How do you sell a $250,000 car in North Hills? With all the attitude you can muster, which is what Galpin Motors has done for its new Aston Martin showroom, complete with a living room, fully stocked bar, even its own, private back-door where the theme from James Bond plays while customers climb the flight of stairs to the showroom entrance. “We needed a reason to come to the dealership and to do that, we had to have something that would wow a Steven Spielberg who’s seen it all,” said Beau Boeckmann, Galpin vice president who designed the showroom concept with help from several designers and his mom, Jane Boeckmann. The showroom opens officially this month, although Galpin has been using it for the past several months and during that time sold 20 Aston Martins, more than it sold in more than two years since it acquired the franchise. With less than 2,000 Aston Martins produced last year and only 900 shipped to the U.S., it would hardly seem worth it to construct a $2 million showroom specifically for the marquee. But the Aston Martin isn’t just any car. In a class with the Ferrari and Bentley, the British-made sports car is affordable only to an elite few, ruling out traditional advertising like television commercials, which are priced for reaching a broad market. The top of the line model, the Vanquish S, boasts a 12-cylinder 550 horsepower engine that will go from zero to 60 in about 4.2 seconds. The DB9, starting at a mere $160,000, with 450 hp, gets off the line to 60 mph in 4.7 seconds. The cars have paddles along the steering wheel for shifting (think Nascar racers), doors that lift upward and, because they are virtually made by hand, can be custom painted or otherwise outfitted to match just about anything (think your favorite cognac or tie), and they often are. Wooing prospective buyers for cars such as these takes more than a garden variety sales pitch just feel this leather just won’t do. In Europe, Aston Martin showrooms are typically found on the same boulevards that house Gucci and Chanel. In L.A., Galpin’s only local competitor is in Beverly Hills. The other reason, perhaps more important, is that Aston Martin is getting ready to introduce a new model, the V8 Vantage, which, at a starting sticker of about $115,000, will bring the carmaker into a competitive arena with the Porsche 911 and more than double its production capacity. Galpin hopes to capitalize on those potential sales as well. “When a brand like Aston Martin gets picked up by a major manufacturer like Ford, Ford wants to maintain that exclusive brand image, but make it somewhat more of a volume player,” said Chris Denove, a partner at JD Power & Associates. “So now, rather than jump from $70,000 to $180,000, there will be a vehicle in the $100,000 range.” Staying exclusive Ford may be anxious to capitalize on the Aston Martin, but the carmaker has been careful to make sure the brand retains its exclusivity, something Denove and others point out is essential. Luxury brands like Mercedes and Jaguar as they have become far more commonplace, have lost their cache and turned off customers who can afford to move into the next tier. Those wealthy enough for membership in Club Aston will arrive by appointment, through a door they can access with their membership card or a gizmo that will read their thumb print if they’ve so arranged. They can sit at the bar choosing exterior and interior colors, dashboard materials, even roof fabric, from a variety of swatches while they sip a martini (presumably shaken, not stirred the Aston Martin being 007’s car of choice for so many years). The selections can be entered into a computer and projected onto a large screen TV to see how it all looks when put together, and Galpin can even print out a poster of the finished product. One model, the DB9, is featured on a revolving platform, much like the kind used at car shows to display flashy new prototype cars. Another flick of a computer switch will set it in motion, complete with a light show and background music. Test drives Beyond that centerpiece is a door constructed to look like a bank vault. The room inside houses the top of the line model and it leads out to a driveway so the car can be taken for a test drive, though it’s just as likely that someone will drive the car out to the buyer’s home for a spin. Boeckmann worked with several designers before meeting Eddie Sotto, who has worked on some of Disney’s theme park attractions, on a plane ride back from England. Along with Boeckmann, his mother, and another designer, Ann Motocane, the new showroom began to take shape. “The first thing a VIP wants is privacy,” said Boeckmann. “The VIP always goes in the back door, so I said, let’s start with a back entrance and build everything around that.” The showroom is actually situated atop the facility that houses Jaguar and Lincoln, but a visitor could spend hours in the Aston Martin space without ever passing through the other displays. So far, the showroom is doing just what Galpin had hoped. “We had our first billionaire come in, and he walked over and said, ‘you guys have a vault. What’s in there?'” Boeckmann said. “The sales manager answered, ‘Your car of course.’ Here’s this guy worth more money than anything, and he was just having fun. This should be a fun experience to go through.”
