Just saw this thread and don't want to go too far off topic but I do think it is important to note the importance of Hi Performance Motors and their actual relationship to the factory.
HPM was internally referred to as the "factory showroom". In fact, if you took a tour of SAI in period and asked to see some of the cars up close, an employee was likely to hand you a photo copy of a hand drawn map which outlined the route "around the corner" to visit the "factory showroom". It was referenced that way on the sheet which I have found a few examples of over my years of collecting old Shelby American related junk!
Continuing on that thought, the perception of most people seems to be that HPM was a separate entity from Shelby American but the more I learn about HPM, the less likely that seems. HPM was effectively "run" by Ray Wolff..supposedly owned by Carroll Shelby, Lew Spencer, and 3 other SAI employees. That said, HPMs financial statements were distributed to all the executives at Shelby American and seemed to be treated as a division of SAI. In addition, cars were run internationally on DLR 4101 plates from the dealership quite often along side other cars which ran MFG 013 plates.
Just a lot of things which point to the dealership as being the "factory showroom" in more ways than just in "name only". I personally don't see much difference between HPM and 'shelby racing co', "Carroll Shelby Enterprises" etc etc. To me, Im pretty sure they were all under the same umbrella of companies and not so much the separate entities that we now think of them as.
Anyway, what were we talking about?
Sorry for the excessive "interference" in the conversation.
Kind regards,
Vern