SEVIERVILLE, Tenn. — When Corey Miller and his wife, Jackie, decided to move from Florida two years ago, East Tennessee was a natural destination.
"Well, we always vacationed here as a kid," Corey said. "I just kept saying I was going to end up here one day and we decided to make a move and here we are."
Jackie embraced the move.
"We packed up a 28-foot Penske truck, two trailers, two kids and a Great Dane and made our trek. And we don't regret a single second of it," she said.
They are building a new life here in Sevierville and building a new business.
They opened Miller Performance and Restoration in April during a pandemic.
"Our faith has a lot to do with it too, you know, I mean it. It was really scary to try to find a building and then it's like once you get the building it's where are we going to get a job. And then virtually overnight we went from zero jobs to three jobs. So that has been a blessing in disguise," Jackie said.
Facebook helped spread the word that Corey restores classic cars to showroom quality for customers across the country.
Jackie said, "He's a magician. It's pretty amazing. It's something that he's done his entire life, literally since he was 15. To watch him work on a car, or paint a car, it's such an art for him. He is really an artist and he does beautiful work, beautiful work."
He got one decades-old car in Pennsylvania from someone who had already started the project. Corey restored the bodywork, paint, wiring, drive train, everything in the rare car.
"It is a '66 Shelby G.T. 350 Hertz car. Ford and Shelby built a little over 900, just just shy of 1000, cars for Hertz rental company back in '66 and they were usually all black and gold. But there was a certain amount that were done in red and gold, green and gold, blue and gold, and white and gold. And this is actually one of the 45 green and gold ones that was ever built," Corey said.
It should be finished by the end of the week.
"We've got a '67 Shelby that we're doing for our customer in North Carolina," he said. "We're building some custom stuff for this GMC truck that's behind me as well."
They are making beautiful cars in East Tennessee.
"It's beautiful here, it's nice to actually have seasons," Jackie said.
They also do less-extensive restoration, like custom paint jobs.