Black bumpers and steelies: we want proper base models
“I want proper base models. A Ghia or RS was always more exciting when it came five pages after a Popular in the brochure.”
Roy McCarthy – he of A is for Allegro fame – thought he was posting a “boring thought” on Twitter and expected his tweet to go largely unnoticed. Not a chance.
Just 24 hours later, the tweet had been liked 273 times, retweeted 29 times and had sparked 43 responses. These numbers are continuing to rise. Roy isn’t alone in his love of a proper poverty-spec model – like Amiel Daemion, there are plenty of people who are hopelessly addicted to base.
Here's a boring thought (& quick photoshop). I've worked out why modern cars don't do it for me: the top of the range looks too much like the cheaper stuff.
I want proper base models. A Ghia or RS was always more exciting when it came five pages after a Popular in the brochure. pic.twitter.com/zoje4Ngq3U
— Roy McCarthy (@RoyMcCarthy) December 4, 2018
Sitting at the bottom of the range, the base model is a car in its most naked form, devoid of makeup, glitter and glam. It’s a world of unpainted bumpers, steel wheels and solid paint. You’re not expected to buy them – the base model is designed to lure you into a showroom, where the salesman will encourage you to spend more money on a trim level more suited to a man or woman of your calibre.
They’re the result of a heated contest between the marketing and finance departments, with the former throwing bells and whistles at the base model, only for the latter to remove them again.
The Popular, City, L, TC or Merit models of the world represent a vehicle with the slimmest of profit margins. A lower price or an added extra could send the car into the red. And we’re not talking about solid red paint.
Sure, the base model has evolved. Whereas once upon a time it meant parking your corduroys on vinyl seats, living without a passenger sun visor, and using a box of Swan Vestas instead of a cigarette lighter, by the mid-80s, motorists were treated to ‘luxuries’ like a heated rear window, two-speed wipers and carpets.
‘Good deal’ details
Today’s base models are less Scrooge-like with their specification and, as Roy points out, the top of the range cars look too much like the cheaper stuff. Dacia does a pretty decent job with the UN-spec Access versions of the Duster and Sandero, but you need to venture into the world of commercial vehicles for proper boggo vehicles.
Even the base model names have disappeared, replaced with nonsense like Play, Active and Touch. These aren’t trim levels, they’re the names of rubber items dispensed by wall-mounted machines in pub toilets. Probably.
Roy’s Ford Focus Homage pays homage to the Ford Escort Popular, a three-door only model featuring ‘good deal’ details such as moulded black bumpers, locks for the doors, tailgate and fuel filler cap, halogen headlights, reversing lights, remote-control door mirrors, laminated windscreen and a heated rear window.
Upgrading to the ‘more-for-your-money’ Escort L meant colour-toned bumpers, side mouldings, wheel trims, a rear wash-wiper, velour carpet, a cigarette lighter, radio-cassette, space for the cassettes and adjustable head restraints.
Providing details of the GL and Ghia models would provide too much excitement before bedtime, so we’ll spare you the details, but if you wanted to stay ahead of the Joneses, these were the Escorts to have. Telling your neighbours that your car had a digital clock was a big deal – no nasty analogue timepiece for you.
But this isn’t about the Ghias and the CDXs of the world. This is about yearning for the days when base models with black bumpers and exposed steel wheels propped up an entire range of cars. A time when a five-speed gearbox, hubcaps, a passenger door mirror and a light in the glovebox felt as decadent as sitting in a bath while chomping on a Flake.
We enjoyed making the journey from base to top – we knew where we stood and it gave us something to aim for. The brochures were like a life lesson – work hard at school and you might be able to afford a GL. With any luck, you could even stretch to a Ghia.
Thanks to the genius of Roy, we can enjoy some of today’s cars in their glorious base-spec majesty. Please enjoy the Renault Clio Campus, Nissan Qashqai 1.3 DX, Vauxhall Insignia Merit and MINI City in full ‘front of the brochure’ spec.
Marvellous, aren’t they?
Click here to buy a copy of Roy’s book, A is for Allegro: An Alphabet of Curious Cars.
10 Comments
I do agree, with modern cars all looking the same, it is a minuscule occasion whenever I spot an access edition of the Dacia Sandero on the road. however, black bumpers don’t have to mean base model, the Volvo 480 for instance (you are probably aware of my obsession with this car) has black bumpers that are not base at all, they were standard, with the option to paint them coming as an extra, but then, the 480 wasn’t really a bargain bottom choice and as such did not have a base model until later in its life, which even then just took away the info centre and replaced it with a regular gauge.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZBJOzfk3tM&index=22&list=PLiPCez0IKVNu_FqecDgRUz_2exZV4VKBb&t=2s
see what I mean? black bumpers don’t have to mean bog standard, especially when on a very much non-standard choice of car
great article, would love to see these ‘Boggified’ versions of modern cars someday, maybe a new business venture you never know…
That’s a terrific video – I’ve never seen it before. Thanks for the link.
And good call re: the 480!
Very nice. I always thought the base models had a strange dignity / ‘purity’, allowing you to see what the car was really like. They also gave some context to the rest of the range – demonstrated the value of going for the better-equipped models, if you could stretch to them. There’s something to be said for Dacia-like model hierarchies – you don’t end up paying for stuff you don’t want and will never use.
Someone’s done a supercar version:
https://www.autoevolution.com/news/huracan-corvette-miata-and-others-rendered-as-base-models-with-steel-wheels-lol-88100.html
Loving all of those. Somebody posted a link on PB’s Facebook page – many minutes were lost perusing that guy’s handiwork.
Some of the base model equipment omissions were wonderfully creative / mean.
In the ‘70s, the base model Beetle deletions, beyond less chrome, lack of rear air vents (but with the stamping for them left in the metal) and no parcel shelf or reversing lights, included headliner only going to the four corners of the roof, not down the front or rear pillars.
As well as bringing back base models, could I make a plea to get rid of all those silly random trim level names? You know the sort of thing; Avantgarde, Classic, Ambiente, Inscription, Iconic, Play, Expression, Access, etc? If I recall correctly, before this became endemic in the auto industry, it was Citröen that, uniquely, used names for trim levels, such as Pallas and Prestige, presumably to avoid confusion with its alphabetic model names; DS, GS, SM etc.
Let’s instead get back to the alphabet soup of letters on the boot lid. In the 1970’s Ford’s hierarchy was simply Base, L, XL, GT and GXL, although you could have extra equipment packs to upgrade your Capri GT to a GTXLR. (Admittedly, the last three letters didn’t appear on the boot lid.) BL had L, HL and HLS. This used to be a schoolboy car spotters delight. These days, its almost impossible to determine the trim level from outside a car, since even lower trim models have colour-keyed bumpers and allow wheels. Back then, you had to upgrade to an L Spec get “luxuries” such as chrome trim around the windows on your Vauxhall Victor. Happy days!
I remember when the E36 BMW 3 series came out in 1991. Being bigger than the previous E30 made it the ultimate aspirational family car but the basic models came with black bumpers. Needless to say, most of these versions were ordered in black or dark navy to hide the unpainted plastic.
So true. And what about the full-orange indicators vs the “orange-bulb-behind-a-white-plastic-cover” one, to be found in the less basic models!
…and not forgetting the Mk1 Ford Fiesta Popular which came with a foot operated screen wash, intended (I swear) simply as an act of punishment. Yes, it was probably cheaper just to give it the standard steering wheel stalk push-and-squirt from the rest of the range but the ‘Pop’ model needed to make it clear that you needed to be humiliated in return for your thrift.
However, I feel that a huge point is being missed here. As a recipient of a seemingly endless stream of base level company cars throughout my earlier life as a sales rep, I beg you all to consider this: Base models almost invariably used to have a better power-to-weight ratio and therefore out-accelerated their heavier stable-mates which were loaded with ‘extras’.
Furthermore, a base level Escort Mk1 1100 2-door could be rolled onto its side during a ‘parking miscalculation’ and be returned to the Head Office car park 30 minutes later with oil dripping down the o/s/f wing and nobody would notice for a fortnight.
All these pics just remind me how cool steel wheels are – they look more like a legitimate option rather than a budgetary limitation. On a related note the GT86 also had a base spec with steel wheels and unpainted bumpers, however it was only available in Japan. Rationale being – if people are going to heavily customise the car then why sell them stuff they don’t want or need? Here’s a link to it: https://www.evo.co.uk/news/evonews/278485/lowspec_gt_86_available_in_japan.html
On a related note I fondly remember being given a replacement Peugeot 306 with black steel wheels, which depsite being more fun to drive than the C4 it was replacing also garnered many looks of respect from passing teens – probably the hardest audience to impress!