Our Mission:

Inspired Automotive & Performance is dedicated to bringing the highest quality of automotive service available to our customers at a reasonable price. We promise to earn our customer's loyalty by being reliable and transparent. We will work together as an ethical team with a focus on meeting and striving to exceed our customers' expectations every day.

Our History:

Clint was born in Charlotte, North Carolina, in 1981. He was raised there until his family moved to Black Mountain, North Carolina, in 1995. There he attended Owen High School, where he played Baseball, Basketball, and Football. He went on to get a Basketball scholarship to Montreat College and Brevard College, where he studied Business Management. It was during this time that his love for performance cars grew, and he decided he wanted to work in the automotive industry and someday own his very own automotive shop.

Kayla was born in Crosby, Minnesota, in 1991 while her mother was traveling and visiting family. Kayla spent the first three years of her life in Indiana before moving to Tennessee. Kayla went to several different schools in Tennessee until the age of twelve. Kayla’s dad worked a lot in law enforcement and the military. In 2004, Kayla’s dad was deployed overseas, so Kayla and her brother, Ryan, moved to North Carolina with their mother.

Clint & Kayla met in Black Mountain, NC, back in 2010. Clint worked as an Assistant Manager at O’Reilly Auto Parts, where he met Kayla, who worked as a CNA at the local Veterans Home. Clint was an avid drag racer when they first met but decided to part out his drag car to help fund their first home purchase and jumpstart their marriage in 2011. Even though he no longer raced cars, when he was not working, he would build motors in the spare bedroom of their single-wide trailer and do the installs and repairs in the driveway.

Clint & Kayla decided to move to Florida in 2014. Kayla continued working in the medical field. Clint worked for Chevrolet for a couple of years before landing a job with Ford Motor Company as a Customer Operations Manager. In 2017 they welcomed their first-born son, Ethan, into the world. In 2018, their second son Isaac was born. Ethan and Isaac have grown up around cars and enjoy them immensely. They would rather help daddy in the shop instead of playing with their toys.

We decided to build a 30X45 garage next to our home. Clint would always help put the boys to bed in the evening, and then he would work on cars until around midnight. After a year, we were already growing out of that garage. Clint’s grandmother, Sloan, passed away in 2021. She was a wonderful woman who always inspired Clint to chase his dreams. Shortly after she passed, we decided life was too short, and we wanted to fulfill our dreams of owning an automotive shop. We sold our Florida home, bought a 36ft travel trailer, and hit the road with our two boys, Ethan and Isaac. We had no idea where we were going to call home.

We traveled and visited family starting in North Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Indiana, and Tennessee. We stayed about a week in each location. We not only visited with friends and family, but we looked for business opportunities to open our automotive shop. When we came to Tennessee, we spotted the perfect shop, driving through Clarkrange, but everyone told us it was not for sale. We asked around, found the owner and fortunately, he decided to sell it to us. We had a tough time getting a business loan, although we had everything needed except that we were not currently employed. Five different banks told us they could not move forward with the loan, even though they loved our business plan. We finally found First National Bank of Tennessee. They believed in our dream and saw our vision, and Inspired Automotive & Performance was started in November 2021.

Our Team:

Cody Branstetter

Cody has been in the automotive industry for the last 12 years, Cody previously worked as a diesel technician at Dodge for 11 years. Cody has a passion for diesel performance but enjoys working on all makes and models.

TJ Shaver

T.J. is a Clarkrange native, attending school and living here most of his life. He started working in automotive shops as soon as he graduated high school in 2006. He worked at a small automotive shop in Jamestown until 2007, when he left to attend Tennessee Technology Center in Harriman for Diesel Powered Equipment Technology. While attending TTC, he took advantage of a program that allowed him to receive credit towards his education requirements in exchange for real world work experience. Through this program, he began to work at the local Caterpillar dealer in 2008. He graduated diesel school in the top of his class and remained at Caterpillar until 2015. In 2015 he married his lovely wife, Megan, and they decided corporate life was not for him. He left Caterpillar and started a job at a local rock quarry where he spent his time working on heavy equipment.
He has spent most of his life working on diesels and grew up in the diesel boom. He made a name for himself early in his career with the Duramax Diesel platform; working many late nights and weekends in an old barn. He spent his fair share of time at the drag strip and pulling a sled down that muddy track is his trusty Duramax, Hillary. Coming from the diesel world, he is a huge turbo fan to say the least. He is a GM truck guy and really appreciates the LS platform. He is the type of person that gets excited to talk any hot rod and loves anything that goes fast.