By Bernard Martin When Wayne and I started this Concours LLC endeavor, we agreed on several groundrules:
When we get emails, like this one from Ford Heacock below, and phone calls from some folks we highly respect, and see very kind things written in articles about our events, we know that that the six hours of planning was more important than the six minute solution we could have tossed in and hoped for the best. At our events we operate on keeping everything simple. It's called K.I.S.S. by most. We don't ask a volunteer or judge to do anything more than a couple things that they can check off on the fingers of one hand. Otherwise people will forget things if its too complicated. This especially holds true for any first year event: You don't know what you don't know. At the end of the day, it really takes a team of great people to make a succesful event. It takes every person on the team jumping in to lend a hand. We certainly had an "all hands on deck" moment last May. We experienced the second highest amount of rainfall since the "1000 Year Flood" that closed the Greenbrier for a few months after the June 2016 high water mark destroyed so much of the facility. We had watched the weather closely on Saturday and decided that we should be clear of rain during the Concours on Sunday. We made the call at 2pm on Saturday afternoon. We would not need to implement our "rain plan" that would have required moving cars into the building by late Saturday afternoon. Sunday was indeed beautiful, albeit slightly overcast, with only a few raindrops at the beginning of the Concours. Perfect weather for the photographers actually. What we had failed to pay close attention to was the severe amount of overnight rain. I recall Wayne calling me as I was finishing some showfield marking about 10pm at night on Saturday. The rain was coming down in buckets. As I walked back to the golf cart for the last time, I told him we where finally ready for tomorrow and I was not going to make it to the Gala but was going to take a hot shower, have a glass of wine and get some sleep.
We could still handle that easily and but needed to take care of the other half of of the showfield classes.
We still needed a place to put five more judged classes. Fortunately, the golf pro suggested the idea of putting cars in front of the main entrance to The Greenbrier. We where very fortunate to have originally planned to use the front entrance for our show. We pulled out and dusted off the very original plans that called for putting some iconic 20-30's era cars right in the middle of the roundabout and the brass cars under the roof. We had a plan. We could park all the classes and have a show. But how do we notify everyone? It came down to the effort of the judges. What an incredible group of judges Paul Ianuario assembled. Each group called their class, told them where to go and when to unload. The Volunteer hosts who had been to other car shows really pulled out the stops and made if happen. OODA loops!
It really does take a lot of people to make an event success. You've got to have a team and a that team you have to trust to do their jobs to the best of their own discretion.
It's the people that mean alot to us. It's the people that should mean alot to your and your efforts doing a car event.
0 Comments
Listen To Bernie’s podcast by Clicking on the button above, or use your mobile podcast App on Apple Podcast, Google Play, or Stitcher. Bernie Martin is the Founder and President of Rapid Production Marketing in Pittsburgh. It’s a branding and consulting agency that develops strategies and tactical implementation.
A long time resident of Pittsburgh, Bernie has combines his passion for cars and in 2009 created The Cortile in conjunction with the Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix week. The Cortile takes place at the Bob O’Conner Gold Course at Shenley Park. It is a unique car show as it is one of the few events during the race weekend managed by the PVGP Association. Most of the other car marque shows are managed by the individual car clubs. As the Managing Director of the event Bernie and his team bring a wide range of Italian marque cars to this very special show with this year’s highlight being Alfa Romeo. During the 2017 Amelia Island Concours d' Elegance Wayne and Bernie where invited by Paul to spend some time with Roy Sjoberg. Roy H. Sjoberg was named Executive Engineer-Viper Project in February 1989. In that position, he created and managed the Project Team for the development & production of the Dodge Viper. The "Platform Team" concept envisioned by Sjoberg (to bring the Viper to production) became the corporate-wide organizational structure for Chrysler. There was some terrific stories about the inception of the Viper and Roy's recruitment to Chrysler! We not sure if everyone know's Paul Ianuario backstory. Paul is a retired engineer who spent more than 40 years in the automotive supplier industry and has degrees in engineering, mathematics, and physics.
Our discussion on the patio at The Ritz ran the gammit from mothballed factories to CNC machining and CFD testing. Paul is going to be the Chief Judge at the Inaugural Greenbrier Concours d'Elegance, so of course there was a healthy amount of discussion about all aspects of Concours judging ranging from car selection and assignment to classes to filed layout and weather contingencies. Paul is the president of SLR Support Services, Inc. His company provides consulting services and support for museums and vehicle related events. Paul was under contract for twenty years as Curator of the BMW Zentrum and recently stepped down from this position. He was an AACA Museum Director and served eleven years in that capacity. Bernard Martin interviews Ralph Gilles who is the Head of Design at Fiat Chrysler Automobiles. Ralph spends some time going through the history of the Alfa Romeo marque, discusses the development of the 2017 Alfa Romeo Guilia, and finishes up the interview with an thank you to the Alfisti Vintage Racing community. Alfisti have been keeping the brand alive in the North America during their 20+ year hiatusand Ralph admires Brandon Adrian's very rare and early 1956 Alfa Romeo Giulietta Veloce Spider 750F. This is the actual car that won (1st in Class Winner) at the F.I.A./ARCF 12-Hour 1957 Sebring, Florida International Grand Prix of Endurance for the Amoco Trophy and was 2nd in class in the 1958 Sebring 12-Hour the following year. This is one of if not the most significant Alfa Romeo Giulietta Veloce Spider's in the world with a early F.I.A. competition history and it was the FIRST Alfa Romeo Giulietta Veloce Spider with a International racing win at a maior International F.I.A. event in the world. (F.I.A. World Sports Car Championship). This car is the 'Real' and only original 'Sebring' Spider 2015 Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix Interview with Bernard Martin, Managing Director "The Cortile."8/12/2015
2015 Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix Interview with Bernard Martin, Managing Partner "The Cortile." Interviewer: Ted Sohier Camera Operator/Editor: Justin Mackey
The Cortile is a hybrid car show. Hybrid in the sense that it is one of the few car shows on race weekend managed by directly by the Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix Association. Many of the other shows are graciously managed by local car clubs.
In October of 2007 Dan Delbianco and Bob Speer had lunch with Bernie Martin and the subject of Italian cars, and the lack of them at the PVGP, came up. The Italian manufacturer's and coachbuilders had some of the richest history of automotive design and performance engineering. There seemed to be two key problems: There where no Italian Car dealers in the Western PA region; There where no active Italian Car clubs to manage a car show By the end of that lunch it was decided to roll the dice and see if we could attract some Italian gems to the Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix by creating an "All Italian" Marque of the Year. As Bernie tells it, Bob and Dan looked at him and said "Great Idea! You're in charge" So, in 2008, at the 26th running of The Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix, "All Italian Cars" were featured as the "Marque of the Year" There was an overwhelming response! But there was still no local car club and no local dealers to manage an all Italian car show in the future. During the course of the 2008 show there where many discussions about why more Italian car owners didn't participate. Some of the main reasons given was that the traditional location of the Italian car event turned into a swamp if it rained. It was also noted that many visitors to the PVGP, not realizing the rarity of some of the cars in front of them, wanted to "hop in" because there where only a few Italian cars that showed up. Bernie's wife and other family members decided early into that weekend that they needed to keep the momentum going with the Italian Marques into the future. By the end of the 2008 event the discussion was flowing. Several people made the journey across the park to look at a section of the golf course that was completely vacant near the #8 & #17 green of the Bob O'Conner Golf Course at Schenley Park. It was decided to create an All Italian event every year. Those founding members included Bernie Martin, Walt Spak, Sean Kunkle, Wayne Long, Chad Pcsolyer, Jim Shaw, Dan Delbianco, Bob Speer and Ian Martin. In 2009 the Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix launched "The Cortile" which has become a very unique, opulent area befitting the gorgeous Italian gems that participate. The Cortile is a PVGP run event and not a club event which makes it rather unique from many of the other car shows that occur over the Grand Prix weekend. |
Stories
Some of the stories, pictures and articles that we have been included in over the years. Archive
February 2024
Categories
All
|