Vintage Corvette giveaway to a lifelong Meineke customer
A 40-year-long Meineke customer wins a vintage car with a special connection to his family
John Coppin is a vintage car guy. It comes to him naturally.
John’s father, John Sr., was the proud owner of a beautiful, blue and white 1971 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray with racing-style knock-off wheels. John long admired the car, but, more importantly, remembers how the car became a special way for father and son to connect. He always believed that, at the right time, his father would pass down the classic car to him.
There was just one problem: John Sr. had his eyes on another car, a 1959 black and red Corvette convertible that he had once owned and sold decades ago. It was the elder John’s first Corvette. He wanted badly to get it back—but to do that, he needed to raise some money.
“I was with him recently, and I asked about the ‘71 Corvette, and he didn’t really answer my question,” John recalls.
John’s mother, Carolynn, turned to John Sr. and said, “You haven’t told him yet, have you?”
“I later came to find out that my dad sold the Corvette to a museum in Orlando,” John says.
He was heartbroken. Yet, as a car lover himself, he understood. If he was attached to the ‘71 Vette, he knew that his dad’s love for his original 1959 model was at least as powerful. Though disappointed, John also discovered in the experience an important lesson that sometimes things just don’t work out like we hope. Fast forward to the summer of 2022. John, a Meineke customer of 40 years, walked into his local Meineke in Colorado Springs, Colorado for a regular service visit, and was greeted with an unexpected surprise. It happened to be Meineke’s 50th Anniversary, and as part of the celebration the company planned to give away a classic Corvette—a 1972 Stingray.
John entered the drawing on the spot. Though the odds weren’t in his favor, he had a certain feeling. “I hardly ever win anything,” he says. “I figured perhaps karma will come around.”
Weeks later, John had a pile of voicemails that he decided to check—something he says he rarely does. He found a message from Chris Steahle, Vice President of Marketing at Meineke. Chris had been trying to get in touch with John for over a month.
In the voicemail, Chris asked John to call him back right away. John, belatedly, did.
“I told Chris that I had just received some bad medical news,” John says. Days prior, John had suffered a mini-stroke. He temporarily lost 60 percent of his vision in his left eye. The medical event left John and his family with serious questions and concerns, and he told Chris that the only reason he’d decided to check his voicemail was because he’d been expecting a follow up call from his physician.
“Chris said, ‘Well, I’ve been trying to get in touch because I have some good news for you—you won a vintage 1972 Corvette from Meineke.’ ”
To make it even more special, the prize Corvette is white and blue, the same colors as the one John’s father maintained so well for so many years. In a mild karmic twist, John’s ‘72 is white with a blue interior—his father’s ‘71 was blue with white inside.
When he told his father the news, John says, “I could hear the excitement in his voice, as if he had won the Corvette himself. It’s so nice to be able to talk Corvettes with my dad again.”
And that’s a bond John will be able to maintain with his own son, Colin. John has told Colin, 19, that one day, he’ll call his father’s Corvette his own. “This Corvette stays in the family.”
Meineke presented John with his prize Corvette at New Summit Charter School in Colorado Springs, where John works as the school’s Safety and Security Director as well as Dean of School. There, Meineke also presented the school with a $5,000 donation to support New Summit’s safety programs.
“There’s something sentimental about these classic cars,” John says. “I’m grateful to Meineke. They filled a void in my life. They have been huge in making a lifelong dream of mine come true.”