It's the dawn of ...

Well, that was interesting. I was driving with my wife yesterday and noticed a car ahead of me. It had a distinctive personalized license plate, and I had a brief moment of "wonder what that means?".  That was all.

Fast forward a few minutes and we've parked at a fancy grocery store, gotten our food, and were walking toward my car, which was at the far end of the parking lot. Directly between ourselves and the car was ... a new Rolls Royce Dawn. Parked so that it was in side view.

It got my attention because it's quite a large car but only seats two AND is a convertible. Hence the convertible soft-top is large. And that's what triggered my brain: "THAT'S a large top - what car is it? Hmmm, look at the bulky body. I bet that's the Rolls Royce Dawn.". 

So I invited my wife to peek in to see what an uber-car like the Dawn looks like inside. And then I moved to the front to show how the Spirit of Ecstacy hood ornament was retracted so as to resist thieves. Which is when I had "the surprise".

The surprise being - the front license plate. First off, there WAS one. California mandates front and year license plates but I'm surprised someone who could afford a Rolls Royce would care about the potential cost of a fix-it ticket enough to mar the front end of their motorcar. However the BIGGER surprise was that this license plate sported the same word as that one I'd spotted on the road some minutes earlier. AXAXA1 or someothing like that.

WHY was that a surprise? Because at no instant did my brain go "Hey, a Rolls Royce!" when I first spotted it on the rear of the car. Normally I immediately go "Oh, that's a whatever" when I see a car because cars are an interest of mine and I'm pretty familiar with the various models. But the Dawn drew ZERo recognition when I first noted it. All I noticed was the odd license plate. 

That's not great for Rolls Royce. When I see the rear of a Ferrari I know it's a Ferrari. When I see a Porsche I know it's a Porsche. And when I see a million dollar Pagani I know ... it's a Pagani. But the rear of the Dawn is so plain, so unobtrusive, that my brain registered nothing at all with regard to the car. Zero recognition.

I suppose if you're wanting to be stealthy, that's a good thing. But somehow, if I were to purchase a Rolls Royce, I think I'd want it to stand out a bit more that as an anonymous canvas on which to hang a license plate.