Hello and Welcome to Cars and Coffee™ Roadtrip! What is it? Roadtrip is an opportunity to extend your experience at Cars and Coffee™ by participating in an event and building the local car community. Each time, we will end up at a destination that will facilitate conversation, cars, community and good fun. As with all other Cars and Coffee™ events, Roadtrips will always be free just like the show itself.
We celebrated Opening Night at Euromasters in Fountain Valley, California. Save the date, Saturday, November 15th, 2008. We started the trip off with a Seaside cruise starting at 3:30pm with Euromasters being our final destination.
It was set to a classic 1950's theme and featuring cool Rat Pack sounds, the event will perfectly showcase the full-service dealership’s incredible 37,000-square-foot showroom, which is filled with dozens of gleaming classic cars.
While enjoying a night, avid car enthusiasts and families alike were able to peruse classic automobiles ranging from track-ready Porsches to Sunday drive stylin’ Mercedes and even a nostalgic muscle car or two. And if that’s not enough, they saw the dealership’s 40 classic photos hanging like works of art or the theater room, where auto-themed movies were playing.
“My goal is to not have people to feel as though they’re walking into a dealership. I want Euromasters to be more of an event, like going to Disneyland,” says Euromasters Classic Cars owner John Calicchio, a man who has owned not only car and motorcycle dealerships, but more than 40 Porsches in his car-loving life. He’s also owned muscle cars, motorcycles and various other fine pieces of roaring metal. “I’ve logged more than 600,000 miles in Porsches alone,” he admits.
In fact, Calicchio’s passion runs so deep that Euromasters is more a labor of love than a business, as evidenced by the fact that he came out of retirement to open the premier dealership. “I definitely didn’t need the challenges of a new business,” he says with his signature laid back, jovial tone. “But I really wanted to share my passion for classic cars with others. In fact, I like to think of Euromasters as more of a museum than a dealership.”
That attitude is reflected in the peaceful, sky-blue ceiling; the generous space allowed each classic auto for museum-like enhanced viewing; the planned free weekly movie nights in the theater room; and especially in the small electronic devices, or as Calicchio labels them, “clickers,” that allow customers to call a salesman only when and if they need one. “We are a very low-pressure car dealership,” says Calicchio. “I want people to want to come here.”
But make no mistake, when it is time to get down to the business of buying, repairing, or restoring a classic car, Euromasters has the experience and expertise to outshine their competition. Euromasters has a team of knowledgeable salesman, mechanics and craftsman staffing its state-of-the-art Service, Parts, Paint, and Upholstery Departments.
These auto artisans also pride themselves on the most intricate of concourse restorations, performing an extensive disassembly and remanufacturing process that exceeds factory specifications. The results produce an enhanced, smooth, quiet, more powerful driving machine. So confident are Euromasters technicians that every delivered car receives a 3-year/36,000-mile Bumper-to-Bumper or Limited Warranty. Bottom line: While Euromasters specializes in fine German automobiles such as Porsche, BMW and Mercedes, they can handle almost anything that has wheels and purrs – or is supposed to.
Euromasters even makes selling a classic automobile less stressful with their unique first-month-free consignment terms.
On Saturday, November 15, it was all about having fun and enjoying a revving good party. As evidence, Calicchio merely points to the sign above the Euromasters Classic Cars entrance, which reads: “Through These Doors Dreams Come True.”
Euromasters Classic Cars is now the national distributor for Vintage Speedsters and Stuttgart Spyders.
Betim Berisha of BBI AutoSport started in the automotive industry in 1994 when he bought his first car, a 1967 Mustang. Eight years later, he started working for Porsche Motorsport North America as a Dyno Tech and PMNA Track Support.
Passionate about perfection and innovative ideas, Berisha teamed up with friends, Joey Seely and Jared Deputy, whom he grew up with in Seattle, in California to help grow the business.
To date their combined skills have created a high caliber street tuning division. "Using the most exclusive vehicles in the world as our platform, we engineer an uncompromising marriage of performance and style. We are not limited to a particular manufacturer, so provide us with your favorite canvas and together we will create a masterpiece."
BBI AutoSport was founded in late 2005 to date with their combined talents -- they specialize in engine building, custom exhaust, performance, suspension packages, race track prep, and custom exotic carbuilds.
Welcome to their Coastline Cruise and Barbecue! FREE for all online Cars and Coffee™ Members. . .
Date: Saturday July 26th
Surf & Turf Cruise: Begins at 9:00am after the Irvine show. Free Barbecue courtesy of DubzDirect.com.
RSVP: CLOSED. We apologize but this event has reached capacity and we are no longer accepting RSVP's. Please register early for our next Cars and Coffee™ Roadtrip.
Photo Right: "Passionate about Perfection and Innovative ideas"- BBI AutoSport Left to Right Jared Deputy, Betim Berisha, and Joey Seely.
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