How does a brand new 1981 Pontiac Phoenix strike you? Bob Sellers has 26 in stock, $500 off!
No? How about a brand new 1981 Pontiac Grand Prix? 82 in stock now! $700 off!
I was doing some electrical work up in the attic of the 1899-vintage house I’m refurbishing last night when I came across this jewel. I’ve found a number of fantastic things working on this house so far-a telegram from someone fighting in World War II, a vintage beer bottle, and a number of “wheat pennies.” But, this is the first auto ad I’ve managed to find.
Also, yikes! I mean, I know it was a recession in 1981, but 82 Grand Prixs in stock? Dang!
Indeed, it was a recession, so maybe a new car isn’t in the cards. How about a ’66 Chevelle? 283, 3-speed, only $225! I’m pretty sure that’d be worth a small mint today.
Much to my own surprise, there was a pretty wide assortment of foreign cars listed. Maybe they were auto workers that decided having them keyed or burned wasn’t so cool after all. To hear the stories, a foreign car was not long for this world if you turned up at one of the plants in it.
Truly a car town back then, what with special sections for wagons and convertibles! An “Extra Nice” ’68 Fiat convertible was only $2,200.
Probably the most interesting to me? The “64 1/2” Mustang that was both “mechanically new” and “completely original,” needed body restoration, and was still $3,950. That’s $11,000 in 2017 money. Even then they went for ludicrous money! If we’re being fair, though, it is a convertible.
From a remnant of the Monday, March 16th, 1981 Detroit News that’s been lying around a Detroit attic since then.
I even know where Grand River and 10 mile is located (lived in the 13 mile and Telegraph area for 2 years).
In 1982 would those Grand Prix have been available with the Pontiac 301 or had the switch to Olds 307 already occurred? As a child I naturally always said “Grand PRICK”.
Paper is from ’81, but the 301 Poncho V8 was last built in same year.
No 1982+ Pontiac V8’s.
Olds 307 wasn’t ready yet. Grand Prix top motor in ’82 was Chevy 305 [?]
Had to laugh! As a kid, i always said, “Grand Pricks”! My dad and his drinking buddies used to laugh their butts off until finally he explained the proper pronounciation to me.
Man, I still love those ’69 through ’72 Grand Prix models. And I’ve never decided which is better, the two single headlights or the quads? Hey, Paul, is there a CC article in relation to that?
Inside the first orange arrow. “Equal opportunity for women!” Imagine the feathers that little line would ruffle today.
Why would it ruffle feathers? That’s the way it SHOULD be. The only thing that makes that line stand out was the fact that it actually needed to be said back then.
Because mentioning it today would be seen as sexist, as it would imply that women aren’t normally treated equally and that they think they are doing women a favor by giving them equal opportunity to taken advantage of. What do you want to be that they offered a higher interest rate to an unaccompanied female than they did to men with similar credit qualifications.
Yes, thank you scoutdude. Yeah Wildabeast, nobody’s saying that it shouldn’t be that men and women are treated equal, Its just the fact that if you were to put something like that in print today, someone would instantly get bent out of shape about it kind of like how you did about my comment.
My in-laws lived in the Salt Lake City metro area for several years in the 1990s. They complained to us about numerous occasions when my mother-in-law was completely ignored, or talked down to, in any number of business interactions. I wouldn’t be surprised if little has changed in that regard in the last twenty years there, especially in the suburbs of Salt Lake City. (Why did they move there? A job opportunity.)
My Mom has a similar situation in the mid 70’s. All the credit cards were in my Dad’s name. Since my Mom worked and as a precaution, my Dad insisted that she get a credit card in her name to establish a credit history. Initially, the store pushed back. However, she persisted and was issued a card without my Dad’s signature on the application. He also made her open a checking account in her name as well.
My sister worked for a company based in SLC and the invitations to the company Christmas party specifically stated “employee and spouse (limit one please)”. Strange part of the world.
Wow that is a serious stock of GPs and Pheonix.
I like the auto loans ad, with the still often heard “we will finance anyone” “bad credit or no credit”. “even if you’ve been turned down in the past”, would make you think it was a modern ad.
The lines I haven’t seen before is the “SPECIAL CONSIDERATION GIVEN TO FORD AND CHRYSLER EMPLOYEES”, which of course is due to their location
The one that really marked it as old is the “Equal opportunity given to women”. That would definitely not be acceptable today and shows that the equal rights movement still had a lot of battles yet to win.
Back when my (now former) in-laws bought a brand new “Pontiac Transport Montana” in the 1990s one of the reasons the Pontiac dealer got their business is that the salesman treated my mother-in-law as an equal. The Ford salesman kept addressing his questions to my father-in-law who would reply with “Ask her it’s going to be her car.” – still didn’t get the hint.
That sort of thing happened to my mom in 2005 when she bought the car she has now. So the story goes, her and Dad went to look at cars, and the salesperson started talking to Dad straight away like Mom wasn’t there. To Dad’s credit, he said “I dunno, ask her. She’s the one buying it.” When the dealer continued on, Mom interrupted him mid-sentence, thanked him for his time, and walked out.
Mom’s a bit of a bard, but when Dad said “They didn’t treat your mother real well,” I knew it had to be bad.
A Fiat without a model, I’d love for it to be a Dino, but likely it’s just a 850.
When I was in around the 8th grade we were assigned a project to research the news from the day we were born and write a paper about it. In the pre-internet days, that meant going down to the library, asking for the microfilm, and looking through old newspapers from that day. I found the old ads a lot more interesting than the actual news — stuff like “Lease a Ford Pinto for $99/mo!” and “New RX-7s from $7995!” I don’t remember the exact price but it seems like it was in the $7000s. That actually seems king of expensive compared to those Pontiacs from a year later.
RX-7 was considered to be an upscale car, and had to be shipped all the way from Japan. They weren’t cheap.
Wow — our local dealer only (?) had 50 Grand Prixs in stock!
Thanks for posting this; brings back a lot of hometown memories. I’ll take that TR-6 for $2,000, please. Though that Toyota “Celecia” also sounds tempting. 😉
There’s a 1971 Chevelle convertible, in 3rd image, for $500!
“New top” “needs body work”
The “women treated equally” was a sign of the times. I remember a lady in her forties at our accounting office showing up in tears one day. She and her husband were having marital problems and she decided she wanted to buy a new car, on her own. She went to the dealership they always dealt with. From what we were told, when they asked where her husband was and she explained, she was basically patted on the head, told to go home and sort it out with “the old man” and come back with him when THEY were ready to buy a car.
I’m glad times are changing.
An info in the newspaper on the interest rate for car loans. IIRC, the rate was in the 17%-18% range at this time.
The first car I financed was in ’84. For a used ’83 Olds Cutlass 231-V6, the interest rate was 13.5% via a local bank, and you could itemize the interest. Also, the longest loan period was 36 months.
Today, I think you can get it below 3% and up to 72 months. ==;-]
OK, I just found a 1981 story in the NYTimes giving rates as highs as 19%. The story mentions that certain states had mandatory limits on interest rates which was causing issues with car loans. Worth reading ==;-}
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/01/08/business/your-money-shop-around-for-a-car-loan.html
Try up to 84 month auto loans. (I’m not comfortable being beyond 72 months and that would be for a brand new car.)
As others have noted, the interest rate on new car loans was sky-high at this time. And that was for people with GOOD credit.
We were in the middle of a full-blown recession in 1981 (which was more like a depression in the industrial Midwest) that would not bottom out until late 1982. For many years thereafter, 1982 was routinely cited as the low point for new-vehicle sales. It’s thus not surprising that the dealer was well-stocked with Grand Prixes. It was during late 1982 that sales of the GM full-size cars and intermediate personal luxury coupes began recovering.
As for the used car classifieds, I’d be curious as to the condition of the 1974 Chevrolet Laguna S-3 for $900, which is advertised for sale below the ad for the 1966 Chevelle.
’83 model year saw rise in sales, especially big cars. Pontiac brought back the B body, from Canada, the Parisienne.
Gas prices leveled off at 1.25/gal, and buyers got used to it. Also, pent up demand for new rides, or some wanted back into a bigger car.
Also, interest rates declined to 12% ish? And it was like ‘wow’!
In the case of my parents, they traded their 1976 land yacht Delta 88 Royale hardtop sedan on a slightly used 1982 Delta 88 Royale four-door sedan in early 1983.
Initially they thought that the downsized GM cars were “too small,” but by then they were “just right.”
That 1982 Delta 88 had been traded by a co-worker of my father. He and his wife were in their early 60s and almost ready to retire, and she wanted a car with a power passenger seat (the 1982 model had split front seats, but only the driver’s side was power-operated). They bought a brand-new 1983 Ninety-Eight four-door sedan.
Out of curiosity, I checked to see what Sellers (formerly Ponitac) Buick GMC currently has in stock for new vehicles. Below are the top 4. Looks like Mr Sellers is still up to his old tricks of loading up on volume. Also, note that the below are SUVs of one sort or another. The closest I could find to a Grand Prix were 11 Regals.
Acadia 132
Enclave 68
Encore 97
Envision 49
The cars may have changed, but the sales mentality of volume at any cost lives on!!!
Another interesting ad is in last picture: ” ’66 PLY, 4 door, 6 cyl, std … $250″
Doesn’t say what model, maybe a Valiant?
That’s equivalent to a $999 or $1499 “transportation special” these days. $250 is scrap now.
At the time many people still called the “standard” size cars simply by the brand so I’m going to bet this was a Fury and based on the power train likely a Fury I.
Of course you payed by the line so it was always an art of what to put in the ad.
If I recall correctly, the downsized 1977 Impala and Caprice were advertised as “The New Chevrolets” – the implication being that these models were the real Chevrolets.
Everything other offering needed the particular model name, although Corvette was strong enough to stand on its own.
I couldn’t help but notice the people willing to spring for “AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA” to get to the top of the section. Art indeed!
Depending on the car, maybe it’s just their emotional state. “AAAAAAA! Must sell Vega before it kills me!”
$250 was for a beater then (1980ish). A decent used car was at least $800. My first car in November 1979 was a ’71 Skylark sedan with 85k and a few small dents for $895. It incidentally, was driven to the scrapyard the following September and exchanged for $50. I remember looking at a ’68 LeMans coupe (maybe a Tempest?) with an absolutely destroyed rear quarter panel, yet still legal and driveable, for $225. Or a rusty ’73 Laguna for $1100. I really wanted a ’77 Monte Carlo or a Rabbit, but $4k to $5k just wasn’t happening.
I found old newspapers under the original siding on our 1918 foursquare farmhouse (presumably used as proto-housewrap). The car ads would be for Model Ts…
Hard pass on the Acadia, but I wouldn’t mind the Grand Prix. I always liked the dash layout on those. A reasonably optioned one in a nice color would be a competent every day choice for the 55 mph era in the Northeast.
Outstanding finds, and entertaining piece! I did like the ’81 restyle of the Grand Prix and always wondered why they seemed the least popular of the four GM versions.
About foreign cars, the same sentiments applied just about an hour north of you in Flint. Many foreign cars were vandalized to varying degrees. Nowadays, there seem to be a greater percentage of foreign cars in Flint (with only two major plants still remaining), but it’s still a small number.