Cars and Coffee™ Las Vegas: Trailblazers to Sin City

by Saloman Braun, host of Cars and Coffee™ Las Vegas

It was a brisk Saturday morning one weekend in early September of 2007 when I first arrived at the PAG parking lot. I couldn’t believe my eyes! After all, it was only 6:45 am and in the middle of this jungle of corporate buildings stood a barrage of automobiles and enthusiasts co-mingling around with coffee in their hands and stars in their eyes. This was my first Cars and Coffee event that I attended with my friend Mark Trewartha just before an awesome trip to Bavaria filled with Porsches, castles and the Autobahn, of course.

People were just hanging out looking at each other’s cars, drinking a cup of Joe and talking about what seemed to be their favorite subject. Over 400 cars showed up that morning. A plethora of Porsches, Ferraris, Lambos, Vettes, classic cars and a few rods filled the rows of this petro Mecca. I was hooked. It was hard to believe that people would wake up at the crack of dawn just to hang out in a parking lot full of cars and have a cup of coffee. But wait, this was So Cal.

I was determined to bring this to the city of Entertainment. Since my wife Jackie and I had just purchased our first Porsche earlier that year, we were unable to let the car sit too long without venturing all over California every weekend. We were putting an average of 2000 miles per month. I’d say we had the bug pretty hard.

After a long four months of talking to Brent and Josh about the prospect of bringing the show to Vegas, we set a tentative date. Lucky for me it landed on my birthday. June 14, 2008 couldn’t come fast enough. Since Jackie and I had been involved with many car clubs locally, the campaign to spread the word for the Cars and Coffee Las Vegas launch was not a chore but a labor of love. We were finally going to have a place where all the auto enthusiasts could congregate and share stories about their babies. A place where Car clubs would finally be together in one place sharing their passion for their beloved Marques and a place where spectators would be able to feast their eyes on something other than flashing lights and tantalizing buffets.

The special day was finally here. Would anyone show up? I didn’t sleep a wink the night before. Josh and his friend Matt came from Irvine the day before to show their support and help out with the logistics. When we arrived at the desolate parking lot at 6:15 AM, there was a guy with an old MINI already there! Was this a good sign? It was. Cars started rolling in at twenty to seven and didn’t stop the trickle ‘till the end. 278 to be exact. I kept counting the cars so that my eyes weren’t lying to me. Over 250 cars have shown up every week since that glorious Flag Day, aka, MY birthday. A great start to what will become THE place for car nuts to be on early Saturday Mornings. I hope you come join us for a cup of Joe and some good conversation sometime. One more thing that happens in Vegas not to stay in Vegas.

Salomon Braun

July 1st @ 10:40 PM | Trackback