[Durt]

A buddy of mine attended a SAAC convention with his SPF some time before the lawsuits hit the fan. Ol' Shel was making the rounds, and when he reached my pal's car, who was terribly excited to meet the legend, stated flatly to the person he was with, "that's one of them I'm gonna put out of business."
Nice to meet you, too.
According to an article in the LA Times, which alarmed me somewhat at the time, Shelby's lawsuits, in the extreme, would not only have put the replica industy out of commission, but also have all products from those targeted manufacturers destroyed.
What's not to love?
Shelby moving next door to SPF, in my opinion, is a calculated 'in your face' continuing effort to do what he couldn't accomplish in court - and that's to "put them out of business," or at the very least, let them know that he's far from done with his war on the industry.
It has nothing to do with muffler, tire or Happy Meal sales in the same block.
It has nothing to do with bold competition.
I don't think it's necessarily even about profitibility.
What it does have to do with is contracting a South African company to produce a competitively priced, fiberglass roadster to which he can attach his trump card - a CSX prefix and autograph, beat SPF at their own game and try to make life miserable for them. And if he makes a few bucks in the bargain, all the better.
If I were the owner of a Kirkham bodied 'continuation Cobra' or any other CSX-whatever, I'd be real angry.
Shelby is 30 years and 50 + thousand replicas too late.
I'd have a lot more respect for the man if he were content to produce a limited production Kirkham quality masterpiece and say, "bring on your replicas - this is a Cobra."
THAT would lend desirability and exclusivity to the Shelby marque.
Instead, he's decided to leverage his legend hawking SPF clones, and hooray for him.
Is all this fair game in the whole scheme of things? You bet. But when the dialog gets ugly regarding the Godfather's questionable motivation in his dotage, I hope all of his supporters keep in mind that when he declared war on the replica industry and their customers, he lost a lot of devoted fans, and as far as I'm concerned, the benefit of the doubt regarding his motives surrounding the proximity of his new showrooms.
My 2 cents worth.