$100 MILLION AND COUNTING: Zac Brown Band Ferrari and Driven Hearts Corvette among the charity cars in Palm Beach
April 9, 2018
Posted by Barrett-Jackson
A Zac Brown Band-wrapped 2006 Ferrari F430 Spider (Lot #3000) once belonging to the band’s fiddler Jimmy De Martini will be sold at the 2018 Palm Beach Auction to benefit Camp Southern Ground.
Through the auction of 10 vehicles totaling $6.21 million at the 2018 Scottsdale Auction, Barrett-Jackson hit – and surpassed –$100 million raised for worthy causes to date through the company’s unique platform.
The 1988 35th Anniversary Corvette (Lot #3001) was gifted on the auction block by the late Dave Ressler to Craig Jackson and his mother Nellie.
That tradition of giving back, which has been an integral element of Barrett-Jackson since day one, will continue at the Palm Beach Auction in April with the sale of a number of charity vehicles. These special cars for a cause will go across the auction block with 100 percent of each sale going directly to the designated charities, as Barrett-Jackson waives all fees.
Among them will be a beautiful white 1988 Chevrolet 35th Anniversary Edition Corvette (Lot #3001). The car had been gifted to Craig Jackson and his mother Nellie on the auction block during the 2006 Scottsdale Auction by the late Dave Ressler, who passed away not long ago due to heart issues.
Lot #3001 – a 1988 Chevrolet Corvette 35th Anniversary Edition – will be sold to benefit the American Heart Association as part of Barrett-Jackson’s yearlong Driven Hearts charity initiative.
Now destined to help raise much-needed funds and awareness for heart health as part of Barrett-Jackson’s Driven Hearts charitable initiative, the Corvette raised $350,000 in total for the American Heart Association through its sale at the Scottsdale event (see story HERE), and was generously donated back to be auctioned again in Florida.
Certain to attract a lot of attention at the Palm Beach Auction will be a stunning 2006 Ferrari F430 Spider (Lot #3000) to benefit Camp Southern Ground, the passion project of multiplatinum Grammy-award-winning artist Zac Brown and his wife Shelly. The Ferrari was presented by Brown as a surprise gift to Jimmy De Martini, Zac Brown Band’s fiddle player, to thank him for his years of service to the band. “I would take the car into the north Georgia mountains on day drives,” says De Martini. “There are some beautiful winding roads at the beginning of the Appalachians, and I would head out by myself or with some of the other band members and crew on their motorcycles.”
100% of the hammer price of this 2006 Ferrari F430 Spider (Lot #3000) will benefit Camp Southern Ground.
Eventually, in the midst of moving his ever-growing family to a new home (his wife was pregnant with their fourth child), De Martini realized the Ferrari was not ideally suited to his lifestyle. Through an intermediary, he reached out to Lou Hutchinson and his daughter Erin Dilley, owner of the Vehicle Vault in Colorado, to see if they might be willing to buy the car. Hutchinson is no stranger to Barrett-Jackson, or Camp Southern Ground, for that matter. A longtime Barrett-Jackson customer known for his generosity, Hutchinson had the winning bid on the very first vehicles the Zac Brown Band brought to the auction back in 2013 to benefit the camp: a pair of custom Indian Chief motorcycles. He (along with Erin Dilley) later hosted Zac Brown’s Exclusive Birthday Event at the Vehicle Vault, a private fundraiser for Camp Southern Ground that raised close to a million dollars.
When they were approached about De Martini’s Ferrari, Hutchinson and Dilley saw it as an opportunity. “We came up with the idea to keep the giving moving forward,” Hutchinson says. “Our plan from day one was to use the car for the camp’s promotion and to eventually consign it as a donation Lot at Barrett-Jackson with its sale benefiting Camp Southern Ground. Barrett-Jackson provides a wonderful environment for this, with the intersection of car people, people with resources to donate, philanthropic folks and those who have an interest in many of the specific areas these non-profits serve.”
With a custom wrap conceived by Zac Brown Band’s design team that co-brands ZBB, Camp Southern Ground and Vehicle Vault, the supercar is powered by a 4.3-liter V8 and has just over 9,000 miles on the odometer – as well as an enhanced sound system to keep those ZBB tunes cranking.
The car will be the seventh vehicle to cross the Barrett-Jackson block to benefit Camp Southern Ground, which is now accepting registrations for its week-long sleep-away summer camp sessions (SouthernGroundSummerCamp.org). “So far we have raised $1,270,000 for the benefit of the camp (through the auction),” says the camp’s President and CEO Mike Dobbs. “We have used all of these funds to help with the capital construction of the camp, and money raised from the sale of the Ferrari will be used towards scholarships for campers with financial need, as well as to help with the construction of our new residential lodge.”
“It’s important to the band and myself to do everything we can to help Zac’s dream come to fruition,” says De Martini. “We’re extremely blessed to be in a position to help and give back to our community and spread the word about the camp. It’s exciting to see Camp Southern Ground has finally become the place Zac first dreamed of.”
Barrett-Jackson is honored to have played a part in making Camp Southern Ground a reality, and to provide the platform to help so many great causes over the years.
For up-to-date information on the charity vehicles crossing the block at the 2018 Palm Beach Auction, click HERE.