THE BEST... TELLINGS OFF
CAR has been in trouble ever since it set its suitcase down. Born at a time when motoring mags were mere pawns of the industry establishment, CAR’s mantra was ‘if you’re not ruing feathers, you’re doing something wrong’. That, plus a mischievous streak that I’m afraid we just can’t help, has earned us a few tellings off in our time.
During the ’80s car manufacturers queued up to advertise to our growing audience, then queued up all over again to pull their advertising over what we said about their products. All the editors have fielded numerous shouty phone calls over the years – it’s the job.
McLaren’s Ron Dennis was perpetually cross with us. He raged about everything from our P1 scoop to Stephen Bayley’s assessment of his Italian shoe collection. He accused us of industrial espionage, and personally called Bauer Media’s CEO to demand the removal of editor McNamara. When the 12C flunked its first big test in 2011 the noises from Woking were so incandescent they could be heard in space.
Then of course there was the lawsuit handed to us by Rover back in 1999 after we acquired dozens of documents detailing faults with the new Freelander; the non-optional summons to Crewe to explain how we obtained secret pictures of the new Bentley Azure taken inside the factory; and the litigation threat by a major oil company over Jamie Kitman’s exposé of lead in petrol (they had warned us not to revisit a previous 300-word story, so we ran Kitman’s 3000-word follow-up).
CAR coverlines proved surprisingly productive in garnering weapons-grade bollockings, notably ‘Ford beats Ferrari’, ‘McLaren’s worst nightmare’ and ‘God told me to go to Mercedes’ – the latter from our Lewis Hamilton interview, which yielded a live overnight explosion from the F1 pitlane in Melbourne.
Then there was the mischief. Skoda was unamused when we sent Ben Whitworth to Vienna for the Mk2 Superb launch armed with a taxi roof light and magnetic taxi decals; Seat’s sense of humour ran out just after we conducted a group test of the A4-clone Exeo by sticking a foil Seat badge on an actual last-gen Audi; and Subaru spluttered in disbelief when we flew snapper Tom Salt 6000 miles to hide in a Japanese hedge for the one shot of the new Impreza they had refused to let us have.
So, if you ever meet editor Ben Miller or any of his dozen or so predecessors, speak up – they’re all deaf in one ear.