07/22/2026
When the return of 40's In A Bag - Euro GTG and Campout was announced earlier this year, I donāt think Iāve ever seen so many people genuinely excited. Every friend I talked to was excited. Every veteran of the show was excited. Even people who had never been before couldnāt wait to experience what everyone had been talking about.
This wasnāt just another car show.
At one point, aerial photos showed well over 1,400 Volkswagens filling that field. Not spectators. Cars. The crowd was unbelievable. It had grown into something far bigger than a meet. It became a festival, a family, and a tradition.
It was never about who had the cleanest car. Letās be honest, if youāve been there, your freshly detailed VW was probably covered in dust before lunch, and if it rained, you were finding mud in places you didnāt know mud could reach. Thatās part of the experience.
It was about the people. The conversations. The friendships. The late-night laughs. The community that made us all want to come back year after year.
But excitement alone doesnāt make an event happen.
It takes every one of us stepping up, registering, following the rules, and proving this community deserves to keep this tradition alive.
For those unsure about the new registration process or the event rules, take a step back and think about every major Volkswagen show youāve attended. They all have rules. They all have expectations. Thatās what keeps these events going.
The underage drinking, burnouts, reckless behavior, and treating the town like a playground donāt just reflect on the people doing it. They reflect on every one of us, and theyāre exactly how events disappear.
This isnāt a āpay at the gateā show. It isnāt something you decide to attend the morning of. If we want 40s back, we have to commit.
So if youāve been thinking about it, stop thinking.
Register.
Help make this happen.
Because this show means more than just a weekend. For a lot of us, itās where friendships were built, memories were made, and the Volkswagen community felt like home.
My soul is begging you. Letās bring 40s back the right way.
This morning itās time to s**t or get off the pot with 40s. Iām giving this process till August 1st to correct itself or we will be cancelling the event.
At this moment nothing has worked in terms of getting new awareness for the show. In person booths at shows, podcasts, flyers in One Love Auto Groups , TDC shop, Driveway Monsters, packages, 5 hours a day on social media since January, 1500 flyers dispersed, event listed on PVW, presale shirt summer tour contest, and endless cross promotion has still netted us enough interest to not even keep up with costs we have incurred. The event is now 67 days away roughly and a huge amount of ānumbers based ā planning and investment must take place in the next 2-4 weeks.
Sadly only the core group of followers have signed up and committed. The numbers are truly astounding for the effort I have laid out. I have never worked so tirelessly for less in my adult life. If the interest doesnāt increase we canāt continue. We have reached a critical moment. I canāt plan for 1000 people when only 135 have committed.
100s have never seen their invites as they canāt seem to simply search 40s in their spam folders and basically nothing is telling me to keep moving forward. We Passed out 500 flyers and talked to hundreds of people at Lime Rock and not one single invite request. That would be fine in 1975. But itās 2026 and they will not remember at all about us a few days from Sunday. Infact the window of success for that has already closed as today is the third day.
If you want one of the coolest shows to exist you need to do some work and make it happen. Tell your people the sun setting on their opportunity to experience this show. Iām on the hook for 27,000 dollars at this exact moment if I cancel it. 15k in costs and 12K in donations and tickets refunds. Whatās it gonna be folks? Do we just cancel it and move on before I lose my shirt or is somebody gonna give an actual s**t soon. I donāt know the answer and mentally Iām falling apart about having to make this decision.
