Why billionaire Adrian Portelli is buying into Summernats

Australia’s richest muscle car enthusiast is expanding his business empire with an investment he says is more driven by his heart than his head.

Richlister Adrian Portelli is buying a minority stake in Out There Group.

Adrian Portelli, Australia’s richest muscle car enthusiast, is expanding his business empire with an investment he says is more driven by his heart than his head.

The billionaire, best known as “Lambo guy” for his collection of expensive Lamborghinis, has bought a slice of the business behind the country’s biggest and noisiest annual petrolhead gathering, Summernats.

Portelli, 35, is one of the most prominent members of The List – Australia’s Richest 250, with an estimated $1.3bn fortune underpinned by his LMCT+ promotions business – and a huge social media following.

The young billionaire is buying a minority stake in Out There Group, the owner of the Sumernats festival held each January in Canberra, motoring magazine Street Machine, the National Drag Racing Championship and regional events such as RockyNats, Dust Hustle and Red CentreNATS.

Adrian Portelli with Out There Group co-owner Andy Lopez.

While he would not disclose the exact terms of the deal, Portelli did say it was worth eight figures, suggesting an investment of at least $10m.

Not that he is doing the deal strictly for a financial return.

“It’s not an investment as such, it’s more of a passion project,” Portelli told The Australian.

“I grew up going to these car shows, so now I’m just jumping on board, bringing what I can to the table to keep the car scene thriving in Australia.”

What Portelli brings is eyeballs; a huge customer database that has helped make him tens of millions in profits and helped boost other ventures he is now getting into, including fast-growing energy drink label Flipside and alcoholic ready-to-drink Gee Up.

That database is full of car lovers, with the LMCT+ membership base well north of 100,000 subscribers hoping to win giveaways of fast and expensive cars and boats, as well as properties and other prizes including cash.

“Like everything I do, I always make sure my LMCT+ members and customers are involved in some way,” Portelli explained.

“With Gee Up and Flipside they get exclusive access to discount rates, and I’ve always wanted to get into the event space. I’ve run a couple of events myself and we know how to draw a crowd but it is hard.

“In the back of my head I’ve thought this (Out There Group) is the perfect business to plug into LMCT+, and we’ve spoken about how we can get my customers more involved and put events on for them and take it to the next level.”

Adrian Portelli debuted on this year’s Richest 250 list.

Out there Group co-owner Andy Lopez said Summernats had $43m economic impact for the ACT in January and attracted about 130,000 people over four days.

Lopez said there was an opportunity to take the Summernats event to the US, and the drag racing series also has plenty of room for expansion.

“It’s like football or soccer in Australia. It’s got a massive opportunity given it has a huge enthusiastic base with a lot of grassroots involvement and so forth, which has just really needed some stewardship and guidance to bring it together into a coherent national series.”

In typical fashion, Portelli announced the deal on Tuesday via a livestream on his Instagram account, which has almost 370,000 followers (LMCT+ has a similar amount), and filmed in his north suburban Melbourne warehouse packed with fast cars.

Flanked by a Lamborghini and Maserati, and joined by Lopez with a vintage “XBoss” 1976 Ford XB Falcon directly in the background, Portelli also gave away prizes to several LMCT+ members during the deal announcement that – as is his penchant – doubled as a publicity stunt.

But fast cars are not the only investment Portelli has on the go.

Adrian Portelli with his new private jet.

He has already bought a private jet this year, a 2001 Bombardier once owned by the late media advertising magnate Harold Mitchell, and more recently devoted more time and social media posts to Flipside.

So far, the move has been a big success with 7-Eleven taking an exclusive batch of Portelli’s energy drinks that quickly sold out over six weeks, and then negotiating another three months of stock.

“They did that without even trying the drink. They just wanted it. Once they tried it, well, obviously it’s a good product – I wouldn’t put my face to it if it wasn’t,” Portelli said.

“The first week we launched in 7-Eleven, they recorded their best ever sales of energy drinks.”

Each month’s order is 400,000 cans, meaning Portelli is selling more than $2m of energy drinks every four weeks.

“Our first order we did online, and we had $300,000 of orders in the checkout within four minutes. It crashed the website. So we’re sticking to having it in retail now.”

Originally published as Why billionaire Adrian Portelli is buying into Summernats