Talk me out of / in to a side business (Miata content)

Keith Tanner said:

I've been thinking about this for at least five years ;) I have also been involved in six-figure Miata builds.

You certainly have vastly more experience than I do with Miatas, but I have owned about a dozen along with many other sports cars, some collectible, some not.  Two things I think hurts this, and I believe it held the 240Z back for years also, is that they were so customizable when new, and too cheap.  Almost every older Miata now was customized at some point in its life, and it is easy to do so even now, years later.  You simply buy a clean one and put on the parts you want.  You have a few serious fans that will spend big money to make one they want, but the rest of us will build our own.  Are there really enough of us with a lot of disposable cash that want a high end Miata?  Maybe, but it would need to be beyond exceptional, which is where I think Flyin Miata's V8 conversion cars are.  

And I alluded to this above, I think the NA and NB are too small for the concept.  Most of the potential customers I think are older, and probably a bit porkier as well.  Unless it is a high end track car, you are far more likely to get your significant other to spend time in a Porsche than crammed into a Miata.  Unfortunately I know this from experience.  It is a real issue.  My personal belief is that the potential customer is more of a motorsports oriented person, so where does this fall?  Maybe I'm wrong, but my personal experience says otherwise.

Beyond exceptional is the key. There's nothing stopping someone from buying an aircooled 911 and bolting on a random pile of aftermarket stuff either - but Singer is selling half-million dollar cars. Why? Well, once you figure that out you'll be a lot closer. 

You don't need to sell to the masses. That's not the point. You're not competing with some guy who reads Miataturbo every day and follows the recipes that others have developed with an eye to being as cheap as possible. If you focus on that sort of stuff, you'll never build an exceptional car. You might build a good one and/or a fun one and/or a cheap one - but not an exceptional one.

My take on this can be summed up in one word: Scarcity. Long nose Porsches went through the roof, and Singer had the vision and taste to backdate newer air cooled Porsches. The 240Z is getting hot because so many returned to earth. 

Mazda sold millions of Miatas in the same body style for nearly a decade, and they still are not rare. People who buy boutique cars have the money to buy, not build something truly unique. 

Witness ICON.

Flyin Miata V8 are the Yenkos of tomorrow because they are unique.

To go truly bespoke/ custom, a Miata needs a heart of gold, or a unique look, and for all their awesomeness, they are somewhat ubiquitous.

Several someones have already done something like that.

FYI, Mazda sold about a half million NAs. Car 500k was a gold 1999. And fun fact, Porsche made 420k air-cooled 911s ( source).

Singer just happened to be doing excellent air-cooled 911s just before the market went berzerk. Did they benefit? Oh yes. But if you look at the timeline, they were already there.

I don't think the solution is to make it look like something else. You get into the uncanny valley and it clearly becomes a kit car. Those Pit Crew (the green car) noses are appreciated by some because they are different, but they do not mesh with the rest of the car. An Italia (the red car) can be made with a LOT of work to look cohesive, but you still can't change the windshield pillar and quarter windows, so it's always a Miata trying to look like something else.

What you need is something that is recognizably a Miata, but more so. Keep the things that make it look like a Miata - the turn indicators, the pop-ups, the tails - but add a bit of presence. Maybe flare out the fenders in such a way that it looks like the factory did it. Maybe tuck the rear bumper in a bit. Maybe (gasp) offer a real coupe if you really want to get crazy. But don't put on a Ferrari onesie. Again, look at Singer. They do quite a bit of reshaping to the body. But it is still very much a 911. Same with Eagle and the E-type.

Or, if we're talking about ICON...

There are two groups in this conversation and you aren't marketing to the same people. One group is thinking cheap cars, performance, autocross and track days, the other is thinking garages with 15 expensive cars in them that the owner is bored with.

The amount of money a wealthy person will spend on a toy or car is insane. You just have to offer a product that catches their eye. 

Doing that with a Miata would be difficult but it could be done. 

You can't do it with a box of parts or a engine swap. You are going to have to subtly redesign the entire car to what Mazda could have built with a unlimited budget. It would still be a Miata, but more. Every part would have to be touched and made better. 

I couldn't design it. I could do the mechanics, but the style, stance, and visual details are what is going to close the sale.

You are going to have to start with a vision. 

It could be a fun project. Do it. Even if it's not a viable business, you will have a great car. 

In reply to Keith Tanner :

You are a romantic. I like that. I agree with everything you are saying. 
 

Absolutely  nothing about it sounds like a side gig. 

In reply to SVreX (Forum Supporter) :

It probably has to be a side gig, at least initially because you'll need a full time job or two to cover the startup costs u til you get to the break even point. 

Ideally, it starts with someone obsessing over and refining the vision for years. That's a side gig. Once you start turning wrenches, less so.

Singer actually does very little of the work in-house. Even the tear-down is contracted out. They're basically a general contractor. They also take a very high percentage of the money up front - I've gone through the economics of it on this forum in the past, actually. The end result is a company that requires very little cash or staff. But they got the product right, which is the hard part. And they're established enough that people accept the payment terms.

Keith has mentioned figuring out the secret sauce of Singer. IMO, part of that is the mentality of rich folk. Everyone knows the P cars are drivers' cars but people who drive Carreras are self-indulgent weiners and I want to stand out: You could get a GT2 or GT3 but that's either too stiff, too much of a handful, or too new. An air cooled is classic but you saw 3 parked in front of Starbucks last week. Enter Singer: you are now a connoisseur.

We do have a Singer that lives nearby, the 100th built that Leno drove.  It is breathtaking in person, a work of art really that I probably would not drive..  

Bear with me here...  The spridget was made from 1961 to 1980 (with bugeyes 1958 to 1960). Every structural part for one is reproduced at this point, you can even get a whole heritage shell from scratch. 

Cons on the car are pretty much addressable through restomodding. Find a modern engine that can fit under the hood and accept doing some trans tunnel mods to fit a modern overdrive transmission (there are a few options, even the option to do a BMW motorcycle head on the A series with fuel injection).  Possibly replace the rear axle with something stronger or install an LSD. Dechrome, remove and/or replace trim that looks dated with more timeless stuff.  Good engineered tube shock conversion, more modern wheels (not minilights, maybe 14's or larger?). Change the driving position to more down in the car and reclined.

OR,

All the stuff is out there to put honda power in one, go the extra mile refining other aspects of the car.  Thinking about it, this is the better bet, but more initial buy-in. Hell, look at Project Binky, but thats TONS of revision work.  

Thing is that the old british car build quality could be VASTLY improved upon and you could really make something special. 

https://www.davidbrownautomotive.com/mini-remastered/ 

The good news is that once you figure it out, if you are right, money is never the object for your clients. What they are paying for is exclusivity. People who put out big bucks for splashy stuff are making the statement "My E36 M3 is better than your E36 M3" and you cant afford what I can.

As I read along this thread, I keep going back to the FM ND V8 conversion as your niche . That thing was done to as close to factory standards as they could and based on what I can tell, had few flaws. You might want to ask yourself why they stopped doing conversions just in case legal liability factors in.

Another example that comes from a similar business model is the Frontline developments MGB GT with a Miata drivetrain. Oddly enough the final price is about the same as the FM V8 ND.

That Singer is a project managment project to build a brand above all else does not surprise me; it take ALL your time to manage a brand, you have no time to play with cars.

Want to know why FM stopped building ND V8 cars? I know why! And it wasn't liability. It's because guys doing R&D for a retail part store are more of a benefit to the company than guys building custom cars at our scale. Building custom cars is a very different business than an efficient retail operation, right down to how you manage inventory and suppliers. We couldn't be really good at both, unfortunately, and we were big enough that we had to decide. I looked at ways to spin it off or to commit ourselves further but the decision was made to double down on what we've been good at. 

Now, a small shop with 2-3 guys - that's got a very different set of priorities.

That Frontline car is the LE50 I mentioned earlier. There are "like Singer, but with a ..." examples all across the industry. A non-trivial percentage are working with iconic British cars. Is anyone doing vintage Mercedes?

In reply to Keith Tanner :

I think there are a couple of people who do, but none of them have the kind of reputation that Singer et al have. I also suspect that you'd be looking at only a handful of models that are iconic enough, and there isn't that ready a supply of cars like Gullwing 300SLs. And IMHO the other SLs just aren't that iconic.

In reply to BoxheadTim (Forum Supporter) :

450 / 560SLs do look the part when modded however, at least I think so.  But you are probably right in that no one is lined up to pay big money for one.

SVreX (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to Keith Tanner :

You are a romantic. I like that. I agree with everything you are saying. 
 

Absolutely  nothing about it sounds like a side gig. 

I suspect that if there was a viable business plan here, Keith would already be doing it instead of giving away his ideas for free. 

ShinnyGroove (Forum Supporter) said:

I suspect that if there was a viable business plan here, Keith would already be doing it instead of giving away his ideas for free. 

As complicated as it all is, he's only giving part of it away, the main value propositions and/or problem/solution fit. Rich guy has too much money, wants something more exclusive. It's the other half of the business model that gets very complex (cost, partnerships, what you do in house vs out) that makes or breaks it compared to how much money your target, er, customer wants to pay.

AaronT said:

Keith has mentioned figuring out the secret sauce of Singer. IMO, part of that is the mentality of rich folk. Everyone knows the P cars are drivers' cars but people who drive Carreras are self-indulgent weiners and I want to stand out: You could get a GT2 or GT3 but that's either too stiff, too much of a handful, or too new. An air cooled is classic but you saw 3 parked in front of Starbucks last week. Enter Singer: you are now a connoisseur.

I think this is close, but I think another part is that most old cars are absolute garbage to drive by modern standard and are slower than any modern minivan.

What classic model hasn't yet received the "Singer" treatment yet?

I personnaly can't think of any.

ShinnyGroove (Forum Supporter) said:

SVreX (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to Keith Tanner :

You are a romantic. I like that. I agree with everything you are saying. 
 

Absolutely  nothing about it sounds like a side gig. 

I suspect that if there was a viable business plan here, Keith would already be doing it instead of giving away his ideas for free. 

No, because Keith isn't quite ready to walk away from his day job to do this. FM isn't going to be doing this anytime soon because it's a big step for a company that's already keeping everyone involved working at about 115% capacity. I've actually put proposals in front of various decision makers with this very thought process, but it was too far outside what we were already doing to be comfortable.

Could I go solo and do this? Yes. Have I considered it? Oh hell yes, some days. Am I ready to make that leap? Not every day.

wheelsmithy (Joe-with-an-L) (Forum Supporter) said:

To go truly bespoke/ custom, a Miata needs a heart of gold, or a unique look, and for all their awesomeness, they are somewhat ubiquitous.

Several someones have already done something like that.

I feel like trying to backdate the Miata to an era that it never existed isn't the way to go. What make the Singer work aesthetically is that it's an idealized version of all the legendary classic 911s. If you wanted the looks of a small 60's roadster those options are already out there.

Borrowing the elements from some of the factory concept/limited production cars would be the easiest way to retain the Miataness while having something totally unique.

A version of this without the color matched wheels and different headlights is a dream build of mine.

The very first modified Miata!

I think it is an idea that actually has merit.

I mean there is a group called Built By Legends that is working with Mine's and Spoon Sports in Japan to build resto modded Skylines and Civics. I mean granted Mine's and Spoon are pretty big names already but 90s Japanese cars are starting to have a major surge in value. I think this will at some point include the NA Miata. If it can be done with EK and EG Civics surely it could be done with Miatas. I mean lots of us who grew up in the days of Fast and Furious/ Sports Compact Car/ Super Street/ Best Motoring videos etc are now getting into our early 30-40s and have a bit of money to spend on cars and they are probably going to be on the dream cars from when we were growing up. For a lot of us that is going to be JDM vehicles like the Supra, RX7, GT-R, AE86, Civics, 240SXs, etc.

Tom Suddard said:

I'd be quite wary of a business that relies on a raw material that went out of production 20 years ago and will never be made again. 

The restoration business says "hello"

Keith Tanner said:

The very first modified Miata!

Crazy that Mazda decide to show the modified one at the North American reveal alongside the stock ones.