Ladies & Gents... it is with great sorrow that I report that Goodies Speed Shop of San Jose, CA closed it's doors forever this week.
This was one of the oldest speed shops in the country. Goodies opened in 1962 and operated continuously ( changing the name to Speed Merchant in the 1970's and back to Goodies in 1997) for 50+ years.
Goodies was home to many of the folks who shaped our modern hobby including
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Liberman
Author, Tony Huntimer
Kevin Stearns of Pacific Fabrication
Paul Caselas of Park Performance fame
Dave Johnson of Spectre Performance
Countless others over the 50+ year history,
...and me (2000-2005)

A little trivia, Goodies was so old, that the account number with Crower was 009
This was one of the last of the great bay area hot rod shops... and will be missed

 

wow didnt know they are closing
I used to buy my 5gal meth cans there since they were WAYYY cheaper than Road Riders and I didnt get looks because i didnt drive the "right" thing to their shop. they actually were very open and asled a lot questions on the STi when I pulled up.

 

WAIT, WHAT? Seriously?? We were just talking about swinging by yesterday for a bit before I got pulled to something else.

I hope VicHubbard and the rest of the small independent parts houses aren't next. I thought the new location might work for them, someone say this is a Trick-or-Treat hoax b/c if true this sucks.

~One of the guys who is old enough to have gone to the old shop as well as seeing the guys at the dragstrip.

 

wow that's crazy, I used to walk around their shop while getting my lotus serviced at dietchwerks next door.

 

With the drag strip and most of the older crowd that was the Rod Culture moving on it had to happen eventually, I'd just hoped not like this.

People, if you have a domestic, or want to build one, SUPPORT LOCAL.

You hear me say this all the time, here's where it rings true. Sadly in my case I now need to reconsider my game plan for the truck.

You all may think "Oh well, doesn't affect me..." but guess what, it does because your Import Tuner/Dyno shop could be the next thing fazed out.

 

I can say firsthand, anyone who came into Goodies/Speed Merchant was welcome. If people acted like ******, the leash was short... but hey that's how it should be.
We did plenty of import work. Aki from Blacktrax actually worked for Speed Merchant for quite awhile.

 

Nooo. Used to go to meets at speed merchant. Sad to see goodies close.

 

Wow. my dad will be sad... What a shame.

 

That's the case with this industry period. Not just domestic. Import shops have the same issues as the domestic ones... possibly more because there's more attention on aftermarket import parts and those that use them.



Bums me out about Goodies. Legendary.



How bummed are we gonna be when we start hearing things like... GST Motorsports is out of business today. LIC Motorsports shut it's doors today. FW Tuning has been forced to lock it's doors.

How bummed are we going to be when we see this happening because we're not supporting our local shops?

I know it's hard. I save a buck when I can. I just ordered parts from a friend because it saved me a bunch of money and quite frankly... my favorite shops don't carry all the parts I ordered. We all do it. We shop online and we shop in the classifieds section. Etc.

My only request is that if you can do it... do it. You need a tune... get one from a local tuner. You need an engine built... have it built local. You need some head work done... do it local.

I had the heads done on my caddy out in san jose. Old school guy. He's on his way out. Not because he's not good and not because he's not busy... but because he's old. LOL! Hell... when he did my caddy heads he had like 10 sets of evo heads in there. You want to survive... adapt.






Side note... save your local tracks. Pay attention to what's going on around you. Speak up. The hippies come in and buy houses next to tracks and then file noise complaints because it brings down their property values... well guess what ding dong... that's why your house costs $100k less than mine... you chose to live there.

Most of our tracks are in danger of being shut down every month of every year for several reasons.

One of those is bull**** legislature brought about by self centered narrow minded fools.

But there's also finances. Thanks to the way our insurance works in this country it costs tracks a FORTUNE to operate. Toss in maintenance and staffing and it's damned near impossible.

Laguna just lost the biggest motorcycle race in the country. That's huge money. Pay attention there. They might run in to some issues.

By my house is the Ocean Speedway. It's under attack again and up for vote this month. Our tracks are rare and they're all one vote from closure.

Pay attention. Vote when you can. Pay when you can. Donations or just go to the events. Go see a friday night dirt race or go check out 24 hours of lemons or moto gp. Support them.




Sorry we're loosing another great shop like Goodies. Take this as a warning... support your favorite shops and tracks or loose them.

 

Agreed.


Most of the old school shops didn't discriminate. You want to go fast... they'll help you get there.

The dude that did the heads in my caddy is out in san jose too. Way old school dude and when I was there he had more new heads than old heads. Mostly EVO heads.

Mind you the dude is like 75 and he still keeps up on whatever is the newest way to go fast.

Heck... most of our local shops farm out machine work to shops just like tese guys. I love my old hot rod shops and they're all having issues. Custom shops, speed shops, upolstery shops, etc.

 

Man, this makes me sad.

 

People don't realize just how many race tracks there were in the bay area at one point:
Halfmoon Bay and Fremont had world class drag strips
Alviso and San Jose Fairgrounds both had dirt ovals


We've let this heritage be stolen from us.

 

You hit the nail on the head with that one... We've LET that be stolen from us.


Unfortunately it was the 80's that stole most of them and we had nothing to do with it but we certainly haven't helped. I know we tried to get one put in during the street racing boom and got shot down several times.

California used to have TONS of tracks state wide. Pomona had one. Dirt tracks and circle tracks all over. I pretty much grew up at the tracks.

Loosing the watsonville speedway would be a catastrophe to the local community. It's a money maker, a job producer and a positive family activity in an areas with very few of those left.

 

As I walked to work, the emptiness of the shop and all the great muscle cars with crazy blowers and immensely rear slicks, just made me so sad. I'm going to miss the guys always burning rubber and doing crazy things.