“Let’s see how much free stuff we can get at the LA Auto Show!” That’s what my best friend and I used to always say once November comes around. Every year as a kid, I used to go with my friend and his Dad to check out the huge automotive spectacle that takes place at the Los Angeles Convention Center.
We’d go around the floor looking at all types of cars and claim which one we’d be driving when we get older. We’d collect every single auto brochure and I mean literally every single one because I’d go home, go find mom, catch her while she’s yelling at dad about how he turns the A/C on all the time, and tell her about the sickest Chrysler Town & Country minivan I saw at the show (because it had TV’s in the back seat). We’d spend hours looking through the brochures inside our fort that we built because sleepovers were the thing to do.
Well now that we’re grown up and busy with our lives, it seems like no one really goes to the show anymore, but I still do. Although it’s an older car now, I’m driving a car that was once roped off in the BMW section and had all the automotive writers raving about the debut of this amazing machine – just like this year’s F82 M4 GTS.
Swag and giveaways at the auto shows have changed. It’s not just brochures and lame Bic pen giveaways anymore. Well, most of the items are pretty lame still, but now you need to sign up for newsletters or get connected to social media. Understandable. I tried waiting in line for a free flashlight that Honda was giving away, but they made me and my cousin wait in line to shoot a cloud ring gun into the sky towards a huge panoramic screen in the middle of the showroom where everyone would see a picture of me and him. We said f*ck the flashlight.
Here are some of the shots we took. Mostly tried to grab the notables. Sorry to all the basic economy sedan-seekers. Check out Car and Driver for that kind of stuff. Let’s start at BMW…
