, you got to hack it off yourself.

That would be even karma.

Yeah, yeah, I did that probably 15, 20 years ago.

I was friends with this German family in Traverse City

and I was, I always used to joke that I loved head cheese,

you know, like the gelatin with like the meat scraps on it.

With a nice bite of blood sausage.

Yeah, it was a running gag

for a very long time with these people

and then they had family come in from Germany

and they brought all of their favorite head cheese

specifically for me.

Wow.

And I was like...

Wow.

Wow, would you look at that?

Yeah, if it isn't my favorite food,

what is very famously my favorite food to eat

in front of people.

And they were all grossed out.

Oh, like they don't even need it.

No, I mean, the people in Germany did,

but like all my friends were like,

oh my God, I can't believe you're doing that.

I was like, got to, sorry.

Yeah, yeah.

It's not a pleasant experience.

I did this for myself.

Yep, that's your pain.

Yeah, you've paid the fight for it at that point.

Yeah.

Well, next time, bush meat, new challenge.

Yeah, what is bush meat?

We've talked, I've heard of that before.

Baboon, you know, from like markets

where like, you know, diseases like COVID start,

I think, you know?

Yeah.

Just, you know, hang, hang, hang in there or whatever.

Yeah, I feel like-

That's right.

I'm having a weird memory where like,

I don't know where I came across this,

but like at one point I found maybe a catalog

where you could order that stuff or like a website.

That's what's funny.

And some friends were talking about

ordering like some exotic meats.

Maybe we should do that.

Maybe next time I'm on, we could do it like a taste.

We all do like a thing and we have like,

okay, so first up is the swan.

Yeah, yeah.

Next up.

I'm very curious about that.

I can go down to my local pond and find that.

I know, right?

I think if I recall my third grade animal report,

at least the trumpeter swan is endangered in the States.

So I don't think you're supposed to be.

Okay, okay.

Yeah, that just doesn't, just as well.

I like the animals.

I'm a friend of the animals.

I'm that.

I'm all talk, don't worry.

Anyway, cars.

The swan population of Denver can relax for the moment.

Really, they only have to worry

when we're recording in person

and we can enjoy the swan together.

So yeah, you got to, you know, I know, I know.

But yeah, should we get back to cars?

Yeah, sorry, that'll happen.

That's my fault.

No, that's your fault.

Yeah, you're right.

So what's your car story?

Like how'd you get into this whole hustle?

That's a good question.

You know, like I don't have,

I don't come from a car family.

I think like I was really surprised to figure out

like once I got into the business,

how many people were like,

oh, my dad was super into cars

or I had an uncle or whatever.

And it's like my dad had a couple of meadas

but was not really like a car person.

He had maybe a Jeep Wrangler.

But like, you know, it's not like a hardcore enthusiast.

In fact, it was like extremely cheap

and would always tell me like,

this is the worst thing you can do with your money.

Like, don't, you know, don't do this.

Like, and I remember I tried to buy

when I was 16, a 60 Chrysler Imperial

because I was like, this is being a great driver for me.

A 16 year old.

Yeah, solid choice.

No, he was like, absolutely not.

That's, that's stupid.

Don't do that.

You want something you can drive every day

that's reliable.

Yeah.

I mean, it would not have been

the most unreliable car I've ever daily driven.

I don't think.

Sound like you're in a story there.

Yeah, I mean, I've driven to you about that.

I don't, I think like prior to 2015,

I had owned one car that was newer than like 30 years old.

I just don't, I don't vibe with the new stuff as much.

But I, I don't know.

So I guess I kind of got into it by fixing cars.

And I think like I had kind of like a formative experience

like getting my first like fast internet connection

and getting on like BW Vortex

and like getting into like water cooled

Volkswagen's in college.

And then like just kept buying cars

that I couldn't afford to take to mechanic

and like learning wrench and, you know,

like one thing led to another.

And then it took a long time.

I worked in a bunch of other shitty jobs

that I kind of hated for like a decade ish.

Before I found, I found a job at Hagerty

as I was actually their lobbyist.

And then.

I saw that.

It's fascinating.

A bunch of other, yeah, weird stuff.

Did a bunch of other stuff there

and then sort of writing.

And that was like, Oh, okay.

I'd like shit.

I wish I would have known if this was a job.

You're like the whole time.

Yeah.

It's like, I guess someone does have to write

all the articles in the magazines that I read.

And I guess they probably get paid.

Yeah.

That was pretty tragic.

You think so.

Yeah, right.

It was a thing, yeah.

It doesn't apply now, of course.

That's not how it works now.

But yeah, that's, that's kind of it is

it was a weird journey.

And I think like, I don't know.

There's, there's parts of it.

Again, like, I wish I would have started earlier on it,

but it's like, I feel like I had a good,

like well of experience to draw from

when I finally like did start writing where it's like,

I did this as an amateur as a hobbyist for a long time,

you know, like before I got to go on press trips

and like drive fast stuff and learn

what I was actually supposed to be doing

and all that stuff.

So that's the story roughly.

Well, you have a really unique

and I would say very personal fleet.

So I'm curious.

Yeah, yeah.

You kind of walk us through what you have right now.

Yeah.

How you came to have the collection that you have.

Yeah.

So it's funny to call it a collection.

It's like, that's not, it's not how I look at it.

It's like the, you know, like you go see a collection

and you're like, wow, this is a collection of cards.

This is just stuff that I failed to get rid of

over years, over the years.

Yeah.

We can all relate to that.

I coined a term for that.

Yeah.

So I have, my daily is a Rivian R1S.

Nice.

That I had to try EV.

I had to try, you know, like a new car.

Like every 10 years or so, I have to try a new car

and see if that it's not for me.

Remind yourself that you don't like them.

Yeah.

It's a great, I mean, it's awesome.

Like it's an incredible machine,

but it's just.

Right.

It connects to my phone.

Not your thing.

Just like, yeah.

But I've got that.

My wife has a 15 GTI that she bought new

and will not get rid of manual.

She's like, that's like, we've talked about

kind of upgrading it.

It's like been the kid mobile for a long time.

And it's like showing some wear,

but it's, there's really so few options

that are manual.

Right.

And that's kind of like the hang up

is like, what else would you get?

And also like Mark's Evans are awesome.

I think like a future.

That was the best one.

Yeah.

They're awesome.

It's my third or fourth GTI

and the Mark's Evans is like astonishing.

Such a good car.

I've heard that.

Yeah, that's really tough

if you want a good manual option.

I mean, we just really, yeah.

And like the offerings are so slim.

If, if at all.

Yeah.

And it's like, you know,

like in the back, kids in the back,

like, you know, that thins it out even more.

It's like, takes kind of the BRZ Miata out of it.

And like,

Yeah.

It's tough.

Then I have an old 911 that I bought

when I was 23 back when they were like cheap.

It was like, this is the most 2006 story in the world.

But I was like, also gave myself a little bit.

But I, I was driving,

I actually had bought a Mark 5 TTI brand new one.

And I was like, I hate this car,

which is, it's stupid.

That's a wonderful car.

But it was too new.

And it was like, this is too nice.

And I was driving around and saw this old 911

and I stopped.

It was at a repair shop.

And I was like, who owns this car?

This is like, I live in a small town.

So it's like, you don't see stuff like this all the time.

And I was like, who's this belongs to?

And I found the guy and went to his house,

just showed up at his house.

And I was like, hey, is it black 911 years?

And he was like, yeah, he's like, you're in luck

because I've got five of these.

And my wife said, I have to sell one of them this month.

And I was like, he's like, this is the worst one.

And I was like, I'll take it.

Like, I'm your man.

Yeah.

So I went to the bank and I was like 20, whatever,

I was in my early 20s.

And I had to get kind of had been duped into buying a house.

I had a mortgage.

And then I had the payment on the TTI.

And I walked in there and the guy was like,

we don't loan money on cars that are older

than however, whatever, 20 years, whatever.

And I was like, what if I can show you

how much it's worth, like what the value for it?

And he's like, yeah, yeah.

So I went to Hagerty and got whatever their Hagerty value

guide was.

And I brought it back.

And he was like, man, I really shouldn't be doing this.

And he's like, your credit picture is really bad.

Because I had the mortgage, the car payment.

I had never had a credit card.

I had no credit history whatsoever.

And he was like, you gonna pay me back on this?

And I was like, yeah, of course.

And he was like, all right.

He was like, I know your family.

You're good.

And he just gave me a check off of his desk.

And it was like, this is why the financial crisis happened.

I think that type of underwriting.

Underwriting where he's like, yeah.

Just like, yeah, it's fine.

And it was.

I trust you.

You have a good face.

Yeah, exactly, yeah.

Never missed a payment, never had a late payment on it.

And it had the car, I daily drove it for a long time.

Drove it in the winter, drove it all the time.

And cause it was like, at the time

it was like a cheap sports car.

It was like whatever, 14 grand.

And then put it up like eight years ago

to start a like sympathetic restoration

and have just been like touching it.

I had like a weird mental block about it for years.

Like we can get deep.

And I had like some kind of psychological block

where it's like I would work on anything else.

And it was like, I worked on cars.

Oh, like I built that.

We can talk about it a second.

I built it twice in the span of me having the 911.

I built it from scratch twice.

Let's talk about it.

Or you were just like, lalala.

Yeah, did you think you didn't deserve it or something?

Let's go deep.

Yeah, I don't know.

It's like it's something I think about a lot

because it was it was a daily driver.

And so it's not a car that was super precious to me.

And it's not like it's not in good enough condition

to be super precious to anybody.

But I think like honestly, I think there was like a period

where I was so kind of annoyed

at the air-cooled 911 thing.

Do you guys have air-cooled 911s before I say this?

No, I don't.

But it became a thing.

Okay, it became a thing.

And it was like a man of my age.

Like it was kind of like the default cool thing to do

is to buy an air-cooled 911.

And it's like, it was like I just can't,

like I didn't want to be a 911 guy.

I didn't want to get rid of it

because I knew that this like trend would kind of pass

and go by.

Yeah.

But it was like, and it wasn't like,

oh, I don't want to be that guy,

so I'm not working on it.

But what it was is that every other thing

that came across the transom was like more interesting to me.

So it was like the, I got an old Willys,

which I still have.

And it was like, oh, I'll just,

like that'll be my old car.

You know what I mean?

Like, so the 911 kind of sat.

And it's like, I went through spurts

of like really basically like people giving me a hard time

about it being like, you have a really good,

the old 911 like you should be driving this car,

which I agree with.

Like that's insane to not drive that car.

It happened though.

Yeah.

But it was like, again,

and it was, it was so strange

because you, you know,

everybody has seen those like YouTube shows or whatever

where it's like there's some old guy

and like in the back corner of his garage,

there's like a Daytona so Pantera or whatever.

You're like, how are you not driving?

What's wrong with you?

Like there's something and it's like,

I would always be like, yeah,

what is wrong with that?

Oh, wait a second.

Like, that's also, yeah,

that's also what I'm exactly what I'm doing right now.

But I think it's one of those things too.

Like I think we've all driven by those houses

where you can tell there was a car

that like is in the front yard or it's wherever.

And I don't know about you guys,

but I always see it like, what was the story?

Like what was the tipping point

where the car was set there?

Nobody probably anticipated

that it would still be here 10 years from now,

but like how did this unfold?

And you know, like same thing where you're like,

sir, how did the Daytona so Pantera get stuck in the corner

and never brought back out?

And that was me.

He didn't want to be that guy.

Again, it was not like I was so annoyed by the idea.

It was just like every other thing

was just a better distract.

You know, it's like, and really like,

I think like driving that 48 willies around Detroit

was like one of the best times in my life.

Like it was like an awesome car to rip around the city.

And like...

Yeah, what an experience.

And you were probably the only one, I'm assuming.

It was awesome.

It was so cool because everybody would like,

it's like it was a farm truck.

So it was like, it's totally original,

never been painted.

And it's like, it is mostly rust

or like very heavily patina paint.

But it was like, you could leave it anywhere

because no one could figure out how to start it.

It's like a floor push button starter.

Like just leave the keys in it, whatever you want.

You can park it anywhere.

And it was like, it was super reliable.

And it was like, yeah, it was open.

No seatbelts, no anything in it.

It was a phenomenal, I drove that car.

And I think I was probably driving that car

like 2,500 miles a year.

Like, and I lived two miles from my office.

It was like, I put a ton of miles on that thing.

It was so fun.

You were enjoying it.

Well, people laugh about like,

like a manual transmission being an anti-theft device.

And you're like, I'll do you one better.

That's a total flex.

Yeah, it's like, if you can steal this car,

you literally deserve it.

Go ahead.

It is, yeah, it's yours.

I will applaud the effort and send you off

with a fanfare if you can accomplish it.

Yeah, yeah, and I'll find it.

Eventually I'll find it.

Do you like living in Detroit

because I think a lot of people listening

have probably never been to Detroit.

They have a certain sort of idea of what Detroit is.

I think Detroit's a really neat place,

but there's no other town like Detroit is there.

No, it is the best place that I've ever lived.

And I think like, it is a place

that has like a lot of big city character, obviously,

but a lot of like big city, like, you know,

there's sports, there's, you know,

like Major League Baseball, NBA,

and I fell downtown hockey, great restaurant scene,

great music scene.

Like, you know, the awesome thing

that I loved about Detroit is like,

you could just go to a club at any night of the week

and see a band that you knew or like that you wanted to see

or like that you were excited about

and like just show up and like the same for, you know,

same for sports.

Like it was just easy to live there.

You can drive.

You don't really have to know anything special.

Like there's not a lot of, like being in New York,

wonderful place, I would, you know,

I love being in New York.

I spent a ton of time there last year,

but you have to know some tricks to get around.

Like, you don't have to like know

how to navigate a little bit.

Like Detroit is like, it's exactly the way

that you think it is.

It's very user friendly.

And it's also like, I mean, it's getting more expensive.

It's gotten more expensive in the last,

certainly since we left,

but I think like it's a place where you can kind of

as a younger person,

live kind of a version of the American dream

that we're all, you know, it's like home ownership.

You want to start a business.

You want to like be active in your community

and like have friends in the third place

and all that stuff like that's Detroit.

Like, and that's, I really love that about it.

It was like, I had a bunch of friends

who were entrepreneurs trying stuff out

and like, you know, some of the ideas

were better than others.

And so it worked and someone didn't,

but like that was fun.

It was like, yeah, let's do this together.

Let's figure this out.

And I think like, you know, you can still today,

you can still buy a decent home in Detroit

on a normal wage, which is like tough to say

for most places in the United States.

Yeah, yeah.

So yeah, I loved it.

I mean, I would move back in a heartbeat.

I think I recommend it very highly

to anybody who's thinking about like,

how do I take the next step?

You know, like I said, do you want to buy a house?

Do you want to sort of business?

Like, it's a great place to do it.

And there's tons of support.

It's a really fun, welcoming community.

Like it's a really good time.

Yeah, yeah.

Sounds amazing.

So we're all moving to Detroit next week.

It sounds like you have painted quite a bit

for this moment.

I mean, I can't recommend it highly enough.

I get you set up.

It's so fun.

And it's like, again, it's like,

because of all that stuff,

there's so much good creative energy.

So there's like good shows.

There's good, it's a good art scene.

You know, like you can afford to try things

and do things in Detroit

that you can't afford to do in other major cities.

And I think like, and it's also got some juice.

Like there's like, there's a lot of like

big Midwest cities that are like kind of cool,

but like just don't have the juice.

But like Detroit still has like a little bit

something to it.

Like people are coming to town.

You know what I mean?

Like for reasons not just because they're stuck there

because their, you know, flight got delayed or whatever.

Like sure people go to Detroit for things.

So it's, I don't know.

I dig it.

I'm a huge fan.

Yeah, I'm a huge fan.

That's awesome.

Well, so, okay.

So I know you have, so we talked about the Willys,

but then I want to hear about probably,

probably the member of your fleet

that is the nearest and dearest to my heart

is the 95 F-150.

So I would love to hear the story of that.

So actually that car lived in Denver.

I don't know.

Ryan, do you know a brewery called OMF,

our mutual friend?

I don't.

Oh, how cute.

Sounds like a great brewery.

I do need to know them though.

Yeah.

Really great.

Yeah.

I mean, some of the best beer I've ever had

in my entire life.

Really?

Okay.

Really, really fun.

But a couple buddies own it.

And Jan was using it as a, as his daily driver,

but also like to haul kegs.

And it's, I think it was owned

by like a mining company at one point.

Cause it's that really, that teal color,

like the super teal.

Which was so up the era.

Yeah.

You see that on Broncos every so often.

The Forest Service or something, yeah.

It's like the Forest Service was like a little,

I would, I think I prefer the Forest Service.

That was a little bit more like C-Foamy,

like it's a little bit more.

And it's mad.

Madnessy, yeah.

And this is like a, this is a,

this is a metal, metallic teal color.

I mean, it's like, it is very Alan Jackson video.

Very teal.

There was a Bronco, like 95,

there was a Bronco color scheme

and it was that teal and white.

And like with the white on it,

it made the teal even more teal.

And you're just like, yes.

Yeah.

There's one of those running around Traverse City

that every time I see them,

I'm like, cool, I think I just gotta go on, man.

Right.

You better check the seat cushions of this thing.

If it was owned by a mining company in Colorado,

I mean, the price of gold is way up.

Yeah, right.

You never know what you might find.

I actually did find a knife in the seat cushions.

Really?

They've had killed a man.

Yeah, yeah.

That's how real that truck is.

Yeah, yeah.

You're like, should I,

I feel like I should turn this into a truck.

Yeah.

I just hit it with some brake cleaning.

Right.

But yeah.

Call the day.

So Jan was using it and then he had a baby

and it was a two door and I was like,

hey, you know, if you're gonna sell the truck

and he obviously decided to sell it.

And I had previously gone to Denver with a buddy,

this is an entirely different weird story,

but he showed up with six.

Yeah, he was like, years ago,

I was dating my wife, she was in law school in Denver

and I, my buddy was like,

we should go out to Colorado and buy a pickup truck

for, you know, to take it back to Michigan,

like a clean dry pickup.

And so he figured out you could carry $6,000 in cash

on an airplane back then.

So he brought $6,000

and then I had sent him a bunch of trexless links

like go, like make a deal before we get there

so that we're not standing here like, you know

with $6,000 in hand.

Which he obviously did not say.

Burn a hole in your pocket.

Yeah.

So we made this, we made like 20 appointments

to go see trucks and like finally ended up in,

I forgot what town it was.

It was some little, some little tiny town,

met this incredibly weird guy named Rock Fuller

who was like a sculptor and would,

he had all these little sculptures of like little aliens

that he made out of junk metal,

but they were all like,

I don't want to say anatomically correct

because I don't know what they were doing.

They were like.

Humanoid-ish.

They were, yeah.

They had, they were in doubt.

They had some parts.

Wow.

Were the, and I'm imagining they were

beings he'd met on his travels, maybe?

I don't know.

He was a strange fella.

I would say like, kind of like, you know,

you kind of like the guy you aspire to be

where it's like, you're crazy, obviously,

in a very pleasant way.

Like, this is like not, not unfun to be around you.

So you want to buy a truck.

Charmingly, adorably crazy.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

It's like, and even the sculptures,

even though they were kind of weird,

it was like, this is nice, you know?

Good for you.

You got a thing going.

You found your niche, sir.

Yeah.

It's fine, you know?

You're up here in the mountains.

Well, did you buy a sculpture too?

No, I should have.

Yeah.

I know, I had-

The truck's where they could take the sculpture home.

Yeah.

But we, so we ended up buying this truck

that was like, it was owned by this guy

who bought it when he retired

and then immediately had a heart attack

and died in his widow.

Put it in, left it in the garage

and it was like, it had like 67 miles on it.

And it was absolutely like a vehicle cast

for like, no country for old men

where they had all those like hyper-accessorized 80s pickups

but like had the light bar, had the bull bar,

had orange, it was silver with orange

and red hockey stripes, red interior, wood grain,

had everything on it.

And it was like, I was like, we're buying this car.

Like we did the thing

where we're like, yeah, we'll think about it.

And we like went down the block and just did there.

And I was like, we're buying this.

Like, it bought a cash and drove it back.

It was five speed, four wheel drive.

I mean, just like everything.

Wow. Perfect.

And it was an F-150?

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, F-150, single cab, short bed.

I mean, just like exactly the truck that you would want.

It sounds incredible.

I think we need to find it.

Yeah, it's so good.

Yeah.

Well, I know where it is.

It is in, it's been living in Michigan

so it's completely ruined now.

But I remember like crawling underneath it to it.

Should I have people for that?

Yeah, it would be an endeavor.

But. I imagine, yeah.

Yeah, but I, so we did that.

And then exactly 10 years later,

we drove this green truck home in the same way,

which was, we drove it straight through,

we drove it, it's like 19 hours to Traverse City.

Really nice.

One of my absolute favorite things to do

is just like do too long of a road trip.

You know, like.

Uh-huh.

You get a lot of fun in Traverse City, yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

You start seeing some well-undowed aliens

and you're like, oh.

Yeah, yeah.

Is that a real alien?

Yeah, that sculptor guy has moved.

Yeah.

All right, good for you.

That's awesome.

It's all the work out here.

Shoot, shoot.

But yeah, I use it as a truck.

It's like, you know, it sits in the barn in the winter.

I don't drive it in the winter.

But in the summer, it moves, you know, like trees

or moves gravel and all kinds of like move tires.

And like it's a truck in the summertime,

which is like, trying to explain to somebody

they were like suggesting I get a new pickup truck.

And I was like, I don't know if I could drive

a new pickup because it's like I need to harm the truck.

You know, like I need to, I would feel,

if it's a new thing that I'm making a payment on,

I would feel really like hesitant to use it

in the way that I do.

You need it to be not precious

because then it has the utility

because you go get something really nice.

And it's like, I mean, I think about that like,

I have an F-150, that's my daily

and I went to an off-road event last spring

and I was gonna take the truck

and I ended up getting to take Subaru loaned me a car to take.

And later I was so glad because I'm like,

I didn't really want to scratch up the truck.

You know, like, and it's not a new truck

but it's still in really good shape.

And yeah, it changes how you use it.

Like you're hesitant to throw a bunch of gravel

in the back if it's still in good shape.

Yeah, yeah.

I mean, it is nice to have a car

that you can like chuck a car battery into.

It's like, without thinking about it.

That's a very freeing experience.

That's a very nice thing.

Like, yeah, like you said, the utility of that.

And like the utility, like there's a picture,

I took this summer where I literally piled it.

So I cut down a bunch of trees

and I piled it so full of trees

that you could no longer see the truck.

And I had to like crawl around the other door

and like kind of halfway climb in the window to drive it.

And I was like, this is good.

This is a, this is a-

That's what we call maximum truck.

That's amazing.

We're living at this point.

Oh man, stuff, Rory.

Yeah, you get up to,

like you have to get the blood flow on every now and again.

Well, I think when you have a new one,

like there's that one thing that kind of like breaks the seal

and you're like, well, now it's official.

Like mine has a ding in the back tailgate

where like a stump was,

it was used to pull a stump in the chain.

You know, it went a little more quickly than anticipated.

Oh, we hate that.

Yeah, that's a tough one.

But then it was like, okay, now it's official.

Yeah.

Yeah, now you can fill it with trees or gravel.

Yeah, now like, we're not worried about it anymore.

You could just destroy it.

Yeah.

Game on.

Yeah.

Let's change topics a little bit

and talk about car journalism, automotive journalism

and sort of the state of automotive journalism in 2025.

I don't know if you were one of those kids like me

and I think Lindsay who like couldn't wait

for like the new car and driver to show up

in the mailbox or the road and track, whatever.

Were you one of those kids?

And if so, what was your poison

and who did you read growing up?

Yeah, I mean, honestly, like it was the later onset thing

for me and I think like, I certainly would like buy

DuPont registry at the grocery store

and like just look at the ads.

It was like very important to me as a 12 year old

to know like how much a Dodge Viper costs.

I remember like flipping to the Vipers

and being like, okay, 70 grand, all right.

Maybe, you know, save some pennies or whatever.

And then like I would buy.

You wanted to have a handle on the hyper market

as a 12 year old.

Yeah, that was what it was.

It was like, I just needed to know how much they were.

Cause someday.

400 horsepower.

I mean, mind blowing.

Yeah, that's why.

I mean, I remember seeing him at the Detroit Auto Show

and being like, like at the time,

like nothing looked like that car.

Like it was so insane looking.

But yeah, I would buy like a road and track

or pick up a car and driver.

If I was at the store and saw a car,

I'd like to on the cover or whatever.

But my first like honest to goodness,

like obsession with reading about cars was Chlopnik.

Was like when it started.

I don't know how I came across it.

But within a few months of it starting,

I had, I started reading every post.

And like, this is extremely embarrassing.

But for a period of, I will say several years,

I read every single post that went up on the site.

And if I was traveling,

cause I didn't have a phone or a computer.

If I was out of town, I would go back

like to the day that I left

and go back and catch up and reread all the posts.

And that was like massively influential.

As far as like, to me, it was like finding a group

of people who liked cars in the way that I liked cars

where it's like, you know,

it's like a little bit more esoteric

and a little bit more about like story

and a little bit more about like the context of the car

than like the raw, you know, specs and yeah.

Yeah.

Which is like, you know, don't keep it wrong.

I did memorize a lot of car specs back

when I was younger.

I had this book called like 50 years of classic cars.

And I remember like, I've never been a studier,

never been a much of a student that was not into that.

But I remember like making tables like by hand

and memorizing specs for the cars.

And it was like-

Cause you were interested in it.

Yeah, yeah.

I mean, you wanted to do that.

Yeah, that's the difference.

Yeah.

That's how you found your place or your thing

or your people is this,

where you do it without thinking about it.

And then you look back and you're like,

I was making tables for what?

That's a lot of work.

Yeah.

So it's more work than I ever put into school

probably in my entire life.

I was memorizing all of Jalopik.

I reached the end of the internet.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

But yeah, that's how I got into it.

I think like, you know, those guys also too, like,

I think those, that early group,

Spinali, Johnny, Davey, Bumback and Phil,

like those guys for whatever reason

read as cool to me

in a way that like the other card journalists never did.

Yeah.

You know, like, especially like in that era

of like the early 2000s, it was like,

those guys just seemed like,

you know, like guys that I would want to hang out with.

And it turns out like they are,

like as now that I know them all,

they are guys that I like to hang out with.

Like I was a hundred percent correct.

Isn't that wild?

They're like, and now we're friends.

And yeah.

Yeah.

That was right.

They're good guys.

They actually, those guys, Phil and Johnny

talked me into buying that stupid lotta

that I still have.

That was their idea.

So we can blame or thank them or both.

At this point, we're blaming them.

I think like this has been a near 20 year

ordeal of me owning a Soviet car.

All right.

We have to talk about this

because you don't just,

yeah, you don't just stumble into a lot of it.

Yeah.

Okay.

Where'd you find this thing?

Yeah.

It was a nice price of a crack pipe car

on Jalopnik.

And, you know, that's a joke.

Like there's like,

no one would buy the crack pipe.

It's a great joke.

Yeah.

No, it was Project Car Hell.

It's actually at the, yeah.

Oh, okay.

Okay.

So that's even worse.

It was like this is,

it was like this or Dodge Power Wagon.

And I was like, ah, fuck it.

Like call the people in Canada

who had the Craigslist ad

or the Seafoam Lada.

And I was like, would you take 500 bucks for it?

And they were like, yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, absolutely.

Like we'll even deliver it for free, sir.

Weren't you saying you are?

Would you have taken $50 for it?

And it was, so it was in Canada,

it was too new to import.

So I told them it was gonna be,

I told the border people it was gonna be a race car

and never registered for the street,

which got me detained for a really long time

at Customs and Border Patrol.

They did not believe that story.

They didn't believe that story.

No.

And I had done a bunch,

I actually had done a bunch of research

and looked up the law and like,

that's how I had the cover of a race car.

And they tore the whole thing apart.

And they were like, you are like,

to them looking at the Lada,

I could see where it didn't seem plausible

that it was actually gonna be a race car.

You know, like, okay, fair enough.

Like this guy has nothing about cars.

What's going on?

It doesn't look like a race car.

Wow.

Race car is subjective.

Ran it in lemons.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

It's like, you guys don't know what lemons is.

No.

This is anything can be a race car as it turns out.

Right.

You're like, allow me to dazzle you.

Yeah.

Let me show you some Jalopnik articles.

Right.

But yeah, so I ran it in lemons

and then twice and then tried to give it away

to Camille from Hooniverse.

And he had it for a number of years

and then finally called me and was like,

hey, this car is never running again while I have it.

Like I just, we're never gonna get to it.

Do you want it back?

And I was like, no, I don't.

And he's like, well, it's probably gonna go to scrap.

And I was like, okay, I'll,

so Brad Brownell from Jalopnik.

One of the founders of Radwood too.

We had in Radwood, yeah.

He was like, I'm doing Radwood in Chicago.

So I'll be in your neck of the woods six hours away.

I'll just run out to Boston and get it

and then deliver it to your house,

which is like so much striving to do.

Yeah.

That's a wild just pop in.

It's really like a cross country's worth.

Yeah.

So he went and got it.

He had the huge ambulance

and he like towed it here on you all trailer.

Oh wow.

And then long story short,

I was like, I'm gonna case swap it.

And then I was like, if I case swap it,

I should put an independent rear in it.

And if I put an independent rear in it,

I might as well match the front and the back

so that it's the same thing for handling purposes.

There's like a hill climb up here.

And it was like, anyway, it snowballed

into like this stratosphere.

I have more money into the lot

of that I have ever put into a car.

I will say that.

And it's.

Yeah.

So it's a lot of body with like a integrated cage

into the subframes.

So it's Subaru BRZ front and rear subframes

bolt into the cage, which is awesome.

You can just drop the entire subframe with two bolts.

Oh wow.

And then.

That's handy.

It's great.

And then it's a K24, K24A2 that I got from eBay

that thankfully runs.

I like, I built the whole car and then I didn't fire it

until like a week before the race.

And it was like, I had no idea where the motor came from,

what it was doing for the last,

since it had been out of a car.

And thankfully it worked fine.

Didn't work great.

Honestly, the first time we had it out,

but it worked and then it runs awesome now.

I mean, it's really incredibly lightweight.

And it's, you know, there's nothing in it.

It's like, it was like a utter nightmare

getting everything to fit and then getting,

I had Thompson Racing fabrication

built the cage up here,

which actually I took the old cage

out of the lot that I built for lemons.

And it was like, so sketchy.

It was like, I cannot believe I did two lemons races

in this cage.

Like it seemed fine when I was in my 20s,

but it's like, it's so horrifying to be, to anyway.

You look at it and you're like,

I felt good about this at the time.

I felt horrible.

I'm more to lose now.

Yeah.

And it would have,

I honestly think that the cage that we built

was more dangerous than going without a cage.

Like there were so many places where it's like,

just tubing that could have impaled me somehow.

Yeah, yeah.

It would have been, yeah,

the cage would have killed you instead of.

Yeah, yeah.

So yeah, that's the lot.

It is a super fun car.

I'm super proud of like figuring out

how to do all that stuff.

Like it was like, no one's ever done it, obviously.

So there's no like reference to look at.

Right.

But yeah, and now it's fun.

It's like super fast.

I shouldn't say super fast.

It's fast enough.

Sure.

Fast for a lot, maybe?

It's, yeah, it's probably one of the faster lot is out there.

I'm sure that's.

There's a guy in Miami who has a 2JZ-powered lot,

which I feel like it's almost like a fast car.

I think we need to do like a head-to-head lot of addition.

I would love to get in contact.

I would also love to do that, yeah.

There are enthusiasts,

and then there are enthusiasts like yourself.

I mean, that's, you know, that's dedication

to the craft.

Yeah, I was built it in,

I think like a year and a half.

And it, you know, it was also like one of those things

where I think at a certain point,

it's like you don't progress in your ability to do stuff

unless you do something that you don't know how to do.

Sure, sure.

And it's like the, my ability to like weld

and think through bigger problems

and like build parts and structural parts of a car.

That like taught me so much about how cars are built,

but also like how, like what makes cars handle,

what makes cars behave in a certain way.

And it was like, I was at a point, I think,

like wrenching-wise where it's like I could,

it was close enough to being able to do it.

And it was like really glad,

I don't know that I'd build a car from scratch again

by myself.

Yeah, that's an idea.

But I know, I can't.

Yeah, it's like, maybe it's, I don't know,

like now that I said that out loud,

I'm like, there's like, I would actually actually do that.

I'd like to revise my answer immediately.

No, I will probably end up doing that again.

But if you can do it with a friend too, you're right.

Like that's, it's more approachable.

Like your 911 might get done.

Yeah, yeah.

That's, I mean, the real thing is like,

I have to just go out there and finish it.

I have made it, I got it running

for the first time in a long time.

Yeah, that's amazing.

It's a big progress.

But anyway, we were talking about automotive media.

I'm sorry.

No, no, no.

But I mean, this, I think this is good evidence

of kind of where you're coming from.

And, you know, I mean, you're the real deal

if you're doing some shit like that.

I mean, that's, that's incredible.

And so, and you've been,

you were the editor at Jalopnik twice.

Yeah.

You've written for New York Times.

You've written for what was,

what else was on the list, Lindsey?

It was a whole.

Yeah, I can go back to Ireland.

I'm glad you had the last two thousand.

It took me a long time.

We were timed.

Right.

Walking in post, car and driver, road and track,

Pagarty, Porsche, Panorama and Gizmodo.

And of course, did you write for AutoWeek?

I know you ran the outlet.

Yeah.

I started there as a web editor under Davy actually.

Okay.

Oh, wow.

Yeah.

So that was something I was going to ask you

and it leads into obviously the ultimate reason

that we're here, but you have obviously written

for many of these outlets.

You freelance, you've been full time

and then you've been in leadership roles.

And like, what did you,

what was that like going from writing

into leadership in the automotive industry

and kind of at these outlets where you'd been a writer

and did you continue writing while you were running them?

Like, what was that path like?

Yeah.

I mean, you do write a lot less,

but I tried to keep doing it just cause it's,

I think it's an important skill

and you have to keep that muscle active or whatever,

but I think when I got to AutoWeek,

I knew right away that I wanted to run AutoWeek

cause it was like such a cool story,

such a cool publication.

And like there was so much potential in the brand

where it was like,

and like I really love the people who I worked with

and like my boss and everything,

but it was like, if there's an opportunity,

if he retires or moves on or something,

like I, you know, I told the cranes early on,

like this is what I want to do is run this book.

And like, we, I was super,

it was like a crazy opportunity that, you know,

I had done a lot of good stuff there, I think.

And like I had really helped kind of shape the business

and sell a lot and kind of grow the business

and did all the stuff that like led them

to believe that I was able to run it.

But I think I was like 30, 32 or something

when I took it over.

It was like maybe 33.

So it was like really had no business,

you know, on paper doing it,

but I was, you know, we had a great time.

We completely redesigned the entire brand

from top to bottom, got it profitable,

had not been profitable in a super long time

and did a lot of really cool stuff

and ended up, we ended up selling it to Hearst

who owns it now.

But it was like, like,

when I think about as well as it could go at the time

and yeah, it was like a great learning experience.

What a cool thing to be like handed this 62 year old brand

that like meant so much to so many people.

And like the people that you get to meet

and talk to like, remember getting like a fan letter

from Alec Azidius, the old hot writer kind of,

this is the most surreal,

he'd like to call them that I read or wrote

and they accept me a handwritten letter.

I was like, this is, yeah, freak me out.

But it was like.

I hope you framed it.

Yeah, I've still got it for sure.

But it was like, you know, it was like a old man scrawl

with a Sharpie marker, like each inch tall.

It was like, yeah.

You're like, okay, I'm gonna hold it up.

A ransom letter or something.

Yeah, well, at first I was like, oh, this guy's mad,

like just by looking at it.

That's why are you killing, sir?

Yeah.

It's the analog version of all caps.

Yeah, maybe you just can't see as well.

Sure, sure.

But yeah, it was super cool.

I think like the Jalopnik thing too

was one of those opportunities.

Like obviously, like I said, I grew up loving Jalopnik.

I actually got offered that job pretty shortly

after selling auto week after Crane sold auto week.

And I turned it down because I had been hearing

some things about the ownership.

And I had a bunch of conversations with some friends

who were like close to it and they were like,

yeah, you know, this is tough, tough situation.

And then I ended up getting on a call with Jason

and David Torchinski and David Tracy.

And they were like, hey, we feel like they're gonna hire

somebody who does not get what Jalopnik is.

And they're like, it is a tough situation right now,

but like we would really love it if you would take this

and like just do it for a couple of years

so that it doesn't get ruined.

And like, which is a tough position to be in

because it's like, you know, you go from auto week

where it was like total free for all,

like you do whatever you want, you hire whoever you want.

Like this is your thing to like, okay,

let's try to keep this thing alive during this period.

Which like-

Definitely a different challenge.

Different vibe.

Yeah, it's like a different challenge.

It ended up, you know, it's like the people

and this is, we can get into this too,

but I think like the company that owned Jalopnik

was a private equity company

and they have a three to five year timeframe

where they need to own the company, make a return

and sell the company.

And like, you know, where at auto week

it's like you're looking for how do you build a brand

that people are gonna be in love with for 20 years

and like you got these return customers

and like people like this brand

mean something to them or whatever.

And it's like just because of the nature of private equity

and these kind of shorter term ownership,

it's like they are fundamentally

in a different mindset, different business.

They don't care what happens 20 years from now.

And it's like, you know, it's like,

it's like there's a Nietzsche quote

about like you can't blame the hawk for eating the rabbit.

Like the hawk eats the rabbit.

Like that's what it does.

It's like, and that's what private equity,

it's like, you know, it's like, that's the system.

I don't love it.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah.

Can't blame Lindsay for ordering the swan.

She does.

Every time we go to a restaurant, she orders the swan.

That's what I do.

I don't love it.

It's annoying, but she does it every time.

What are you gonna do guys?

Yeah.

We all have our own lanes.

I just, it's mine.

Huh, what a position to be in though.

Yeah, that's wild.

Yeah, it was a, it was really interesting.

I think like probably one of the most,

you know, honestly really rewarding.

Yeah.

I got to do a bunch of cool stuff

and I got to be in New York all the time,

which was great.

Yeah.

And then got to help out with Gizmodo too.

Had like the most incredible staff at Gizmodo.

It had the people who are now running it

were like really, really smart.

And like have like absolutely blown up Gizmodo

and it's like new iteration.

It's like, I think they're up like 400% in audience.

Like they're making money.

Like it's a really great story.

That's amazing.

Yeah.

So it's like, it was a different challenge,

but it was fun.

And also like at Jalopnik, it's like,

at the end of the day,

you do kind of get to write whatever you want.

So it's like, you know,

like that part of it was very satisfying.

And I got to add some cool stuff.

Frozen cons.

Yeah, yeah.

I mean, it was a different deal,

but it, and also like I am very proud of the fact

that it survived, like made it true.

Well, it thrived, I think, under your leadership.

Truly.

It was a launching pad for so many names

that we know and love now, right?

I mean, I think that all began under your leadership.

That was, you know, there were,

certainly Jalopnik has always kind of been that place,

but I think like one of the things

that I've been most proud of is like,

I think really reaching into like some obscure places

to bring people into the business

that I think are talented and good.

And it's like, that's like,

it's like looking at the,

God, who's the guy who's like the San Francisco coach

who was like the West Coast offense,

like back in the eighties

and you would look at his coaching tree.

And it was like every current NFL head coach

had like some connection to this guy's bills.

And it's like, that's kind of like,

I feel like that, you know,

like look around all these publications,

you're like, oh yeah, like I heard that guy

do a freelance thing

or hired her to shoot some photos or whatever.

And it's like so many people now come up to me

and they're like, oh, you were my first paid, whatever,

like writing job or paid photography thing or whatever.

And it's like, I don't remember that at all,

but that's fantastic.

You are welcome.

But yeah, it all started there.

Well, and I mean, I think without knowing it,

you were like molding yourself

into the ultimate, you know, Jalopnik editor

because how many other people were they gonna find

who had the whole site memorized?

That's true.

Yeah, that's true.

You're the guy.

I did have a freakish dedication

to Jalopnik at one point.

The knowledge, yeah, yeah.

Amazing.

Like I've been studying for this job

most of my adult life.

Yeah, I know everything.

I know everything about Mike Spinelli.

What do you want to know?

Yeah.

It's just going away post.

But fast forward to 2025 and things have changed so much.

Yeah, yeah.

So we actually raised the money

and we tried to buy Jalopnik.

We had put all these ideas together,

but we would do differently

and how we would kind of rebuild it

in our ideal world or whatever.

And that ended up fizzling for reasons

that I don't understand.

I think they ended up selling it

for way less than we were offering.

Really?

Which I think they kind of ninth dimensional chest it.

We could get into it,

but it's a very weird story.

Where I was like, multiple points.

Yeah, it was like, what is happening here?

What are you trying to do?

Can you tell me what you're trying to do?

And I'll help you do it.

Yeah.

I'm so fascinated.

At the same time, I'm just...

Yeah.

I wish I wasn't involved with this.

Because this would be so fun to watch.

But yeah, so we did that.

And then we got this opportunity

to build our own thing in Alloy,

which like through that Jalopnik process

and then like through this early process with Alloy,

like we really got a chance

to interrogate the entire business model.

And I think like going back to AutoWeek and Jalopnik

and then Gizmodo and kind of like seeing

what's happening at different like bigger publishers

outside of AutoEvent,

we came to this conclusion that like the actual issues

that are facing a lot of these publications are structural.

And I think like they're all related

to this early 2000s business model,

which is like massive audience

and extremely low cost ads.

And then like if you can get to a certain audience number,

like even though you're not getting paid very much

for individual like clicks or views or whatever,

it adds up over time,

which is like it doesn't.

And it really hasn't for a very long time.

I think like, you know, there was a tremendous,

there's a period like in the early 2000s,

early aughts maybe where it was like,

you know, Vox and Slate and all these like different,

companies were raising tons of money

and they're like, oh, we have a billion dollar valuation.

Like everybody has to get it.

It's like an AI thing now.

It's like the metaverse or whatever, remember that?

Like two years ago or whatever.

Yeah, it was so many years ago.

Yeah, one of its real guys.

Yeah, but it was, it was the,

I mean, I have a whole theory on why that's happening,

but it's just like,

Hey, we have time.

There's just not a lot of places to put money anymore.

So there's not a lot of like, you know,

like you used to be able to buy bonds against a freeway

or whatever like highway projects you used to be able to buy.

Like, but there's not a lot of places

that offer like big explosive returns.

Yeah, yeah, back when we would invest in infrastructure.

Is that what you're saying?

Yeah, yeah, that's right.

But you used to do a lot of that.

So I mean, rich people used to buy a lot of construction

bonds and like municipal bonds and stuff.

But now it's like, I read something yesterday

where it's like the entire economy is like Nvidia

and I forgot what the other company was investing in AI

and then reinvesting in data centers.

And like, it's like, if one of those companies falters,

like we are in such a bad position,

but it's like every couple of years

you have to have like a hot thing to invest in.

It's like, you know, it was blogs

and then it was social media,

or maybe it was social media than blogs.

Anyway, there's like a new thing

that it's like crypto, NFT, metaverse, AI,

that's kind of like what is making the economy happen now,

which is terrifying, but.

Yeah, I remember that.

But anyway, that was wild.

Oh man, it was so fun.

I was at RM hawking an entrance for a minute there

and I was like, guys, we can't,

we're gonna get burned on this real bad and.

You're like, this is gonna go poorly.

Just.

Yeah, it's like, this is not real.

We can't put our name on this.

But yeah.

But yeah, so that era, I think that kind of optimism

about like, oh, if we can get to these mass numbers,

then we can continue to grow and we'll continue,

like we'll figure out the profitability

end of this eventually.

And I think there were a bunch of years

kind of in that interim where it's like

they were, you know, ad rates were higher.

They were selling a lot of like direct

and like sponsored content type stuff.

And you could kind of keep it afloat.

And a lot of them did and a lot of made a lot of money,

but like we've been seeing for the last like 15 years,

this like slow, or like it goes in big chunks,

like big layoff, everybody survives for another five years,

big layoff, everybody survives for their five years.

But it's like, I remember having this conversation

on auto week in 2015 or 16, but it's like,

every year they want more impressions

and they want to pay less for them.

Eventually this model exhausts itself.

Yeah, it's understandable.

It's a race to the bottom.

And I think unfortunately that's kind of where we are now.

And I think like, if you look at the environment,

you have, you know, these three kind of main constituencies

in digital publishing, we have the publisher,

you have the marketer slash advertiser,

whatever, and then you have the reader.

And it's like, the experience as a reader

is as everyone knows, awful.

Like if you go to try to read a website today,

the ad experience, to say nothing of the content experience.

I mean, there's some, and this is, you know,

I should say too, it's like everybody in this business

from the ownership down to like the individual writers

are, it's like, I'm sure some of the people

on the ownership side are evil people,

but like, I think most of them are trying

to like make this work

and putting a good faith effort into it.

But I think like a lot of them are stuck in a cycle

with this business model where, you know,

you have to produce a bunch of kind of mass market,

I would say like commodified content

to get to a certain like SEO position

to get to like a share of traffic

that is gonna like make this little tiny individual spend

on each ad, you know, like you can get to that size audience

that's gonna like eventually all those little pennies add up

and then you get to a revenue number.

And then you have the actual publisher kind of like,

they're kind of facing that diminishing returns thing

where it's like they're making more and more traffic,

they're making less and less revenue every year.

But anyway, like, you know, if you're the reader,

I was like, I could just digress for one second,

but I was reading this like, sorry, it's like again,

but I was reading this profile in GQ,

it's a good magazine, I think.

And it was this Walmart ad sort of showing up on the page

and it would like hover over

an entire like two paragraph block of text.

And there's no, yeah, it's like, no way to dismiss it,

no way to, so you had to refresh the page to dismiss the ad

and then you'd scroll down a little bit more

and it's two more paragraphs are covered by the wall

and then you'd have to refresh it.

It was like, hey, it's like, why is there a GQ ad

or a Walmart ad on GQ?

Like, it's like the flagship, yeah.

Why is it broken in a way

that like makes it impossible to dismiss?

And like, why is no one at GQ fixed this?

Like, this is like, this is a miserable experience

as a reader, Walmart doesn't want that ad on GQ.

Like, it's not doing anything for Walmart.

They don't want to pay for that ad.

And they don't want to be irritating you

where your only experience of the brand is like,

gosh, it was so annoying.

That sucks, yeah, I hate Walmart.

It's like-

They're paying to irritate people, like, that's.

Yeah, but like that's the experience

of using the internet now.

And I think like, you know, there are a lot of pages

where it's like impossible to see what you're reading.

And it's like, you give up.

It's like, you know, Jalopnik was like that

when I was there, there was like the number one complaint

that we would get for readers was like,

it is physically hard for me to read this page.

Like, it's making my phone hot in my hands.

Yeah.

I was trying to load so much shit.

Well then you get those ones where it's like moving

and like the ad is the fixed content

and the article you're trying to read is the mobile.

This is insane.

It's maddening.

And it's like, again, there's these, you know,

the three constituencies are like,

the publisher is not making enough money.

The reader is having this incredibly frustrating

experience that like just really is like,

we don't care about you at all.

Right.

And then the worst part of it.

That's the message.

Yeah, yeah.

And the worst part too is like,

if all that was true,

you could have like an evil little business

if the marketers were still like,

okay, we'll pay for that.

But like the marketers don't want to pay for it either.

Like they don't like it either.

And it's like, one of the discussions I had really early on

with one of these marketers was like,

we will continue to do this.

It still makes sense for our business.

Like we still sell,

we still do like sales promotion stuff on there.

But like we will pay exactly what we think it's worth,

which is almost nothing.

And it's like, so like all three people

who are making this little industry happen, hate it.

Like this sucks for all three of them.

Like you ask anyone involved, they're like,

yeah, this is terrible.

Like I read websites, it's awful.

And so we-

So nobody's winning.

Yeah.

Like no one's happy,

but because of the way it's set up

and because of the way these companies operate,

like they're only,

or like at least their big source of revenue now

is this display ads that are bought programmatically,

you know, via a third party auction.

And the idea of going into a board room

or going to ownership and saying like,

we should get rid of this part of it is like,

you might as well shut the whole thing down.

Like it'd be really hard to do.

It'd be really hard to like turn that ship.

So like our position is if we start from here,

it start just building a reader experience

where it's like, let's get something

that readers are super excited about

that looks good, that doesn't hurt your eyes.

It's not distracting, like all the things.

You know, I think like on a content level,

like I said, there's a lot of great stuff being written

on almost any website that you can think of,

regardless of the ad experience,

regardless of who owns it or whatever.

There are good journalists doing good work

on almost all those sites.

But I think like the game that you have to play

to rank in Google,

the game that you have to play

as far as we used to call it curiosity gap headline writing

where it's like basically like a clickbait type thing.

That's the official, I like that package term though for it.

It's much more friendly.

No, no, no.

Yeah, this is not clickbait.

We're just creating a little curiosity gap.

We're just engaging with our audience.

Yeah, but I think like that's,

you know, like building a hundred page slideshow

where like every slide reloads the ads on the page.

Like it's just like you got to do that stuff

because that's the business model.

Like that's like, you know what I was saying

about the Ditchelopnik thing is it's like,

that's the model and if you want to keep

these companies afloat on that model,

you are incentivized to do a bunch of stuff

that you probably wouldn't do naturally.

You know what I mean?

You probably wouldn't say like,

this is valuable journalism.

This is fulfilling to me as a writer.

This is going to connect with a reader or whatever.

It's just like, you know, it's like,

you wouldn't write the article that is,

this is what your tire pressure should be.

That's just like meant to be a response

to the Google query of what's my tire pressure

supposed to be.

I wouldn't do that, like.

The entire focus of the article, yeah.

Yeah, like you wouldn't write that article.

But it's like, so our proposition is like I said,

build this user experience, build this reader experience.

And then it's like, write stuff that readers

are going to value and they're going to feel like,

oh, I learned something or I got smarter or whatever.

So like, we're lower volume, we're a little bit,

I think slower to the punch in every case.

But it's like I said, we're really trying

to really hit that next level of like,

you know, the way that I've explained it before

is like, there's five people sitting around talking

about like the new BMW M5 or whatever.

One of those people knows what factory it's being built in

and like that's the guy we want to talk to.

Like that's the reader for us.

It's like, the weirdo.

But it's like, you remember, yeah, yeah.

But it's just like, you remember,

you can all, everybody who has read car stuff

can point to a moment reading an article

where they were like, either that was the most entertaining

thing I've ever read or I learned something

that has stuck with me for the rest of my life.

And it's like, that should be the ask,

like what you aspire to as a publisher

is like producing something like that.

So that's the plan.

And then I think like, you know, we have some,

we have some kind of creative ways to bring in revenue.

We have obviously like the regular stuff

that everybody does like the merch,

memberships, live events, like that kind of stuff.

But I think like, we're also offering

like a quarterly sponsorship thing

that has like been really well received by automakers.

I think like, you know, our pitch is that

you can land a kind of suite of content on the site

and we'll trickle it out like in the order

that you want it to trickle out.

It's like the problem that a lot of marketers

now are having is like you used to be able

to do like a campaign on social media

where it's like we're releasing a new car,

a new new technology or whatever

and like over the course of six months

we'll like trickle this, this messaging out.

But now everything is served algorithmically

they have no control over what order things come out.

And it's like, you know, it's like totally jumbled

like if a reader would ever see it at all anyway.

So it's like this solves that problem for them

seems to be something people are really excited about.

We'll see.

I mean, it's like everybody's really excited in the pitch,

you know, that's when it's check time

we'll see who's really excited, but

but it's been awesome.

I think like, you know, I guess my, you know, like I said

it's been very well received on the pitch side.

Anytime I have an idea, there's like a six month period

where you're like, how good of an idea

could this be if I came up with it?

Or if like in this case, like Fernando, my partner

came up with a bunch of this stuff.

And it's like, if us two morons think this is a good idea

like we're gonna need some external validation for this

but we've gotten a lot of it.

And I think like, you know, I'm sitting here

and you guys are in the same position

but you're watching a lot of your friends and colleagues

and people who you know and admire

either getting laid off or having their

like career prospects diminished or whatever.

And it's like, you know, these are some of the most talented

hardworking people that I've come across.

And I feel like if someone doesn't try something different,

really different, you know, then it's like

it's almost like giving up, you know what I mean?

Like if it's like, we're gonna just keep banging our head

against the same old model that everybody knows

is failing, everybody can feel it collapsing.

It's like somebody has to try something different.

And like if it doesn't work, it doesn't work

but you can't, you have to try it.

Like someone has to, someone has to,

and maybe this is not the idea that like solves the problem

but it's like, again, it's like you have to try something.

And I think like, you know, like I said,

I feel really good about it.

I feel like everybody who we've talked to has been excited

and we'll see what happens.

But yeah, it's been good.

Give us an example of your content.

Like what's something that's just gonna kill

on the new site?

Yeah, I mean, that'll be actually really interesting

because I don't have a, like Jalopnik,

it took six months for me to figure out

like what was really gonna hit.

Okay.

But we have a bunch of really good stuff

that I guess I can give you like the preview

but like Tim Stevens is writing something about OTA

like over the air updates

and how like he was a gaming journalist

in kind of their early 2000s

and at the beginning part of his career

and he watched that process of like shipping unfinished

products and then like updating them down the road

like ruined gaming in a way that it hasn't

really recovered from.

And he's like, the pattern is like this yearly

recognizable pattern with cars.

And I think like I've had that experience.

I've had other people like, you know,

tell me that they're having the same experience.

And it was like Tim is, Tim,

and I think one of our things with this is like

Tim is somebody who has genuine insight

who can tell you because like he saw it firsthand.

And I think like for me that is one

that it's gonna be really useful information.

I think it's gonna be very illuminating.

And I think we'll like cause some discussion

in the car business.

We have a bunch of stuff like John Volkler.

I don't know if you know John, but he's brilliant.

He's been following EVs since before anyone

was following EVs.

And I think like he's got a really cool piece coming

about analyzing cash burn for all like the EV startups

and like just figuring out kind of where they are,

which is like.

What the real story is.

Yeah.

Which I've never seen before.

I don't know what that is where people stand

and like kind of what, you know,

what we're looking at.

Yeah.

Across the board to see.

Cause I think we've all watched,

you know, they're not all on the same cycle.

And I think you sort of get like an article

will come out and say like, all right,

they have X amount of cash left

or they have this many months left,

but to see it all spelled out,

especially from somebody who has lived that cycle

in a different industry would be fascinating.

Yeah.

And I think that, you know, our thing on this is like,

the gap that I see is like, again,

because of like this, this programmatic

and kind of display based model,

it's like, it's very hard.

And I saw this as an editor at Chalopnik.

So it's like, I had people on staff

who I think could write those types of pieces.

But it's like, if my job is to get to 30 million

page views or whatever impressions this month,

it's like, do I want someone to take four days off

to write this really good story

that maybe well, maybe well, rather maybe won't,

or am I going to make them write up,

you know, 10 posts about a viral,

about different viral videos or whatever.

And it's like, that's an unfortunate calculation

to have to make, but it's like,

that is kind of where I think the gap is

in the market is around that kind of stuff.

I think like we also, you know,

I like to talk a lot about like the journalism

and like the analysis part of this,

but I think like one of the things

that like really differentiates us is like Fernando,

that the designer is like full-time designer.

He's creating custom art on the page.

All the, like everything that goes up

has these like incredible visuals.

And I think like there's an opportunity to like

tell stories through visuals that is also like,

unfortunately again,

it's like because of the way that car sets are made.

If you go from car set to car set,

you're going to see a lot of the same images

because it's just like,

what did you get with the press packet

for this press release

and like get it up as quickly as possible

and then you get a lot of the same stuff.

So I think like I'm super proud and excited

about the art and the level of like design thinking

that's going into this.

So yeah, I think it's going to be very different.

I will say like the site is in beta now

and I've been looking at it

and so I've never seen anything

that looks like this on the internet before.

It's like a totally different experience,

which maybe people like or maybe they will hate it.

I don't know.

I think there's a huge appetite for just that, really.

Yeah.

The quality and like I liked the way that you described it

and that it was, you know,

news and analytics from like for the enthusiast

or kind of from the enthusiast perspective,

I think that has fallen.

By the way, I said like you were saying

where you as the editor, your calculation is like,

I have to get the clicks and that changes the content

and then the people that are sort of the true enthusiast

are like, where's the meat?

And they sound like you're delivered.

And again, it's like-

We're tired of being talked down to, you know?

I mean, that's-

Yeah.

Right?

That is like something I don't like to say,

but it's like so many of the sites that you read,

not just an automotive or whatever, the assumption.

And I think like it's this way on social,

it's this way in video too,

but like the assumption is that the audience are idiots.

And it's like-

Right.

That sucks.

And also doesn't like that they're not gonna read

beyond the headlines.

So you don't really have to worry about it.

Like there's not gonna be that much attention

to the actual article anyway.

Yeah.

It's like a not a nice way to start up your relationship

of like, I assume you're not actually going to run this,

and I assume you're not gonna understand it

even if you did.

So why am I bothering with you?

Right.

Yeah.

Why don't we just end this now?

Yeah.

That's not nice at all.

Yeah.

No.

It doesn't feel good.

It doesn't feel big.

Yeah.

It's alloymag.com.

Dot com.

And it's in beta.

I think we like we have a soft target in mind

of like end of October.

Okay.

But it, this like because this is a extremely

like high risk situation where it's like,

it's gotta deliver on all this crazy stuff

that I just told you.

Like, we will not-

Got one Batman.

Yeah.

We will not push it until it's right.

So like it's-

Yeah.

I think-

Or should you?

Yeah.

I think we're still gonna be like that last week

in October to go live.

But, you know, caveat of I can always hold it back

if we need to keep tweaking it.

But I think you can keep up with it.

We have an Instagram page up where we're upgrading

or updating regularly at alloy underscore mag.

And there was a newsletter sign up

but that's now down because we're,

we've pushed the site live behind a password.

So like our sign up sheet is now

behind the password as well.

But yeah, it should be a couple of weeks.

Excellent.

And then we'll see what happens.

There's a great manifesto for lack of a better term

on Instagram, right?

Yeah.

That swirls through like Star Wars, right?

And really talks about what you're doing.

Yeah.

What you're all about.

I don't think really sums it up well.

So check that out.

Good place to start for now.

Yeah.

That's like how you know you're dealing

with a crazy person when they-

It wasn't in Sharpie, Rory.

Yeah. No, it's true.

That's true.

I did-

Crazy good.

You know, it's hyphenated.

It looked weird when I did it, but Fernando made it.

So it's alloy underscore mag on Instagram.

Instagram, yep.

Okay.

And there will be,

did you say there will be subscription options?

Yep.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

We've got a bunch of different subscription options.

One of which comes,

I think is going to come with me making a custom

car out of steel by hand.

So please really think about if you want me to,

how many of those you want me to be making?

I like, I put it in there and Fernando was like,

are you sure about that?

And I was like, yeah, yeah, I'm going to do it.

So-

I feel like this is like the story of the bomba's founder

where he's like, when we sell, you know,

X thousand pairs, I'll get a tattoo of bombas.

And like, guess who now has a tattoo of bombas?

Yeah.

Oh, that's another option for you Rory.

Yeah.

I mean, I will be very happy if we sell that many,

but it will not be very happy making

little tiny scale cars with my welder.

That will, I actually tattoo.

So remember the Volkswagen thing

where they said that they were going to change

the name to Volkswagen on April 1st

and everybody fell for it?

I wrote it on a Kalanchalopnik that said,

if they actually changed the name to Volkswagen,

I will drive to Herndon, Virginia,

Volkswagen's headquarters and get a tattoo

like at Volkswagen, of a Volkswagen.

Like I'll get the Volkswagen logo tattooed

on my person somewhere.

And everybody got so mad at me

because of course I was right.

And everybody else had it confirmed by Volkswagen PR.

But yeah, it was not a good weekend

in the publishing chats for me for so mad.

Anyway, sorry, another digression.

A US gate is the moral of the story.

Clean as a whistle we got.

You're right.

Oh my gosh.

Well, we're so excited for Alli

and I know at least for this corner of the internet

we're very, I think it's gonna fill

the enthusiast needs and wants

that we've all been sort of like wishing for.

So I'm super excited.

Yeah, if we can,

if we can build a sustainable publishing business

on the internet in 2025,

you really did something.

I think that's our goal.

And we don't have

huge ambitions to be the next billion dollar company.

But I think we can do it the right way

and really respect our readers and our partners.

I think we can build something that people really value.

And I think that's the goal.

So we'll see.

Yeah, it's a brilliant ever.

When you get that valuation,

we'll celebrate with a meal of swan.

Right.

Gonna get a swan tattoo.

Only the freshest swan.

You know, this is endangered, right?

Makes it taste a little better.

Be quiet, we're celebrating.

Come on.

Yeah, I love it.

Well, what a pleasure.

Yeah, I know, I was gonna say.

Yeah, tell us where you're,

where can we find you on Instagram?

Obviously, I'm,

aloe underscore mag.

And the website is just aloemag.com.

It's aloemag.com, no underscore.

And then I'm on Instagram at Rory underscore carol.

And I think all the other ones

are Rory underscore carol too.

I have like a dead Twitter account.

You and most of the other people.

You know, I used to have a lot of fun on there,

but I just don't find myself doing it as much.

I feel like Joel, when we had Joel Fedder on,

he was saying the same thing.

That was when we got his start

and you know, it was a good launch pad.

Yep, yeah, for sure.

RIP.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah, I really appreciate you having us on

or having me on.

And I love talking about it.

The royal rest.

Yeah, yeah.

Me and Fern.

But yeah.

We're so excited for you guys

and can't wait to check it out.

And you know, we wish you an amazing launch.

So we will be,

we'll be keeping an eye on the Instagram account.

Excited for the launch.

Soft and otherwise.

Yeah, yeah.

And please come back, you know.

Six ways down the road, okay?

Let me know.

Whenever you need a late ad.

Yeah, I appreciate that.

Yeah, this was really fun.

Well, thank you so much for joining us.

15 minutes notice.

Thank you.

I'm like, and go.

We're, we started recording 10 minutes ago.

Can you join us?

Yeah.

Well, on that note,

it was such a free to have you on

and we're excited for what you're doing

and you know, look forward to enjoying it

and we're that car show.

So always be driving and we'll see you next week.

Rory Carroll Stops by for Dinner

About this episode

project cars

Drake Motor Cars

Velocity Restorations

Cars and Bids

bring a trailer

Land Range Rovers

Jeep Wrangler

Chrysler Imperial

water cooled

Volkswagen

Rivian R1S

Volkswagen GTI

Mazda Miata

Porsche 911

Hagerty value guide

daily driver

De Tomaso Pantera

Ford F150

Ford Bronco

hyper-accessorized

Dodge Viper

horsepower

Detroit Auto Show

Dodge Power

Lemons

case swap

independent rear

Subaru Brz

subframe

K24A2

2JZ

welding

BMW New Bmw

BMW M5

Request an Explanation

Want to learn more?

Help improve this episode

More from That Car Show