Ed Bolian has always had an obsession with cars and a knack for business. As a high schooler, he had an albino iguana breeding business that turned his love for reptiles into an entrepreneurial venture. Although it didn’t end up being the thing that brought him all of his success, he was able to pretend that it was more successful than it was and get into different exotic car dealerships and convince salespeople to let him drive different exotic cars like Lamborghinis and Ferraris. In college, Bolian started an exotic car rental company. The company would loan out super cars to various clients throughout Atlanta, sometimes including rappers, and Bolian was able to have a fleet of amazing cars of his own at a young age. The company was not extremely successful due to how a significant repair on one of the vehicles could lead to all of the profits being eaten up.

Next, Ed worked as a Lamborghini salesman. This gave him lots of exposure to supercar owners, and allowed him to work within that industry after closing his rental business. Throughout his time selling Lamborghinis, he was able to learn all about how automotive sales worked, as well as tracking down specific versions of cars to meet clients needs.

Possibly Ed’s greatest story in the car community is his cannonball run. The Cannonball Run is a drive that is based on the 1980’s movie. It starts at the red ball garage in New York City and ends at the Portofino Inn in  California. People will modify their cars to drive through the night across the country to try and beat this record. Bolian was able to beat the record in 2013 in a 2004 Mercedes S55 AMG with a time of 28 hours and 50 minutes.

With all of this automotive experience, Bolian noticed how difficult it was to find and track information about a car. There was carfax, but you would need to pay to learn about a vehicle and it was not crowd sourced. VinWiki allowed people to post about their own cars, and have other people comment on them. This gave each car more of a story, and could lead to more detail for people who are looking to buy the car instead of just a small amount of information that you would get from a carfax report. To help with marketing, Ed created a youtube channel to go with Vinwiki. Other people would come on the channel and talk about different experiences and stories they have had with their cars. The channel grew to two million subscribers and has helped the business grow substantially too.