Ive been seeing less and less of these horrific mods on cars. Im wondering if they're starting to go the way of stickers and altezzas. One can only hope and pray that people are finally starting to get their acts together and realize that vertical doors, altezzas, stickers, big aluminum wings, etc are and

 

I help develop kits and my office is located AT Vertical Doors Inc. So more or less I can quite possibly give you the best and most thorough answer out of anyone in the market. Maybe not, lol, but anyway. No they're not dying out. Not cause I'm all "schwing, vertical doors" but because I see the sales and take 10's of 1000's of dollars every month selling tons of them.



Here's what you see: A market that was once void of this part, until a few pioneers came along and made some cool designs to make bolt on door hinge kits. Boom, a trend started, it was the new hot thing to do. Everyone did it. Guess what China did? What they always do, and they got every design they could get their hands on, copied them with cheap metal that looked great (but would bend out of shape with ease), and sometimes didn't even look well build (nasty welds, crooked sloppy construction). So they make a ton of bootleg kits, then flood the US market with them. Tons of brands put their names on these insanely inexpensive parts that were coming over by the boatload.



Fastforward a couple years, to 2006-2007. Vertical Doors Inc., who are the patent holders and pioneers in the business are still doing ok, but they're battling a ton of lawsuits for patent infringement. They themselves were sued early on, and in the case they ended up paying a buttload of cash to buy the patents from the company suing them. They made good on the transaction, and started to defend what they paid dearly for. So while the market was flooded with cheap kits, which inevitably led to the stigma of cheap parts destroying cars, lots of bent fenders, chipped paint, and frustrated bodyshop and custom car owners, only a few key players were actually fueling the fires for these knock offs. Those guys all got sued.



NOW, what you see is a market that is not saturated by bootlegs. Thousands and thousands of kits have been seized with US Marshals assisting raids on warehouses, and lots of these kits were so bad they were literally sold for scrap metal. The kits that could be refurbished and retrofitted with better hardware were kept, sorted, boxed up, and now I sell them on a daily basis, along with the real deal VDI kits.



I see 2011s getting doors all the time, Mercedes, BMW 6 series, Audi, Corvettes, HYUNDAIs etc. all getting kits installed or prototyped, because despite common car culture belief, this is still a NEW part to the rest of the world. To car forum junkies and car show regulars, we're tired of seeing every single door in show lifted up, because it doesn't set you apart anymore, it makes your normal. To your regular everyday Joe walking down the street, a car with the doors up makes him take another look. Seriously most places still dont have a single car in town with these, or they have "That one guy with the Lambo doors on his car". Here in Cali, yeah you see them all over car shows, but still not very often at a gas station or grocery store parking lot.



They're not going away, they're just not the big thing anymore, and China is spending any time or cash on an old trend. They are more than likely trying to create as many iPhones and bootleg electronics that are crippling our economy and my particular industry.



And now... you are informed my friend