I’m Matt Conklin, one of the Directors for the Motor City Chapter of the BMWCCA. I am new to the position and I appreciate being elected a few months ago. In my role as Director, I volunteered to focus my time on marketing and communications for the club. Since I hope to interact with members more, I thought I’d start by introducing myself.
Alright, don’t hold it against me but I’m originally from Ohio. To be specific, Toledo which is basically Michigan (at least that’s what some people tell me). I’m a product of a blue collar, middle-class upbringing. My father and brothers got me interested in cars, but not as a hobby. It was a necessity. When a car broke, it was cheaper to fix it ourselves so that’s what we did. Sure, we had subscriptions to Hot Rod and Car Craft but we could only dream about having cars like that.
After getting my Finance degree, I spent some time in the Army. While a valuable experience, I learned I didn’t like the bureaucracy of a large organization. This led me to pursue a career focused on small and mid-sized companies. I’ve spent some time with manufacturing companies and some with service providers. Luckily, no matter the industry, there’s a need for accounting and finance at any company. I’ve been a business professional nearly 30 years. After working my way up to a Chief Financial Officer role, I decided to start my own business. I enjoy helping small to mid-sized business achieve its goals.
Back to the car stuff … I have no idea how or when, but my taste in cars switched from muscle cars to sports cars. I didn’t learn about autocross until I was almost 30. Several years later, I decided to take the plunge and try road-racing. While it was thrilling, it taught me that I was only an average racer. It took a few years and A LOT of laps on the same track before I finally started winning races. I sold my race car years ago. Now I enjoy participating in autocross, rallycross, and open track days occasionally.
Well, that’s enough about me. I hope in the future to have more articles such as: Meet a Board Member, Spotlight on a Member’s Business, and Car Contemplations (any car or driving themed content from myself or other members). I welcome your input. If you any ideas for content or would provide some content, please email me at webmaster@motorcitybmwcca.org and we’ll talk
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