Chinese Bus Drivers Told Not To Total Super Cars

Bertel Schmitt
by Bertel Schmitt

After a rash of crashes involving pricey supercars in China, a bus company in Jinghua, China, is taking action. It teaches its bus drivers:

a.) How to spot a super car

b.) How much that super car costs.

Not in order to raise brand awareness amongst its bus drivers. Carnewschina explains that the insurance usually only covers the first 200,000 yuan ($32,000.) Anything above that comes out of the pocket of the crashor. You have to sell a lot of bus tickets to make up for a bus that plowed into a Rolls.

To mitigate the possible damage, these posters appeared on the walls of the bus company. The posters show the logo of the super car manufacturer and the average price in China. The 500 next to the Maybach indicate 5 million yuan ($800,000.) About right. Ouch.

The only problem: By the time you are close enough to see the logo, it’s usually too late.

Nitpicking Carnewschina misses Porsche on the list, and deduces that the Zuffenhausen cars can be “freely crashed.”

Bertel Schmitt
Bertel Schmitt

Bertel Schmitt comes back to journalism after taking a 35 year break in advertising and marketing. He ran and owned advertising agencies in Duesseldorf, Germany, and New York City. Volkswagen A.G. was Bertel's most important corporate account. Schmitt's advertising and marketing career touched many corners of the industry with a special focus on automotive products and services. Since 2004, he lives in Japan and China with his wife <a href="http://www.tomokoandbertel.com"> Tomoko </a>. Bertel Schmitt is a founding board member of the <a href="http://www.offshoresuperseries.com"> Offshore Super Series </a>, an American offshore powerboat racing organization. He is co-owner of the racing team Typhoon.

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  • Marko Marko on Mar 22, 2012

    Granted, I've never been to China, but why would you have to treat supercars differently than any other car in traffic (other than trying not to get too distracted)? Isn't this encouraging distraction in itself? I mean, wouldn't it be better just to teach keeping distance in general?

  • Darth Lefty Darth Lefty on Mar 24, 2012

    I would personally consider this a list of targets. You could keep track of your value, like the tonnage sunk by your submarine.

  • Lorenzo I just noticed the 1954 Ford Customline V8 has the same exterior dimensions, but better legroom, shoulder room, hip room, a V8 engine, and a trunk lid. It sold, with Fordomatic, for $21,500, inflation adjusted.
  • Lorenzo They won't be sold just in Beverly Hills - there's a Nieman-Marcus in nearly every big city. When they're finally junked, the transfer case will be first to be salvaged, since it'll be unused.
  • Ltcmgm78 Just what we need to do: add more EVs that require a charging station! We own a Volt. We charge at home. We bought the Volt off-lease. We're retired and can do all our daily errands without burning any gasoline. For us this works, but we no longer have a work commute.
  • Michael S6 Given the choice between the Hornet R/T and the Alfa, I'd pick an Uber.
  • Michael S6 Nissan seems to be doing well at the low end of the market with their small cars and cuv. Competitiveness evaporates as you move up to larger size cars and suvs.
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