Every Saturday morning, San Clemente holds an event known as Cars and Coffee, where people bring their own luxury cars for everyone to see. As crowds increase, and the event remains without a price tag, Cars and Coffee continues to be an important tradition for the community.
Cars and Coffee has been around for roughly 25 years, originating in Australia where father and son Simon and James Wehr came up with the idea of people bringing their own cars. They built off of this genius idea, and expanded it to Crystal Cove, a local beach in Orange County. The attraction was immediately a hit, but was moved to San Clemente in 2017 due to the lack of parking. and has now remained a popular spot for people to go.
Although there are many other places to look at expensive cars, the admission scares people away, but Cars and Coffee attracts people allowing them to connect without having to swipe their credit cards.
A major reason that the event remains so popular is due to its authenticity. Rather than looking through windows, or standing behind bars to look at cars, people are able to walk right up to the cars, sit in the cars, and even open up the hood to look at its engine. It’s eye-opening to many as real people show up with their real cars that can amount to millions of dollars.
With the focus being on bringing your own car, it makes the tradition far more exciting. Both the people with the car and the one’s watching, get to connect and share common interests, where owners often offer insight and fun facts about their cars.
As much as it is a blessing to the people showing up, it’s an even bigger gift for the workers and shops at the outlets. Revenue streams flow through the stores each Saturday bringing energy and money to a typical ghost town any other day of the week.
“Saturday mornings are like a holiday for us, we have hundreds of people rushing into stores bringing heavy workloads, but handing us lots of money in return,” said Caleb Goley, who is a local employee at the Outlets’ Starbucks.
The cars are the obvious magnet that attract audiences, but the backdrop of the event often has an even bigger pull on visitors. With the event being placed right by the beach, people are delighted with a beautiful ocean view as well as cool breezes that fill the air.
The weather and beauty of the setting magnifies the perfection of the event, and continues drawing in large crowds week in and week out.
Talk of events similar to Cars and Coffee have begun to break out rapidly, disrupting the expensive norms of society, and creating this throwback effect to pastimes where people got off their phones and bonded over something so simple.
Cars and Coffee is the gift that keeps on giving for this beachside community, bringing people closer together, shining light on these quiet shops, and relieving guests from emptying their pockets. As the event continues to take place every weekend, the community grows as well, showing the heartwarming effect it has on the residents of Orange County.
