Wilkinson: "Pur Sang" = Pure Scam

Stephan Wilkinson
by Stephan Wilkinson

The VW/Audi Group, owners of both the Lamborghini and Bugatti boutique brands, have invented a lucrative niche market that could awkwardly but accurately be called, “I’m Rich but Not Stupid… Come to Think of It, I Am Stupid.” Exhibit A: the Lamborghini Reventón, a limited edition, moderately rebodied Murcielago LP640 that stickers for $1,440,000 (exactly 4.5 times a Mercy’s $320k Monroney). Exhibit B: the Bugatti Veyron Pur Sang. For $560k more than the $1,440,000 "base" Bug, you can get an unpainted body. I asked the best high-end bodyshop guy I know how much he’d charge if a Veyron owner on a budget asked him to strip their ride right down to the aluminum and carbon-fiber skin, polish the metal and shoot it with a layer of clearcoat. "Fifty grand," Mickey Bigg of Vails Gate, New York, estimated. “But I don’t wanna do it. Too much trouble.”

Stephan Wilkinson
Stephan Wilkinson

I'm the automotive editor of Conde Nast Traveler and a freelancer for a variety of other magazines as well. Go to amazon.com and read more about me than you ever wanted to know if you do a search for either of my current books, "The Gold-Plated Porsche" and "Man and Machine." Been a pilot since 1967 (single- and multi-engine land, single-engine sea, glider, instrument, Cessna Citation 500 type rating all on a commercial license) and I use the gold-plated Porsche, a much-modified and -lightened '83 911SC, as a track car.

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  • Virtual Insanity Virtual Insanity on Oct 30, 2007

    To each his own. In the case at hand, if you can afford to tac on an additional 500k to a Veyron, I'm fairly sure you could give two shits about what anyone thinks your car looks like, lol. At those prices, you can buy someone who thinks your car looks nice, and will tell you at every chance they can get.

  • Landcrusher Landcrusher on Oct 30, 2007

    Having sold airplanes to millionaires, you realize that when they decide to buy something a certain way (even when you have advised them against it) you just have to let them. They are big boys, and it's their money. So, if someone wants to pay to have all the CF weaves lined up and matched, then let's be happy for the guys who likely got paid extra to do it. If it's too much trouble to strip and cleat coat the car for 50k, is it still too much trouble at 100k? At some point, someone will take the job. They will get paid, wealth will be transferred, taxes collected, and capitalism will once again be verified as the best thing man ever invented.

  • Stephan Wilkinson Stephan Wilkinson on Oct 30, 2007

    Slow_Joe_Crow, the Bultaco is cool, but Bugatti did invent the term Pur Sang as applied to vehicles, way back in the 1930s, maybe even the '20s. Bultaco "borrowed" it...

  • Ryan Knuckles Ryan Knuckles on Oct 31, 2007

    I have to agree with Virtual Insanity on both comments.

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