And when you present that to the insurance company they just laaaaugh and laaaaaugh and laaaaaugh.

Your pal,
Meat.

Well. That's an interesting response. So let's take a look at this whole idea from the top.

First off, it's good that you seem to want to stand by your idea, and in no way should you let anyone deter you. However, you have not in any way thought this through, you're being far too optimistic, and you're not looking at any portion of this idea in a logical manner.

First off, the world is a very large place. Finding 10 people in one location - or finding 10 people who can take the same 10 weeks off every year is a virtual impossibility.

Secondly, a shop with all of the power tools, hand tools and functionality to build 10 cars at the same time (a floor space of roughly 30 three-car garages plus storage) is a very, very, very costly amount of real estate in any country. That doesn't include security, electricity, gas, or any of the necessary equipment or molds to make the bodies.

Further, I would never buy a first time body. Fiberglass is a tricky material. It takes time to make sure you do it right. Ten weeks isn't the amount of time it takes to master it enough to make ten bodies. Time-wise, it takes a day to do a body. Then the body has to set. Ten week course, ten flaw-free bodies while building personal cars? Not possible.

Then there's the safety factor.

No insurance in any part of the world is going to insure a shop that has a high turn over of unskilled workers using dangerous, flammable, people-killing materials and tools as a business. As a vocational school, it could possibly be done, but then you'd have to have a proven track record, an actual school that has a curriculum and some kind of accreditation, a staff of teachers, an infirmary, and a campus. Insurance companies are in the business of making money, and this is a dangerous and risky proposition. You'd have to have at least a million dollars worth of liability insurance, plus you're responsible for teaching people how to build cars. Cars are inherently dangerous in the wrong hands - and you have no way of knowing whether the cheap ******* who's going to your car to get a cheap car is an idiot or a saint. Generally speaking, people are idiots. All it takes is one yahoo smoking around the fiberglass or the paint booth (which also has to meet EPA and other requirements and costs a ton of money as well) or taking his car that he built and then wrecked to sue you. One lawsuit and you're out of business, broke, and probably declaring bankruptcy or moving to a country that doesn't have extradition.

And no, you cannot build a kit car in 'weeks.' To promote that is sheer stupidity.

Schools do have shop class. They do not - generally - build cars for the public. They teach you how automotive systems work. They teach you how to take care of your car. No school would ever allow you to buy a kit and then build it under their supervision; the liability is too great, and involves untested, unknown, unreliable death machines operating in real-world - not academic - situations. That changes the entire equation. No school does that with something as dangerous as an automobile. Mott College offer(ed) a class on building a Cobra replica; they'd build the car during the course of the class. Then they'd take it back apart for the next class.

The kit car industry is not in any way ripe for more lawsuits or bad press. The kit car industry is a group of splintered factions that bicker and fight among themselves at every opportunity. Further, you're not really creating any new jobs. And the student would have to worry about the corruption and scam exactly the same. You mention buying in bulk; you'd have to buy in bulk from somewhere.

Those with money are - and always have - invested in America. The reason they have money is because they make intelligent investments. Your half-baked idea is not in any way an intelligent investment.

You're not looking at this thing in any kind of rational light. You obviously haven't come up with a business plan or model, nor have you taken the time to figure out how much it would cost to set up and run an operation like this.

And mantacars hit a point I hadn't even considered; you're making illegal copies of someone's exotic. America isn't built on vanity; it's built on litigation. Your understanding of how America works is sorely lacking. Further, when you attacked mantacars, you misunderstood what he wrote. That's a big problem. Barter is not illegal. Schools are not made on the barter system, they're made on a foundation of cash. Schools are in business to make money. Barter does not make money.

Further, Michael Everson - who has been involved in the kit car industry for some time, and knows what I'm talking about when I mention Mott College (as well as the Tri-State Cobra build school) - is also correct.

What you're offering isn't an alternative to anything. You're asking people to buy a kit with cheap parts, with a body done by amateurs. You're asking people to bet with their lives that a copy of someone else's kit - an inferior one at that - that they can build a cheap and crappy car.

But that's not the worst part. You're thinking that the finished product is going to be worth something. That's not going to happen. A sow's ear is a sow's ear no matter what kind of paint an wheels you put on it. You build a cheap kit using cheap labor in ten weeks and you've done nothing more than reinvent the Yugo. Maybe the finished item could be worth up to 6 or 7 thousand dollars. I wouldn't buy the replica.

I wouldn't take the class.

I'm not saying that what you're formenting isn't a good idea. I am saying that you - and I say this alot - HAVE NOT DONE THE RESEARCH. Do the legwork. Find out how much it costs to rent/buy 15,000 square feet with at least another 2,000 square feet for storage. Plus insurance on 10 students working at all hours. Plus employees that have to be on premises 24 hours a day. Plus security. Plus ten sets of automotive shop tool. Plus ten sets of automotive power tools. Plus utilities. Plus phones. Plus office equipment. Plus computers. Plus paint booth. Plus proper storage facilities for dangerous and flammable liquids, solids, etc. Plus office space. Plus ten complete kits. Plus ten complete molds. Plus ten complete bodies. Plus complete fabric shop for ten kits. Plus parking for all students, teachers and employees at the same time. Plus ...

You get the idea. If you don't then I expect to see another wacky post from you soon.

When you can get all of that information together (you're looking at probably an investment of at least a million dollars- not including collateral or insurance...and you can't work without insurance), then make a presentation. Selling ten kits every ten weeks ( for a possible profit of $500 per kit based on your pricing will bring in around $25K a year...a single entry-level employee costs that much) is not in any way going to turn a profit.

Defending your half-baked idea with rhetoric is just a waste of time. Do the homework. Listen to people who know what they're talking about - like Michael Everson or even me - and think about your idea from a profit/loss perspective, rather than the position you're taking.

Hope that helps.

Your pal,
Meat.