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It’s easy to hear overt enthusiasm in Bill Mayer’s voice. He’s owned, restored and sold several of what he calls “works of art” — classic and exotic cars.
After many years of planning, Mayer is now also the co-founder of the website, ThatsANiceCar.com. It reflects his passion for expensive automotive rarities. Andrew Sparrow is also a co-founder and the site’s technology guru.
Launched in January, the website features only high-end exotic cars offered in a unique pricing platform. It’s for buyers and sellers.
Mayer is our guest on episode #180 of The Weekly Driver Podcast.
Co-hosts Bruce Aldrich and James Raia discuss with Mayer the idea for the website and his plans to compete in the online marketplace.
Exotic cars get reactions
“I’m a car guy and I like to talk about cars,” says Mayer. “I’ve been working on this concept for a while. The way I came up the with name is that it’s kind of a common understatement that I hear car guys make.
“Let’s say I’m at a Cars and Coffee event and I’m standing next to a beautiful Ferrari or a Lamborghini. Someone will just nod their head a little bit and say, ‘that’s a nice car.’ That’s the genesis of the name.”
Mayer has been researching and studying exotic cars online for about 15 years. He started when several niche print publications switched to online publishing. He was first interested in classics.
“I had a hard time finding classic cars for a while,” Mayer explains. “There weren’t really any sites devoted to classic cars. You really couldn’t find any sites that were only devoted to classic cars. I remember being frustrated when I looking.”
Mayer’s interests then moved toward exotics and supercars.
“I was starting to see exotic cars much more regularly, Mayer says. “Ten or 15 years ago, you almost never saw a Ferrari, Lamborghini or Aston Martin just driving down the road or parked in a parking lot. But now you do. It started to occur to me that if there was another segment of the used car marketplace that needed to be segmented like the classic car segment had evolved, it’s supercars and exotic cars.”
Thus, the online business began.
Please join us for an engaging conversion on how the site acquires vehicles and the platform for buyers and sellers to negotiate.
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Article Last Updated: May 10, 2021.
- About the Author
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A sports, travel and business journalist for more than 45 years, James has written the new car review column The Weekly Driver since 2004.
In addition to founding this site in 2004, James writes a Sunday automotive column for The San Jose Mercury and East Bay Times in Walnut Creek, Calif., and monthly auto review and wellness columns for Gulfshore Business, a magazine in Southwest Florida.
An author and contributor to many newspapers, magazines and online publications, co-hosted The Weekly Driver Podcast from 2017 to 2024.