Written in the Scars

…And to think that Kemal never really even wanted this car.

Sometimes, the little opportunities that we almost let slip by, end up having such a huge & widespread effect on our lives… that we wonder what we’d have ever done or where we’d be, if we had just let it pass.

Think about it. And certainly you can find at least one instance (hopefully positive), where you almost bailed on an opportunity… but you didn’t. And that opportunity that you almost let pass, ending up having an exponential/domino impact on your life.

If you always make the sensible decisions, then you’re most always going to end up with the safe-zone results. For some people that’s comforting & ideal. But for others – it just feels like there’s more life to be had.

Kemal has a thing for Japanese cars. Not the kind that you buy at a car lot, but more like, the kind you receive at a port. He had imported a couple of cars before, and had been through all the red tape in order to get those cars registered.

Meanwhile – another guy in the NYC area had this Aristo, but things weren’t going as smoothly. That guy was having problems getting the car tagged… and was getting fed up.

Kemal was fresh on the whole paperwork process. So although he wasn’t in love with the fat 4-door, he took it on anyway.

Most people would naturally go VIP with a car like this, and NYC is definitely thick with VIP builds. But Kemal is not a VIP guy. He’s more of a ‘rip it’ kind of driver. That’s why at first – he hated the Aristo. It was so textbook out-of-touch with his style.

If you always make the sensible decisions, then you’re most always going to end up with the safe-zone results.

But with a little performance parts-slapping, he began to get wise to the Aristo. Maybe even catch little flickers of a relationship forming. After all – bashing the a ‘luxury’ right-hand-drive sedan through the NYC streets was a chore that he could get used to. Fast-forward through a couple seasons, and he was in love.

Since there was minimal (non-VIP) exterior aftermarket support for the Aristo, Kemal decided to do what any badass car guy would do… and make some stuff from scratch. To a certain extent – he had done this before for friends & whatnot. He’d always been hands-on. That part wasn’t anything new. But with the Aristo, things began to get involved.

With little on the market for the GS chassis, Kemal’s hand-made aero pieces were quick to get attention & demand through the internet. People started asking if he could make more, so Kemal figured – hey why not? He needed a name to make it official, so Suprlife was born.

As with many emerging new companies in the culture these days, Suprlife is kind of hard to define. Yes it’s a brand. Yes it’s soul lies in Kemal’s Aristo. But yes – it’s also more than just any one thing.

I think the reason we’re seeing more brands like this in the culture these days, is because more & more entrepreneurs are just starting to ‘go with it’ – as mentioned in the beginning of this article. The internet allows us so many advantages, and these brands are just the result of people using the internet in a positive way…. rather than a destructive way. In the past, companies trended toward being very specific in who/what they were, and or who/what they serviced. But the new strategy seems to be: Why try to define yourself & tie yourself to just one thing?

Brands are becoming, in a way, a resemblance of social media feeds. Meaning that the ‘brand’ is, in reality, the person/people behind the logo… and the products are an ever-evolving result of their interests & experiences. In other words, their ‘page’.

And as the Aristo continues to morph, evolve, & take hits… it’s almost like a living part of NYC. Yeah – that may sound corny. But when this car rolls down a side street, or splashes through a puddle, it adds another element of life & culture to the scenery. The car reflects the character of the city. It’s at home there; in it’s element. Just like the people, it’s got a few scars… but those scars come from a life lived.