SE Hawaii Background and History

[eight08customs]

Ok guys just thought i'd share this with the rest of the SE members here thats been posted in our local forums.
http://sehawaii.informe.com/viewtopic.php?p=33525#33525

Here is some background history of myself and how and why Scion Evolution was started in Hawaii.

I have been building anything with wheels ever since I could get my hands on it. From RC Cars, mopeds, motorcycles and cars of every style and type you can imagine.

I have built a lot of Hawaii's wildest rides, with international features in mags. I once ran the most winningest car clubs in Hawaii and held a VP position in the club.

Before I bought my Scion, I had stepped away from my hobby for 9 years. Hoping and telling myself I’m never going to get so deeply into it like before. With a bad experience I departed from my old club and it faded away after I left. Founding members were not willing to let new leadership or members run with their ideas. I told myself never again to be a part of any club.

But I proved myself wrong and started running a car club and building show cars once again.

Scion Evolution Hawaii was started thanks to the Web and Scion Life. We only knew each other by Screen Names. I saw Kory around here and there but never really knew him.

One day while searching for parts for my car, I came across a site called NishDesigns.com and I made a phone call to Gary Nish. From there, he told me about Scion Evolution and told me check out the site. And I also found out his mom lives on Kauai and he even knew some of my old friends here in Hawaii through the car club world. So he told me all about SE and I liked what I heard, especially about the mission of the club and how the club is structured. No officers (Pres, VP, and what not) because I don't believe in that due to my past car club experiences.

So before I even met these guys, I joined through the web without asking or caring where my 40 bucks went. I just wanted to be a part of SE becuase it was a national club. And this was much cheaper, since in my old club, it was 40 bucks a month for dues. I decided to fly to California to check it out and see what it's like. The first day I get there, Gary and Nilo are looking for me and this is 1 am in the morning so they call me and we meet up. When I meet Nilo and Gary, I knew this was the club for Hawaii. These guys all looked local and very cool. They held a meet just for me and I met up with so many owners with crazy xBs and tCs. I was like in heaven and everyone made me feel welcome just like how we do it in Hawaii. So I just watched and saw how they held their meets and followed it in Hawaii. I simply liked the idea that many of the founders had ties to Hawaii and even I went to cchool with..

Also what I saw was the support they had from many vendors and, most of all, Scion Corp. which was a win-win situation for a chapter like Hawaii being out in the middle of the pacific and so far away from all these big companies. In the begining I was having a hard time getting Servco to support SE, the reason we needed to get Servco on board with Hawaii was that Servco is privately owned and had no ties to Scion Corp. in California and Servco was the only dealership that could support the club here in Hawaii. Without Nilo and Adrian talking to Scion corp.,I don’t thin Servco wouldn't have come on board and believed in what SE could do for them. Without Adrian taking me over to Scion Corp to meet the pres of Scion and Steve Hatanaka, and the Vice Pres of Scion Corp they would have never known about the Scion owners in Hawaii. I also wouldn’t have met Troy of Five Axis who played a huge role in getting us that spot at the UH event for Toyota that SE Hawaii as the only ones from the public that was invited.

Also, we got all those free parts from Scion Corp through SE. Hawaii did get its huge share and probably the most out of any chapter. No other Scion club got this treatment. I know many of you are new and never saw all these parts. I would fly back from LA with cases of parts for the Scion cars and all kinds of promo stuffs to give away. All these things helped Hawaii create a kitty of money that we still have today.

At the time, I was still a one-man team, but thanks to SL again, Kory, Co, and Chris De Guzman, Matt and I started talking. I knew Co because we worked together. Chris was from LA and in the Navy with friends in Hawaii. Kory I would see here and there. Well there was one more person that sort of helped get things rolling and I remember her SN as cutebB. She was the one responsible for that bulletin board at the dealership. She held the first meet at the dealership. From there, I finally met Katchkillah. From there I just told the SE story to everyone and explained what SE was about and they all joined. I hung out at the dealership a lot and kept signing members there. I worked it through SL and held more meetings and cruises. All of a sudden, everyone was joining SE because they had the chance to make new friends that all loved the Scion. Our first offical meet was at the airport Starbucks where there was about 15 Scion owners.

Ok forgot about Matt "ObnoxiousXB." He played a huge role before he took the dark side. He designed the first SE Hawaii/eight08customs.com site. He did anything to be a part of this club even though he didn’t have a Drivers License yet, or a car. He took the bus to the meets and I used to drop him off at his home in Ewa. He was at every meet no matter what. He was always online searching for new owners. We can’t forget Matt.

I started this because I knew it would be successful from learning from my old club what worked and what didn’t work. I wanted to bring people together where everyone could make friends and share the Aloha outside of Hawaii. I wanted to show the Nation that we knew how to do it in Hawaii. And most of all, I just wanted a basic car club in which members all have a say. It was never about winning shows or who had the nicest Scion it was about Ohana and comming together and helping the community. We started this chapter with no income. All we had were donations. I wanted to make this car club like no other in Hawaii and wanted to hold huge charity events to help others.

I always believed in not one member ownes the club every member paid there dues and have a stake in the club and chapter and I have always told members at every meeting. It you the member that makes SE and its up the the individual member to decide how sucessful this club becomes I can only provide direction. Everyone has there say. No one shall hold a leadership position for ever, Hawaii was ruled by Kings and Queens but there shall be no Kings and Queens in SE. Positions are put up for vote every year and voted by membership. Everything we do from what we spend money on to events and problems are brought forth to the membership. We do not hide things from members and keep everything out in the open. We are aways open to new ideas and sugestions that can only better the club as a chapter and as a whole.

We in Hawaii have exceeded our goals and showed everyone that we are the best team in Hawaii by providing various community services in which no other team in Hawaii has even coome close to doing ever and winning best team at HIN 2007 and 2008 aginst car clubs in which focused on every type of car and not just one brand and it showed to us that we alway can come together and make great things happen. It was well worth the 40 bucks to join. The cost of a shirt, sticker, shipping, website, INC and Trade Marking the logo.

One big Ohana!!! That’s priceless.

I just wanted to share why and how SE Hawaii was started. I hope this will help members on the history of SE Hawaii.

Aloha
SE Hawaii Leadership team
Marshall Lum