It didn’t take long for his former space to get a new tenant, either. He recently relocated and expanded the business into a 100,000-square-foot space down the street from his first Bridgeport location. Although he said negative stigmas of Bridgeport can sometimes make obtaining new clients difficult, that hasn’t kept his business from growing. “For a small business, a big change like that was tough.”Īmster brought Redline Restorations to Black Rock, starting in a 20,000-square-foot space on Fairfield Avenue that was a former Studebaker dealership in the 1950s. “My rent was going from between $1,500 and $2,000 a month to almost $4,500 a month overnight,” he said. That all requires plenty of space and, depending on where you’re located, that doesn’t come cheap.Īmster left Stamford and was drawn to the Bridgeport in the early 2000s in search of a facility where he could get the most for his money. A number of clients have been with the business since it was founded.Īlong with spaces that align with the needs of the market, many car restorers have put down roots in Bridgeport because it is cost effective.Īuto restoration providers offer an array of services to their clients from brokering sales to storage and restoration of antique rides valued up to a several million dollars. The business focuses on maintaining its clients’ cars and offers restoration, preservation, sales and storage. “One important thing is we need to have level floors, and since our building was used as a machine shop the floors are as level as you can get, so that gives us the ability to be more exact with doing alignments.” “That gives us enough room to do what we have to do and the buildings are purposefully built for doing what we need to,” he said. With 60,000 square feet of former warehouse and factory space, the space suits the company’s needs well. “Because Bridgeport did so much manufacturing, there are some huge buildings in Bridgeport that are empty,”īlack Horse has been at its East End facility at 726 Union Ave for more than 20 years the former machine shop had been vacant for years before the company bought and revamped it. “At one time, Bridgeport was the best of the best for manufacturing and machining, so I think it falls along with it,” said Matt Carfo, vice president of Black Horse Automotive Services. Bridgeport’s history of manufacturing has left behind a stock of old warehouse and factory buildings that, with some work, serve today as prime locations for businesses owners looking for space to store and work with their clients’ vintage cars.
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