"I had met the producers of 'Pimp My Ride' and we hit it off," Boeckmann said.  "They called me up and asked if I would be interested in filming the show here but said they needed to start filming within 60 days."

What ensued was a mad scramble to assemble the shop's crew, get equipment installed, and get the facility opened, Boeckmann said.  "Our first customer was MTV and the biggest automotive TV show in the world."

  
Boeckmann, who would become the company's chief designer, said he was already a big fan of the show.  "I would watch the first part of the show, where they described the person and their car, and then I would sketch out my ideas before they came back and showed off their design."

The show provided endless opportunities to experiment but also required a tremendous amount of work, Boeckmann said, noting that for the show's second season at GAS, filming went on seven days a week for nine months.

"I always felt like we were one man or one day away from disaster," Boeckmann said.  "We would be building the car as they were setting up the lighting for the reveal.  It was the most fun and hardest work I've ever done." 

 
After two years of filming, the show is now hiatus.

While the show made Boeckmann, his crew, and the shop world famous -- it is shown in more than 100 countries -- the affect on the business was not as dramatic as one might expect.  "People don't make the connection between what we did on the show and what we can do for their car," he said.

"Since then we have gotten a number of enormous projects to do -- mostly corporate projects but also a few individuals -- but for the other stuff like wheels and stereos, we had to start out and build it from scratch," Boeckmann said.

Well maybe not quite from scratch.  GAS is, after all, a division of Galpin Motors, which includes Galpin Ford, the No. 1 volume Ford dealer in the world for 18 years running, as well as eight other franchises.  Vehicle customization was not exactly a new business for the company, either, Boeckmann admitted.  The company had actually "Galpinized" its first car in 1953, he said--a 1952 Ford with a Lincoln front end and Mercury bumpers, which was featured on the cover of Motor Trend magazine that year.

In fact, Galpin Motors lays claims to many firsts in the automotive accessorizing industry, including the origination of the conversion van industry in the 1960s, Boeckmann said.  Even then, the dealership was known as the place to go for over-the-top customization, he said, pointing to pictures of a van from the late '60s -- Madame Frenchy's -- which included not just swiveling captains chairs and a red velvet bed but a crystal chandelier and a fireplace.

The first sunroof installed in America was done at Galpin when Bert Boeckmann (Beau's father and the owner of Galpin Motors) met Heinz Prechter, a German immigrant who had brought the rights to the European sunroof to America with him.  Prechter owned a local car wash when the two met, Beau Boeckmann said.

Performance was also in the blood at Galpin Motors, Boeckmann said, noting that the dealership won the West Coast NASCAR Championship from 1961-1964 with a young auto enthusiast from its service department, Ron Hornaday, behind the wheel, along with "Steady Eddie" Gray.  Hornaday continued to work at the dealership until his retirement as service manager in 1995.  His son, Ron Hornaday Jr., started his automotive career as a mechanic at the dealership but has gone on to become a popular NASCAR champion with 17 Winston West victories.

Boeckmann said the dealership was also the first Shelby franchise in California and was the exclusive Valley dealer for the Shelby Mustang and Shelby Cobra.

While a new business, GAS is therefore a continuation, expansion, and centralization of many things that the dealership had continued to do over the years, Boeckmann said.  Beyond just being an accessory shop, the initial vision was expanded to include automotive related books, jewelry, clothes, and much more, as well as a sky-is-the-limit customization shop, he said. 

 
The 7,650-square-foot retail showroom is organized into some general sections that include aftermarket performance parts, custom paint displays, custom interior options, and in-car audio and video, as well as brand-specific displays for most major brands, including many that Galpin does not have new-car franchises for.  The store also has a display area for exotics, including Bentley, Ferrari, Lamborghini, Porsche, and Aston Martin. 

 
While the "Pimp My Ride" exposure means that the shop typically has two to five large projects in the works -- meaning jobs in the $50,000 to $125,000 range -- Boeckmann said the shop's largest sales category is custom wheels, as evidenced by more than 200 options that are on display on the "wheel wall" that runs from floor to ceiling through the center of the store.  The second-largest sales area is audio and video gear, he said, followed by performance parts.

The parts and services offered by GAS tie in directly with the company's nine new-car franchises through an internal salesman, who works with the sales managers at each store to determine a selection of Galpinized vehicles to have on display.  The setups range from a custom set of wheels for a Ford Focus to a carbon fiber kit for an Aston Martin to a tailgate package for an F-150 that includes four flat-screen TVs mounted above the bedsides, a satellite dish that raises out of the bed, a beer cooler and keg tap, and a swing-out barbecue grille.

While Boeckmann estimated that three to five vehicles worked on by the shop appear in magazines each month, it can still be a challenge to turn that into new sales for the business, he said.  "These publications are national, and we're a local business," he said.  "We only get a benefit from how it is viewed in the local market."

Of the more than 4,000 cars at the Galpin dealership's at any time, at least several hundred are accessorized to some degree, Boeckmann said.  On some makes, such as the Ford Mustang, as many as 20 percent may be sold with some add-on parts or accessories.  Most of the vehicles will have less than $2,000 in upgrades, Boeckmann said but the larger jobs mean that the average upgrade sale is probably between $2,500 and $3,500.

"There are a lot of deals that we've saved because somebody didn't like something about a car and we were able to change it," he said. 

Boeckmann added that profit from accessories is important because the average profit on a new-car sale is relatively small.  "We may not make much on the car, but we can make money on the wheels."

Viewed another way, Boeckmann pointed to a custom Bentley grille on display in the store.  "I have more markup in that grille than in any Ford that we sell."

Beyond just making a profit, though, the magic of GAS and the Galpinized vehicles on display at the various showrooms are their ability to get the customer excited about buying a car and making it their own.  "It's a more enthusiastic customer who is more likely to come back and to tell their friends about their experience."

The broad range of accessories and performance parts that customers may desire is both an opportunity and a hazard, Boeckmann said, as it requires a learning curve each time you do something new.  "The fun and frustrating thing about this business is that there are so many opportunities," he said.

After a little more than two years, Boeckmann said he is now focusing on how to continue offering the wide range of products and services that GAS has become known for while also improving its efficiency.  Much of that is happening on its own as his salespeople and staff gain experience, he said.

"Installing that first supercharger takes a long time," he said.  "The next time you do it is faster.  It's all about getting the right people who know how to do the work."