Alas, Cuba’s famed creampuff vintage cars may not be all they’re cracked up to be. So many of these classic pre-1960 “Yank Tanks” from Detroit have been extensively altered via foreign-built diesel engines and other non-Concours components, with powertrains, interiors and finishes battered, bruised and abused through many years of daily driving – resulting in drastically reduced values as pristine collector’s delights.
However, assuming that Cuba’s laws banning vehicle exports are eventually relaxed to allow some them off the island, a selection of Cuban cars could be deployed as museum exhibits and traveling car show and county fair displays of Cold War ingenuity, offering a snapshot in time to portray the amazing engineering ability of Cuba’s shade-tree mechanics to keep these beasts running.
“You’d take a ’51 Ford and put it next to a dinosaur. It’s a cultural relic,” says Rick Shnitzler, lead organizer of the Philadelphia-based TailLight Diplomacy advisory working group, which has long advocated car-culture exchanges between the two nations.
Diplomatic inroads initiated by President Barack Obama and Raúl Castro are again heightening awareness of Cuba’s unique car population, accelerated by omnipresent b-roll television footage of vintage vehicles to illustrate the coverage.
“All of the mainstream TV networks and print media are using clips of Detroit’s cars on the streets as a picture of Cuba,” Shnitzler points out. “You have this firestorm developing,” and the excitement is even illuminating the silver screen: In April the Havana Motor Club movie, which tells the story of underground hot-rodders trying to conduct an officially sanctioned drag race shortly after the 1959 revolution, drew rave reviews with its world premiere at New York City’s prestigious Tribeca Film Festival. A Cuban delegation associated with the flick took a side-trip tour of Philly to view auto collections and take in the city’s historic sites.
“It’s an interim period. A lot of it just waiting to see what will happen,” says Shnitzler, who foresees opportunity ahead for American automakers and aftermarket businesses. Restrictions related to visitations and the embargo will have to be resolved before commerce can commence.
To speed things along in the meantime, TailLight Diplomacy is urging Ford, General Motors and Chrysler – along with aftermarket vendors – to start publicizing their new product lines and restoration parts through exchange programs designed to connect Cubans and Americans. The proposal has already been pitched to Cuba’s official representative in the U.S., who works out of Switzerland’s embassy pending full diplomatic recognition.
The ideas include bringing Cuban classics to the U.S. for admiration and analysis at museums and technical centers in exchange for new vehicles being donated to the contributing family. “The amount of brand enhancement from just a few new cars would be huge,” Shnitzler contends.
“Tap into that brand awareness that already exists,” he says. “That would be a huge chip to generate interest in American cars.”
Spark plug manufacturers, for example, and other aftermarket enterprises can introduce their wares to leverage Cuba’s longtime attraction to well-built and snazzy American nameplates. “They can re-invent the innards of these cars,” says Shnitzler, suggesting that perhaps the United Nations can organize a special conference to implement the processes. “It’s a very broad proposal, and much more needs to be done. It requires some creative thinking.”
Creativity has long been standard operating procedure among Cuba’s home-grown mechanics, such as using shampoo in place of unavailable brake fluid. What Cuban motorists need most, according to Shnitzler and others with knowledge of Cuba’s car parc, is an influx of replacement parts, chemicals and other maintenance products. “If you showed up at the airport with an alternator for a ’54 Chevy it wouldn’t make it out of there because everyone would want it,” Shnitzler says. The prospects, though, still remain dependent on Congress repealing the trade embargo and continued easing of tensions.
A stop along the way
“It can only be positive for aftermarket suppliers,” says Bailey Overman, senior analyst at the Automotive Aftermarket Suppliers Association (AASA) and its Overseas Automotive Council (OAC).
Yet given the politics involved and Cuba’s stressed infrastructural issues it could take up to a decade before the Cuban marketplace is truly open for business, according to Overman. “I think there will be a 10-year gap before there will be significant progress.”
She compares the anticipated pace of market development to emerging economies such as India and China. “You can look at a lot of nations like that.” Setting up distribution networks within existing maritime lanes is not likely to be too difficult once the appropriate permissions are obtained. “I imagine it will be a market similar to Panama,” Overman says. “It’s a stop along the way if they’re shipping to other countries.”
Cuba is certain to be a key topic of conversation at the June 18-20 Latin Auto Parts Expo being held at Panama City’s Atlapa Convention Center. “It will be something that everyone will be talking about,” says Robert Tanon, general manager at Pembroke Pines, Fla.-based Rapid Auto Parts. The company has been busy establishing distribution centers throughout the Caribbean region, including DCs in Colombia, the Dominican Republic and Honduras.
“Once the market is open in Cuba we’d love to go there,” he says, indicating that the perceived 10-year wait for a window of opportunity could be an overly pessimistic forecast. “That’s a difficult one,” adds Tanon, citing the challenges presented by the current uncertainty.
“We’ll have to go there physically to see what they have” regarding the automotive population. “We’re not sure what brands they have there,” Tanon explains. “They don’t have too many new ones, but a lot of old ones.”
Although Rapid Auto Parts doesn’t focus on vintage classic car components, once an inspection is completed, “The parts that people use every day we can supply; we might specialize in what they can’t get.”
Cuba’s low wage structure, averaging $20 a month – in pesos – is equally undaunting, according to Tanon, noting that other nations being served in the region are not exactly awash in disposable incomes. “We buy directly from manufacturers,” he says. “We can get very economical parts from good brands. We have good pricing, so that is something we can do easily.”
Everything on the table
Panama’s Atlapa Convention Center, host of the Latin Auto Parts Expo, was coincidently the site of the recent Summit of the Americas conference. Obama and Castro both made conciliatory comments during the first face-to-face meeting between the two governments’ top leaders since 1956 – back when pre-revolutionary Cuba was still a vacation playground destination complete with crowded casinos, lively nightclubs, grand hotels and wide income disparities.
Human rights, infrastructural investments, tourism and monetary policies are among numerous post-revolution points of contention. “I think that everything can be on the table,” said Castro at the Summit. “No one should entertain illusions. It is true that we have many differences. Some things we will agree on; others we will disagree.”
“I think that after 50 years of policy that had not changed on the part of the United States, it was my belief that it was time to try something new, that it was important for us to engage more directly with the Cuban government and the Cuban people,” said Obama. “And as a consequence, I think we are now in a position to move on a path towards the future, and leave behind some of the circumstances of the past that have made it so difficult, I think, for our countries to communicate. But I think what we have both concluded is that we can disagree with the spirit of respect and civility, and that over time it is possible for us to turn the page and develop a new relationship in our two countries.”
The overtures are “good news for the U.S. economy,” says Rep. John Conyers Jr. of Michigan. “Cuba sits just 90 miles off our coast and has an economy of more than $68 billion. Yet, up to this point, American firms have been forced to cede business to foreign competitors. Of particular interest to my hometown of Detroit, the people of Cuba – who must famously rely on American cars made before 1959 – may soon be able to buy American cars and automotive parts once again.”
“We’re not there yet,” observes Mavis Anderson, senior associate with the Latin America Working Group, headquartered in Washington, D.C. “You can’t go there legally for tourism.” In 2014 Cuba attracted 3 million overseas visitors, mostly from outside of the U.S. “They run out of hotel rooms. They definitely need to build new hotels” before the welcome mat is fully extended.
And media commentators express doubts that Capitol Hill’s leadership will grant Obama anything resembling “a foreign policy triumph” by ending the embargo during his term.
Cutting deals
Seemingly taking a cue from domestic aftermarket businesses that study adjoining retail development prior to entering a new neighborhood, a television pundit recently suggested that erecting a Home Depot will signal Cuba’s readiness for investment.
“Oh, please no,” Anderson replies with a sigh when told of the remarks. “I don’t see that happening for a long time. Cuba will guard against big business and big box stores.”
She does say, “When Cubans have a few more resources they’re going to want to purchase cars.” Sales of vehicles taken out of service from rental fleets are being contemplated, but the market is limited. Anderson does not expect the government to allow its classic cars off the island. “I just don’t see that happening – it’s a national heritage for them.”
“The cultural norms with the cars in Cuba are unlike anywhere else in the world, and the evidence is on the streets,” says Shnitzler. “Just because your business model works in Poland or the Philippines, it does not mean it will work in Cuba. It is pinpointed and tested applications.”
Cutting car deals could be tough. “Don’t send over a slick used car salesman, they’d say, ‘Who are you?’ They only sell used cars to people they know. They’re distinct from every nation in the world,” Shnitzler advises.
“Look at the time and energy they have devoted to their cars. They have this tradition of handing them down from grandfather, father and son,” he says. “It will be a long time before there is enough money in individual households for people to buy new cars. You fix your car forever. If you sell it, you sell it to someone you know – not a stranger like we do here.”
Shnitzler suggests that collectors start exploring stateside barns and garages if they’re searching for a collectable creampuff. “That pending glut is huge. Gray-haired white guys make up most of the vintage collectors, and they’re done restoring; who’s going to buy their cars?” he ponders.
“The car club culture hasn’t brought in the kids,” says Shnitzler. “The millennials aren’t collecting ’51 Fords. What’s going to happen to all those cars that we have that are comparable to the ones in Cuba but are in much better condition?”
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