WTR knows a great way to rebel against the what’s expected with a regular 9-5 job, is to become your own boss. Enter, the entrepreneur. Tony Salloum, President and founder of VAC Motorsports in Philadelphia, has done just that for 35 years. Follow Tony’s story as he talks about his passions and gives his blueprint for success.Tony Salloum[email protected]VAC Motorsports1-(215) 462-46662501 Snyder Ave. Philadelphia, PA 19145VAC FacebookVAC Instagram Read Full Transcript Transcript[[Today I'm joined by a guest, Tony. Hi Tony. How are you? Good, Good. How are you Kev? Doing wonderful, having, having youyou. Wonderful having you too. Wonderful being with you, on this podcast.Fantastic Tony, we love having you here, it's good times. This is not commonplace I would I would believe for my industry.At least not in the wealth building industry. Perhaps not, butTony is an entrepreneur, and the wealth building industry, well, entrepreneurs love to build wealth. I think that's a rather fitting tale.a lot of people start their lives with a job and a career, and they think that's the path they're going to go down. They might find out later that they want something more out of life.They want to make their own job, career, path; become an entrepreneur, have their own business,Tony is with VAC Motorsports. The founder of that. VAC has been around for 35 years this year. He's done quite well with that.[It's true you know from when I was a little kid, my dad had a repair shop and he would take me to the repair shop at the age of eight really I started going. Started tinkering with cars.[everything used to be repaired not like today's industry where you know it's just a lot of parts swapping so,engines used to be rebuilt alternators used to be rebuilt,shortly after my dad hurt his back and then decided that they didn't want to be in the automotive industry and then he had a thing for you know the kitchen as well so Middle Eastern cuisine called saloons Middle Eastern cuisine.[I did continue to work on cars because cars were my passion even at the age of 13 14 I would crawl under the cars on the streets of South Philadelphia,Oldsmobiles in Fords and Chevys and so forth and you know they used to have a lot of well pump failures back in the dayit was commonplace for me to drop in oil pan on one of those big American beats in the Streets 2 pump replacement,distributor repairs and so forth so that's kind of you know how far back it goes,interesting story that will lead the way into the BMW Marketplace for me,when I was in 6th grade I went to school called Masterman, Julia R Masterman, which is actually probably the number one rated School currently in the city of Philadelphia.[And typesetting, for those that don't know, it's actually when you know magazines and newspapers were printed you just have to do typesetting used to take the,the different fonts and have to set them you know as mechanical characters basically the whole magazine,add or whatever was done that way in the printing presses were so it was something that we learn so in that class,the teacher the time says I want you guys to look through these magazines and find out and let me know what magazine captures,your attention and when I started flipping through the pages I found the most attractive act to me.[Their ad was the ultimate driving machine.[[What kind of got me into the mark.Then my uncle's overseas had BMW service shops and I learn how to drive on a BMW 2002 I was 13.On the other side visiting my uncle.They would let me drive in the foothills of taught me how to drive a manual in the mountains so it was all BMW and then you know that's really when the bug was planted.Couple other uncles had the old BMW 3.0 and 2500 slightly smaller than 2.5.Here in the states, some of those were brought in his 3.0's, or, you know, Bavaria is another name that it was givento those chassis. But yeah, that's, that's how far back that BMW bug goes nuts in it that's the evolution that's basically what you started it also in high school I went to Central High School.Which also put out a lot of successful people, here in the city of Philidelphia.[That has come out of the school start up a long history for me,so you know when I would drive up back then it was a muscle car era, and I had a 69 Olds 442 convertible that I would drive up the central,and some story stuff to share.All boys school that time okay girls girls I was right across the street from us anyway,yeah I managed to stick with the although we had the restaurant I was working and putting in restaurant hours I managed to to stay in the automotive field and.When I graduated Central I went to Temple could have gone anywhere I chose Temple so well.But my dad you know during during the years one one thing that my dad,really pushed us to do is to always be alright.[[The hundreds not enough hundreds not enough so we continued the education.When I was in Temple I started to work that was probably the only time I was employed for someone else.I worked for a a little repair shop called Tom's Auto Repair and I was super nice guys shop still there in South Philadelphia.General service for him law was a friend of mine at the time really knock out a lot of work and I did that for about three months and then.Just words of wisdom that my dad used to shed shed upon us that,I always want you to Be Your Own Boss so that never left me shortly after you know I was when I was in Temple when I started I took business classes but I also wanted to do engineering.Did engineering business administration.Did that for a couple years but during that same. I had to run to have my own business so bought a place that time from an old man.[Friend of mine works for Lu Verne was about to retire to sell the business so we thought this could be an opportunity,I asked Dad to borrow some money for me the business eventually but back then it was not a not a property just a business.[For 1984 and the interesting part is that,promise to stay with us and Cochin train me because a body man I was not was actually mccant,so that was good but Loose on the paperwork got his money next day never.[learn really really fast my dad lent a hand.[you're learning business but you're also have to learn how to repair people's cars properly from a mechanical standpoint it was not a problem from the body and paint side.Started learning that stuff and within six months Tommy said to me.Tell you I'm really impressed I never imagined that in six months you would learn so much that you would surpass me and be better at this in this industry that I was,The Laughing that's again,used to be driven you want to be successful you have to be driven right I guess I guess that's the thought process of any entrepreneur now for me never really looked at it from the money side o is.[I'm not that was kind of always my Pro so that's the early days now.It started to have to push it forward so I was using my engineering Knowledge from Temple and my business administration skills for bookkeeper,I'm making sure that I stayed on track with the business making sure that when money rolled in.You don't just start spending it frivolously because it's it's easy to reach into your pockets when it when it's when they're full and spend that when you really need it yet and so,that's that's where the discipline had to come so I always believe in putting back in the business.There are many business owners regardless of the business type they start.Turn it really business-minded people but they know they're either good craftsman, or whatever it is that they do, they start to make money and they just miss manage their money. So ultimately.[the proper frame machine to learn frame straightening class get certified with that because we bought a frame Basketball Kansas jacket,that was the first four and then I took my painting classes and got certifications painting and so forth reinvested,instead of being like the other shops were when I needed a pint of paint I would have to call the local business to local inspired by I had the mixing system in my shop so I would mix it as I needed it,Dennis always thinking ahead always investing so whatever business you don't have to have for an entrepreneur you always have to try to think ahead.[instruct my instructor teach people that you look ahead and you join you driving you don't drive it all look at the corner you look ahead of the corner and and I believe that business is the same way I think that's the general principle.[if your business is really starting to take off you really have to look even further ahead so I think,I've done a reasonably good job growing the business when we started it was a basically one man show. Two people,2000 square foot body shop where now occupying over 18 thousand square feet 5000 square feet of that is machine shop that includes engine building equipment but you know as,some people know,C&C publisher manufacturing we have the internet bass ale that's a good portion of our business end and then the earlier years I'd focused,the international side of it because I realized that I'm business you're going to sell the same product that everybody else has,you're off to return on investments going to be minimal so I focused on keep products that we created it on solutions for these automobiles,and we constantly look to create solutions and.[so that's really been you know the approach from then to now other than a lot more square footage into you know we were up to about 30 employees at one point which is a handful to manage,so I did have to dial it back and fortunately for, not because we were necessarily doing bad, but because I[the investment was huge but the return was not any better. And that wasn't enjoyable for me.[[in our our industry, probably many Industries, they're cyclical. So, you start to have that.That slope that steep slope and there's a lot of growth and all the sudden you know that market trends change and people's desires change or whatever you know.Stuff beyond our control and then you start to see that is trending down again a little bit.You going to have to hit the reset and then start focusing and redirecting.[I think if you have a good stretch you have eight years I think five to eight years probably and I'm not might be a normal never I've never researched it but maybe somebody out there that does it for a living light so you know your your spot yours is a good cycle.And so you know I feel that were probably going through our.Not force reset at this point and we feel that in Ivy and another year to as the economy turns continues to turn.And try to take this business to yet another level I think then we should be trying to go cruise control for another 5 years,analysis on business.[you been erasing wreck yourself so why did you get into the racing and how is that influence your business.Well the the racing was always a passion you know driving fast you know car control and all that that seems.Innate behavior for me make skill.[driving classes with driving schools are as they call Auntie he's driving in Mass with BMW Club of Porsche Club and the first time,I want was the song and I remember it like it was yesterday.[[[We did well we used to have fun in Salt Lake.My card that song I would drive it felt like I was on my door handles I was there was only so much that corner so when I went to this my instructor.Was not very impressed and I kind of remember the conversation with him at the end he said.You know you may have some skill but if you don't see you don't learn to listen you're not going to learn.So it wasn't a very good review from that particular instructor. That must be your, driven-ness. Yah. Yah. You know you want to drive so hard that you're not drivingproper. You know, using proper technique. So it didn't take me long to fix that and.Probably in under season of DE'sthe Porsche Club sign me off as an instructor and a couple of the instructors that have instructors with Porsche Club at that time, for probably.every bit of 30 Years, that had a lot of experience, said what are you doing on on that side you know you can easily be an instructor.[in 1996. At that time I was I was also building my own tube frame car.BMW, as one would have it, you know. A 320i, old body, and that was for SCCA.[we had to start of the back of the pack but luckily we had a decent race and ended up finishing mid-pac. but that was the national championship. After that we ah, we went pro racing. We built a 1999BMW 325 right off of the showroom floor. Wow. Went up to ah, I think that was purchased in Rochester New York.Sent a tow truck up, he brought it back down. It was a non-sunroof car. Drove it around the block once. Parked it.And under 60 days it was on the race track racing it was the first E46 BMW in racing anywhere on the planet actually. Nice. Straight into the scalpel. Yah. Yah. Right to the surgery room. And that's and that's basically,were the Deep, call it the Deep racing roots. But before that I was actually, I built a rally car,VW rally car for ah, Lebanon.[[[Yah, you can look back into the early nineties for the racing Heritage you know, at VAC. So the VAC name,If you're curious, like I said it started as far as Vernas Auto Body cuz I bought it from Lu Verno. And then a couple years later when I,built enough show winners and that kinda, I get bored. Right. I'm always looking for a challenge that't probably most entrepreneurs are...