Image Is Everything, From Bugattis to Chevys : Auto show: Electric cars, $400,000 cars and hot-red cars. All displayed against a backdrop of the mythic Open Road.
The Greater Los Angeles Auto Show opened its doors to the public Saturday and if you think it was mere transportation that brought out the crowds then you have clearly just arrived in Southern California. From Mars.
Granted, the more than 1,000 cars, trucks and vans on display at the Los Angeles Convention Center were widely assumed to be capable of transporting people from point A to points beyond--although security refused to allow this premise to be tested--but the 73rd not-necessarily-annual show was about much more than that.
It was about freedom, about dreams. It was about the Open Road, which was rumored to still exist in selected locales outside the Greater Los Angeles area.
It also was about how many grocery bags could comfortably be stuffed in the back of a minivan, and about all the body parts that would be protected by new and improved air bags.
It was about money, too. How does an estimated American list price of $400,000 for Bugatti’s EB-110 automobili grab you?
For the environmentally conscious, there were electric cars inside the center and outside, a giant chain saw balloon held aloft by seven members of the Rain Forest Action Network--”Stop the Chop! Boycott Mitsubishi!”--who were protesting the company’s “chain saw massacre” of the rain forests.
And then, of course, there were lots of anatomically sound young women dressed in form-fitting clothing who talked about things like torque.
Angelia Cyr, for example, had just finished her spiel about the hot-red 1995 Toyota Celica convertible when a reporter wanted to know was that 144 foot-pounds of torque in the GT?
Cyr, who lives in Detroit and is about midway through her travels with the auto show circuit that runs from October through April, focused her eyes in the distance and silently began mouthing her bit until her tongue stopped at torque. That’s 145 foot-pounds of torque, she said.
Cyr, 19, explained that her auto expertise did not come easily. “We have to take tests and everything with Toyota and get certified,” she said.
Then a man who was passing by interrupted to ask the price of the Celica. She said she did not know. A woman wondered what kind of a back window it had. “I have no idea,” Cyr said.
Just a few feet away, Doug Gindlesberger, 13, was hunkered down behind the wheel of a gray Chevy Lumina Z-34 with his friend Victor Valdez, 14, riding shotgun.
“This car is just not made for performance,” Doug said. “It’s a family car.”
“Yeah, it’s like something my mom would drive,” Victor said.
Doug said the only reason he was even bothering with the Lumina was because he wanted to find a car for his grandmother. He figures he owes her one after she bought him a 1968 Charger last year.
Sara Gindlesberger, however, was later found ogling a super sleek Camaro Z-28. “No, I like this ,” she said.
Image was big at the auto show, even omnipresent. You were what you drove, or what you would like to drive.
Charlie Hughes, president of Land Rover, said that although it was not included in the owner’s manual, “You don’t buy a Range Rover and sit in front of the TV all day.”
Auto entrepreneur Reeves Callaway, unveiling his Callaway SuperNatural Camaro C-8 at the show, said his car was for the young man or woman “who likes to go fast and not spend a lot of money.”
And if your tastes run toward Rolls-Royces, Aston Martins, Ferraris, Lotuses, and Lamborghinis, the auto show honchos thoughtfully included an espresso bar / bakery stand in the small hall where those cars were displayed. If you couldn’t actually drive a Rolls, at least you could eat like you could.
(For those of the Chevy persuasion, the auto show positioned a hot dog stand within easy walking distance of the display.)
But unlike the lower-end cars, where an open-door policy prevailed, expressing an interest in a six-figure automobile would not get you a chance to hop in the driver’s seat. The cars were displayed like museum pieces, roped off, “investments” not to be tampered with by just anyone.
Arnie Johnson, a vice president for Lotus, which is the parent company for the $400,000 Bugatti, said he had “a couple of serious people” come by to check out his cars. These customers, however, were not the type you would expect to see with a stamp on the back of their hand after paying the auto show’s $5 admission price.
“They come over with salesmen from Beverly Hills,” Johnson said.
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Others were more down to earth. Mechanic Luis Chavez, 45, had his wife snap his picture as he sat behind the wheel of a black Dodge Ram 3500 pickup truck, his elbow resting on the window sill with a jaunty smile on his face.
Chavez, who lives in Fontana, said he will send the photograph to his daughter in his native Honduras as a memento.
For those who did not wear their enthusiasm on their sleeves, there were many opportunities for soulful contemplation about how their lives would change if only, maybe just this once, they could own the car of their dreams.
Take Stephen Kafka. He stood, alone, staring at a slowly revolving metallic gray Porsche 911 convertible. Round and round went the Porsche. Again, and again.
Like a dog who hears the whistle when mere humans cannot, Kafka, an apparently mild-mannered accountant from the Westside, was tuned in. Just how would his life change if this baby were his?
“I’d probably be broke,” Kafka said. “I’d probably have to live in the car.”
Over at the Volvo display, the pitch was much less sexy, but plenty corporal nonetheless. In place of beautiful women and flashy videos, crash dummies showed potential buyers what it might be like to have a head-on collision in a brand new Volvo.
Salesman Solomon Morris conceded that when he bought his first Volvo (a 740 turbo) at age 23, the car wasn’t quite up to his image as a cool-looking guy. “People used to look at me funny,” Morris, 31, said.
Sadly, however, Morris drives a Mazda today. After wrecking his Volvo on the second try, Morris said he cannot afford to buy one now.
