When I started OutMotoring.com in the fall of 2002 I never thought it would be much more than a way get upgrades for MINI while enjoying some tax benefits and maybe bring in a few bucks a month to cover a few bills. Well, as you may have guessed, I was way off. The hobby has truly grown into a ‘real’ business, with real expenses, a real warehouse, a list of equipment too long to think about and a lot of happy customers. And this month was one of those months that I was extremely busy all month, and it turned out the be the biggest month of sales to date.

People! I am not a real ‘business’ person, I used to design products for a living! I don’t have a MBA or any of experience that justifies being a part of anything this successful, although I do BS with the best of them. A new friend and customer came in the other day and as we talked about my business he said “the market put me in business”, which is completely 100% true. And it is the market that keeps me in business so I will continue to enjoy it. Thank you everyone.

On any given day it’s just me running the company although my wife comes in with our 3 year old a couple hours each week to help keep me straight and to make me stop for lunch. I am notorious for working through the day without eating breakfast or lunch and come home all emaciated looking most days. I think I lost 6 pounds this month. Next month I promise to stop and eat lunch at least 3 times a week. I promise.

I finally got a chance to add the Borla exhaust systems for the R56 2007 MINI Cooper S Turbocharged cars. I have had Borla systems on my 2003 MINI and really loved it and will most likely put one on my new 2007 MINI soon. As you may know Borla makes great products and they have this insane 1 million mile warranty! All stainless steel construction and meaty looking tips make for a nice look. They have two version available as they did with the gen 1 MINI, dubbed the “touring” and the “aggressive“. They also call the aggressive system the “S” which is just too confusing so I will leave it the way it is. If you’re on the fence about which exhaust system to get, this is a good option and you will not be making a mistake if you bought one.

After about 4 years of wanting to update the sites how to files for MINI Cooper products and emailing many hundreds of PDF’s around the world as customers requested installation guides I finally got a moment to get the site completely updated with every how to for the MINI Cooper that I have collected over the last few years. The list is pretty long and we may have one of the most comprehensive collection of official and non official MINI Cooper DIY guides on the planet. Check them out here.

I have noticed that a lot of MINIs are missing their ashtrays that nest into the cupholders in the front under the toggles and so I decided to start selling them. Wow, what a great idea? A stroke of genius? Highly unlikely. They are just great little places to store change, small stuff and such.

I always wanted to have 2 of  these little coinholders in my MINI but never got around to ordering them until now. I thought at some point there was a ’smokers package’ which came with the ashtray and the cig lighter but can’t recall exactly. I do know that my MINI did NOT come with a cig lighter but it did come with the ashtray which was generally stuffed with coins, paperclips, my daughters hairclips and all manner of auto ’stuff’. So, for what it’s worth, if you want one in silver or anthracite (or black for the generation 2 R56 MINI), we now have them at
OutMotoring.com.

We’ve always had a “driver gear” section buried way deep into the site navigation which was accessed via the model/year selection nav on the left but I decided to bring all of that content up to the main navigation level so it was easier to get to. With the addition of nearly 45 new items into the subcategories under “driver gear” it became clear that it was worth giving it more recognition. So, there you have it. You can now get to your favorite MINI Cooper Shirts, Racing Helmets, MINI Cooper Hats, Piloti Driving Shoes, MINI Cooper Watches and all of the other fun stuff with less clicks. Your mouse will be greatful.

After owning a few pairs of Piloti Driving shoes for a few years I realized that our customers would most likely enjoy them as much as I have and do. Piloti shoes are the ultimate choice for those looking for a casual daily wear shoe that not only have the technical features needed to be a great shoes for use when Autocrossing or doing road races yet are VERY comfortable as a day to day shoe. I wear them for 10-14 hours straight at the office on concrete floors and they have always been very easy on my feet. I currently have about 5 pairs of Piloti Shoes to match my mood. A few people have recently emailed asking if these shoes are only for driving and my answer is that while they were designed to be a great driving shoe and have features that make the ideal for driving and racing they are actually some of the most comfortable shoes I have ever owned and I wear mine frequently. They are very supportive, are easy to put on and take off and look cool. I say ditch your Nikes and get some of these pups.

Of course, in most of the color patterns that they offer they are a quite different from most ‘normal’ shoes. Keep in mind that MINI Cooper owners tend to be anything but normal or mainstream. My guess is that most will find it fun to pick a Piloti shoe that matches their MINI Cooper. I got a pair of the Prototipos in Black and yellow to go with my Yellow MINI Coooper S and love em’. They also have some pretty clean and simple looking shoes for those that want something more mainstream. Check out the Black and White Prototipos or the Sebring in Black and Tifosi Red. The G16 in the Olive and gum is also a pretty slick looking casual shoe.

Check them out on our site here:

If you need new wheels for your MINI Cooper, look no further than the Team Dynamics Pro Race 1.2 and 2. They are among the most popular wheels for the MINI Cooper and offer a light weight yet incredibly strong and well engineered. They have proven to be one of the best values on the market and will clear nearly every big brake kit I know. I have owned them and used them on my personal cars for the last 5 years and have yet to bend one even with the nasty Ohio roads. I currently have some 17″ Pro Race 1.2’s on my 2007 MINI Cooper S as well as a set of 15″ Pro Race 1.2’s in Anthracite on my Miata.

While the Pro Race 1 has been the standard for some time, it is sadly near extinction as we know it. The Pro Race 1.2 by Team Dynamics is set to be the permanent replacement when Team Dynamics shifts the Pro Race 1 into a ‘race wheel’ with race wheel prices.

Check them out here:

I’ve known this for some time but everyday it becomes more and more clear. I need to hire someone to do the shipping, receiving, trash-taking-outing, sweeping, organizing, labeling, packaging so I can do more marketing, designing, thinking, customer servicing, emailing, blogging, developing, fixing network issues, adding products, photographing.

I keep holding back because I am getting ready to relocate my family and the business to Charlotte North Carolina  and don’t want to train someone only to leave as soon as my house sells. So, I am stuck here in this limbo of being overworked and not getting to the things that I really need to get done, like finally getting a chance to design some new stuff. I decided a few months ago that I wanted to release a new product every 4 months and to do that I will need to free up some time, at least 6 hours a week to focus on whatever it is I want to develop.

I hope that when we move I can get someone full or part time that has their head on straight so I can do the stuff I would prefer to do. I like answering phones and emails but packing boxes and running UPS labels…..not so much.

I was thinking today that we have lot of international customers at Out Motoring. Out of the 10 or so phone calls today 3 were from outside the USA. One from Australia, one from Puerto Rico and one from the UK. Pretty cool huh? The funny thing is that each country truly does have their own dialect and speech patterns. It’s fun to talk to people from Australia that often end conversations with “cheers mate”. Quite likable people in my opinion. In fact I don’t recall having a negative conversation from any of our international customers as they are often very happy to find someone who will take the time to actually help them get stuff for their MINI. I’m always happy to help.

By far the most asked question is how to get USPS shipping rates. Our site software was developed with some secret relationship with UPS and for some reason by default it only shows UPS rates and the only way to get USPS rates is to use the drop down menu at the second page of checkout to select “other carriers” which will then allow USPS rates to show up….sounds like the developer of the X-cart shopping software may be getting some sort of kickback or something for doing this kind of crap. Of course there’s no way around it unless maybe we have a some custom code made to work around it??