1969 Pace car information

[MotownMadman]

According to the answers I have received to the very same question, provided to me by some well placed at the time GM executives, there was enough interest in house between actual GM employees who were provided cars, and the upper management at the dealerships, that these cars were produced with one of the main reasons of employees who liked the style and color scheme who did not want to have to deal with the cold in winter as well as the leaks in summer, combined with the year round wind noise and flapping provided by the canvas of the convertible. At the same time the marketing and advertising people figured that if enough employees would drive the Camaro hard top with the pace car colors it would add public interest to the pace car, in which it would be a great deal more then if the employees were not driving a Camaro at all. We have to remember that many of the employees who qualified for a company car were married family men with kids, the Camaro was not the optimum car for that duty, add the aggravation that can come with a drop top and all of a sudden the pace car would have received limited exposure from the employee driven area. Who better to be involved with the marketing or sales of a car then the people who were actually driving them, vs not driving them at all or being less then 100% pleased with the non practical problems associated with a drop top. I would guess that many a pace car had been sold after John Q Public saw the catchey color scheme on a Z10, only to arrive at the dealer to find none available, but the same colors and more styling options available on the spot with the pace car. This was opposite of a situation of seeing one thing advertised then to be dissapointed that what was advertised was sold out and have to settle for a lesser model. In this case the opposite was true, expect one model from the memories of those you have seen, only to find out you had to settle for a better model instead. Pretty tricky marketing all while keeping the employees happy. And they say that Ford has a better idea....HaH!
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