Dan Weinberger: Japanese Classics - JDM Classic Trucks (@japaneseclassicsllc)

On this episode, Chris and Dan discuss the emergence of classic JDM 4x4 trucks and how their popularity has grown amongst classic 4x4 enthusiasts.  They also chat about the import process, which models have gained prominence and the models that are under appreciated. 

Based in Richmond, VA, Japanese Classics is the premier importer and largest US dealer of Japanese Domestic Market (JDM) vehicles.  They select only the best right-hand drive (RHD) cars, SUVs, vans, and trucks from their base in Osaka, Japan. 

 Thank you Garret Ohm (@garretohm / @fourbieexchange) for requesting the topic and guest for this episode!

Follow, Like and subscribe to the podcast on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube and your podcast listing platform. Check out our website at classic4x4.com and reach out if we can help you sell your classic, vintage or collector truck or 4x4. Thanks for listening!

Transcript

Chris Picconi (00:02.218)
Hello, hello, Classic 4x4 Podcast listeners. Welcome to season three, our listener request season. And today's listener request is a unique topic and an even more unique organization with an amazing guest today. So the topic is JDM Classic Trucks. And this is not only a topic that...

was highly requested by several listeners, but I am going to self-licently say something that I'm very, very interested in. So I want to learn more about. And our guest today is Dan Weinberger, the GM, the general manager of Japanese Classics out of Richmond, Virginia, which is one of the largest JDM importers in the country. Dan, thanks so much for joining us today.

Japanese Classics (00:52.266)
Yeah, it's exciting. It's fun to talk about something which a lot of your users are quite interested in and a big part of our business, which is the trucks and vans that are exported out of the island of Japan. So I couldn't be more excited to chat with you about what's going on in our line of work. And I'm glad that you've got such great interest.

Chris Picconi (01:14.186)
Yeah, man, we're going to have some fun banner today. But we also have to give credit to, yes, we did have many people that requested it. So again, we've had this instance with a couple of different guests. I can't mention everybody, so I'll mention the person that requested it first. So not only did they request the topic, but they also gave me the speaker that they wanted to hear, which was somebody from Japanese classics.

And that request credit goes out to Garrett Ohm, who is one of the co-founders of 4B Exchange, who are a great group of guys. I've had them on the podcast before. And Garrett is a big JDM fan, and he's an even bigger fan of Japanese classics. He loves what they do. So he was the one that requested the topic and also requested to hear from Dan.

or somebody on his team at Japanese Classic. So Garrett, you get the credit and all of our listeners out there, if you're looking to buy or sell a classic, unique, modified or custom truck, make sure you head over to 4Bexchange.com or 4B.com and follow them on all the social channels at 4B Exchange. So now that we got all that over, Dan.

Let's talk a little bit about you. People wanna know, yes, we know about Japanese classics, their amazing inventory, and we're gonna talk a little bit more about that, but how did you end up at Japanese classics? How did you become the general manager? Where did your passion as a young buck for either JDMs or cars in general come from?

Japanese Classics (02:51.286)
Yeah, so it's funny, like a lot of the people that work at the dealership, I was a customer here and I had a great delivery experience on a cool car around about 10 years ago. And at the time I was purchasing it, a lot of people in the US had not quite kind of dipped their feet into the water as it were to a lot of the JDM imports. A lot of the product frankly, that's a little bit older, wasn't quite as exciting or reliable. And so as a customer, I walked in the door and left.

with a $9,000 turbocharged Skyline. A lot of people wouldn't believe that nowadays, but these cars have gone up significantly in value every year. They're decent investment pieces. And so in a former Laffer and a Highline store, I was the General Sales Manager at a BMW dealership, ran a mini store. Although the product there is great and exciting, and we had a lot of enthusiasts, you know, simply put the service experience of new cars is a complete different animal.

And although at the time, you know, for instance, I had a water-cooled 911 and a new BMW, the driving appeal just simply isn't there compared to a lot of these old vehicles, which you really have a connection to. So after a tenure there of over a decade, took some time away from the car business and got roped back in to the place where I was spending all my money and got an opportunity to team up with the owner here and it's been a really good run.

Chris Picconi (04:18.902)
That's awesome. I love to hear a story like that. Hey, and you know, it's like a hair club for men, you know? You know, I'm also a customer, right? I remember that old school, like 80s, 90s commercial. So that...

Japanese Classics (04:27.39)
Right, right, right. If you have, if you have, you know, raving fans, you'll have a dealership for life.

Chris Picconi (04:36.094)
Yep. Hey, it's simple. You do right by the customer. They're going to do right by you. You give them an amazing experience. And I think, you know, I'm sure a lot of your principles and your sales process and your experience driven sales process comes from, you know, working and running high line dealerships where those that clientele requires a higher level experience. So that's great to hear. Love that story.

Question I ask every guest is what was your first car or truck that you had? Like, you know the day you got your driver's license What did you take that test in or what did you drive to high school in for that first time?

Japanese Classics (05:12.286)
Yeah, it's a great question. So I worked before I was able to drive and I was able to save a little bit of money. And I think I got my driver's license in 2003 or four. And I actually bought a car before I had my driver's license. Although I could not afford a real WRX, I was able to buy a salvage one back when they were new on the market. And so nobody would know that driving into high school that it was a salvage vehicle, but it was definitely a great learning experience.

coming from cars which are much newer and much more complicated, getting your feet wet was something that's relatively simple in terms of today's vehicles that we see was a blessing and kind of a precursor to what I've been doing.

Chris Picconi (05:57.09)
super cool. So WRX and if you were driving a WRX in 2003, there is no question that you had a blowout valve on that turbo.

Japanese Classics (06:05.41)
First thing I did besides a manual boost controller, very first thing. Yeah.

Chris Picconi (06:07.998)
100%. I think every WRX that left the lot in 2003, the first thing that anybody ever did was just throw a blowout valve in it. Yeah, exactly. All right. It's too funny, man. Let's talk a little bit about Japanese classics. So, you've been there for a while. You were on the show, the owner, and trust you to do so. But what's the history? How did this business start? You just don't start...

Japanese Classics (06:17.718)
So annoying and so cool.

Japanese Classics (06:21.902)
BLEH

Chris Picconi (06:36.95)
you know, importing massive amounts of JDM vehicles overnight. Like, you know, there has to be some type of humble beginnings. Where did this, where did it begin? And how did you get to where you guys are at today?

Japanese Classics (06:39.95)
You know.

Japanese Classics (06:49.09)
Yeah, so it started 12 years ago and it started with one car. So it's the snowball effect, you know, as it begins to roll downhill and sell one car it leads to two and two to three and it's funny that the dealership now retails around 500 cars a year. And all the cars just like from day one, you know, they're reconditioned and assume that, you know, people are going to daily drive these things. I feel like all of the products changed heavily. You know, if you're walking in the doors of a dealership

four years ago, you'd be hard pressed to find a van or a truck. Although the products change, the principles are still the same. And so what we've always done from day one, we legalize the cars, we fix them cosmetically, mechanically we fix them. And we have them state respected so people can drive them off the lot. But it's really interesting. It started with the 1986 Toyota Corolla, which those things are nearly impossible to find like a lot of the product that we traditionally had been known for retailing.

and since then it's snowballed. So it's been a very long road, but the growth has occurred a little bit more quickly than we might've even expected for the type of cardiology that doesn't have a playbook like a regular.

Chris Picconi (08:07.03)
I gotta tell you 500 units a year does not sound like a lot out there to most people, but for a specialty dealership, that's like a bonkers number. Like that's an absolutely bonkers wild number. That's a, that's a very, very big number, man.

Japanese Classics (08:23.282)
Yeah, it's really, you know, one of the things that we joke around at the dealership is making the sausage. You know, we've got a lot of more difficult logistic challenges than a traditional dealership would. You know, if you're selling a three-year-old Acura TLX, you can get your parts for it the same day. And so where we really try to streamline the processes by cross-referencing parts, making sure the technicians are, you know, well equipped to fix the vehicles properly.

They get proper US inspections and we do a fairly good job of it, but it would be great if the cars weren't coming from Japan. We sell a lot more than 500 cars a year.

Chris Picconi (09:01.147)
I gotcha man and correct me if I'm wrong. You're one of the few import dealer groups that you guys sell everything on a title. You're not selling with import paperwork. You're selling on a title, correct?

Japanese Classics (09:12.49)
Yeah, and we do give you the import paperwork that's been color-scanned in process. We find that a lot of people originally bought these cars because they were fun to drive and unique. That's still the same, don't get me wrong, but I think the one thing that we really try to impress upon people now more than ever is the fact that these cars appreciate. It's not just the seamless titling process, like you mentioned, getting a US title, but it's the fact that if you want to sell the car or put it on a great auction website, something like that, it's that it's got a bunch of disclosures, down to a domber verification.

cars person at auction and auction sheet and a full list of items which you know we've taken care of here in the shop so it's meant to be a turnkey experience and yes as it relates to titling you get a US title on temporary tags even a tank of gas or diesel and you drive right off the law

Chris Picconi (09:55.554)
That's cool, man. And the reason I ask about that is, I wanna talk a little bit more about the import process, but I imported a lot of our listeners know, I imported a Land Rover Santana 2500DL, a while back, so I have some experience in that space and I will never do that as an individual ever again, right? So I wanna talk a little bit more about that.

and the import process. But before we get to that, I love talking about different markets and I wanna talk about some trends and drivers in the JDM market. Cause you mentioned something earlier, which was, if we came into Japanese classics four or five years ago, it was not classic trucks and vans and four wheel drives. It was probably mostly all Supras, Skylines, stuff like that. And that,

that trend has changed drastically. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure there's a ton of importers out there and there's demand for Supra Skylines, but there were a lot of really cool JDM trucks that came to market in Japan in the 90s that now qualify for the 25 year rule. And then looking at your inventory now, it's majority of it is all classic trucks and vans.

So talk to us about some of the trends that you've seen like that in the market and what you think a lot of the drivers of those trends are.

Japanese Classics (11:26.466)
Yeah, so I think if you're going to come into an import dealership in 2023 and buy a Mark 4 Supra or Skyline, you're going to pay a premium for that. So it's not just the lack of inventory in Japan, which we've been exporting these cars for the US for 10 years. There can only be so many Skylines left, right? But it's the type of vehicle it is. If you're buying a sports car, it's probably been ridden hard and put away wet.

And if we want a client to daily drive a vehicle, which we do, it's gonna typically take us a lot longer to make that vehicle right. The trucks, for a bevy of different reasons, take for example the fact that just the size of the vehicle alone makes it more difficult to park. The public infrastructure in Japan is much better than it is here in the US. So instead of driving your truck, you might take a tube or a bus, for instance, around town.

Island size is very small. And so where we've kind of honed in on the trucks and vans is twofold. First off, if you're shopping an American 4Runner, you're gonna have twice the miles. It's not gonna be in that type of shape. Probably won't have the options our car has. And you lose out on some really tasty power plants. The second thing is just the type of use, right? I mean, if you're driving a truck or a van, it's a utilitarian thing. You're probably not modifying it.

Granted, I'm sure a couple of these four-wheel drive vehicles have had some fun off-road, and seen some snow from time to time, but at the end of the day, having a vehicle that large in Japan is fairly impractical. We benefit from that culture of upkeep, low mileage, and simply if you're a savvy American consumer and you're shopping what a gas V6 4-Runner is compared to our product, you probably see a lot of value in what we're selling. I think there's a multitude of reasons why we've switched over to trucks and vans.

you know, frankly, we want to do something else that somebody else isn't doing and hit kind of an untapped market. And so for the past four years, we've been investing heavily in the segment. And I think the American market's really starting to see the benefit.

Chris Picconi (13:34.89)
love that contrarian view, but hey, you know, the proof is in the pudding, you guys are moving 500 units a year. So obviously, there's demand, you're not bringing them in if they're not if they're not turning quickly. That's cool. That's that's pretty cool. What do you know, if you had a crystal ball, right? What's it? What do you see the next trend in JDM? You know, so we had, you know, the fast cars, the sports cars, the classic trucks and the vans are hot right now. Is there anything else out there that they have that's unique or

Japanese Classics (13:45.934)
Sure.

Chris Picconi (14:03.53)
that you could see becoming the next trend.

Japanese Classics (14:06.23)
Yeah, you know, one thing that we're having some success with right now that I really wasn't expecting was the low displacement, I'm not talking about 600cc, but smaller displacement four-wheel drive. You know, take a product like the Suzuki Jimny, which just got restyled, you know, that car will retail darn close to what a high-lux surface, which is really surprising to us. But the fact, the matter is that in the U.S. is really, there's not something that's similar to it. And so I would say that some of the smaller four-wheel drive, there's definitely...

mean a huge demand for and these cars are retailing at higher figures than what we probably would have guessed. And there's also some ease of service there which those cars will allow the customer to get parts of your local Advanced and O'Reillys, take a Jimny for example, where some of the 600cc stuff is still popular and not as easy to service. I think it just offers a little bit better experience when you're trying to keep a car on the road. So small four-wheel drive I'd say is one area to kind of focus in on.

And then it's not a new thing, but the overlanding. I mean, four-wheel drive vans, we're hitting new inexpensive segments where I think two years ago, the market started to jump pretty heavily on cars like a Toyota Hiace for instance. But there's some really nice substitutes out of Japan. And so that's the idea, is we wanna satiate every part of the market if we can. Trucks, vans, large, small, diesel, gas, we really wanna hit everything. But I would say small four-wheel drive is one of the trends I'm seeing right now.

Chris Picconi (15:32.066)
That's pretty cool, man. Those Jimny's are neat. And hey, for any of our listeners that listened to our year-end market review and update at the end of last year, the Mitsubishi Pajero Evolution was the top price appreciation vehicle in the classic truck and 4x4 space. So again, the proof's in the pudding, man. There's demand there. Those Pajero Evos do some big numbers, man.

I see some of those things across the block in like the high 30s and I'm like, man, who is buying these things? And they, people can't get enough of them.

Japanese Classics (16:09.531)
Yeah, they're really cool. And frankly, for half the price of one of those, you can get a really nice GDI model now. A lot of people don't realize this, but the Pajero and Mitsubishi was the first to stick a GDI motor and a V6 motor at any car in Japan. And so those things, even if you don't get the Evo, you can get a lot of performance for the money. They'll undercut a lot of the Toyota product, frankly, and they're just as reliable. And so, you talk about trends that we're seeing, Mitsubishi's always kind of...

in the redheaded step child out there for a lot of four wheel drive stuff. And frankly, that's another trend that we're seeing is Mitsubishi product is definitely becoming more in demand from a, um, especially on the four wheel drive SUV side of things to and forward. Or we're getting a lot more than we used to.

Chris Picconi (16:53.55)
That's pretty cool, man. So let's talk about the import process and I'll kind of set this up. And I've talked about this on the podcast before where a couple of years ago, I had this genius idea that I was going to import a, I don't wanna say Land Rover Defender cause the purists get upset out there, but the sister to, or the brother to the Land Rover Defender which is the Land Rover Santana 2500 DL, which is,

essentially a Spanish built one 10 defender one 10 through license. So I, and you could get these things out of Spain in very, very dry Southern climates off of, you know, off of a States that had very low kilometers on them. And you get them at really good numbers. And I wanted to go out and I wanted to import one of these just to have the experience and see, hey, is there something here I might do in the future? But I knew enough to realize that

I didn't know, I knew enough to know that I didn't know enough about it. So I actually ended up going out and finding a third party that had some experience in the space. Not only did they have a Florida dealer license, which would help with getting a title, but they had relationships over in Spain. They had all the transport relationships. They knew which ports to come into, which ports not to come into. And I did pay them for their service.

And once I purchased the vehicle, once I paid them for their service, for the transport and everything, net-net, it still cost me less than what it would have cost me to buy one here in the US that either was on import paperwork or was title. That said though, I would never in a million years do that ever again, purely because the risk that I took, the time that it took.

um, was exponential and it didn't outweigh the cost savings. So yes, there was a cost savings, right? But the risk and the time did not outweigh that cost savings. And if I was to do it again, I would 100% find one that's here in the U.S. from a reputable seller that has a U.S. title and pay the premium for it purely because it didn't make sense. And as I started to walk through this process, the time...

Chris Picconi (19:21.618)
It takes a long time. So, you know, everything, you know, we, um, we exported it, uh, or brought it in from, um, from Spain. And there's the transport, right? They put it in the, in the, uh, in the sea box and it gets put on the boat. That's not a quick process. That is not like that takes time. And then once it lands here, and I think that's what people don't understand. Once it lands at the port, right? You are purely up to like,

that there's an inspection process that has to happen here in the US. And I wouldn't have known that if I didn't partner with a third party that advised me on, hey, buy this one, don't buy that one, because this one has modification, though it's acceptable modification. You know what? You don't want to roll the dice because you are essentially once that vehicle lands here in the US at a US port, you're completely up to the subjective nature of an inspector. And that inspector

may have like a customs inspector and that customs inspector may have gotten up on the wrong side of the bed that day, may have gotten in a fight with their significant other before they went to work. Their kid may have gotten suspended the day before at school, you know, a family member. They may be having a bad day. And if your truck or vehicle, your import vehicle comes up on their list, that day they had a bad day and they don't wanna sign off on it.

Guess what? Then it gets rejected. And then now you spent all this money and all this time and literally to pay to put it on a boat and get it out of here. That's, it's a complete loss. Right. And I have to say, once it landed in the port and it, you know, we were waiting for the inspection, which again is not a quick process. It's like, it's like you're on the edge of your seat. You're biting your nails. Like, cause you know, you're doing the right thing, but you're still like, it's like getting pulled over, right? You know,

you know, like, hey, I wasn't doing anything bad. Maybe I was going five miles over, but you're still nervous, right? Like I, that like week or two until we got our sign off, right, was like nerve wracking for me. And I had invested almost all the money at this point, right? Um, so knowing that there's just one ins I'm at the mercy of one inspector and whether or not they're having a good day or not is all this money, this time is at risk. It kind of freaked me out.

Chris Picconi (21:44.994)
I'll put it, and so that alone, let alone, was completely not worth it. But I mean, you guys are specialists in this. Walk me through the import process, how you mitigate a lot of your risks, and just like, you know, my experience in the end turned out good, like the truck was great. Mechanically, it was rock solid. Cosmetically, it was on point. Yes, did I restore it top to bottom, but like.

you guys are mitigating a lot of that risk. Your experience in importing, you know, mitigates a lot of that risk, but you've also probably had bad experiences too. So walk us through from when this truck, you know, how do you identify it at an auction or from a seller in Japan to it getting fully reconditioned at your shop in Richmond, Virginia.

Japanese Classics (22:29.322)
Yeah, so a lot to parse apart, but to start from the beginning, I guess I would say that to mitigate risk, first we're based out of southern Japan. So the climate of Japan is very similar to that of the East Coast. The further north you go, places like Hokkaido, you're going to naturally deal with corrosion more. And that's not to say that sellers in Japan are not trying to dupe buyers in America. They absolutely are. Moving cars from north to south is a thing.

But we don't buy out of the North for that very reason. We do have folks that can look at the cars beforehand, which helps, but doing as much volume as we do, sometimes you have to rely on a Japanese auction sheet. Those are notoriously fraught with misinformation. I've seen a car with a grade four, which is about as high as it'll get, that you could see daylight through the windshield seals and the side window seals, and it was missing a portion of its transfer case.

It was a really rough car. And I've seen great art cars that you can eat off of and look like they're off a showroom floor. So I would say that at some point, there's gonna always be risk buying a car. It's no different from buying a car in the US at an auction with the exception that you're not actually there. But as the car's purchased, we don't believe we're gonna keep every car. In fact, we know we're not. The statistics bear out that there's a loss rate.

what we do. And so we mentioned the biggest killer cars, which is corrosion. The second biggest killer cars, you know, accident damage. Um, you know, if a car has been popped and the frame's not straight and it can't be fixed, then sorry, it's not a good car to keep on the road, but you're not going to know that until the car gets here. And sure. I mean, you bring up the point with, you know, inspectors having a bad day. It's happened to us, you know, $2,000 cleaning bills at certain ports because of vehicle, you know, supposedly had soil in it. That happens. And it would.

You know, if somebody's buying their own car, and we get plenty of calls, people throwing money at us to buy me X, Y, Z car in Japan. If that car arrives to the U.S. and you mentioned it, it passes customs and all that stuff, the numbers bear out that it needs mechanical work. I mean, we spend 25 to $3,500 just on mechanicals on average on every car, and people are selling 25 year old cars for a reason. So you just gotta embrace all this stuff. And so the benefits of buying a car from us as a dealer,

Japanese Classics (24:54.494)
is that we're not making any cars perfect. We never tell people that. It's that we're betting the vehicle, we're embracing the fact we do need to do stuff to get these cars to be road-ready, turnkey vehicles. And we're also, what we're not doing, we're telling the people. And so the idea is that you probably will get burned if you do it enough times. And it's certainly better when you have 50 cars.

that you can sell to lose three of those vehicles, then hey, this is my Santana I'm bringing in from Spain. I got 20,000 bucks on this car and I hope it arrives good. And so that's really our thing is, yeah, we do all the titling stuff. I think that's a great reason to buy a car from us. As you mentioned, we do get a title and do all the import documents and handle all the shipping. So when you see a car on our website, it's already been vetted and we know it's a good one. But at the end of the day, can't disagree with you. You can save a bunch of money.

But it's the risk equation that you mentioned and some people it's worth it and some people it's not. And our customer base are the people who want to spend a couple thousand bucks more for a car that they know is a little bit better vehicle and it's been sorted.

Chris Picconi (26:00.902)
It's interesting. You talk about the risk too, which, you know, the risk is obviously, hey, you know, you guys can absorb that risk of a bad car comes and you want to know something you have wholesale relationships. You also, hey, you guys have a huge inventory and you have a need for parts. You can part these things out. You know, you can you can strip them down and part them out and throw them on a, you know, piece by piece on a on a parts rack. But, you know, we talk about the risk of a car coming. It's bad. But one thing I don't think people.

factor in is that time, right? Like that, to me, time is money, right? And, you know, hey, with you, I can look on your website, give you a call, say, hey, Dan, and this is the one I want, you know, let's put it together and I can, you know, fly in and pick it up, whatever, and I can have instant gratification, right? And there's value in that. I see actually more value in the time-saving process. So like, walk us through, you, the hammer goes down, you win a...

a truck, let's call it a 70 series Prado, right? A Toyota 70 series Prado in an auction in Southern Japan, right? What's the time from that leaving the auction to getting transported to the port in, I don't know which port in Japan, to it getting put to sea to coming to the port that you receive it on here? Like what are the logistics?

Japanese Classics (27:19.606)
Yeah, so sure. So I'm probably not gonna see that car for about a month and a half, right? And there's some variables there. The nice thing is we always have cars in the queue, right? There's always cars on a ship at any time. So we're dealing with these batches, which allows us to smooth out some of those issues you mentioned with, hey, I'm waiting on my one car, right? So we always have cars in transit, but I'm probably not gonna see that car here for...

a month and a half. And when it arrives at the dealership, we usually get those cars released after two or three days in port because of how much volume we do. And I think that just the experience that we have on the paperwork side of things and our relationships we've cultivated over 12 years, that's a little quicker than what most people would expect. But once the car gets here, there's a queue that it goes into. And so we'll stock every vehicle in and there's two main inspectors at the dealership and they're assigned to do two inspections a day.

So we can look at four cars and determine whether we're gonna keep them a day. And when we determine we're gonna keep a car, at that point, then it's about figuring out what it needs. And so those inspectors, they create a really nice list, just like they would at a conventional car dealership for a used car manager, right? And so it's basically a repair order of items that, you know, we have to do for state inspection.

stuff that you want to do, tires, brakes, fixing oil leaks, stuff like that. And then minor items for the customer to keep in mind down the road after they own it. And so if we have a leak on a valve cover, severity at seven out of 10, we're going to do that here at the dealership. But if it's starting to seep at two, we're not going to do it, but we're going to tell somebody that that's coming up on the radar. So dissemination disclosure, I think, is one of the most important things that comes off that initial inspection.

And then we'll then order a parts based on the approved estimate. And so one of the things that a lot of people are thinking is that we're going to have to wait two months to get those parts out of Japan. We just got those cars. Now we got to ship the parts over. And so that's really another competitive advantage we have. Our retail customers get access to our parts department, but we've cross referenced nearly every part for, you know, take the 1KZ diesel, for instance, right, to be found here in the U.S.

Japanese Classics (29:40.798)
And so we'll order parts up. Pretty much everything comes from the states. And once the parts are ordered, car goes into the paint shop to have cosmetic fixes done. And a $50,000 car is going to be looked at admittedly differently than a $10,000 CR-V. If you want to buy that beautiful Z on our website, brand new paint shop, glass came out, wet sanded and buffed, it looks like a million bucks. If you're painting a CR-V, a $10,000 CR-V, and you're giving it all over the paint shop, you're not going to do that. But we still believe that.

Somebody who's buying a $10,000 product should be proud of the cosmetics. But there's a level assessed to the car. We choose what we're going to do cosmetically. And by the time the car is done, in that shop, parts are usually here. They're installed by an installing technician who then re-road tests the car. We actually put between 100 and 1,000 miles on the vehicle. Once the mechanical reconditioning has been performed, it's then cleaned, photod, and sent to state inspection. When it passes, the state inspection of the local Honda dealership.

For instance, if they're looking at a six-year-old Honda Ridgeline for used car reconditioning, they look at it through the same set of eyes that our cars are being sold. And so things like structural corrosion, steering, suspension, door locks, window electronics, that type of stuff is checked not by somebody who works at the dealership, by a licensed police state inspector here. And if the car passes, at that point, the sticker is given, and we post the car on the website for everybody to see. And it may take four months from the time you click that button in Japan.

But at that point somebody just like you mentioned, and this is a thing with the American market, and there's an immediacy. I want it, I want it now, and we want that customer. It's really tough when you're buying a car in Japan and you have to wait for that Santana to come in for four or five months. It's tough.

Chris Picconi (31:24.306)
Yeah, that's a pretty comprehensive reconditioning, which I have to say, those numbers you were giving me, you know, a month and a half in transit on the boat, you know, two to three days at the port. I mean, that right there is those are pretty low numbers. I expected you to say, hey, it's, you know, it's 60 to 90 days in transit before it hits the port and the port is two to three weeks. So I guess also, like you said, hey, you have deep relationships. You guys have.

You guys do this on a high volume. And when you get a good reputation, guess what? The inspector knows, okay, that Japanese classes is bringing this in. They traditionally, you get the benefit of the doubt, which is the average guy. But that four months alone, in my opinion, is not worth the cost savings. Outside of the risk, put the risk aside. Four months is like, which actually ironically took.

when I brought my Santana in from Spain, the whole thing from start to finish took a little over 90 days, like a little over three months, like three months in a week, right? But that's where I saw the value was the fact that I'd have to, if, yes, I saved some money and yes, I averted the risk, but I had to wait over three months.

I'm like a big little kid, man. I don't want to wait three months. I want things instantaneously, and I will pay a premium for that. And maybe that's just uniquely an American thing, but that's where I see the value right there. And obviously the reconditioning. So that's cool.

Japanese Classics (32:42.83)
Sure.

Japanese Classics (32:56.062)
Yeah, and I would say that the other thing that we take for granted as a lot of enthusiasts is we may have multiple cars, and so you can wait three, four months, but frankly, some of our clients may not even be an enthusiast. It's surprising how many people had a lady in here the other day, she's a real mail carrier, and this car's gonna be something that she needs to put to use immediately. And so we get really hyper-focused on some of the neat stuff that we're doing, and...

cool colors and big suspension lifts on these SUVs, for instance, but some people are going to put these cars to work and they don't have time to wait three months. They may just have had a car which just conked out on them. I think that's one thing that's really important is you can turn the key and drive off a lot in anything that we have on the website. If you need a car, it's not just a want. There's definitely a case for these SUVs to be a need item, especially with folks who use them for mail carrier use or delivery service or whatever.

You leave a lot in the vehicle, you know it's ready to go. And so that's the other thing which is nice is that we've got multiple cars. So a lot of us would understand doing a purchase like that but not everybody's got that resource.

Chris Picconi (34:05.406)
I didn't really think about that. That's a whole market where the right-hand drive comes in is the Royal Marrow carriers. I didn't even think about that. That's a huge market, which I, people, we can talk about right-hand drive real quick. And here in the US, we're one of the few left-hand drive states or countries left out there. But, and back to my import, why I actually ended up importing out of Spain was because they're left-hand drive. But,

Japanese Classics (34:14.211)
Yeah.

Chris Picconi (34:33.514)
You know, I recently actually drove a friend of mine's 80 series. So he has a right hand drive HDJ 80 series, right? Toyota Land Cruiser. And yeah, man. And I got to tell you, I'm a big diesel fan in the first place, but I took it out on the highway and man, it's super like, there's really no difference. Like after the first five minutes, you don't get

Japanese Classics (34:45.314)
See you soon.

Chris Picconi (34:59.726)
you think, oh, I'm driving on the other side. There really isn't, you get used to it after the first five, 10 minutes and it becomes normal. And you're not really looking at things backwards. You're driving the same way just on the other side. But the one thing I noticed that people, what gets the looks is when you're on the highway and you're doing 80 miles an hour and you look over to the right in a right-hand drive and a person in a left-hand drive is looking back at you and they give you this look like you're on the wrong side.

Japanese Classics (35:29.59)
Yeah, and you know, there's some benefits to it. A lot of people don't consider that, you know, take Richmond where we operate, you know, a lot of the parts of the city are built before cars. And so the roads are awful skinny here. And you know, if you're driving some big hulking SUV through downtown and you want to, you know, get out, you're exiting the car on the side of traffic normally with a US vehicle, you get out on the sidewalk, you know, same thing goes popping a tire on the interstate, for instance, you don't have to get out of traffic. So we'll test drive with people who

Chris Picconi (35:29.818)
So.

Japanese Classics (35:59.05)
We've sold cars to folks in their 80s, we've sold cars to people who are first time drivers, and it's funny, we've never had somebody not feel comfortable enough to not buy a car. Everybody hits the wipers on their initial test drive. We call it the Japanese classics, hello. But besides the turn signals and wiper stalks being switched, it's really easy to do. We never have people with issues with it, thank goodness.

Chris Picconi (36:20.134)
That's pretty cool. And that's the end. I had never driven a right-hand drive before. It was the first time I drove a right-hand drive and I expected it to be a bigger learning curve than it actually was. It was like driving any other car. Man, it really didn't make a difference. So other than the looks from the people on the highway that were in the left-hand drive, it was all the same. But that and going, I guess, going through a drive-through. But you know.

Japanese Classics (36:45.826)
done.

Chris Picconi (36:46.466)
There is nothing different. It was cool, it was fun. But let's talk about some makes and models, right? So I'm a Toyota guy through and throughout. You know, I have owned classic Toyotas. You know, I've owned a lot of classic trucks. But what is my, people always say to me, hey, you know, oh, you must drive, your daily driver must be this awesome, cool, classic truck. And it's like, no, I have a full collection of classic trucks, right?

And guess what? I spend enough time dealing with, you know, maintaining them, restoring them, that with my daily driver, I don't want that headache. So I drive a Toyota as my daily driver. I drive a 2023 TRD pro, a four runner TRD pro in the color of the year solar octane. And that's my daily driver. I'm on my fourth four runner. These things, you can't kill them. I put a ton of miles on them, other than eating tires, brakes, and rotors, and wipers, and simple wearables.

that you never have an issue with them, knock on wood. So I'm a huge Toyota guy. So let's talk about Toyotas first, right? I wanna talk about the 70, 80, 100 series, right? So the 70s have fallen into the 25 year old for a while. The 80s have been the past couple of years, but now we're starting to see the 100 series fall into the 25 year rule. Mm-hmm.

Japanese Classics (38:07.166)
One thing, you just did something that our customers do. Conveniently missing the 90 series. It's funny how that happens.

Chris Picconi (38:10.72)
What?

So, well, talk to me about the 90 series, because I feel like that's like the forgotten Land Cruiser series. So let's start off there, yeah.

Japanese Classics (38:18.87)
It is. It might be the best value, which is an interesting thing. If anything, that model gets critiqued for maybe having a bit conservative styling, but we've drawn back significantly on selling that model. Once again, it's not about how good that car is, how easy it is to get parts for, which it's basically a big, refined 4Runner. Smoother riding, a little bit safer, full-time four-wheel drive versus selective four-wheel drive.

Chris Picconi (38:24.246)
Okay.

Japanese Classics (38:47.302)
You get behind the wheel on one of those and the third generation surf, which is our best seller in my opinion, the Prado is the better feeling vehicle. But it's not about us, as you mentioned, it's about the market. But that Prado may provide the best benefit of ease of service, refinement of ride quality and inception price of all the land cruisers, but it's the least requested. And we don't do a bunch of them, maybe one a month or two a month.

But it's a great product. I wish the US market would be able to get behind the wheel more because they'd figure out how great it is.

Chris Picconi (39:18.558)
And that creates opportunity. There's a, there's a local guy here in New Jersey who does, he's a dealer. He's a specialty dealer, but he does import stuff from all over the country, but he does JDM stuff. And, and he has, I drove by his lot. I want to say it was cold out and I want to say it was like December and he had a beautiful, that, that like blue 90 series Prado. And it was, I want to say the L is it the LX model? What's the, the higher line model?

I'm sorry, you're saying?

Japanese Classics (39:51.171)
Was it a four-door product? Or a two-door?

Chris Picconi (39:53.888)
Uh, it was a, it was a four door.

Japanese Classics (39:57.07)
So the four doors are TX, I think is the highest trim level. There's TS as well. I believe the TX is the wide body one, if you're looking at the body work. All of this.

Chris Picconi (40:02.37)
Mm-hmm.

Chris Picconi (40:06.618)
That's what it was. It was the TX and this thing was clean. It had like 70 something thousand kilometers on it, which, you know, if we back that into miles, it's like, I don't even think it's 40,000 miles, right? Yeah, it's, it's nothing. This thing was clean. All the electronics were working. It was immaculate. And at the time, I want to say he wanted like 15 grand for it. And I just happened to drive past his lot the other day. And again, this is probably about seven, eight months left. And he had it sitting out front for like 11, five.

Japanese Classics (40:16.866)
Yeah, incredible.

Japanese Classics (40:24.578)
Yeah!

Chris Picconi (40:34.182)
Right. And I'm like, man, that thing is still around and you know, it's an 11 and I feel bad. I can't get rid of it. I know. Right. I'd be happy to refer you to it because this thing was clean and absolutely clean. Um, but I agree that the 90 series are the forgotten ones, uh, but let's, uh, let's, uh, I'm sorry. I forgot about the 90 series, but I'm glad we talked about it. Um, well, out of the 70, 80.

Japanese Classics (40:41.006)
Hey, get me his number. Just kidding.

Chris Picconi (40:59.73)
and the hundreds, what's the most popular? Is it the square 70s or is it, the hundreds that are hitting 25 year old right?

Japanese Classics (41:07.526)
Yeah, so it's really tough to get a good idea for the 100 market because it's so brand new. It's kind of like, I really feel like being around new product launches as much as I've been around the dealership recently. People, it's like an iPhone. They'll pay a premium for the first couple ones, but it takes a little while for the American market to realize, hey, this model is legal. And so some cars, there's a quick little dip in pricing and then it picks back up the next year. If you go through Bloomberg and Robb Reports reporting on our business, not...

Chris Picconi (41:12.127)
Mm-hmm.

Japanese Classics (41:36.93)
Japanese classics, but the entirety of the JDM import business, I mean, these cars go up 10 to 15% in value. But I think that 100 is one of the softer cars in the marketplace for the time being, but it's only because it's been in the US for three, four months at this point. That's gonna pick up. And the build quality's fantastic on that car. The refinement is fantastic. Frankly, it feels too modern for me. I'm used to driving vehicles which feel a little bit more dated than that car. I think it's the most modern-feeling Toyota that we're currently offering.

But it's cool because those cars are so different and they hit different markets. The cool thing is we're not a commission based sales staff at the dealership, right? And so we're just listening to what people see and what they like. And the 70 series buyers is motivated very similar to a Land Cruiser 90 or 110 guy. They love the fact that you get behind the wheel and you look like Rambo. And it's not about refinement with that car. Drive a 70 down the highway at 75 miles an hour.

It's got the aerodynamics of a brick, and it'll do it, no problem, but the hood is just flexing up and down. The sheet metal is thin, and you get a lot of road noise, but it's deadly reliable. We've sold cars to some of the higher-ups, people at National Geographic, who are buying 110s and stuff, driving them on the Serengeti and bringing them to the U.S. They don't want to deal with the service issues those cars usually present, the rust issues those cars present. That 1K engine, which powers that car in the 70 series, is still built to the state of Venezuela.

It's just a gem, it's a classic design. And so those cars have doubled in value over the past four years. It's been insane. But you're not buying that car for refinement. Sure they're plenty spacious and they are very cool in their own respect, but stylish sells it. The 80 series, I think we get a lot of people who use those cars for hauling families around, off-road use. Yeah, the lockers are a pretty big draw.

Japanese Classics (43:34.87)
But I wonder how robust the 80 segment's going to be with the 100 here. It's kind of the same thing that may have happened with the second generation Hilux Surf, where it's still a great car, but the next generation of the car, the next iteration is so darn good that people almost forget about it. And so we'll see what happens to the 80 and 100 market. That's gonna be one of the most interesting to follow, in my opinion. But the Hilux Surf, I know we're moving off anchors, that is our volume seller by a long shot.

Chris Picconi (43:39.97)
Mm-hmm.

Chris Picconi (44:06.386)
It's interesting before we even get into the Hilux Surf, because I'm going to talk about that. I'm a forerunner guy, like, you know, and I love early generation forerunners, gen two, gen three, you know, absolutely love them. And I want to spend a lot of time talking about that, but it's interesting how you brought up the 80 to a hundred series, how the hundred series is just hitting the 25 year rule. So it's only been three, four months since you're bringing them in. So they're a little undervalued right now. And the 80 series have are a little bit more mature. And we've kind of hit this inflection point where, you know, you could, you could almost say,

If you had a crystal ball, the eighties are going to possibly pull back a little bit as the hundreds appreciate. So you might see a little depreciation in the eighties and some appreciation in the hundreds, uh, which is again, creates opportunity. Uh, but that's a, that's super cool. Like, and you, uh, you just let up, um, what I really wanted to talk about, which is the high luck service, man, those, and technically like, those are really, really technically what they're Jen.

three and gen four for runners.

Japanese Classics (45:07.43)
Yeah, so we're currently on the Generation 3. They call it the M185 platform. In the US, you still see a bevy of these things running around. They're built probably better than a 47-packard, right? They're tough to kill. A lot of folks in the US don't even realize that we've got a 2.7-liter motor, which is a really well-designed engine as well, a little four-cylinder gasser.

Chris Picconi (45:12.439)
Mm-hmm.

Chris Picconi (45:21.311)
Oh yeah.

Japanese Classics (45:31.678)
And so if you want a seamless service experience, go into Toyota dealership, you can buy a V6 gas car, a 2.7 liter gas car from us. They're wonderful vehicles. But our customer base requests that diesel because it's such a bulletproof engine. And I think that is the best selling vehicle we have is a diesel surf. The whole model line, 10 of those things leave here every month. So.

Chris Picconi (45:55.491)
What's in the diesel surface? Is it the 1KZ or the HDJ?

Japanese Classics (45:58.078)
Yeah, 1KZ and they offer an optional intercooled version of it too. Still 1KZ, but in the US you see all of us dummies here spending 700 bucks on that sport hood. You actually get to use it with the intercooled diesel. But yeah, the diesel 1K, what that engine lacks in refinement, it makes up for in power and longevity and frugality. It's a very efficient engine. We're in love with that power plant.

Chris Picconi (46:25.666)
That's cool. And I'm a huge diesel fan. Personally, I'm a huge diesel fan. I drove a diesel X5 M Sport pack for a while. That was my favorite truck. And man, I used to fill that thing up like once a month. They used to get like 700 miles of the tank. Like it was, it used to eat death fluid. Like it was going out of style, but hey, you're just pulling any BMW dealership. They top it off. They knew it, but I got to tell you, like I am a big diesel fan. They're much more refined than the big clunky, you know, 12 valve Cummins is in the back.

Japanese Classics (46:33.196)
No. Awesome.

Japanese Classics (46:41.655)
Mm-hmm.

Chris Picconi (46:53.214)
you know, of back in the day, you know, so.

Japanese Classics (46:54.126)
Sure. Sure, and when you start to get in some of the Land Cruiser six cylinder diesels, talking about BMW levels of refinement, maybe compared to an X5, which is obviously built on 20 years newer technology, they're a little bit quieter, but there's certainly no more prone to vibration than these inline sixes. Yeah, and I mean, we've sold, so we actually have sold a 100 series with the new diesel on it, which is still a 4.2 liter, but.

Chris Picconi (47:14.504)
Are you talking about like the HDJ?

Japanese Classics (47:23.726)
Golly, I mean, it's really, really refined. You put your feet in the floorboards and even the gas six cylinder cars, I mean, you feel virtually nothing. For those of us who are used to, for instance, a product like BMW, you do go down and lack some refinement in a lot of these cars, but you don't have to necessarily. Some of them are just as good.

Chris Picconi (47:42.722)
I'll tell you, when I was driving my buddy's HDJ 80, man, other than startup, you really wouldn't know that it was a diesel, unless you were like hood up looking, you know, at startup you knew, obviously, but like other than that, you didn't really, you didn't have a loud pang, it wasn't obtrusive, it was, but you got all the benefits of diesel, the torque, the gas mileage, all that fun stuff. And here in the States, we're starting to see diesel almost get a parody to unlead it, right?

Japanese Classics (47:52.814)
Sure.

Japanese Classics (48:12.398)
It's less expensive here.

Chris Picconi (48:12.65)
happened. Yeah, it's crazy. I filled up the other day for like, I live in New Jersey, so our gas is super cheap. But it was like 339 and diesel was like 379, which it's usually a much larger spread. I mean, to see it for less than $1 is pretty impressive.

Japanese Classics (48:30.582)
Yeah. Yeah, we're in Richmond. It's a full dollar underneath the price of a super unleaded, which is what we use in our gas cars. And I think a lot of our folks are really enjoying that. I mean, you take the Hilux Surf, for instance, it probably gets 30 to 40% better fuel economy than the gas version. So right now is a great time to be looking at diesel, besides just the longevity of the engine, which I think is a great reason to look at it. It's just less expensive to run. No death.

Chris Picconi (48:56.93)
Of course. Yep, yep. That's cool. And then let's move on to one that I really like talking about. I'm a huge fan of, but the market just doesn't value it like the rest of the JDMs, which is the Nissan Patrol. And man, all of our listeners know, I hawk the market. I look at transactions on anything. I love classic trucks. Like I am a student of the market. I'm constantly looking at it all day long.

Japanese Classics (48:57.975)
Lobby's here.

Chris Picconi (49:23.37)
valuing vehicles, I'm out there buying and selling myself for my own collection. And I see a lot of patrols. I'm starting to see a lot of patrols, both the older boxy ones and the more modern ones come in and man, these things are sitting people aren't buying them. They're not like, they're not moving them. And I like I'm personally perplexed because they create a value proposition where you could say to a consumer, Hey, I have a

a 70 series Toyota Land Cruiser or this comparable Nissan Patrol. And the Nissan Patrol is 10 grand cheaper. And no matter what, the consumer is still going to buy the 70 series before they buy the Patrol. And like walk me through that. Why are people here in the States just not gravitating towards the Patrols and valuing them the way that they do the other JDM imports?

Japanese Classics (50:05.963)
Yeah.

Japanese Classics (50:15.598)
Yeah, and if you were to go over to the UAE, for instance, you'd probably see that equation flipped, right, where they're very popular. And so I think a lot of it has to do with, frankly, the market. Same thing can be said for Mitsubishi. That's why they're less requested. It's not a difference in build quality or the excitement of the product. I think that can be the same. But why we have had issues with Safaris and Patrols being sold, and we sold a really neat one to Chris Forsberg, actually, the professional drifter.

couple years ago. So we have retailed the product before, but they've got issues with sourcing parts that Toyota's don't have. They've got issues with corrosion more so than Toyota's and Toyota's already known for having corrosion from trucks of this era. And, you know, glass and body panels, for instance, not sold here in the U.S. I mean, that's a real life portion of pre-sale that we have to focus on. And, you know, the demand, once again, for whatever reason, it's simply not there. It's not that the product isn't a cool product.

And there's some, I mean, I think the drive trains are every bit as good as a Toyota, but it's some of the ancillary items, which makes it a little bit more difficult for us to retail. And unfortunately, as much as you love how a car drives or how it looks, the market is the market, same for the 90 series. And so we have sold a number of those over the years, but really the market trends towards Toyota. It's just the way it is.

Chris Picconi (51:39.19)
I get it. I mean, I'm true and true in Toyota, but I see the opportunity in the patrols again. I mean, just like we talked about the 90 series Land Cruiser. I also think there's an opportunity to acquire, you know, how much further can you go down? Like, I mean, if you could pick up a 90 series Land Cruiser with low mileage, right? You know, for 10, 12 grand. I mean, how much, what's your downside risk, right? I think the same is true with the patrol, right?

Japanese Classics (52:01.874)
Oh

Yeah, but I think the assumption is because a car is not popular in America, it may be cheap to purchase. And that's not necessarily a true equation. I think the 90 series in Japan sell for every bit as much as a high-lap surf, but when they get to the US, the retail's three grand underneath it. So just because we have a certain demand here in the States doesn't necessarily reflect the global perception of the vehicle.

And a 90 series in places like New Zealand or Australia, for instance, is about as hot as anything that's out there. They pay a premium for that car. You just got to ship it 12,000 miles the other direction. And so for us, I would say that if we could buy a Safari for next to nothing and sell it for undercutting a 70 series by 15 grand, that would be worthwhile to do, even if it's a little tougher to get the car.

parts for it and to fix things cosmetically, but at the end of the day, that's probably not the case. They're probably going for similar money in Japan, just for that reason we mentioned at the beginning. I mean, in the UAE and Saudi Arabia, I mean, God, those things are way more popular than the 70s series.

Chris Picconi (53:10.934)
Yeah, that's cool. That's a good point. So as we get into the end here, I wanna talk about one last make and model that you brought up, which is a trend that you said, hey, this is where you see, they're being demand, which is the small four wheel drives. And you brought up the Suzuki Jimny. And if we had this conversation a year ago, this isn't even something we'd be talking about. I've never, other than being in the islands and being,

traveling internationally and trying to figure out what one is. Like now you're starting to see them here, right? So like what's up with these things? Like you're starting to see them in, I don't want to say in droves, but you're starting to see them. All the JDM importers, all the classic JDM sites, they have them where a year ago they didn't have them. So is there a, is there a, is there a market force like the 25 year rule that's playing in but, and there's a value opportunity too, because I've noticed a couple on your, on your site that are.

Japanese Classics (53:48.695)
Yeah.

Japanese Classics (54:00.194)
Yeah.

Chris Picconi (54:10.646)
price, you know, very well. I don't want to say pocket change, but you know, there's a lot of bang for the buck.

Japanese Classics (54:17.152)
Yeah, they're expensive for a small product, and I think part of that's how cool the product is. But the other thing that's surprising is you can buy that car at the 600cc engine, and there's lots of great cars out of Japan, four-wheel drive, small key vehicles at 600cc, which they do command a premium, all of them do. What we're seeing at the dealership is that there's a lot of states which are, including Virginia, which is a really scary thing, they're no longer registering these cars. They may title it.

Chris Picconi (54:21.388)
Mm-hmm.

Japanese Classics (54:44.174)
they will not register it. And the benefits of the Jimny is they sold it with a 1.3 liter engine. And if you do a little digging and go on rock auto, you can figure out it was offered here at the Swift in the States. And it's freeway capable. And when you get behind the wheel on one of those Jimny's, it doesn't feel like a small car. Take a Honda Beat, for instance, you get behind the wheel and it's smaller than a glorified golf cart and probably won't do as well on an accident. And it makes sense why states won't register these 660cc cars. And don't get me wrong, we want to sell them.

We've sold them over the years, but at this point, it's too big of a risk for somebody to buy a car and not be able to put a plate on it. And so the 1.3 liter cars have a ladder chassis, some of those big straight axles, I mean, it's really funny, but they are a little micro machine. Like we joke around, it's the little 80 here, but those Jimny's, they'll get more looks than a $60,000 GTR, they're easy to service. They've got a low speed transfer case and short wheelbase.

I mean, same for the RAV4, as crazy as it sounds, but you get some of these cars out in the West and on some rocky terrain, and they're great. I mean, they're really incredible. And they're just as good on the tarmac, which you wouldn't expect for such a small vehicle. The most recent two Jimny's we sold, they sold I think in a day, and it's because they're usable, in my opinion, whereas the last ones we brought in over the prior generation, which 98's brand new model year,

Those are largely 600cc powered and really not usable for anything but, you know, traveling around your neighborhood or, you know, cruising the grocery store.

Chris Picconi (56:17.938)
That's pretty cool. You bring up, and this will be the last thing we talk about as we go into the end here, you bring up serviceability, right? We've talked about that a couple of times. So like, you know, these Toyotas, the Hilux Surfs, you know, the 70, 80, 90, 100 series Land Cruisers, you know, hey, I pick one up at Japanese Classics, right? Can I bring it to my local Toyota dealership and can they plug it into the OBD and diagnose? Like, is it, is there that much portability between Japan and...

and the US, how does that work?

Japanese Classics (56:48.618)
Yeah, it's a great question. So it depends on the car. And it really depends on how you phrase it for a dealership. I'm sure a lot of people are eager to hop into Toyota dealership that spend $150 an hour labor rate. And for their old 25 year old car, frankly the aftermarket is probably much more ideal for service solutions. Think about 80s, 90s, Mercedes, diesel guys, your third gen, fourth gen, four runner service shops import repair facilities.

because these cars until 1996 would not have OBD2. In fact, they have a similar system called OBDJ, which can be accessed with snap-on diagnostic equipment. But they're basically analog. And so what we tell our clients how is, we load their lips with a little bit of verbiage, right? And so, hey, you know, what I'm gonna bring in to you, let's say it's a diesel Hilux Surf, right? If you drive into a toy dealership and you say, hey, I need you guys to service this thing, you don't give them any setup.

they may not want to do it. You know, older product, they may have concerns about finding parts, diagnostic equipment, whatever it might be. And so what we tell our clients to share with local service shops is first and foremost, if you guys need parts for it, since I bought the car from Japanese Classics, you can speak directly with their parts department, get that cross-reference part so you can get it here in the US, which is the first big hurdle to overcome. Remember, most everything diesel specific, as it relates, for instance, to a Hilux Cirque, we've already cross-referenced.

to be here in the US, right? The second thing is the diagnostic portion of it. You know, there's seven full-time techs here, and we have a dedicated customer care contact who is overwhelmingly mechanical and easy to speak with. And so if that Toyota shop needs to speak with them on dyad, you know, if you're seeing a problem for a Hilux Serp, we've probably seen it 15, 20 times before. And so we offer diagnostic support, free of charge for the duration of your ownership. If you buy a car from us, you get access to our parts department.

For the duration of your ownership and so if you if you tell somebody hey, I got you know Do you know that's gonna send you parts from the car is happy to help you with diag? They're generally overwhelmingly excited to work on the car and you know, we sell a lot to enthusiasts and that same Coverage extends to them if you're doing your own fixes and stuff You don't you know, you can call us up at any time and we'll assist with over-the-phone diag Or if you find a part cross reference for us getting it from Japan We're happy to supply you with that part number if it exists

Japanese Classics (59:14.338)
And so yeah, I would say that if you buy a car once, you service it for life. Most importers don't want to tell you about the serviceability side. And frankly, when you buy a used car, it's going to break. It's a matter of time and mileage. And when that happens, we realize our client tells a rolling billboard for us. And so if we can't keep them on the road, then they're probably gonna be unhappy with the car and with the dealership. And so that's why we won't retail cars, which are maybe a little bit more unique.

It's at the behest of being able to find the customer parts. And so, yeah, I would say that everybody buys a car, gets service, and these things I wouldn't necessarily bring to a dealership, because you may spend a little bit extra money on the labor rate, but you can. And we do have people that service it.

Chris Picconi (59:57.506)
That's pretty cool. It's interesting how focused you guys are on the post sale. There's definitely some value there that's neat. But hey, Dan, I really appreciate your time, your participation, and all the absolutely valuable information you provided in framing out the JDM market and specific models and the import process for all the classic 4x4 listeners today, man. So again, I can't thank you enough. I really appreciate you joining us today.

Japanese Classics (01:00:25.238)
Yeah, glad we could chat.

Chris Picconi (01:00:26.662)
All right, thanks a lot, man. Have a great day.

Japanese Classics (01:00:28.334)
Thanks.