Car Rally Around the World: Bullrun

Ready for the 'real life' Cannonball Run? Here it is!

Bullrun's Website explains itself as two things:

1. "The Bullrun Rally is a legendary annual cross country car rally over a week involving 100 cars, celebrities and a party in a different city every night. Filmed for TV outside of the USA it is the most glamorous and high profile 'luxury lifestyle' automotive rally. Each year, cars and individuals from around the world embark on the beginning of an epic seven-day rolling road-trip. Bullrun parties across the USA, bringing together a celebrity strewn cast of characters and for an unforgettable adventure, where, the only obligatory goals are to party, drive and enjoy..."

2. Bullrun II Reality TV is a challenge TV show -- this show format is based on the legendary Bullrun Live! Rally but is a totally separate event as 12 teams and cars compete for $500,000 over 4,000 miles. The show aired on MTV Networks Spike TV (www.spiketv.com) in March 2007 with production of Bullrun II beginning in Q4 of 2008.

I first met Bullrun founder in 2005 when I covered the event for TraderDaily/TraderMonthly. Three years later, what was just showing the first signs of blistering success, has now become a cult blowout, with television shows in Europe and the USA, a conglomerate of media related products and rally's on three continents. In short, Bullrun hasn't been a success for founder Andrew Duncan and his partners, his undertaking has been nothing short of absolutely astounding.

Catching up with Duncan on a recent Saturday afternoon, I had the chance to talk to him personally about his business, the past few years since we last connected, the future of Bullrun and a few of the things he's seen in his super car rally tenure.

Andrew, thanks so much for your time and great to chat with you again. Since my last article a few years ago, you're business venture has completely blown up into a worldwide success. I cannot tell you how impressed I am! Anyway, can you tell a little about yourself and how/why you started Bullrun?
Well, I graduated with a Law degree originally and then worked in finance with investment banks like JP Morgan and Credit Suisse for 10+ years doing long hours like everyone else in the industry . I got bored with the normal beach or skiing holiday as it wasn't a real stress breaker for me. We had started getting involved with car rallies in Europe for fun a week each year and one day I was having a sit down and starting thinking that maybe we could set up an event on our own, build a brand and have the whole thing supported and promoted by accompanying TV shows. It was a ridiculous naïve really idea now thinking back as I had no idea of what it was going to take. I'm still involved in finance today though with CFT Financials.

Obviously there no shortage of success at Bullrun, I'm wondering if you would share with us about your thoughts on Bullrun today, versus where it was just a few years back?
Well success is all relative, we don't personally regard ourselves as successful yet but we're certainly making progress in the right direction. When we started in 2004 there was the two of us sitting in a Starbucks with a basic idea of creating an event. The rally is a pretty well known event now and airs on TV in about 95 countries and the reality show has a huge following in the USA.

It's amazing to see that you've been able to take a concept and turn it into an all-out media cult icon, as seen with your shows in Europe and on SpikeTV, here in the U.S. Was it hard to make come together, or did things just naturally fall into place?
It's been really bloody hard. We realized we had to move to the States to make it happen so we left our jobs, uprooted and started everything from scratch here. Overall our belief in what we're doing and joint optimism once we got here has got us through but I'd say it's hard (but enjoyable) work!

Would you consider Bullrun a success in the present stage, or do you have even bigger plans in the works?
So far so good I'd say right now but we're about 20% of where we want to be.

I'm sure you’ve seen some pretty crazy things over the past few years; can you share with us one, or two experiences that stick out in your mind as a "Bullrun unforgettable"?
Shutting down Times Square for the start of our rally in 2006 was pretty amazing. Last time they did that was for Vanilla Sky, but no one had done it at 9am on a Saturday morning in June. We had 3 blocks closed, 122 cars on the street and Mario Andretti...really good fun.

On location filming the reality show for Spike TV was a 21 day long experience!

I have to ask, have you ever had to bail any Bullrun drivers out of jail?
Never. But we had to get a camera man out once...

With all that you've seen and done, are you getting tired of the rally's at all?
No they're definitely still fun and we figure that if we organize them to keep ourselves amused everyone else will be pretty happy too...

Here's another one of those tacky questions I have to ask too; do you think Bullrun's staggering success has changed you at all?
Not at all. We're probably even hungrier to achieve our goals but I think being in business is as grounding as it gets! If you're in touch with what's going on you have to appreciate how much work everything takes, peoples contribution to that and always have a 'what if...' mentality.

A few years back, I think you were developing your own car...Are you still making the car, or do you have any plans to produce more of your own cars in the future?
We're not making that car anymore but we are working on a big licensing deal right now in that area!

Well, congratulations, you've definitely proved that where there's a dream, passion and drive, success will follow.

Readers who are interested in Bullrun can find footage and articles on Bullrun.com. Moreover, if you're interested in being on the Bullrun television show, the web site has information for prospective drivers who would like to participate. To learn more about your shot at becoming a famous Bullrun driver in the future, check out the Bullrun reality television show.

Mark Whistler

9/5/08

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