What Inspired the Names of Classic Cars

In a world saturated with products, there is little true uniqueness, so what makes a company successful is quality and marketing. Famous American businessman Peter Nivio Zarlenga once said ‘In our factory, we make lipstick. In our advertising, we sell hope.’ This encompasses perfectly the principles of advertising: you don’t sell a product, but a lifestyle or what a product will transform you into.

You only have to watch nowadays ads for cars to see how true that is. You may be buying yours to commute to work and do exciting things such as your weekly grocery shopping, but ask yourself which make you are more likely to buy: the one with the ad showing your everyday activities and how well a car is suited for them, or the glamourous ad depicting a drive along the Italian Riviera taking the car owner to a red carpet event?

This is by no means a new phenomenon, and business minds from the 40s already understood the importance of choosing the right name for their cars in order to sell them, with a few exceptions like Henry Ford who liked its car names plain and simply used letters. Perhaps, as the genius father of mass production, he felt that he didn’t need marketing gimmicks. What is curious, however, is that he was clearly alphabetically challenged as Model T was produced before Model A for example. MG suffered from the same ailment as Models TD and TF were manufactured before Models A, B and C. Triumph kept it simple too by using the first two letters of its name followed by a number between 3 and 8.

But, at some point, some marketing executives realised that glamourous names with prestige might boost sales and there they were, trying to come up with the most evocative of them.

Cars named after animals

Of all sources of inspiration, the animal kingdom has always been at the top. It isn’t a surprising choice as animals are symbols in many cultures and at the centre of various rituals. Eating an animal’s heart was a rite of passage in certain tribes and supposed to imbue the young warriors with the attribute of the animal, while Native Americans believed that each person was individually guided by nine animals or totems.

If you are trying to promote mechanical power and speed, you can’t do much better than a cougar, an impala or a mustang. Birds feature quite high up too, and gave birth to the Ford Falcon and the Ford Thunderbird. Of course, not all birds can make it as inspiring names. Who would buy a Chicken or a Turkey??

Other creatures have done quite well, not so much for symbolising speed as because they inspire a somewhat fearful respect: barracudas, sting rays, cobras and vipers made it on the list, but the last two, specifically, were a bit of a gamble as the association to a deadly animal won’t always encourage people to buy models named after them.

The Mangusta (mangoose in Italian) by De Tomaso is a witty choice as it was originally created to compete with Shelby’s Cobra!

Likewise, one has to wonder what was going through the mind of the marketing people at Datsun when they named some models the Hornet and the Honey Bee, insects you definitely want to run away from. However, the Beetle is one of the most successful cars of all times so, presumably, as long as the insect doesn’t bite or sting, it is acceptable as a car name.

Now, if you are looking for a car manufacturer with a sense of humour, Plymouth is for you. In the 1960s, they paid Warner Bros US$50,000 – a significant sum at the time – for the right to use some of their characters’ names for two of their models. Their names? Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote!

Other unusual vehicle names include the Gremlin by AMC – presumably you can’t wash it? The Volkswagen ‘Thing’ is another interesting choice for amateurs of horror films.

Cars named after places

Naming a car after a place can be a tricky thing. If customers have actually been to the place, the experience they had there will colour how they feel about the car and there isn’t anything you can do to turn around those who will feel negatively about it.

Nevertheless, locations are the second most common source of inspiration among car manufacturers. Monte Carlo, the French Riviera tax haven, was used for 30 years by Chevrolet for its 1970s’ luxury car. Renowned for its casino and an extravagantly opulent lifestyle, it lent the car its aura of exclusivity. Dodge, who also wanted to capitalise on the tiny principality, picked the next best name: Monaco.

Malibu was another inspired christening by Chevrolet. A 34-km strip of pristine beach west of Los Angeles, Malibu is home to many movie stars and super wealthy individuals and the name evokes both fame and affluence. It is also a major site of the surfing culture and therefore the ultimate coolness factor!

Sunny, exotic places are a good source of names. The Mercury Monterey took the name of a well-known Californian seaside town from the 1950s to the 1970s. Buick chose ‘Riviera’, after the area of France where Cannes, St Tropez and Nice are located, and Renault named one of their models Florida.

However, it doesn’t all have to be real places. Take the Cadillac Eldorado for example. Who wouldn’t want to find the mythical city paved with gold?

Other unusual names

Then there is the real of the weird and wonderful, such as the Alfa Romeo Disco Volante (‘flying saucer’ in Italian), the Chevrolet Corvette named after a small warship, the Dodge Rampage or Lamborghini’s Countach, meaning “Oh my!”, which is what people will say when they see you drive by!

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