Driven Up the Wall

Appropriately enough, I was driving to a breakfast meeting at a Calabasas deli called Label's Table when I found out that Armani was going to design special-edition smug-on-wheels-mobiles for Mercedes. It's bad enough that I'm forced to fight for my vehicular life on Southern California roads against repurposed Army vehicles the size of the Lusitania that cost as much as a two-bedroom condo and are named after a sex act. Now I have to sit bumper to bumper on the Ventura Freeway with cars decked out like talent agents? I can't deal. For the first time in 20 years of living in this tinseled madhouse, I no longer revel in being part of the car culture. I pine for an efficient light-rail system. A subway that covers more than one-tenth of 1 percent of the Los Angeles basin. Buses that don't belch black. You want to see the guy with the bad breath and the fish-eye who changes your oil at Jiffy Lube sashaying down a runway in the latest fall fashions? No, you do not want to see that. So why would a company known for powerful vehicles that own the road hand the design-studio keys to a guy who's gonna give them silk seats? We have to get automotive marketers off this insane special-edition kick. Look, I understand the power of a brand name, especially one that basically announces to everyone that you're better than they are. But this feels wrong on a cellular level. Maybe I'm not the target market. The only label I wear (and proudly) is a tattered, faded-orange Syracuse University T-shirt. My most common fashion statement is "Made in Malaysia." And the label most often emblazoned on my car is "Wash Me," etched by some joker in the quarter-inch of dirt and grime that usually covers the Feuermobile. Maybe I'm just not genetically equipped to fathom a world in which the idea of an Armani Mercedes would even occur to someone. (Before they mercifully began to vanish from the roads, I could barely pass an Eddie Bauer Explorer without gagging.) So at Label's Table, as I waited for a source, I picked desultorily at my bagel. The cream in my coffee seemed sour. I didn't want to get back in my car for fear of what I'd see next. And boy, was I right. Because at lunch (automakers really killed my appetite that day, let me tell you), a car-agency guy reminded me that P. Diddy began tooling around in a special-edition Sean John Lincoln Navigator earlier this year. No silk seats here. It's not just for rich golfers now, it's a playa's market to boot. The damn thing has more automotive bling-bling than a James Bond Beemer. You got your tinted windows, your six TVs, your Sony PlayStation. I'm surprised they didn't replace the cup holders with gun holsters. Think how out of hand this could get. Next we'll hear about the special-edition Rush Limbaugh sedan that comes in any color but black. The Arnold Schwarzenegger SUV that double-locks every female passenger inside until she takes her clothes off. The American Idol sports coupe in Coca-Cola red that won't start unless you're a really talented singer (that sucker won't ever move). The Ozzy Osbourne truck with the decapitated-chicken interior. I don't know if these things have public relations value. I doubt they make a profit. And I bet the celebrities who lend their names to them get more marketing mileage out of the whole thing than the car companies do. If this trend ever makes it off-road, I'm moving to Malaysia. I don't want to even contemplate what the special-edition split-level designed by 50 Cent would look like, do you? I think the American car-buying public should rise up and fight this special-edition sickness before there isn't a street left in the nation that's safe. If only to enjoy their breakfast in peace. Besides, the only special-edition vehicle that ever really made sense was the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile.

Brand Marketing

Driven Up the Wall

Jack Feuer

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Jack Feuer