This weekend, I dragged Michelle out to the Men’s Luxury Toy Expo at the University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale. We went AFTER I mudded the kitchen ceiling, of course. I had expected at least some techie geek stuff and maybe a few more supercars, but it was OK. It was also smaller than I expected. We made it through everything in about an hour or so. Here’s some of what we saw.
The “affordable” supercar
That’s the Mulsanne GTM, unless I’m mistaken, and it looks like one hell of a car. The “booth” was really just a table with a guest registry on it, so I’m left with Google searching to find out more about it. It seems Factory Five developed this kit that’ll run you around $20,000 or so and gives you most of what you need to build the car. You’ll still need to buy the engine and some other key ingredients and you’ve gotta put it together yourself. Still, not bad for the price. Here’s a bit of what they have to say about it:
The GTM is an all-new American V-8 powered, mid-engined, original design with a stunningly beautiful hand-crafted composite body shell and a computer designed steel tube frame chassis. It is a fantasy Supercar engineered to be affordable and bring the dream of owning such a car to people whose talents and craftsmanship outrun their bank accounts.
Rent a super car
One of the first things we saw upon entering the expo was this beautiful Lotus Elise that Status Toy Rentals wants you to rent. The price isn’t really all that bad, at about $400 for a 24 hour rental. I thought it was going to be a lot more. More importantly, they have a Ferrari F355 Spider with my name on it for $795 for 24 hours. The rental policies on the site state that “The vehicles may not be used: To carry persons or property for hire”. Does this mean prostitutes? Kind of an odd policy. They also disclose that they reserve the right to remotely disable and retrieve their vehicle if you take it outside the allowed areas or near, say, a race track. Now that’s a smart policy.
Spas, pool tables, trucks, choppers, coaches, and everything else
The event didn’t have JUST cars. There were also a lot of spas, pool tables, big trucks, huge coaches and buses, million dollar boats, and various other items. There were also several booths offering prizes like vacations and tickets, but you have to fill out a form which will undoubtedly land your name on several call and email lists, so I stayed away from those. All said, it was almost worth my $9, but I don’t think I’ll be going next year unless they do something drastic to enhance their vendor list. Throw some tech toys in there for starters.
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