the Nostalgia Chassis

“When people ask me what mattered most when we were deciding whether to buy Berrien Buggy, my answer usually surprises them. It wasn’t a body style or a name—it was the Nostalgia chassis.

At the time, Acme Car Company was still young. We had shortened a handful of Volkswagen pans for customers who wanted to build buggies, and while we did the work carefully, I never felt completely right about it. We were starting with old, often rusty steel that had already lived a hard life. Volkswagen never intended those pans to be cut apart and re-used the way we were using them.

We had fixtures. We had a jig table. Everything went back together level and square, and the welds were solid. But even doing everything “right,” I couldn’t shake the feeling that we were asking too much of something that was never designed for it. My reservations stuck with me.

Then came our first order as a Berrien dealer—and with it, a Nostalgia frame.

When that chassis arrived and I really looked it over, the decision became obvious. The strength was there. The design made sense. The fiberglass floor pan was clean and purposeful, and the ability to access everything from underneath made building and maintaining the car easier and smarter. Right then, I knew Acme would never shorten another VW pan.

That single frame changed the direction of the company. Honestly, without the Nostalgia chassis in Berrien’s lineup, I doubt you’d be reading this today. It mattered that much to me.

I’ll choose strength over “tradition” every time. You can build things the way they used to be built—but I’ve walked away from too many crashed race cars not to respect what real strength means. Some lessons stay with you for life, and this was one of them.”

– John Mickle