City Stickers

They’re the Great Equalizer on hundreds of thousands of cars from faded VWs to shiny BMWs--oval black-and-white decals boasting hometown status such as HB (Huntington Beach), SA (Santa Ana) or CdC (Coto de Caza).

The $2 Euro-style decals, which took off in Huntington Beach in 1992, have spread nationwide and across the border to hundreds of cities, including WH (West Hollywood), LV (Las Vegas) and CSL (Cabo San Lucas). But the fad has also prompted a backlash that has one of the country’s original decal makers fuming.

Larry’s Decals of Laguna Hills has hired a copyright lawyer to investigate several companies that produce decals similar in design with coarse messages, owner Larry Aguilar said. The satirical decals mock the booster-ish city decals with messages such as BFD (as in “Big Deal” you’re from HB) and other unprintable ones.

The crude decals use the same graphic format and lettering of his copyrighted Lo-Cals city decals, Aguilar charged.

“There are always going to be sticks in the mud that don’t care to kick in with community spirit,” he said. “But if you go so far to make it look like [my decals]. . . . Some of the loyal customers I’ve had in the past associate me with this satirical kind of raunchy statement.”

But the owner of Huntington Beach-based Fast Track Labels, which produces the satirical decals, said his auto stickers are clearly different from Lo-Cals’.

Fast Track decals are a slightly different size, use a different lettering font and have a black-and-silver shimmery look as opposed to Lo-Cals’ flat look, Fast Track owner Steve Stearns said.

And Fast Track, which also puts out city decals, spells out the cities’ names in capital letters under the initials while Lo-Cals uses upper and lower case, he said.

“He didn’t invent the concept,” Stearns said. “It’s been around a long time. We took an idea he had and derived a different idea of our own.” Stearns also stressed that Fast Track sells “positive” decals such as “Hugs Not Drugs.”

The concept of the oval auto stickers and simple lettering originated in Europe, decal makers said. In Europe, where national borders are close, cars bear oval decals indicating their country of origin, such as “GB” for Great Britain or “D” for Deutschland (Germany).

In the U.S., it is unclear how many companies produce the decals or which started the fad. But decal makers say Lo-Cals was among the first in the country to popularize the concept.

Aguilar, 49, a consulting engineer, said he came up with the Lo-Cals design 20 years ago after spotting the decals on trips to Europe. And he found it annoying when local drivers kept the European decals on cars they bought overseas.

“I thought, ‘Isn’t this the height of arrogance? OK, so you bought your car in Europe.’ I thought, ‘Why don’t you just put a decal [saying] where you live now?’ ”

Aguilar started Larry’s Decals in September 1992 with stickers for the booming new south Orange County cities and the beach cities, where surfers are notoriously territorial. He and his wife, Kitty, are the only employees.

In 1992, he sold 385 decals. This year, he will sell about 250,000 in 12 states.

“The simplicity is what intrigues people,” Aguilar said. “Like ‘What the hell is RSM?’ ” (Rancho Santa Margarita).

And the status.

His best seller remains HB, with 60,000 sold; Huntington Beach’s population is 181,519. Either one in three Huntington Beach residents owns an HB sticker--or nonresidents are buying them up.

“[The decal] says he [a driver] lives in HB--everyone says, ‘Surf!’ and he loads up on all the benefits and the acclaim because he’s part of that town,” Aguilar said.

At the Corner Drug Store in Seal Beach, best-selling decals include BFD and LB (Long Beach), said clerk Eric Stordahl. Long Beach decals are popular among rap fans of Snoop Doggy Dogg, whose songs recall his days as a gang member in that city.

“I think it’s associated with a badness or a rebel,” Stordahl said.

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Others turn their noses up at the idea of a city decal. Dustin Humphrey, 21, a Huntington Beach surf store clerk, said he doesn’t know anyone who has an HB decal.

“People from Riverside put them on their cars,” he said.

Or “maybe our parents,” he suggested.

He thought some more and owned up to having one once. Briefly.

“Sometimes, some of your friends, as a joke, will slap it on your car,” he said.

Sniffed another Huntington Beach surf store clerk: “I don’t need one. I know where I live.”

But Omer Shalikar, 20, said he wants everyone to know where he’s from. He has an HB sticker on the rear window of his red Toyota truck “because I’m proud of living in Orange County and Huntington Beach,” he said.

His decal turns heads.

“They’re like, ‘Where did you get it from? Where can I get one of those?’ ”

Brett Marangi’s HB sticker sometimes draws more attention than his barking Rottweiler that rides in back of his gray Isuzu van.

Marangi, 37, gets mad when younger surfers poke fun at his decal.

“I was surfing when they were still in diapers,” he fumed. “I love Huntington Beach. It’s a great town. . . . That’s why you don’t see any other sticker on my car. Because I don’t believe in anything else.”

Marangi, a business owner, taped the decal on his rear window. His civic pride isn’t about to stop there.

“I’m actually thinking,” he said, “of getting a tattoo of that.”