Papa John cannot get over his old POS camaro

 

by Michael Harley (RSS feed) on Nov 27th 2009 at 3:58PM

 

We’re suckers for a happy ending – especially when it involves cars, kids, and hot pizza. Recall, if you will, this past summer when John Schnatter, founder of Papa John’s Pizza, was on a nationwide quest to find his beloved 1971 1/2 Chevrolet Camaro Z28 – a car he sold in the mid-Eighties to fund his first store. John found his car in Kentucky, paid out more than a quarter of a million dollars in finder’s fees, and then generously gave free pizzas from its 2,600 nationwide locations to all Camaro owners on August 26th.

Still feeling more than a bit elated with the return of his Z28, and intent on providing hope and inspiration to less fortunate children, Schnatter has now created a nifty little 1:64 scale diecast replica of his car. The metal cars sell for $4.99 apiece and each one comes with a coupon for a free medium cheese pizza ($1 from each car purchased will be donated to the Marine Toys for Tots Foundation). In addition to selling the cars online, Papa John’s is donating 5,000 mini Camaros directly to Toys for Tots. All told, Papa John’s is contributing more than $155,000 to the Marine program and touching countless lives in the process. Go ahead and order a couple… we did. Full press release after the jump.  (source: autoblog) 

Auto Auctioneer Kruse coming up with a bad case of the shorts, has jet repo’d

by Michael Harley (RSS feed) on Nov 28th, 2009 at 2:33PM

The walls are closing in on Dean Kruse, head of the Indiana-based Kruse International auction house. In September, a slew of lawsuits were filed against the company. Further opening the wound, a county court in Indiana has now ordered Kruse to pay more than $1.3 million to a bank in Warsaw — just one of several debtors seeking money from the company — for an overdue loan originally in the amount of $4.5 million. Two foreclosure lawsuits in DeKalb County, Indiana, are pending. One is for $6.5 million in unpaid loans. The other is for a loan in default for $7.8 million. Adding to his growing headache, and slowing down his travel, GE’s financial arm has asked a federal court to repossess Kruse’s million-dollar Cessna corporate jet.

While Kruse isn’t talking to the media about his current events, he told The Journal Gazette last month that the recession has been hard on his sales. Compounding his troubles and drying up his cash flow, his longtime business practice of releasing cars to good customers before payment has come back to bite him. Understandably, he told the Gazette that he has since suspended that practice.

[Source: The Journal Gazette]

Protected: A disagreement with Ed Wallace (car talker?) over Ratings

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Tiger’s Wife Upset Woods Reworking His Stroke

by Wooten

Here’s some gossip from down under.

There’s some “clarifying” info on TMZ

It looks like the Black Helicopters are circling and the conspiracy theorists could be on to something…

A wife running out of the house with a golf club, breaking out the window of an Escalade…  sounds a bit suspicious.

Will this rampage impact her ability to claim half the fortune?  Did she sign a pre-nup? Was it Rachel Uchitel?  Or an Aussie hostess?

Lesson Learned?  You can’t keep a Tiger in a cage.

Footbal Picks Week 12!

by Wooten

 

Went 50/50 again… pulling a 62.7% on the season

 

I like the Horned Frogs to make a statement.

The Razorbacks to win the boot.

The Panthers to down the Jets.

And the Saints ironically continue the quest for a perfect season against the Evil Patriots.

Jay Leno Predicts Future Collectible and Classic Cars

It’s been 10 years since Jay Leno’s garage first appeared in Popular Mechanics. But instead of looking back, Jay’s celebrating his first decade with PM by looking forward–at which cars today have the potential to be collectible in the future.

By Jay Leno
Illustrations by Ian Kelsie
Published in the May 2009 issue of Popular Mechanics.

Stocks and bonds? I don’t know much about them. In fact, I don’t know anything about stocks and bonds. I’ve lost money in the stock market; come to think of it, I’ve lost money in real estate too. But I’ve never lost money on cars.

The reason is simple: I’ve always bought cars I really want to own. If you buy a car that you like, and it loses its value, at least you still like it. Besides, even if the car’s value does go down a little, it will come back up at some point down the road.

Tiger’s Wife got the idea from this: Pontiac GTO Car of the Year spot

Nicolas Cage: 9 Rolls-Royce Phantoms, and isle, jet, and more..

by Chris Shunk (RSS feed) on Nov 27th, 2009 at 1:02AM

Nicolas Cage is suing his former manager Samuel Levin for $20 million for gross negligence of his finances and for lining his own pockets at the actor’s expense. Cage is moving to sue the former manager due to the actor’s sudden cash crunch, which includes a boat load of debt and over $7 million in back taxes. But Levin has a story of his own to tell, and it involves excess on a scale that we can hardly imagine. According to Levin, the actor purchased a scad of really expensive stuff. Like a $7.5 million island in the Bahamas, 15 mansions, four yachts, a Gulfstream, 47 pieces of art and even nine Rolls-Royce Phantoms.

Now we can understand owning nine exotics, or even collecting hundreds of rare cars and storing them at the Burbank airport, but nine Phantoms? At least Reilly purchased a Ferrari with his National Treasure money. We’re guessing Cage likes to have a Phantom just about everywhere he is, and since he owns an island and a bunch of mansions he probably has one parked in nine different garages. Regardless, we’re having a hard time feeling too sorry for Cage, even if Levin is exaggerating. The actor makes about $20 million a film, so while all that excess sounds like a ton of money, we’re guessing the actor can pay his tab with a couple more movie deals. Gone in 60 seconds part two, anyone?

[Source: The Sun]

Camaro Convertible is a comin (wonder how many they’ll sell to the rent car agencies)

by Noah Joseph (RSS feed) on Nov 27th, 2009 at 9:55AM 

 

Chevrolet Camaro Convertible Concept –

Ever look for something high and low only to find it hiding in plain sight? That’s how we’d sum up the latest announcement from General Motors. The company has announced that the new Buick Regal – based on 2009’s European Car of the Year, the Opel Insignia – will enter production at the beginning of 2011 at its assembly plant in Oshawa, Ontario. There it will join the existing assembly line for the Chevrolet Equinox and GMC Terrain crossovers and the Chevy Camaro. 

 

The kicker? General Motors subtly slipped in the announcement that the Camaro Convertible will begin production there as well around the same time. The drop-top pony car was first mooted with the concept unveiled at the 2007 Detroit Auto Show, and GM has been hemming and hawing about its production prospects ever since. Well, apparently they’ve made up their minds, and told all of us about it in the most understated way they could think of. Follow the jump to read the official press release.

The Truth About Why Chrysler Destroyed The Turbine Cars

 

By Paul Niedermeyer on November 25, 2009

The video showing the destruction of 46 of the 55 Chrysler Turbine Cars we posted recently generated lots of heated discussion. The key issue is, and has been for years, whether import tariffs played a material role in Chrysler’s decision. There is a wealth of sites and reprinted vintage articles dedicated to the TC, and the import duty conspiracy theory reoccurs throughout them. Interestingly, Wikipedia, which is not to be trusted in all things automotive, is the only source that throws some doubt on that story: “The story at the time that this was done to avoid an import tariff was incorrect^{[citation needed]}.” Lacking that citation, it was time to do some further sleuthing, and either join the tariff theorists, or put a stake through it once and for all.