MadaboutKitcars

Hi Paul, Lucky to come across someone who knows the chap, so hopefully we can arrange it and on a nice day! Yes it gets plenty of attention, hence the A4 sheet in the windscreen so I don't lose my voice repeating everything. If nubodi and Tribute dont get extra business from people asking about my car then I will be suprised! I should be on some sort of commission structure.....

The Tribute range of cars, but mostly the SWB's bridge the gap between "classics" and "kit cars". I don't think many people outside of the kit car scene would see the Tribute cars as kit cars. For the most part they simply look too good to be a kit car !

Its known as a "Finders Fee". Ask them to quote your name when they order a kit and Tribute should send you a cheque for £100. I know A Plan insurance offer this deal to existing customers.

Ha ha, great find of that shot from a random! plenty of head turning in that one, and rightly so, as you don't see your car on the road every day. Yep, even though it was a classic day at Sharnbrook there were plenty of modern super cars, 2 brand new lambos got alot of attention and they left when I did so doubt I will get any sort of shot like you did, in fact I can't find many pics of this weekend, ah well

Good luck with that ...lol ...

Not as far fetched as you might think. Most small companies would be happy to spend £100 to generate an order of £4995.

Would be nice. I think these forums must send a fair bit of business for Tribute et al. Difficult to quantify though.

I'm not in it for the money, but if anyone wants to send me used notes in a brown paper envelope, please feel free to do so...

I had bought a Retroforza kit for an MX5 and then I found this forum. I really wanted to build it, the finish was as smooth as glass but watching the 250 sub development got me hooked and I really enjoyed see the progress, false starts and all. The choice of a 2.8 six pot over the weedy 1.8 four pot was the deciding factor.
I needed to sell the retroforza to buy the 250swb which is a shame as I would love to have tried to fit it to the Z3. I really fancy trying some "stickin n gluen" in the Tribute style, probably would have ended in tears.
The development threads do get you hooked.

I'm sure you're right and Chris and Dan claim to be busy the whole time. I don't know how many kits they can supply in a month but it must be several.
Perhaps they don't want or need more orders for the time being. There must be a small trickle of new people who are coming forward to place orders who have just happened to come across Tribute or Nubodi or a customers finished car. The orders are unlikely to be coming from any serious marketing or sales activities. The other orders will be existing people in the kit car scene or in the know. That's fine in itself and maybe Tribute are happy with that arrangement but I think they might be missing a trick , the product has huge potential and the finished cars being built, on the whole, are excellent.

i have found that over the years having a good product at the right price and a certain amount of "word of mouth advertising" is the best and not only that its free !!

I'd known Chris for a few years through conversations at shows regarding the MX250 but placed my order within 3 weeks of seeing the first Z300S at Stoneleigh. That was only dependent on getting a suitable donor.

Tribute run at least 3 adverts all the time on Ebay, unless they take the plunge with some television adverts , there is no better place to advertise.
There are millions of people logging on to Ebay every hour and generally have a pretty good idea of what they are after.
I sell Cafe racer parts for motorcycles, it's a pretty small market as I only make the parts for a couple of models, however apart from selling to the UK, EU,US Oz and the countries you would expect I have also sold to South Korea, Japan, Brazil and Iceland. You can only get this type of coverage by listing on Ebay. I know you get a lot of idiots on Ebay but honestly no more than you get dealing with the general public.
With the tribute adverts he gives the name to find the website and a link to this forum. You do need to keep the adverts fresh, it is very easy to place them and forget them, every now and again I swap the lead photo on my adverts, always get a lot more enquiries, stopping the adverts for a week also works wonders, people think you are going to stop selling so they should buy it now and not later.
We all know that the product that Chris sells is good, by linking it to this forum he can show prospective purchasers what is involved in a build and almost a free build manual!
The initial sale interest however is created by the Ebay advert not the forum but I'm sure the forum has helped a few sales.
The one thing that lets Tribute down is the website, desperately needs updating, a few before, during and finished pictures would do wonders, I can't think of anyone objecting.

There are always a lot of people trolling Ebay for dreams, I had 2 cars up for sale last year, a Mitsubishi GTO Twin Turbo and a very nice Corsa 1.2 with all the bells and whistles.
Both were listed for 30 days, GTO had over 5k hits on the advert, the Corsa 800. I would image that Chris gets a very high hit rate for his adverts.

I agree the ebay ads do help spread the word and its a free advert for your whole range when its linked to your website. Unlike the Nubodi site, the Tribute site is a pretty poor effort! Reading the Nubodi site you would think the cars are a Nubodi product. I read somewhere, maybe one of the magazines that Nubodi have adopted the Tribute products !
I bet many people outside the kit scene are intrigued when they see finished Tribute cars on the road. How many I wonder, would love to own a car like Eric's or JeffH's but assume it would be too expensive or exclusive for them to even consider? Chances are they won't have seen the Ebay ad or ever been to a kit car show, they simply won't know about it.

I honestly think that would be the best result - they are the only ones continually developing the product and accessories for it. Plus it would mean every known issue learned about since the git go (and let's be honest there are quite a few solutions listed in threads here) could be ironed out and a much straighter/simpler build shell could be splashed as a result.

But in terms of reputation, the damage was done early on for resale, especially via kit car dealers - I know at least one who won't touch them, it will take a long time for that to wear off even though there are now some really stunning cars out there. Look how any finished Tribute struggles on ebay...they have gotten the reputation for being a bit cheap but are actually anything but when done to the high standards of some of the coupes seen on the forum

There have been quite a few really top class builds being completed over the last 12 months. Nubodi are promoting the cars and their builds are always top end as well as a several home builds mentioned on this forum. Its time to shrug off the poor quality image and get the cars out there so that people can see them at their best. It doesn't help when Tribute display unfinished cars for sale on Ebay. That unpainted 250SWB in black doesn't do the current product any justice. Put up a photo of one of the stunning finished cars and they ( Tribute ) might get a better response. Only a few want a rat look car at the end of the day. It might be time to get the molds sorted out so you don't have to hack up the kit to get the doors to open and bonnet to close.

Be careful what you wish for.
The DNA 2fifty was a superbly finished kit with real attention to detail, it was also, rightly so, a lot more expensive. The trouble is that the resale value was so high that they are now not available as kits so unless you have very deep pockets you can't have one.

The 250SWBc, only has 2 problems, the fact the bonnet needs the slice and the fit & function of the door skins.
The bonnet slice I imagine would be an easy fix, it just needs the "slice" done to the inner bonnet mould. The door skin needs a bit more work and a small adjustment to the shape of the back of the bonnet. It also need different door skins for the coupe and convertible due to the sliding window set up on the coupe.
Again not major jobs, the kit is 95% there as it is.
On the positive side, I have had to use very little filler and the front and rear clips fit very well. It is also an easy build and ideal for your first kit.
The trouble is when you are building your own car you know where the little problems are, such as gapping around the bonnet, as soon as I see a finished car my eyes immediately go to the gaps on the bonnet and doors. Small thing that is easily done right but it takes a bit of time to get it right, but if it was that easy everyone would have one and what would be the fun in that. The other point to make, and the point of the forum is' to point out where the problems are to help other builders, there are no posts to say how well certain bits fit or how easy another part of the build is except of course for the final pictures.
I am hoping for my great reveal at the BBQ, if anyone mentions my gaps there's going to be trouble!

So only 2/3rds of the kit then!!

That's being mean!
Both panels only need small modifications. Bear in mind that the rest of the kit can be bolted on in less than a day if you pull your finger out. It took me longer to wire up the lights than it did fitting the front and rear clams.
The rest is paint and prep which is either a lot of work or expensive if you go the lazy route!

Isn't this ALL off topic ? This is supposed to be a build thread for others to read to get the tips.

A more general thread recommending Tribute and Nubodi business models could be somewhere else.

I come here for tips on people's builds and to see how all are doing. The other conversations are less of interest.

I end up on the Zorg site a lot now. Very useful Z3 articles etc and a pretty +ve place - even to people building DNAs and Kobras.

Dave

I agree with Jag the kit kit is 95% there straight out the box the main problems I had were having to split the back of the bonnet to bring in the bottoms and its trailing edge were it lines up with the leading edge of the doors. My metalwork teacher at school always used to say Haste is the enemy of Perfection and if you are prepared to spend a bit more time on your hobby/project you will end up with a very presentable car that you are happy with and able to say I did that. I am lucky that I have always played about with old classics when they were cheap and learned my skills that way plus being lucky enough to have a mate in the trade, of all the classics a have owned I am most proud of my Tribute because I have put most individual effort into it. If you look at the price of DNA and classics you realise what a bargin we have in our Tributes.

That's a bit harsh, the molds need a little work to correct the known errors that have been there since day one. Tribute may well have addressed the issues by now on current kits, is that the case ?
Shame if they haven't, at £3995 and £4995 the panels should really be top quality.

Hi all,

What interesting views!



Heres a nice picture of my car at last weekends show, I'll be at the Chiltern Hills vintage rally this weekend (Sunday) if anyone is interested (1961 to 1970 section).

Imagasdasde1 by eric holm, on Flickr

That car just looks great, perfect.

Whilst that is not too far from me, I hope (weather permitting) to be prepping my car for paint this weekend.

But hopefully our paths will cross at some point, as I'd love to see this car in real life one day.

Cheers, Paul.