That fact should give reason to pause if your job involves selling Beetle parts, especially if you haven’t shared the Beetle experience. Never fear. This market may be driven by emotion, and sharing that passion can go a long way in growing sales, but it’s not a requirement. Understanding the market is, of course, necessary. That starts with knowing the history, energy and mechanics that have fueled the Beetle craze for over 50 years.
From Deutschland to the heartland
VW began exporting Beetles to the states in 1949. Sales were slow at first. A war weary America had little interest in a German-made vehicle, particularly one whose compact size and odd design stood in stark contrast to the nation’s love of big cars with even bigger engines. In a time when American engines needed to be rebuilt at 50,000 miles, the Beetle ran strong, regularly piling up 100,000 miles with nary a visit to the local mechanic. When it did need repair, even the most modest backyard mechanic could find his way around its innards.
In the 1970s, recently adopted U.S. safety and emission policies would require serious modifications to new Beetles. Faced with changes that would make the Beetle unprofitable to produce, VW ceased German production of the hardtop model in 1978 (convertibles would cease production a year later).
During those years, the Beetle was neither gone nor forgotten, and dedicated fans had often been introduced through family.
“My customers are both young and old. All of them grew up with the Beetle. The younger ones had the vehicle passed down to them,” says Steve Shehyn, owner of Steve’s Pit Stop in Simi Valley, Calif.
Glenn Ring, president of the Northeastern Volkswagen Association (NEVA) in Long Island, N.Y., notes the same phenomenon. “Our membership is eclectic, from people in their 70s to young people. A number of our members have their original Beetles.”
Ring’s father owned a Beetle, which inspired Ring in 1968 to buy his own. Thirty-seven years, one new engine, and 450,000 miles later, Ring still has his Beetle. (Note: The Guinness Book of World Records reports the longest-running Beetle clocked 1.6 million miles.)
Those who don’t “understand” the Beetle typically picture it as a hippie-mobile. In some ways, it was that, but the Beetle also was part of many other cultures — especially the family culture. It dutifully carried mom and dad to work and kids to high school, college, even to the local maternity ward to see birth of their own children — the next generation of Beetle fans.
The Beetle’s story is a collection of shared experiences and the little Bug that could continues to write this grand epic, serving as family hauler, race day winner, car show champ and working class hero.
Beetle basics
Any vehicle that lends itself to ease of repair naturally lends itself to aftermarket upgrades. That’s certainly been the truth with the Beetle, whose introduction was almost immediately followed by a thriving aftermarket.
Early on, enthusiasts swapped out the VW engine with one from a Porsche 365 (no surprise there) while German companies such as Oettinger began offering engine conversions. In the U.S., by the ’60s, companies like Anaheim, Calif.-based EMPI began turning Beetles into high performance dragsters that easily blew away V8 competition.
This tradition continues. Currently, Beetle work can be broken down into four different segments: keep the old gal running; pure restoration; cross-restoration; and performance.
In the case of the first segment, Shehyn reports a number of his customers are looking to keep the Beetle in the family. Nothing too fancy: Typically they’re just looking for help squeezing another 100,000 miles out of it. In other cases, they’re looking for a full restoration. Both repairs can get expensive, but Shehyn points out that even though most jobs cost anywhere from $5,000 to $10,000, they’re still cheaper than buying a new Beetle, even if the owner has to plunk down another $6,000 for an original Bug body.
The second group requires stock parts to return a Beetle to its factory build, making it even more expensive and time-consuming than work in the first segment. Shehyn says this is mainly due to a shortage of new old stock (NOS) parts. “They’re worth their weight in gold,” he says.
Enthusiasts don’t have the option of turning to parts made from Mexican plants still open just two years ago. “They were often modified for Mexican use. Sometimes they don’t fit,” says Darren Dudley, owner of BFY Obsolete Parts in Orange, Calif.
Want to know which model year is the most popular for restoring? Lenny Copp, owner of Fullerton, Calif.-based West Coast Restorations, says look no later than a 1968 model. Copp won’t work on anything built after then and doesn’t have to. So popular is this segment that he has a three-year backlog of work. Copp notes that even when fully restored Beetles are finished, they’re usually treated just like any other Beetle. “People still drive them. They don’t just garage them,” he says.
The third group concentrates on “less pure” restored forms — forms made in the mold of classic Beetle rebuilds. Beetle historian and author Keith Seume says these rebuilds include the Cal look, Resto Cal, German and a variety of stripped down Beetles such as Buggies, Bajas and Roadsters.
A buzzing market
Unfortunately, exact statistics covering the Beetle aftermarket are hard to come by. Restorers put the average restoration cost somewhere between $5,000 and $15,000. Performance shops say the same numbers can be placed on a performance upgrade. Those are only two pieces of the market puzzle because a lot of Beetle fans perform their own work.
Then there’s the matter of where most business is flowing, to restoration or performance parts. Restorers like Shehyn report spending equally on body and engine parts. However, since many restorers install traditional Beetle engines (often placing more powerful later model engines into early model Beetles), they can’t comment on the performance market. There are, however, active trends for both kinds of parts that have been noted.
Dudley currently sees a lot of business with rust replacement panels. Bruce Kranak, owner of Bugformance (a Beetle performance shop in Sunnyvale, Calif.), sees a thriving performance market made all the stronger by growing consumer demand for engine power upgrades and the ability of performance systems to transform the Beetle.
He says, “Beetle performance parts are universal. They can be fitted on Buggies, Bajas. What you can do with these vehicles is unlimited.”
Performance parts suit the character of the Beetle, permitting it to become whatever an owner wants. At the moment, many owners want more power, safety features such as disc brakes and higher gearage in the legendary Beetle shifter — moving from a four-speed to a more performance-ready five-speed.
Since the Beetle market, with its heavy emphasis on nostalgia and performance, in many ways reflects the muscle car market, the two could be comparable in terms of aftermarket performance dollars. The Specialty Equipment Market Association (SEMA) reports muscle car parts generated $1.8 billion in 2003. However, since there are far more Beetles around than muscle cars, the Beetle market probably generates several times that amount. For the sake of argument, though, $1.8 billion is a good place to start.
Mysteries like these can make it difficult to gauge the Beetle market. Veteran dealers and market members can provide more local and current observations on what this market is and where it might be going.
A Beetle’s eye view
Ron Silva, product development manager for Bugpack in Costa Mesa, Calif., previously worked in Beetle retail parts for over a decade. He offers the following insights into the market.
First off, Silva believes the Beetle market currently is expanding. He cites interest surrounding the recent Bug In parts trade show, which usually attracts 5,000 to 7,000 people. This year it drew record crowds — almost 18,000 with many visitors traveling from Europe.
Silva, too, notes the Beetle market doesn’t experience constant growth. Instead, it has periods of expansions and deflation. He says the market grew from the late 1970s to the early 1990s before slowing down for three years. The market rebounded from 1994 to 1995 before again regressing. In 1998, with the release of the new Beetle, interest in the classic Beetle once again grew. This growth has continued.
Silva says that within each year sales regularly fluctuate, with predictable peaks in the summer and winter months and slower times in the spring and fall. He suggests that sales peak in the summer as enthusiasts in warm weather states prepare their vehicles for cruising and other uses. Sales peak again during the winter when enthusiasts living in the east coast and Europe use the colder months to rebuild their garaged vehicles.
The demographics of parts buyers similarly change. Silva says five years ago, most buyers were males between 20 and 25. Now most buyers are males between 30 and 45. Silva suggests the new majority is made up of part of the former group along with Baby Boomers entering the market as their children leave for college — the same phenomenon occurring in the muscle car market.
He also sees another group taking a greater part of the market — young women (ages 18 to 25) who are well versed in performance engineering and looking for unique performance vehicles.
Nationwide, says Silva, most buyers tend to be concentrated in large metropolitan areas with Southern California serving as the Mecca of the Beetle culture and, therefore, Beetle business. The numerous Beetle shops and parts dealers in Orange County run a brisk business with one another and do-it-yourselfers.
Silva notes that many dealers also concentrate their sales around New York City, Chicago and New Jersey, mainly because the large populations tend to provide a greater concentration of Beetle fans. And even with many do-it-yourselfers restoring their own Beetles, shops find fertile business ground.
Silva says enthusiasts frequently encounter complex repair issues too difficult to resolve by themselves. Some simply give up and sell their vehicles, creating an active market of partially restored Beetles. Many others turn the work over to shops for completion.
Working out the parts bugs
Like their buyers, a number of trends and issues surround Beetle parts. NOS parts continue to rise in cost as demand skyrockets and supplies dwindle. NEVA’s Ring reports shortages of some aftermarket parts that carry the VW symbol. “Volkswagen America has come down hard on manufacturers and even VW clubs for using the VW symbol,” he says, noting, “This has made it difficult if not impossible to get some popular aftermarket parts with the symbol, such as VW license plates and mud flaps.”
In the aftermarket arena, customers also have strong buying preferences. Copp says his customers prefer German built parts. Kranak says performance hounds gravitate toward traditional Beetle brands such as EMPI, SCAT and Bugpack.
Enthusiasts on a budget have a wide range of options with a recent explosion of aftermarket alternatives. However, they must shop more wisely than ever to avoid being stuck with low quality parts. “You really get what you pay for. That’s never been truer than now,” says Shehyn.
Making this job more difficult, restorers point out that some sub-par Asian brands are unfairly giving a black eye to other imports. Restorers explain that many ultra-cheap, poor quality versions come from offshore factories attending mainly to local needs for affordable Beetle parts. The Beetle became the world’s best selling car based mainly on its low price and durability, so it proved exceptionally popular in developing countries. Owners there also need parts but often can only afford the cheapest versions. These versions have been making their way to U.S. shores in greater numbers as interest in the Beetle has gained momentum.
Options like ultra-cheap parts are nothing new in the Beetle market, according to Kranak, who describes the entire market as itinerant, with parts and parts makers quickly entering and exiting. “It’s faddy,” he says, “Products and manufacturers come and go. If you pick up a VW magazine from 10 years ago and compare it to one from today, the companies advertising in it are almost completely different.”
Regardless of brands or products, Silva says one factor remains a constant in this market — professionalism sells. He notes that Beetle fans are well read on the market and know what they need. “Ninety-nine percent of the time, when someone calls up looking for a part or system, he has an idea of what he’s looking for. From there, you have to explain what you have and what it does,” he says.
That same notion, of course, applies to part stores and restorers. Many restorers — like Kranak, Shehyn and Copp — have been in business for decades. When they call a supplier, they expect to speak with someone whose knowledge is on par with theirs.
Anything else a parts dealer or distributor should know in this market? One monumental factor — a clear line separates classic and new Beetles. “They’re two different cars,” says Silva. They also have two different sets of fans, with tuners practicing their art on the new version. Classic fans “respect” the new Beetle as a modern tribute to the classic, but they don’t like comparisons between the two vehicles. Speaking on that subject, classic Beetle fans have very little good to say about the new model — in most cases, nothing that can be printed here.
