TMCP #635: ASK RICK! – FIFTY YEARS of National Parts Depot! The REAL Story of Surviving and Thriving in Restoration Parts

The Muscle Car Place online podcast episode number 635.

This week it's the first show of 2026 and it's a new beginning.

We have new dreams, new goals, new achievements to be done, and also new milestones.

Rick Schmidt is here to kick off the new year with the celebration of 50 years of National

Parks Depot.

Now, any business, a family business or otherwise that can survive 50 years is a remarkable thing.

But it didn't always go as well as it is now.

They started out with Nut and Bolt Kits, then they did high-end restorations.

That didn't turn a profit.

And then finally the big leap into the future, Ford Mustang Parts.

A family business is a 24, 7, 365 kind of life and for Rick growing up in it, wasn't

something he necessarily wanted to take over, but he sure is glad he did.

Our Mustang Parts line is really the core of the sun for National Parks Depot.

So, to this day it's the largest market there is in the classic parts realm and it's not

because Mustangs are better than other cars, it's because they've, for decades, not been

just popular, but plentiful, and plentiful, means you have to sell a lot of parts.

This is the Muscle Car Place online podcast, brought to you by National Parks Depot.

This is the weekly show dedicated to people worldwide who love American muscle cars.

If you're buying, selling, restoring, even racing them, this is the place for you.

Now, here's your host, Rob Kibbey.

Yes, indeed, I am Rob Kibbey and welcome to the Muscle Car Place podcast.

Well, here we are, everybody, the first show of the new year.

And Rick is going to start us off with a tale that'll be inspiring, if anything else,

and it will inspire you to do the right thing for the long run.

And doing stuff for the long run is at times murky, unclear.

Sometimes you don't know if it's going to work out.

But in your heart, in your gut, if you know this is the thing I should be doing, stick it out.

And in your heart, if you know this is not the thing I should be doing,

it's okay to quit. It really is. It really is okay to quit.

Give it your all. But at some point, be honest with yourself, this isn't going to work.

I'll have more of that in my upcoming talk about goals for this year for myself.

Now, the story of NPD and what has made it succeed when so many others around it like it failed

is remarkable. Now, Rick, I don't know if he shares this or not,

but it is fun to have your own business. It's really fun to have your own business.

It's also really not fun to have your own business.

And you can't have one with the other.

Rick will share all that here as well as growing up in a 24-7, 365 type of family business.

It's hard. I think you're going to love it.

Plus, we take a look at some cars to flip for the January auctions,

make a little money. That's always fun.

Now, point of news. Since the Kibbe and Friends show was recorded this week on January 5th,

yes, I have heard the news and I've seen all this stuff that the Hemi really is coming back

in the charger for 2027. Unless I've missed something though, I haven't yet seen a real

photo. I have only seen rendering, cool renderings, but at this point, I want proof.

I want the real thing. And while I'm at it, I'd like the real thing with a stick shift and a

handbrake. But at the minimum, I want to see a real photo of a real new Dodge Charger with a

real V8 in it. Yes, I realize the new V8 may not be as good as the six that's in there now.

I don't care. I want the V8. I think I read an article somewhere is that who put it? Maybe the

car and driver. They said, people want chargers that don't require chargers. You know what I mean?

I'm hoping that'll come to, man, here in 2026, we've only got, well, basically two

muscle cars left, the Mustang and the charger. And you might say that neither one is. I mean,

they both kind of blur some lines, don't they? Well, let's talk about 2026 goals. Now, goal

setting, I will tell you, is important to me. It is one of many things that led to me being able

to leave my cubicle from a regular day job and go have my own business. I'm not here to tell you

that everything went great and perfectly and well. In fact, it's been a roller coaster. Things got

kind of good, then things got kind of terrible for about two years. And then things got kind of

good and then things got better again. But that's how it is when you're somewhat self-employed

or in a very, very small business. But setting goals, I will tell you, for me at least, has been

mandatory to move the needle. Without them, I'm lazy. I get sedentary. I do the same thing over

and over every day and expect different results. That doesn't work. That's the definition of insanity.

So without goals, without measurable goals, I can tell you that I wouldn't have

probably left that cubicle. And I sure am glad I am. There are a lot of lines of thought on this.

Some people say, do seven areas of your life. I just do three. I used to do that. I kind of

whittled it down. So I do this. I do personal goals, career goals, and health goals. That's

all I do. I've done those a number of different ways over the years. But personal is a combination

of stuff like social interactions you want to have, stuff for your family, intellectual

growth for yourself, spiritual growth, your life with the Lord. That's all under the personal

section. Then career goals, careers, exactly what it sounds like, career business, whatever that is,

then health is exactly what it sounds like. And if all of that is stuff that doesn't

push your trigger, just do this. Answer these three questions. Who do you want to meet this year?

Where do you want to go this year? Who do you want to be this year? Let me say that again.

These are mine. I made this up. Who do you want to meet this year? Where do you want to go this

year? Who do you want to be this year? Well, I'm going to give you my personal goals here. So

my personal goals cover a lot of ground. Again, social, family, intellectual, spiritual.

But for my kids, I want to take my oldest daughter to Alaska this year. She has a goal to hit all

50 states by age 21. Alaska is next up. That would be a great summer vacation. Want to do that.

I want to take Dallas to another full racing season and build his career to a point

that he's a brand and teach him along the way of how to take it over for himself.

He'll turn 18 at the end of this year. He needs to be in charge of his future, not me. I want to

be there and help him achieve his goals just like all my kids. But it'll be his bag, not mine.

I would not be serving my son very well if I just kept doing stuff for him. And I'm not just

doing stuff for him now. I mean, he puts in work, but the next step next year is his.

And it's my job to get him prepared for that. This will be a big year of racing. I'll touch

more on that on the Dallas Kibbut racing update coming up later. And for my daughter, Noelle,

she has dancing dreams, man. She wants to live a life of poverty.

She really has her heart set on making a dance academy this summer. I don't know that it's a

real money spend, but it's a very high competition spend. She'll have to audition her way in the

door. I hope that that can happen. So my wife is mostly running her dancing career, but there's

a lot that has to happen. And all the kids are in school, M's in college and the other two kids

are in high school. So there's a lot to do right now. This year will be my wife and I's 25th

wedding anniversary. I want to take her on a trip somewhere, just the two of us. And that's

really hard for us to do because we have a lot of balls in the air and we don't necessarily

have a great way to leave two high school kids at home alone right now. But that's a goal. I want

to do it. And then I want to finish a goal I failed at last year. My goal last year was to read the

whole Bible in a year. And I didn't make it, but I failed at it. I've read lots of the Bible

throughout my life, but I have never covered or cover made it all the way through. Well, last year

I got about a sixth the way through. So I have five, six to go. I will finish that this year.

Career. I have three businesses. Muscle Car Place Network is just one of them. And Muscle

Car Place in itself is a pretty complicated one. It's got lots of moving parts, but it's really

just one big business. I have another two, and one of those needs to end. And it doesn't need to

end, but it needs for me to exit. I started the process of that on July 1st, 2025, with the exit

date of June 30th. That's the date. I'm not going to speak too much more of it than that,

but there have been a lot of things in process since that time. It's a business that is fun,

but it takes up a lot of time. And it's time for somebody else to take the reins and it has the

capability to be successful. Just need somebody else to breathe on it right now. I want to do

another car build this year and possibly sell it as a sweepstakes car. As you know, I don't think

it's any surprise that I'd love to be in the new car building business. That's a pretty big jump,

but doing the car flip business, I could do that. And I would like to introduce that into our business

this year. I'd also like to be an astronaut. But I'm crossing that off the list for now. It's not

really attainable. There are several goals that are important to me. And they're kind of on the

nice to have list. Chassis for the Chevelle, engine for the generally in a transmission,

engine for the these are all goals that I've had for several years. They've all taken a backseat

because of time and finances to other goals that are more important than me. But maybe this is the

year with the right industry partners, they can happen. But they can't just happen on my own

checkbook. I don't have those kinds of funds. I want to build the brand of the Kibbe and French

show. I'm just going down the list here, build the brand of the Kibbe and French show on YouTube.

And to some extent muscle car places as well. When you're in the audio podcast business like I am,

you get an audience like you, a friend, like somebody who listens to you often in their ears

directly, like with your buds. And that listens to you maybe for 45 minutes or an hour at a time.

It's a lot. Video is a way to get a broad content, but sometimes it's not very deep.

If you put out a 30 minute video, you're lucky if you get somebody to watch it for two minutes,

right? I mean, we all do it. But the truth is, that's where the masses are. YouTube is the largest

video platform in the world. It surpasses television. So that's a place that we've got to be.

And our niche on the Kibbe and French show is Duke to Hazard. No surprise there. This is the year I

want to get a license from Warner Brothers to sell merch. And it's not that you can't sell

Duke's merch, but in a lot of people do, but I want to sell the real stuff. I think that's an

attainable goal this year. Also, my final career goal, this can take a backseat to building cars

too. I want to race a car this year. And I really haven't decided what it is. I wouldn't necessarily

mind racing a legends car if I have the time, because that's certainly the most direct thing

that I could do, but I need to drive something. I'm happy driving all my own cars, autocross,

stunt, driving, rally, those are all fine. But I need to find a specific measurable goal to be

able to race a car this year. I need a little fun. Another business goal is to add an airplane to

my business with me flying. I do have a license. I'm not current. I would like to become a safe

current pilot this year, but I can't do that and race a car this year. It's too much. I've got to

pick one and only one. The one that makes the most logical sense is to get into flying, because

Dallas, I know I got to do a lot of travel this year. The one that makes the most fun is for me

to be the driver. That would be awesome. Health goal. All right. Here's the health goal for 2026.

A, it's totally vanity, but B, I just want to see if it can be done, because as of my current age

of 50.5 years old, it's never happened ever. I want to see abs. I want to see if it's possible

for this Swedish heritage body to produce abs. Now, I don't think I want to live the life it

takes to maintain that, but I just want to know one time, can I do it? Now, last year I lost 25

pounds. I've maintained that. I put on a little muscle last year, not nearly enough, so this year

I do have a goal to put on another 5, 10 pounds of muscle, but at age 50.5, I want to see if I can

get abs. My goal is by spring break. Again, I don't think I can live the life that it takes to

keep that. I can certainly keep the current weight that I am, or maybe I'd like to trim down another

5 pounds maybe, but my main goal after the abs is then to maintain a weight with good muscle

tone and all that, because A, it makes me feel better. I mean, you do feel better about yourself

when you look a little better, but I also physically feel better. I really used to get sick all the

time. I was always sick in one way or another. I wasn't really sick at all last year. It's got to

be because of the weight loss, but what I didn't get good at last year was eating real meals.

Everything was just basically ingredients like chicken, broccoli, rice, egg whites, all things

that are super easy to track. One real success to any form of weight loss is to eat the same

things all the time that are really good for you, and for the most part, do. But if you want to go

sit down with your family and have an appetizer or a main course and a dessert,

that's a lot of calories at a restaurant. But just to do that at home, far simpler,

I haven't figured that out yet. I don't yet know how to do that. I would like to get back to that,

because sitting down at a family meal is nice. It's a very pleasant thing.

Again, those are my goals, and there's lots of them in there, but really, it's personal,

it's career, and it's health. If that's just too much for you or not in your lane, do this instead.

Who do you want to meet? Where do you want to go? Who do you want to be?

And no matter what route you go, do the smart method. Specific, measurable, attainable,

realistic, and timely. And timely means that you have a deadline on it. Specific is it's very clear

what it is. Measurable is you know how you're getting there. Attainable means you can do it.

Realistic means you have the ability to do it. So for example, I said I want to be an astronaut.

I do, but I don't have the realistic ability to do that. It's also not attainable.

It is specific. It's very measurable. I can put a timeline on it, but the other two things won't

happen. To race a car, I got to put some specifics on that, but hopefully that all helps. Okay,

I'll hold you. I'll hold you. You'll hold me to this, because you know, last year I didn't even

want to tell you guys I was trying to lose weight. I was embarrassed to say it. It was in some ways

harder than I thought it would be and far easier. It really wasn't that bad. It took a long time.

It took a long time to get the first 10 pounds off, which was opposite of what I was told would

happen. I was told the first 10 pounds just melt to it. No, not for me. That first 10 pounds just,

it didn't want to leave. And then the next 10 pounds, it did want to leave. It went opposite of

that. So, Byrne, let's go ahead and cue the Dallas KB Racing Car Update, please.

So, the 26th season for Dallas has started. Now, I didn't say the legends racing update,

because he won't just be racing a legends car this year, but he'll do all the big legends

races this year. If you're not familiar, legends cars are great little entry level race car that

for a realistic cost, you can get a lot of skills on. It's real racing against real competition

at real tracks. And he started testing at Auburn Dale Speedway at Winter Haven, Florida on January

2nd. The first big event of the year there is called the Winter Nationals. It's a six-day event,

February 8th through 13th. Every day is a practice day, a heat, and a race. You're on a controlled

set of tires. It's a lot of racing. It's really hard and it's the best competition.

The goal for this year is for Dallas in legends car now, not just go turn laps and get seat time.

Now he needs to race the good guys, and mainly only the good guys. That's what's left now to do

with legends cars this year. He may never exit legends permanently in the future. I mean,

Bubba Wallace still races a legends car, but for this year, for the main kind of racing,

this will be the end of legends. It's time to move on to the next thing after this,

probably late models. I do have a goal to get him in some late model tests and some races this

year. I already have a few things in the works for both of those items, but also he just likes to

drive. I want to get him some experience in a rally car weekend, and I want him to go to a session

of drifting and some stunt driving. He just wants to drive. Now that's a problem. I get that passion,

but racing and getting paid to drive are two different things, and racing is a backwards

business. The movie F1 is a little bit of a lie. Being a racing nomad in multiple disciplines

for top pro money, unless you're AJ Ford or Troy Stewart, it rarely works out that that's the

focus usually in your disciplines. Clay Millican in his late 50s is having the best part of his

racing career right now. He's stuck it out for the best parts, and he's getting them now,

but he's also in a very specific lane. He's a top fuel NHRA driver. For Dallas, this is the year to

keep trying stuff. I mean, he's still young enough to try stuff, but he'll be a senior in high school

this year. He needs to start making some moves. A lot of kids his age have already made those moves.

I know that. It's sometimes tough to swallow and understand that maybe it's too late for this.

I don't think so. I think we move kids up too fast these days. In every sport,

you see kids who are burned out on playing baseball by the time they're in ninth grade.

I don't think Dallas would ever get burned out on racing, but I do think that people jumping into

late models just so that they can get seen while they're 16 or 17 years old at the top level is

maybe a little stupid. Certainly expensive. Okay, so that concludes the Dallas Kibbe Racing Car

Legends update, or just the normal update. Cue the exit. All right, before we get to our interview

with Rick, hey, I know that life isn't all rose and sunshine for many of you out there, but it

eyes him so this week about the day he shot Will Ferrell with an animal trichelizer in the

nook for the movie Old School. Well, actually the part where he gave him mouth to mouth afterwards.

It's not as funny, but you know, when I pull him out later, I pull him out of the water and it

gives him mouth to mouth. Like the first take, I did it and Will's like, what are you doing?

He's like, you could kill somebody because I breathe air into him. Like I was trying to give

him CPR like a moron, like instead of acting, like I blew air into his mouth and he was like,

dude, it's like that's not safe. I'm like, oh man, I almost killed Will Ferrell. He's pissed at me

right now. That sticks out because that was a bummer moment for many reasons, but also like, dude,

learn to act. Oh, there you go. No matter how bad your day is, you didn't almost kill Will Ferrell

today. So there's that. All right, let's move forward. Up next is Mr. Rick Schmidt for the

very first interview of 2026 and the story of National Parts Depot's 50 years and counting run.

Burn, roll and please. The Muscle Car Place weekly podcast interview is brought to you by our good

friends at National Parts Depot. See them through the link at themusclecarplace.com.

Up next on the National Parts Depot hotline first for 2026 is Mr. Rick Schmidt from NPD. Rick,

happy New Year. Happy New Year. As you know, and as our listeners now know, we record these

sometimes many weeks in advance. We are recording this more than a week before Christmas, but as

you hear this, it is January 9th. The New Year baby has come. The ball has dropped. Rick, do you

stay up until the 31st, like midnight for the New Year? Yes, I do. You do? You watch it happen?

Yes, I do. And sometimes one of my gentlemen who pretty much runs all for the operations

aspect of the NPD warehouses, he and his wife have not every year, but they tend to like to put on a

nice New Year's Eve party. So when they do have a party, we'll Uber over there and have a good time

and Uber home eventually. And when they don't, just stay home and watch the New Year's Eve programming

and kind of like Christmas Eve and just kick back and enjoy, you know, take it all in, enjoy. Yeah.

And this New Year is very special for me and for us here at NPD as this marks our 50th anniversary

year, which is pretty mind blowing. The more I sink my head into it, how long it's been,

where we started. It went back and remembering the early days in the 80s and the 90s, just

scraping and scrambling. So 2026 in many aspects is a really, really special year for us.

Well, I thought that's what we could talk about today, because over on our Kibben Friends show,

NPD sponsors the new segment. And we have nothing to do with the fact that you're turning 50 years

old, but we have been promoting the hell out of it. Well, thank you. And I'm excited for that.

Like you mentioned watching the New Year ring in, my wife and daughter went to New York,

maybe February of 2025 for a little trip. My wife sent me a picture from our hotel room.

She said, I think I'm looking at the ball that drops like on top of this other and she sent

me a picture. It was like during the daytime. I think it is, you know, the cotton ball that

drops. That is neat to me. I like to see the New Year ring in. And I do, like you say, reflect

on the year that was. And I kind of like all the little countdowns they do on TV of

things that happened, monumental stuff in the year prior.

There's numerous different New Year's Eve coverages going on in New York and, you know,

in the Dick Park, where it's now done by Ryan Seacrest, I guess, has always kind of been the

prominent ones, but you can channel surf if you're bored with who they've got his guests,

performers and everything. But I always get a kick out of the unscripted surprises that

always seem to happen in these New Year's Eve celebrations that are televised on TV where

they get a group of guests or at least one guest who's been downtown partying for a little bit

too long to be on TV. And that makes me laugh and I enjoy that. It kind of shows the celebratory

human side of things too, where it's not all, they don't have 100% control over everything.

It's just a big party. The first day of the New Year for them is a rough one. Yes.

Typically. Well, I did want to talk about NPD's 50th anniversary here. I don't know that we've ever

had like a look back through time here, but 50 years of anything is a big deal, especially 50 years

in effectively a family business here. That's what I wanted to do today, Rick. I do want to

walk people through some cars and obviously January's auction month and we have some fun

auction cars to look and I'm totally going to try to make you flip some cars and make some quick

money and all that, but NPD turning 50 this year. So take me back to 1976. Was it called

National Parts Depot in 1976? What did they sell then? Yes, it was. I don't know if it was,

maybe we did have a dysfunctional family. I don't know. I was eight going on nine in 1976.

My dad had been earlier in the 70s and all through the 60s. His career was running my

grandfather's manufacturing business, which was a giant machine shop, of course, because they

manufactured pneumatic valves and cylinders that would be used for automation manufacturing.

Pneumatic valves and cylinders are also what mobilized many of the original characters at

the Disney parks. A lot of my grandfather's stuff got used down there when everything's

air powered. I think it's all electric now. They've converted it. The shark in the movie Jaws,

that's all my grandfather's gear inside that shark. Wow. So it was an interesting company.

My grandfather was sole owner and my dad was basically the operations manager and vice president

of Fabco, and then all of his brothers and even his sister, the whole family worked there,

which had its benefits and had its curses. My dad was always the laser focused workaholic

of the entire family, even more so than my grandfather, because my grandfather really

liked to travel a lot. He sought balance in his life, but my dad had a hard time with the balance,

and he was just work, work, and organized. We should be doing this. So him and my dad

butted heads a lot. So it was, I think, 74, 75 when they finally parted ways. And then my dad bought

some machine, reinstalled it in our basement, started doing piece work, basically outsourced

work for Fabco as a means to continue gathering an income while he decided what to do. And then

what he decided he wanted to do, what his real passion was, was all through his teenage years

in his 20s, he was always collecting and accumulating NOS parts, used parts, buying and

selling interesting cars. He was a huge classic car hobbyist all his life, and he wanted to make

his career. So since what he knew best was the 55 to 57 Thunderbirds, because that's,

he bought one for himself as a daily driver when he turned 16. And he restored another one

all through the 60s. He knew those cars from bumper to bumper, back and forth. He knew every

square inch of the T-birds. So that's what started in the basement of our house. Dad was doing all

the text work and wrote out his own inventory cards and was taking photographs on this photo

photography table. Did I really know what he was doing and what the master plan was at eight years

old, seven years, eight years old as he was working up to this? I didn't have slightest idea what was

going on down there. I was in my own life, went to school, did my homework, and my mom pretty much

dominated my upbringing while dad was work, work, work, work, working in the basement. I'd go down

there and lug them every once in a while. And there was never any discussion as to what is this

going to be. So I was the first person to actually answer the phone when dad put the line in for the

business or eating dinner, phone rings in the office. I jumped up because I always wanted to

be the one who answers the phone. So this is a new phone in the house. So that was even more

exciting. I just didn't even know what the hell it was for. So I picked up the phone. I can hear dad

steps behind me because I just like scared, you know, was away from the kitchen table before he

even knew what was going on. I answered the phone. Some guy on the other end goes, oh,

is this National Parts Depot? And I say real quickly, sorry, you must have the wrong number.

My dad follows me. He's like, oh, no. That's the new business now. And that's how people never

answer that phone again. That is my phone. Luckily, the gentleman called back. Dad,

that might have been his first order for all I knew. And his only source of marketing back then

was a small advertisement in Hemings Motor News. So we started out in the basement of our home

in Gainesville, Florida, 1976 with one small ad placed in Hemings Motor News. So that's another

relationship that we've held for all these 50 years is we started life with Hemings.

And today, if anybody subscribes to Hemings, we own the back cover. We've been advertising

a full page ad on the back cover of Hemings for many years now. It's not just a savvy marketing

decision. It is also a tip of the hat and our support for the Bible of the automotive hobby

Hemings Motor News and the fact that we kicked off our entire business through them.

Was the repertoire of parts, the parts that's selected, were those all just things that your

dad as a hobbyist and knower of Teabirds knew to advertise that other people would want? Like,

how did he make a catalog? Back then, a lot of the 55 to 77 Teabird parts were still available

through Ford. Ford, GM, all of the American auto manufacturers were not so quick to discontinue

service parts for older cars as they are today. Today, everything's just disposable. They just

hope that you drive the wheels off of it, trade it in and get into one. But back then, off a lot

of the Teabird service parts were still available. So it was mostly just a new old stock, commonly

available Ford parts. But the only difference was then, I mean, this is back in the analog universe,

most dealerships did not stock these old Teabird parts. They didn't have them sitting on the

shelves at the dealership parts departments. So if you did walk in there and say, I wanted this or

that, you'd have to go there, sit there at the counter with the guy in this parts book, then

they'd have to order it in and he weren't going to get any kind of special price. He'd need just

be paying a retail for it. Well, the only advantage that dad had was that he kind of had everything

sitting there for 55, seven in original Ford in stock to where you could call him instead of calling

your local Ford dealership and have everything delivered to you in a manner of several days,

instead of how long it would take back then to get stuff ordered into the dealership. So it was

mostly just new old stock Thunderbird parts. And of course, the Teabird market was very vibrant

then. So there were some pioneers, I would point out Larry Thunderbird, Larry and why is his last

name escaping the main now? Because he was a big pioneer in the reproduction Thunderbird parts. He

was starting to reproduce this is and that's, you know, trinkets and things that would go obsolete

from Ford that were good sellers that he thought that would be worthwhile doing. So and then as

time marched on, the other of dad's competitors got into the reproducing parts business and

everybody kind of shared with everybody as far as they were competitors, but they are also willing

to wholesale their exclusive reproduction parts to each other. When did it expand beyond Teabirds?

Pretty quickly. To quote my father, he said to me once, as soon as I realized that I could

pay the bills and put food on the table selling Teabird parts, my next decision was, okay, well,

what comes after this? And that's why he chose the name National Parts Depot,

which he pretty much ripped off from Ford. Ford called its main central parts warehouse there

in Detroit, Michigan and Dearborn, or maybe it was in Livonia. Anyhow, they called their main

parts warehouse their national parts depot. Are you kidding? That's why it's that?

Yes, I didn't know that. So he thought, oh, I'd make a good name. He intentionally wanted something

that was very open-ended so that he wasn't painted in a corner or limited to only selling

Teabird parts for the rest of his life. Everybody else in the business was such and such as

Larry's Teabird parts, prestige thunderbird, thunderbird, thunderbird, thunderbird, and even

the new upcoming Mustang businesses at the time were California Mustang. Mustangs unlimited,

Mustang Mustang. There's a lot of things that my dad did that were a little bit off the beaten

path or kind of revolutionary for the restoration parts business, but he stuck with this generic

national parts depot knowing that he could steer that business anywhere he wanted to steer it

and the name would work. He was very, very cognizant that the new upcoming big thing Corvettes were

already monopolized. That market was already saturated with suppliers because Corvettes were

kind of collector cars from the moment they rolled off the line. But he didn't want to cast his

hook into that pond because it was already too overpopulated. He looked at the Mustang market

and said, look at how many millions they built. This is going to be pretty big. I think I need to

start moving into Mustang parts. And that was the wisest decision that he ever made was going

into the Mustang parts. Our Mustang parts line is really the core of the sun for national parts

depot. To this day, it's the largest market there is in the classic parts realm. And it's

not because Mustangs are better than other cars. It's because they've for decades not been just

popular, but plentiful. And plentiful means you have to sell a lot of parts.

What was the next car after Mustang? What was the next car that wasn't a Ford?

Directly after Mustang and just to prove that my dad's never been just a Ford guy or this guy or

that guy, he immediately jumped into a, he may have done Chevelle first just because he thought

the numbers were better. At that time, second gen Camaros were just used cars.

Nobody thought of that being a restoration parts business at that time. But the Chevelles,

that was 1964 through 72. Whereas the Camaros was only three years. People were really

thinking of, well, that's a classic Camaros, a 60, 70, 99. That was only three years of production.

So dad went to Chevelle first because that was a full eight years of production. Very popular,

very good selling. So it was a Chevelle first. And then it wasn't long after we had the Chevelle

parts on the shelf and a Chevelle catalog out that dad told Mike Cousins, who is our marketing

director, we lost Mike in believe late 2000 for early 2001, but he had an infection that just

took him over like that. And I waved goodbye from him. I said, all right, see you tomorrow.

We'll leave in the office on one day in the next morning, I get the phone call that Mike's no

longer with us. It was huge loss because he was very instrumental in helping my father build MPB

and he researched and laid out, produced all of our catalogs back then. So as soon as we were

done with Chevelle, Mike was off to the races with Camaros. Was your dad just good at looking at the

opportunity of the market and the timing that he was in? Because 50 years in business is hard. I

mean, 50 years in anything is really hard. But those first foundational years is basically where

you can get your foothold. That first decade must have been hard, was it? Oh, yeah. Once he got into

the Mustang parts and things were really cooking, then all of a sudden he's very, very cognizant that

I got to move out my basement. Kind of like a kid doing, starting a business at his parents' home,

you know, in the basement and then kind of move out from underneath my mom and dad and actually

get a space of my own. So he was thinking big. He bought some property right on I-75 with interstate

access there in Gainesville, built a 21,000 square foot warehouse, which he didn't need for the parts

business at that time. But it was his ambition. We were incorporated under the name AutoCraft

Investments when he finally incorporated himself. And National Parts Depot was a DBA underneath

AutoCraft Investments. AutoCraft, he got a dealer's license and he was selling collectible cars from

a showroom in the front of the building. And that showroom faced by 75s, the drivers on the

interstate could see the classic cars and the windows. And then in the middle was our Tibered

and Mustang parts to begin with. And then beyond that was three separate bays that comprised a

full service restoration facility of the highest order. That almost killed the restoration part.

The mental stress, the finances. The first bay was mechanical and assembly,

second bay was paint, and the third bay was bodywork, which is a very, very filthy

bay if anybody's working in the body shop. It's better to have a separate building and

you just do that somewhere else. It's not contaminating everything else. And his joke

all along was like, I make it so much cash in the parts department and I'm taking all that cash

and I'm loading it into a wheelbarrow and I'm walking it out back to the restoration shop so

I can set it on fire. And you've told that story in many times. How many years door to door was

he restoring cars? 1978, nine-ish. I think they finished the first job number one, which was a

67 Mustang GT8 coupe that we own. We've had in the collection now for 35 or 40 years because

we bought it back from the grandson of the guy who had us do it. It was around 78, 79 through

1986, 85, 86. So not a whole lot of time. A lot of cars got done. They were at the time

the restoration business and not the parts business, but the rest of it has also evolved

considerably. And the standards and the quality for craftsmanship and detail and correctness

have increased exponentially since the 70s and the 80s. Dad's shop, Ottercraft, was known

nationally as being one of the marquee shops for a restoration that was really over the top

for the time as far as thoroughness and quality. And they were expensive too, but his customers were

paying the money. We did mostly Teabirds because Teabirds were dad's specialty, but we did some

Mustangs and we did some other unique 63 Thunderbird Sports Roadster. I remember that coming through

the shop, but dad only did stuff high end and high quality. And that was his problem. It was

finding skilled professionals to work for him. Ever so often, dad would go back to inspect

somebody's work, paint, body, mechanical, wherever, and he'd find out that the job was not up to his

standards and he'd tell the guy, okay, I'm going to help you, but we're going to do this all over

again. And whenever he started doing things all over again, his ethics and his sense of right

and wrong would not allow him to bill the customer for those hours. Those hours were on the house

because the customer shouldn't have to pay for things to be done twice or three times over.

Believe it or not, a lot of shops don't operate that way. They screw up, you're paying for the

deal. If your car is on the clock, your car is on the clock, no matter what a mess they're making.

My dad didn't do that. And that made it near impossible for him to make a profit

for storing cars because he was too picky and he was too obsessed with the way that he thought

things should be done and the way the car should turn out. And he wound up doing so many processes

two or three times over before he was finally satisfied that it buried him. So luckily,

we're only into that six or seven. The very last car that was in the shop, that had already fired

everybody. The whole restoration crew out and he had one car that he had to finish and he was

trying to do the whole damn thing himself. He literally did get all the car body work done,

primer blocked, the body was done and he had done the whole entire chassis and engine and

mechanicals himself. But in primer with the chassis finished, he all developed to a friend of his who

also had a Teabird restoration shop in Alabama and had him finish it just because dad needed

it out of his hair. It was monopolizing all of his time and back then he didn't have time.

So that's got finished in Alabama and we own that car now.

Well, we've got the very first car that was completed Outercraft and we got the very last

car that was not really completed by Outercraft. It was done up in Alabama. We bought that back

from that customer as well later on. Were you supposed to be part of this from the get go?

Was it your dad's expectation that you would take the reins? Remember this year you said,

hey, I said, what would you do different if you weren't doing this? And you said, oh,

detail cars or maybe be a dentist. Yeah. I think orthodontist is what I said.

Yeah, orthodontist. My dad was a hard cookie to work with. He was a hard cookie to be a son of

in the 70s and 80s. And in the 80s, his NPD was growing, but all of the challenges of,

I left out the whole entire Jimmy Carter era where dad built that building on an adjustable rate

loan. And at one point in time, he was paying 18% on that loan. And that's another thing that

almost killed national varsity, but before it ever had a chance to be anything.

Death was that construction loan. Those were tight times, stressful times.

You wouldn't have wanted to work for my father back then. He was under a lot of stress.

And there's some of the old employees that worked in the restoration shop and in our sales

department, the parts department, that we're still very close friends with them today. And in

recent years, they've come and visited my dad at his home. His dad's retired and slowed down.

I literally get tears in my eyes sitting there as we're visiting how appreciative they are to my

dad of, you taught me so much. It wasn't easy. And sometimes it was fairly abrasive and abrupt,

but you're always right. And I had a lot to learn and you showed me that and it made me

a better person later on in life. So everybody who was able to ride through that storm back in

those days seemed to be very, very fond of my father. But at the time, I don't think anybody

was very fond of him. And me as a kid, having to deal with him at home and then at work when I would

was working there summers and whatnot, pushing brooms and mowing the yard and everything,

I didn't want that to be my future. But it all just kind of worked out. When I did start,

I helped my dad bailed him out and helped him get our Michigan store put back in shape in 1987.

And then when I came back to Florida and started working full time, as things evolved,

we finally got the business up and making a good regular profit. And his dad finally started to

ease off the gas as far as his own killing himself. Worked at 80, 90, 100 hour weeks.

As things finally started to develop into a real business, and we had a controller and we had a

real accounting office, and once we had a real business, Tim and I started to work together

better. And that evolved through the decades and through the years to the point where we were

really a great team because all of the hard nose aspects that my dad brought and all the discipline

that he brought to the table, I kind of brought in some of my mom's personality as being a good

mediator between the employees and also with customer service. My dad was kind of a hard ass

with customers because he couldn't understand how people could butcher a completely good part.

In his view, when people were saying, well, this part didn't fit or something. My dad's

knee jerk reaction was, well, you don't know what the hell you're doing. That's why you're having

problems. I was kind of the person who got in there and said, you know, we need to be a little

nicer to our customers. So I fit into all the nooks and crannies where my father was not terribly

adept with the business. And between the two of us, we were actually a pretty good match. Did

I plan on doing any of that? No. I had no aspirations early on. I loved my father,

but I certainly did not want to work with him because I thought that that would just be

week after week in hell. The finances side of any businesses is sometimes what takes it down.

It's usually what takes any business down is that their numbers just don't work. But NPDs

have, and I mean, you talked about a construction loan that was difficult. You're also famously

a very conservative company. Your inventory is owned. You have multiple properties. You ride

out the storms. You don't take out the bridge loan every six months. My father's business acumen

and discipline and his ability to do complex mathematical equations in his head, all of

our family kind of has. I was always a math whiz too. I've got a uncle who can pretty much do

calculus in his head, but his ability to understand the business math, understand what it took

to wind up at the end of the month with enough money left over to finance further operations

and his ability to stick strongly to that, you know, because you know, even back then,

we've never been known as a company that does a whole lot of holiday sales,

promotions and discounts and points, clubs. And that really goes back to my dad saying

he'd point to one of our competitors who was given 15% off for the holidays. And he was like,

well, that's a month that they're losing money. They might make those customers happy for a month,

but they are not going to turn a profit that month. And then after the sales over, those

customers aren't going to stay loyal either. They're just going to look for the next discount

somewhere else. He was always very disciplined. He was just like, keep your eyes forward. It's

a business. If you're not making money that you're not picking your payroll and you're not

paying the insurance for your employees and you're not going to have

capital for growth, you've got to stay the course. And he was always very, very disciplined,

where I think a lot of business owners look at around on their competition and they get obsessed

with following and doing the same things they do because they feel insecure and they feel,

well, if we don't do the same things that they do, then they're going to win and we're going to

lose. The winning and losing early comes is very much more complex than that. It involves quality

and it involves speed of service. It involves the experience of your employees. It involves

the ethics of the business. It's not just the price tag on the parts. Either he understood that

or that's what worked out with him because he stubbornly was very disciplined in how he learned

about business. He was never agreeable to wavering from that. What do you think the next 50 years

holds? I don't know. I didn't think I was going to be here for the end of the first 50.

I mean, really, in the 1990s, I think all of us in this industry looked around at each other and

thought by 2025, 2026, all of these old cars will have already been restored and what will be left.

And these modern cars, the math and the numbers don't add up formally. And again, my dad made

his prediction. He says, Rick, I just want you to focus on maintaining a healthy, strong,

ongoing, viable business because he says at the end, there's always going to be a market there

and there's always going to be enough volume to have a nice, profitable business. But you've got

to be the last one standing. To be the last one standing, you've got to not trip over your shoelaces

or get too far over your skis. We're so ambitious that you just invest in this and that. And if

doesn't all go well, you can implode like a black hole. So for the next 50 years, survival,

continuing to be smart, continuing to micromanage our profit and loss statements every single

month to make sure that we are dialed into the recipes that makes us an ongoing, viable company.

And yeah, it's every year, one or more of our longstanding competitors gets bought up by a

private equity firm or the fellow who founded it is going into his 80s and just closes up shops.

Simple as that because he has no family members who want to take it over. I think that the hobby,

and that was dad's prediction, he says, this market, this industry is like a bell curve and it'll

go up and it'll peak and it'll peak and then it'll start to slide down a little bit and it'll slide

down. And he said, and some of the competitors will fall out to the wayside and that's kind of

happened. And he says, and that's going to steady out to a flat line that'll go off into infinity.

And he says, and that's where you really want to be. You want to be one of those last ones

remaining. You can write on that flat line, not into infinity, but the rest of my foreseeable

life that I want to keep this thing going. Well, from me to you, thanks for another year together,

but congrats on 50. You know, you shared some personal stuff in there, but working in a family

business is hard. It just is. Like you said, when the workday is over, all the same people got to

see each other again. And what that means is, in a lot of ways, the workday isn't over. It never

really ends. The personal days are not over. It never really ends. You're just kind of in a

24-7 cycle that is life. But when you wake up at three in the morning,

or two in the morning, and you can't go back to sleep, it's very hard to keep the demons of,

I got to do this tomorrow. I got to do that tomorrow. And what's this ongoing stress?

And how are we going to deal with the health insurance next year if this trend keeps going?

All that stuff spins around your mind endlessly. Weekends, nights, you don't just clock out,

go home. Of course, everybody has their own personal issues to deal with as well. But when

you're a business owner, it's the personal and the business all wrapped up into one big yarn ball.

Well, tell you what, let's do this. It is the month of January. And like you said,

everybody in your family can do math in their head. So let's do a little math in your head.

What we're going to do to end out this episode is, Rick, you are going to look at three cars

to make some quick cash on for auction season. Because you and your dad, you do the math in

your head. Somebody in your family can do calculus. So you are going to flip some cars.

And what you need to do here is pick a car here that you can buy right. Because if this is what

you want to do, if you want to flip a car that you typically make your money buying it because

you know how to sell it, what I've presented for you are three cars that are all for sale right

now on bring a trailer. And the goal is to buy one and you have a price gap. You cannot buy a car

that costs more than $30,000. And your goal is to take it to an auction, any January auction you

wish based on the vehicle type and make a profit. And you want to pick the one that you think you

can make the most on. So what do we have for car number one? Car number one is a 1971 Cadillac

El Dorado convertible. Black with red interior. Is that black or is that like a dark gray? No,

it's a dark blue in this picture. Oh, you're right. Red leather interior looks to be original

interior. Almost certain the car has been repainted on 51,000 miles. Now when it comes to

auctions, cars and you know this price range, I never know what makes a winner or a loser.

Yeah. Sometimes they go for good money. And sometimes they just they walk out the door and

you can't understand how somebody could pay so little. This car has a presence to it.

This little Western car, it looks like it's a year out in Los Angeles. Am I right? Newbury

Park, California. Like I said, original interior that's fairly clean. There's some patina on the

driver's seat. But I'm more particular about that stuff. It seems like patina is getting

to be less and less of an issue with many collectors. They can actually kind of just

enjoy the originality. So I'm trying to step out of my own OCD and this car's got an awful

lot of presence to it. It's a dynamite color combination under the hood. Looks very well

preserved and doesn't look like it's been monkeyed with by shade tree mechanics. It doesn't have

yellow spark plug wires and bunch of incorrect hose clamps and stuff like that. So it looks like

a really pretty nice quality car, but that's a sweet spot for mileage for 51,000 miles on it.

It's quote unquote low miles and it's probably the original engine and driveline and nothing's

been rebuilt, which is good, especially if it's just been serviced religiously all of its life.

So this has all the earmarks of being a really nice quality car. I personally have never been a

huge fan of these big El Dorados. This is what big and little enus drove and

the generation that followed of the convertible El Dorados were so iconic and so handsome. And

these were kind of in comparison, kind of bigger and more bloated and kind of more old foggy ish.

Is that a word? Old foggy ish, then the ones that succeeded it. Yeah, like this way. Also

old foggy ish compared to the really sharp smaller coupes that preceded it. This El Dorado,

all my childhood was never an aspirational car. It was just kind of a big, ugly boat to me.

I've since mellowed my opinion on that and I would love to have this car. Quite honestly, I think

the Coupe de Ville's and the mainline Cadillacs of this era were actually more attractive cars

than the El Dorados. This is one of these weird generations of Cadillacs where I might argue

that the El Dorado was kind of the ugly duckling. They had great photographer do this car because

the photography, I'm saying all this stuff about it, but the car looked dynamite. It's like a

pro photo shoot. I like it, but it's not always been the most desirable of the generation of

El Dorados. Right now, the purchase price is $22,000. Could you make money with that?

At $22,000, yeah, I could make money on it, but who knows where it's going to go.

Just as an offhand thing, there was a thing that had five or six thousand original miles on it,

1971 Mach 1 on Tringer Trailer last week, white with black stripes,

or speed, 351 Cleveland car. Very nice car. Right up to the very end, it was bid up to about

$80,000, $80,000 or $90,000. Right up the very end, which at the time I thought was all the money.

It hammered for over $200,000. So you really don't know what something's going to go for until

the last 30 seconds of the auction and all of a sudden the bidders get serious and it all spirals

up. At $22,000, yeah, you make plenty of money on this car. I think this is a $35,000 car,

but then watch this auction end and it doesn't blow right past that and show that I'm out of

touch with where the market's at right now. I don't know. What do we have for car number two,

another convertible and a nice one? The 1991 Camaro Z28 convertible, white,

which is a nice color for this car. These are the classy vibes, 12,000 original miles.

It's a five liter automatic transmission, 16 inch wheels. It's just like a nice clean cruiser

and it's in like new shape. I've said that before. I don't think it's a mystery. I've never been a

huge fan of the third gen F bodies just from a kind of a build quality and standpoint.

And I was a five liter Mustang guy in the late 80s when we literally ruled the streets and

the Camaros and Firebirds at a hard time dealing with us.

Were these good convertibles?

No, no. Was this a GM?

Like crazy, but again, so did the Mustangs. Now, the 80s and early 90s was not a home market

quality. But here's the deal, just stepping all back from it. There's no denying that

third generation F bodies were drop dead, gorgeous styling-wise. And this is a really,

really pretty car. It's also no mystery that the third generation F bodies,

the Fox body Mustangs have already taken off. These are starting to take off.

So in a manner of speaking, this car has an awful lot of resale potential because this whole

generation and era of Camaros and Firebirds are really taken off right now. I think it's a growing

wave. So even though I'd much rather have that El Dorado cruise around in, I like the vintage

stuff anyhow. I'd much rather have the El Dorado myself personally. But right now,

if I'm looking to make a profit and flip it, especially this thing's only sitting at 13.6

right now, there's a lot of room on this car. I'm leaning towards the Z28 based on the premise

we started out with here.

Okay. How about car number three then? And by the way, all these auctions,

as we do this review, they are all within three hours of ending. So the prices we're giving you

here, you still have three hours to go. And that's usually when there's a tick up here. But what's

car number three? 440 powered, 69th to myth, Roadrunner hard top. Illicolor combination.

This is like a burnt orange, black roof and then a white interior. I love it, whatever it is. Or

25,000 miles shown, three mileage unknown. It's got a Holly four barrel hooker headers,

automatic transmission. It is red paint. It's got a modern stereo and aftermarket gauges.

This is a driver car, not so much a rest of mod, just a driver, muscle car. I can't see

anywhere whether or not it's fitted with a 440 under prior ownership. So it didn't come

from the factory with the 440. So this is not a blue chip collectible. It's a muscle car for

somebody who wants to be a great car. Cool. Color combination. It's not the type of car

where you're going to have three or four serious collectors on an auction going above and beyond

to make it theirs. Cars like this are worth what they're worth. And people kind of stick to their

sanity when it comes to bidding. It's already a $31,000 with three hours left to go. I can't

imagine it going over 40 because it's not even a genuine 440 car. It's not a properly restored car.

It's just a driver and a half fun car. So I can't see it going over 40. And then I'm going to put

it in an auction and try to make money on it. I'll probably lose money on it by the time I pay

for transport and pay the auction fees. Okay. So the Roadrunner is a loser for making money.

Not enough meat on this one. So it's the Caddy or the Camaro?

The El Dorado could survive this and bring a real high price tag just because it's got so much

personality. And where are you going to find another one like this one? Be tough to find.

But that's kind of a gamble. I think the sure money is on the white Z28 unless this

auction goes to the moon in the last several seconds.

How about that? Even you had to pick an F-body.

Yeah. See you. It's just math, right?

I love all cars. I love all cars. But then when you make me compare one to another to another,

then I have to pick my favorites. Rick, there's no wrong answer. It's ask Rick.

We'll track all three and just kind of see where they final out. But for the Camaro,

what's the max price you want to buy it for? 15?

No, no, no. Not that high. It's at 13.6 right now.

Because it's not an IROC. Sure, it's good looking. I would want to get into this no more than the

low 20s with the hopes to be able to get high 20s out of it. But like I said, these are really

starting to scream upward right now. And then maybe it goes into the 30s. And that's where I

could really ring the bell with it. But I would try to have no more than 20 in it.

Okay. Well, Rick, for me to you, congrats on 50 years and happy new year.

Yeah. Well, thanks for letting me because you get me started about 50 years and I can go on

through seven or eight episodes and everybody will be kicked back in their chairs,

taking a nap, listening to me to reminisce about this, isn't that and everything. But

being a family owned business and having them made it 50 years. So we're very, very sentimental

about it. And I hope all of our customers know how much we appreciate them for keeping us

in this and for us to be so strong present day 50 years later is just a blessing. And it's a

surprise 30 years ago, 20 years ago, I wasn't forecasting. I'd be where I'm at right now.

And our customers are what helps make this happen. It's pretty awesome. Thank you, Rick.

Happy new year. See you next month. Happy new year.

Thank you, Rick. Excellent as always. It's going to be a fun year, gang. Alright, that is it for

our very first show of 2026. I will be back next week. But between now and then hit me up on

Facebook or Instagram anytime. Be sure to subscribe to us on Apple podcasts and Spotify

and YouTube. And you can find every single show and all the merch on the homepage of the

muscle car place.com website. And as always, don't forget to keep chasing your dreams like

you've let me chase mine. Yes, that's a new outro. See you later, everybody. Bye bye.

Sponsors often, they make it all possible. See you soon at the muscle car place.

TMCP #635: ASK RICK! – FIFTY YEARS of National Parts Depot! The REAL Story of Surviving and Thriving in Restoration Parts

About this episode

Ford Mustang

American muscle cars

stick shift

Dodge Charger

Chevrolet Chevelle

legends car

Auburndale Speedway

late models

rally car

top fuel NHRA driver

Ford Thunderbirds

Hemmings Motor News

new old stock

National Parts Depot

Chevrolet Corvettes

Chevrolet Camaros

Mustang parts

body shop

Ford Mustang Gt8

restoration

Cadillac 1971

Bring a Trailer

Cadillac El Dorado

low miles

Cadillac Coupe de Ville

Chevrolet Camaro Z28

automatic transmission

five liter

F bodies

Pontiac Firebirds

Chevrolet Z28

Plymouth Roadrunner

440 engine

Request an Explanation

Want to learn more?

Help improve this episode

More from The MuscleCar Place