Nashville, by most accounts, is one of those stereotypically friendly cities that garner complimentary “livability ratings” in this or that national survey. So it came as a surprise to Richard Tonn when he was greeted here about a decade ago with the curious welcome, “Get outta town!”
Fortunately for Middle Tennessee auto buffs, Tonn interpreted that as an invitation. “Yeah,” he says, “they literally threw me out of their offices when I first proposed an auto show to the dealers around here. One of ’em actually threw my proposal back in my face and told me to get out and not come back.”
For four consecutive new car seasons in the mid-1990s, Tonn stepped up to bat, swung and whiffed as dealer after dealer showed him the door. “I just didn’t get it,” he says. “This should have been a no-brainer.” But local dealers, still smarting from unrequited promises and unpaid bills in connection with a disastrous auto show at Opryland Hotel some 14 years ago, weren’t about to let themselves be fleeced again—particularly by some “newbie” promoter they’d never heard of. Presenting a rock-solid front, area dealers—most of them staunch partisans of the Nashville Franchised Automotive Dealers Association—determined to freeze out Richard Tonn in hopes that he’d simply disappear. Never mind, of course, that auto enthusiasts, to say nothing of mere comparison-shopping, wallet-toting consumers, were getting stiffed in the process.
“I just couldn’t understand it,” admits Tonn, whose other auto show projects in Memphis, Shreveport, La and El Paso, Texas, had provoked no such obstructionism. “And apparently the manufacturers couldn’t either. I was pretty much ready to write Nashville off when some of the automakers actually sought me out for a change and pointed out that Nashville was their biggest auto market in the U.S. that still didn’t have an auto show. If the dealers wouldn’t do it, they would, and—do you know?—we brought back the Nashville Auto Show in 1999. Thanks to automaker support, we’ve been bigger and better every year.” Area dealers, moreover, are back in play now that somebody else has broken the ice. The number of those still refusing to participate are now dwarfed by the cohort of dealers who will be supporting the 30 manufacturers committed to appear next week at the Nashville Convention Center downtown.
By a curious calendrical quirk, the 2003 Nashville International Auto & Truck Show is Tonn’s fourth in five years, even though he hasn’t dropped a stitch since he’s been here. The explanation is this year’s new show dates of Jan. 16 through 19 (instead of prior years’ November bookings) which put Nashville at the top instead of the bottom of the new car season. Indeed, only the hugely important “major” shows in Detroit and Los Angeles predate Nashville for the 2003 model year. The tidings, therefore, bode well for Middle Tennessee autophiles who want to get a comprehensive glimpse of the newest and latest models available for sale.
Not that mid-January doesn’t present its own scheduling challenges, however. To be sure, Nashville is no longer the dumping ground for all the old concept vehicles that were awfully long in the tooth by the time our November shows opened. Instead, with only a few days separating the Detroit/Los Angeles shows from Nashville’s new January date, it’s actually less certain what and how many one-of-a-kind concepts will be available for encore appearances in Middle Tennessee. As of this writing, only the Dodge Power Wagon and Jeep Varsity are confirmed; any others must simply be relegated to possible walk-on status, their fates dependent upon logistics subsequent to unveilings in Michigan or California.
Spanking new production models, on the other hand, will be this year’s auto show forte. These are the cars and trucks we mere mortals can actually drive and buy, and since they’re appearing in Nashville at the beginning of the year, they’re real news, not old hat. Crowd-pleasers will undoubtedly be the cute Volkswagen Beetle Convertible, the sporty Nissan 350Z and Murano, Chevy’s Silverado 1500SS performance pickup, Volvo’s XC90 sport/ute, the Honda Element whatchamacallit and BMW’s Z4 Roadster.
Ford’s dramatically new F-150 pickup is rumored, as are Toyota’s revamped Sienna minivan and the 2004 Buick Ranier. Gracing the Convention Center lobby will be a history-making corral of past and present Chevrolet Corvettes, commemorating the 50th anniversary of America's longest-reigning genuine sports car in 2003. Retro buffs will find an immaculate 1947 Chrysler Town & Country Woody convertible, a 1970 Pontiac GTO Judge convertible and, standing as a poignant elegy for the recently departed, a 1909 Oldsmobile.
For Tonn, the Nashville Auto & Truck Show is meant to be a four-day auto mall where visitors can touch and compare almost everything but where nothing is actually for sale. “Oh, there’ll be plenty of business cards changing hands,” he says.“You can count on that. But since the law prevents any actual sales at the show, this is the perfect place for a little pressure-free browsing.” Truth be told, there’s another, slightly more mischievous twinkle in Tonn’s eye as well. With years of promotional experience in the heavyweight prize-fighting world—10 of those at Caesar’s Palace, in fact—Tonn is only too happy to stir up a little “friendly” competition. “I mean, where else are you going to have a chance to put Ford in the same ring with Chevy, Toyota with Honda, Lexus with Infiniti?” he asks. “People love a showdown; and when you have 30 competitive manufacturers in the same big arena, you can bet that they all want to put their best foot forward.” And maybe sneak in a few jabs too—when nobody’s looking, of course.
