(first posted 3/24/2011) Here it is, the supreme formula that took the American market by storm. It started out very modestly; some 68k Cutlass Supreme coupes were sold in 1970. Nine years later, Olds would crank out almost a half million of them. How to explain it? Like many winning formulas, it’s hard to break it down to its components perfectly, because “luck”, “trends” and “fad” are not so easy to quantify. But let’s take a stab at it.
1970 marked a significant new point of departure in the mid-size coupe market. The long run of the sporty mid-size coupe was running out of compression, as we documented in the 1970 Cutlass S CC. But the real origins of this new era can be credited to the pioneering 1965 Ford LTD, which ushered in affordable luxury and launched the Great Brougham Epoch. The influence of the LTD was near-instantaneous, but it wasn’t until about 1970 that it really started to take off.
The reasons are numerous: the performance golden age fell on the sword of its own decadence (high insurance, social and political backlash) and rapidly tightening emission controls. In 1973, OPEC administered the assisted suicide in the form of spiraling gas prices.
But those were only the more technical factors. The whole socio-political climate went through its biggest convulsion ever between about 1968 and the late seventies. The Vietnam War was the biggest catalyst by far; Watergate, a new regulatory fever, environmental awareness and a general spirit of change, any change – good or bad – was in the air. Lots of younger folks think the sixties was the decade of change, but in terms of actual social, political and regulatory change, the seventies were the zenith or nadir, depending on your perspective and the specific issues. The seventies were the reverberations of the sixties’ vibrations.
And the ’65 Ford LTD was either the prescient prophet or dumb luck gamble, in terms of the car market. Change is intrinsically stressful, except perhaps for those instigating it. To isolate and soothe one’s jangled nerves from all the craziness, folks were drawn powerfully to the idea of a RR-quiet cocoon. And they were getting older, more status conscious, and married, with kids. The clapped-out ’63 Chevy II with a semi-race 327, near-straight pipes and Traction Masters wasn’t cutting it anymore with she-who-must-be-obeyed.
(what’s that on the passenger seat?)
The LTD may have been the St. John the Baptist of the mid-size affordable-luxury coupe decade, but it was St. John DeLorean who really ushered it in with the 1969 Grand Prix. He reincarnated the now-tired formula of the full-size luxury coupe into a medium-sized one, by taking the new-for 1968 coupe A-Body and extending the wheelbase in front of the cowl by six inches. Thus the G-Body was created, and as a consolation, Chevy got to use it too, for its 1970 Monte Carlo.
Olds was left out of the G-Body party, but crafted its own clever solution: it grafted the G-Body’s formal coupe line and rear to the Cutlass A-Body front, creating a hybrid of the two. Here are all four of them:
That extended front wheels/nose is quite apparent in the GP (top) and MC (second). And the GP/MC C-panel and tail, with a distinct break between the roof line and trunk is also quite apparent. Buick (bottom) stayed with the conventional sporty coupe body at its peril. It may have been the key decision as to why the Skylark gave way for the Cutlass’ Supremacy in the mid-price market.
Looking at sales stats from the 1970 – 1984 years, the peak personal coupe years, tells quite a tale. The GP had a strong start in 1969 with 112k units, quadrupling sales over its pudgy predecessor. It had its first peak in 1973 (154k), dipped again after the energy crisis, and enjoyed its best years from ’76 through ’79, when it topped 200k, peaking at 288k in 1975.
The Monte Carlo started strong in 1970 (146k), and built up quite steadily, cresting at 410k in 1977, a banner year, before its protracted decline.
Buick sales are hard to break out, because the distinct Regal Coupe didn’t arrive until 1974. The Regal started slowly (58k) that year, built up progressively until its peak in 1979, with 273 k units.
And the Cutlass Supreme Coupe also started modestly in 1970 (68k), and didn’t really begin to take off until the new 1973 Colonnade body style (220k). But by 1976, it crested the 300,000 mark (326k), and kept right on going, all the way to 471k in 1979, its all-time peak.
Its secret sauce? Well, we’re getting ahead of ourselves a bit; we’re still in 1970, for now. Need to save something for the next few chapters of the CCCCC. But the basic ingredients are all here in this first year Cutlass Supreme Holiday Hardtop Coupe. Let’s just say there’s something to the idea of a safe, golden middle: the GP was bold and dramatic; maybe too much so. And Pontiac quality fell disproportionally in the seventies. The Regal missed the first boat, and never quite caught up. The Monte Carlo? Well, ultimately, it was still a Chevy. The Olds: none of the above. Or is that not giving it enough credit?
I think that the allure of the Olds name still held great sway at this time, and the concept of one at an “affordable” price was too strong to resist for many. This was also why the downsized 1977-79 T-Birds sold so well. Never mind that in both cases it led to brand dilution in the long run. Even someone like myself who realizes the under-the-skin similarity of all these A-G cars, would have bought a Cutlass at this time. It was the safe choice. The popularity of it ensured the best value in terms of perceived prestige and resale value. Ah Yes, the resale. In the inflation plagued late 70s, it was possible to buy a Cutlass Supreme, drive it for 2 years and get what you paid for it when you sold it.Possibly the only other marque to pull this off was MB.
I always liked the looks of the Olds the best…something about the way everything synced up was just…harmonious…
Buddy of mine in high school drove one…in 2002. And it looked great and held together so well over the years, that I still want one, especially with “just” a 350.
Now it’s time for the good stuff.
Call me crazy but I always liked the Grand Prix best. And that’s the only generation that I can say that for.
The 1970 Cutlass Supreme was a case of making lemonade out of lemons. GM had denied Olds its version of the Chevrolet Monte Carlo and Pontiac Grand Prix, just as it had denied Olds a version of the Camaro/Firebird.
So Olds took the Cutlass and added a formal roofline and marketed it heavily. Cutlass sales began increasing during the early 1970s. Even more importantly, while Pontiac and Chevrolet divided their intermediate sales between the “regular” intermediates and the personal luxury coupe, all of the Olds intermediates were grouped under the Cutlass nameplate, boosting sales of that one model and making it seem even more popular. Everyone wants to drive a winner, and by the mid-1970s, the Cutlass was the number-one selling passenger car in the country.
Oldsmobile carried this too far in the 1980s, when it added the “Cutlass” prefix to the Ciera and Calais, thus diluting its impact and leaving customers confused as to what, exactly, a Cutlass was supposed to be.
It’s important to remember that Olds, in general, was on a roll in the 1970s. Its success wasn’t built solely on the Cutlass.
The Delta 88 and Ninety-Eight were extremely popular after the market recovered from the first fuel crunch. Sales of the downsized versions of those cars went even higher. If I recally correctly, by 1979, the Delta 88 was the second-best selling full-size car on the market – behind the Chevrolet Impala/Caprice, but ahead of the Ford LTD! Even the Toronado garnered increased sales after its 1971 redesign, and the downsized 1979 model scored with customers.
During the late 1970s and early 1980s, GM’s brand structure still meant something, despite the Omega/Skylark and Starfire/Skyhawk. People still viewed an intermediate or full-size Olds or Buick as a step up from a Chevrolet or Pontiac. And during most of the decade, the intermediate and full-size offerings from those marques did have better quality than their corporate siblings, or the Ford and Chrysler competition.
Oldsmobile had a very good quality reputation by the early 1970s (as did Buick). That, along with the styling, which managed to seem tailored without being overdone, helped propel the brand to the number-three slot by 1972. It also helped that the Olds muscle cars never had quite the impact that the Pontiac GTO, Plymouth Road Runner or Dodge Charger and Coronet R/T did in the 1960s. Olds thus never had to shake off a “juvenile racer” image that went with the muscle cars. Pontiac, Plymouth and Dodge didn’t fare too well throughout most of the 1970s.
GM, of course, was doing everything it could to destroy this.
GM, of course, was doing everything it could to destroy this.
Abso-effing-lutely. A few weeks ago my lady asked me why the Oldsmobile Alero seemed still so popular in our little city of 20,000. I told her the answer was simple, it’s much nice than a Grand Am of the same vintage. She then related the story of a guy she had known back when Oldsmobile was on its last legs who replaced a totaled Alero with… an Alero. GM had a good thing going even toward the end, but hey let’s kill the oldest brand in America.
Right up to Oldsmobile’s last year, there were a ton of Aleros in my area and there are still many around today. They sold quite well here in the Quad Cities, even after the announcement that Olds was toast. There were a bunch of Eighty Eights sold here too. I’m madder at Oldsmobile being axed than Pontiac, Plymouth or Saturn, for that matter.
You’re in good company; Chrysler engineer Pete Hagenbuch had this to say: “… those idiots at General Motors just dropped the g-d name. I’m still pissed at them, I’ll never get used to that one.”
Many of those Aleros were likely “program cars”. The rental lots were full of them.
I don’t think that it makes sense to have three Camaros or three Grand Prixs. As far as it goes, two Camaros made no sense either. I guess my thinking at the time was that Chevy had the Monte Carlo, Pontiac the Grand Prix, Olds the Toronado, Buick the Riviera and Cadillac the Eldorado. The cars are in three basic price ranges and were all personal coupes.
I don’t understand why Olds was dumped when it was, except that they were not selling all that well with quite a number of product lines. Buick had half as many products and sold better. But all of Olds’s products were on the same platform as other GM products, so cost of building is minimal.
I think that of the four the Cutlass works best. Simple, understated styling, yet clearly recognizable as a Oldsmobile from every angle. And it really was an Oldsmobile–still had a Rocket under the hood. I like the two shorter wheelbase cars the best, but the Olds’ styling seems like a natural progression from the youth market of the 1960s.
Buick may have held steady because they had just reskinned the Skylark for 1970, cleaning the car up considerably from the rather bizarre styling of 1968-69, and they may have felt that they had get some more return out of the tooling.
But, to be honest, I like all four.
+1 on the Alero. It’s years since production stopped, and I still see lots of them tooling around Metro New Orleans.
I often wonder if interbrand jealousy killed Olds. Around that time, GM was shovelling money into Cadillac, blowing smoke about building Caddy into a Jack-the-giant-import-killer and fighting the German brands on their own turf (remember that?), and here was Olds with the Aurora and its V8, building momentum on a shoestring by compari-son . The Aurora V8 even had its own racing series. Otherwise, it seemed odd to kill Olds while retaining Buick.
That’s an interesting take, but didn’t Buick sell much better than Olds in the late 90s – early 00s? It seemed to be the default choice for older folks if they had to pick between the two. So maybe sales numbers were the big reason for the decision to kill Olds? I love both equally and would have needed Solomon to make that call.
If GM killed Buick instead, it would’ve been awkward in China, where the Buick brand is well entrenched.
My mother was fond of that generation Cutlass, but I suspect Dad nixed that, for reasons unknown. Grandpa was a GM buyer (Cadillac), maybe that had something to do with it.
Well China can stuff it. Or to be PC/diplomatic GM could simply just throw a Buick badge on any old car they’ve got lying around and sell it to them, it’s not like GM isn’t doing that anyway with Buick’s thinly veiled Opel lineup.
I wonder what it actually costs GM to have divisions now a days, it’s not like the good old days where development budgets were spread out to each division for engine, driveline, chassis component, styling and marketing departments, it hasn’t been that way in decades. Maybe I’m just cynical but I can’t help but see the elimination of divisions like Olds and Pontiac as mere pawns to show the stockholders and/or the American public that “something is being done to fix problem X and eliminating brand X is the right step forward”. Killing off Oldsmobile didn’t save GM from bankruptcy, I’m not even sure it helped stave it off.
You raise an interesting point. I’m not sure what the specific laws are in the US, but generally speaking if you don’t use a trademark for a certain period of time, you lose the ‘ownership’ of it. Not that China necessarily respects these laws, particularly for the domestic market, but some of these discontinued brands would be on the radar of the trademark equivalent of patent trawlers.
I think that rule applies in the States as well, for according to Wikipedia, Chevron retains the “Standard” logo on a handful of its stations in order to sustain trademark rights.
Chevron was originally Std. Oil of Calif., a legacy of the antitrust action against Rockefeller. BTW, Chevron merged with Texaco not long ago, so there is no difference between their fuels anymore.
That is the reason Oldsmobile.com is still an active website.
GM had the largest marketing budget of anyone, but spent the least amount of $$$ per model. A big reason Oldsmobile and Pontiac failed was because GM couldn’t simply afford to market them properly.
There were also over-dealered, Oldsmobile had something like 3 times as many dealers as Toyota for a fraction of the sales. Shutting down Olds actually cost GM an immense amount of money due to strange laws that required GM to buy back the franchise.
Of course there may have been creative ways to solve these problems that didn’t involve shutting down ‘divisions’, but GM had 25 years to figure out their branding issues and never really did.
It actually cost under a Billion to close out Oldsmobile. The bankruptcy allowed them to closed down the rest at no cost, or at least at minimal cost.
What exactly would be the point of having 5 versions of the same car, like we had with the Cimarron?
Nice 84-87 Cutlass ad on the pass. seat.
Very informative comparison of the four GM mid-sizers! It’s always interesting to highlight Oldsmobile’s spectacular rise and sad fall. Also, the 4-up comparison makes me wonder what Cadillac would have done with the A/G platform — I’m sure it was considered even though they ultimately used the Nova (X) to create the Seville.
I’ve seen an early corporate rendering of the Collonades in an old Collectable Automobile mag that had A body coupes including Cadillac. It was a pretty rudimentary sketch, but shows there was some thought about it.
In the summer of 1972, my mother decided that it was time to replace the trusty 64 Cutlass. The 64 had been such a good car, so there was no question that it would be replaced by a 72 Cutlass (much to the chagrin of a 13 year old kid smitten with the new Gran Torino). I spent a lot of time sitting in 1972 Oldsmobiles that summer while mom looked and dickered. I tried to get her into the Viking Blue Cutlass Supreme convertible on the showroom floor (with all white interior, of course) but she was too practical for this.
It was the end of the model year, so the pickings were starting to get slim. The salesman found a Pinehurst Green (light green) Cutlass Supreme 2 door hardtop with buckets, a console and air. The air conditioning was huge, as this was mom’s first car with a/c. The car also came with (gasp) power windows!
She only kept the car for 2 years. She had not figured out what a pain 2 doors are with a family of growing teenagers and their friends. I remember that the car had a feel of quality to it, although I still liked the 64 better. I do recall a couple of rattles that the dealer could never find. Otherwise, the car was trouble-free, and the 4 barrel 350 was pretty swift. The Olds engine had a unique sound, and the mufflers let a bit more exhaust burble out the back than a lot of other cars. The biggest gripe about it was that it was EXTREMELY light in the back. Not nearly as good in the snow as the 64. This was a trait that would continue into the next generation.
I consider the 70-72 Cutlass Supreme 2 doors as the best looking of all of the 68-72 GM intermediates. This car has almost flawless proportions and a perfect balance between lightness and heft. The car just looked right. Of all of them, I liked the 72 the best.
Great story thank you for sharing. Do you own the C/S in the photos above? I spotted the car in springfield oregon, and never got to talk with the owner. I don’t know what ever happened to it.
I am still in shock after several years that olds and pontiac are no longer with us….that GM dumped them……like mercury dropped Johnny Cash….its like telling your own children to kiss off….really GM also killed the traditional caddies with their (lets go after the BMW Cars)…..I dont understand……why???
GM is too top heavy. You’ve got Chevy. And then a huge leap all the way to Buick. Any of the GM faithful looking for a brand more prestigious and refined than Chevy but with less of a blue-hair vibe than Buick is out of luck.
Olds and Buick were much the same thing – Buick was your grandmothers car and Oldsmobile was your grandfathers car. Grandpa probably did not have a blue hair rinse though.
“Oldsmobile was your grandfathers car.”
I wish I had my grandfather’s ’69 Cutlass S.
Amen. Car shopping with mom was a pain in 2011 – she was replacing her ’05 Bonneville GXP (3rd Bonneville in a row starting in ’94) I think the car she’d have gone with would have been a G8 (maybe GXP) but we were years too late for that. Chevy was a step down after the Pontiacs and the Buicks did nothing for her, Caddy was right out. Hmm, something sporty and reasonably quick, something like Pontiac used to sell.
She surprised me by buying a Camaro RS Convertible. My daughter was thrilled. Nice bright red like her ’63 Impala 409. How the woman has never gotten a speeding ticket I’ll never know.
A few corrections, the 1969 Pontiac Grand Prix introduced in the fall of 1968 didn’t start slowly – it took off like a rocket from introduction day, about 112,000 units were sold for the model year which was nearly 4 times the 32,000 GPs sold in 1968 – final year for the full-sized predecessor. In 1970, sales did drop to 66,000 units mainly due to the introduction of Chevy’s Monte Carlo and very little styling changes from ’69 (plus a much larger Chevrolet dealer network and advertising budget). Grand Prix’s sales peak of 288,000 units actually took place in 1977- final year for the colonnade design introduced in 1973 and just before the downsized ’78 model.
Buick’s Regal coupe actually debuted in 1973, not 1974. It was the top of the new intermediate line which was renamed from Skylark to Century. About 92,000 units were made and then for 1974, the Regal was expanded to include a 4-door sedan with an Landau package a new option for the coupe.
The reason that Oldsmobile was denied a request to offer the G-body of Grand Prix and Monte Carlo was the fact they already had a personal-luxury car – the front-drive and higher priced Toronado. And Olds’ request for an F-body was rejected due to the fact that it would cut into Camaro/Firebird sales – just as the corporation had previously rejected Pontiac’s request to build a 2-seat sports car because they felt there was not enough business in that market segment to split with the Corvette, so Pontiac then got the Firebird as a consolation prize.
Olds then decided to offer a Cutlass model that would compete not only with the GP and Monte, but also the Mercury Cougar – which had been Olds’ intent with their proposed F-body back in 1967. To keep the cost down, they would use the 112-inch Cutlass S body and chassis and graft the more formal roofline on it and simply call it the Cutlass Supreme for 1970 (a name in use since 1966) and sell it as part of the Cutlass line rather than as a separate series.
You’re right about ’69 GP sales; somehow I got that number wrong; fixed now. Thanks.
I guess the Cutlass family at that time, was an “escape machine” as these old ads mentionned. 😉
Guess I’m in the minority here, but I have always liked the 70-72 Monte Carlo styling the best. Without vinyl roof. Always worth a second look on the street, but it’s been a while since one has been around. But I’m likely to see one soon, due to the CC effect.
I must really be in the minority, because I like the Buick the best. Albeit in a GS Stage 1 convertible format.
The white Buick above is the ugliest I have ever seen. It really doesn’t look that bad!
Those Grand Prix are tricky on the eyes. As a kid I remember them being huge, as in the biggest coupes ever made. Loved them though for that long hood.
Many years later I read how they were actually downsized and while I believed that I thought it was more dimensionally than visually.
I saw a ’69 GP at a Cadillac event recently and it looked way smaller than I remember. A trick of the eye or age I don’t know. Maybe they looked small compared to the Cadillacs.
In any event I was more impressed than ever with the lines of that car and the size made it look fun to drive. That extra length in the wheelbase for the GP and Monte Carlo was brilliant.
The 69 Grand Prix was nearly a foot shorter than the 68. The wheelbase was 3 inches shorter. I think that the length decrease came more off the rear end than the hood.
New platform. As Paul notes, the 69 G body was an intermediate A body with more wheelbase up front. The 68 GP was a fullsize B body
1970 would be the beginning of what?
The Cutlass Supreme began in 1966 when GM introduced the 4 door hardtop versions of the “A” bodies. The following year, it was available as a coupe too.
That’s true, but it wasn’t until 1970 that the Cutlass Supreme really gained its own identity beyond being simply the plushest A-body Olds trim level. Sales of the Holiday coupe nearly tripled from ’69, so the new roof and more clearly defined image definitely made a difference.
The one to have was the ’70-’72 Cutlass Supreme SX, which basically got you all the 442 performance equipment in the Supreme. Very understated compared to most muscle cars of the era, and a great combination of luxury and performance.
Sounds like a well-kept secret.
The Cutlass Supreme SX was only offered in 1970 and 1971 and included the 455 from the 442 as standard equipment. The SX, because it was an option package and not a specific model, also permitted ordering a performance car equal to any 442 except the W30 without the hassle of insurance surcharges as was the case with the 442 – a specific model with its own VIN. As far as the insurance company was concerned, that SX was similar to a plain 350 Cutlass so you could get by with standard insurance rates without having to go to a Delta 88 just to get the big engine and avoid the surcharges.
The Supremes were by far the best looking of the 4 cars pictured. It’s not even close. My ’72 was a problem filled car from day one, but by 6/74, when I was getting ready to trade it in, it was pretty much bug free and reliable. I liked the red paint, too.
Out of curiosity, what problems did you have?
I think a grad student could do his/her thesis on why the Cutlass was so popular. As someone who had an new ’81 Cutlass, and would have bought a 76-77 if I had the money, it came down to this;
– Prestige. Olds ranked higher in the GM chain in those days, so it was perceived as a more prestigious, “higher quality” car. Was it? Well, as they were all cranked out of the same factories, probably not, but I still see Olds as being better built than the Chevy or Pontiac.
– Styling. The Cutlass just hit the right sweet spot in terms of luxury and sport. It was more luxurious than the Monte and Grand Prix – but sportier than the Regal. I happen to think a lot of the styling credit goes to the Super Stock III wheels – every GM brand had their own wheel design back in the day, but none were as clearly identifiable with their brand as the SS III – if you saw one you immediately knew it was an Olds.
– Momentum. Once sales started to take off, and you saw Cutlasses in most suburban driveways, it just led to more and more sales.
Looking back now, of the early 70s models pictured above, the Grand Prix looks the best. But as the get to the mid to latter 70s, I think the Cutlass was the best styled.
At that point in time the divisions still had their own plants. For one thing the volume was too great for them all to be built in one plant. The other thing was that there were way to many variations. It just wouldn’t have been practical for them to have all the parts for all the variations of all the models. Back then for example you could still get lots of interior colors so it would have meant that they needed to stock something like 25 or more of something as simple as a door panel or dash.
James Garner, Oldsmobile pilot. R.I.P.
i think it’s worth noting that while the personal coupe may seem to be a ridiculous concept in 2014, it made a lot of sense in the 1970s. The thinking back then was that four door cars were for families and two door cars were for single people. if you saw a single person with a four door car, the chances were that it was a hand me down from their parents. remember all midsize american cars comfortably carried five or six occupants back then. this was made much easier by bench seats and very wide doors. since few people actually wore seat belts before the late seventies, it was very easy for the front seat passenger to open their door, slide forward and let other passengers in or out of the car’s back seat. not only did single people prefer two door cars but families often had one family sedan or wagon for the wife and a coupe for the husband’s commute.
Young families also liked 2drs back before the days of child locks on rear doors and when kids just bounced around the back seat w/o being in car seats or even using seat belts. The though was that in all the fighting little Johnny might “accidentally” open the door and little Suzy would fall out when you went around a corner.
I don’t think the personal coupe would be a ridiculous concept in 2014. In fact if there was still such a bodystyle – especially if it was rear-drive and V8 powered, I’d prefer such a car over a ponycar such as Mustang or Camaro with their small and cramped rear seats and tiny trunks. I’d much prefer a ’74 or even ’84 Cutlass Supreme, Grand Prix, Monte Carlo, et.al. over any of the 2014 models you’d find today in new car showrooms. When I traded off my front-drive, V6 powered, unibody constructed and strut-suspended 2005 Buick LeSabre in 2013, I chose a 2009 Mercury Grand Marquis even though it is a 4-door sedan due to its V8 engine, rear-wheel-drive, full coil suspension and separate body-on-frame construction – in 2014 about the only such vehicles are pickup trucks or ponycars. Beats joining mindless hordes of drivers in dull and unstylish fad cars from European or Japanese companies (probably built in U.S. or Mexican plants) with gray interiors, black steering wheels, blackwall tires and rock-hard suspensions that ride and handle more like trucks than cars – some of them also requiring numerous trips to the repair shop (often the dealer) for wallet-busting repairs.
First off – you are right. The new “it” feature to have since pony cars was luxury. When pony cars started looking like kiddie cartoons, anyone over 25 looked for the next big thing, which was LUXURY! But not big-butt Marauders, Toronados and Rivieras, but pony cars showed America that smaller is funner, so adults wanted luxury in smaller cars. The look of the Mark III and GP became the thing, and the switch was on. Anyone caught styling a car with a fastback without a hatch, became a loser.
So Chrysler and AMC became losers with their sporty looking intermediates. The buying public wanted formal looks and padded rides.
The first generation MC was an excellent design. Tasteful and conservative, but still more elegant than a Chevelle. The GP was a Pontiac, ‘nuf said. Then there was Buick and Oldsmobile. Oldsmobile did this best. The Cutlass Supreme was elegant, a step above, attractive and affordable. They looked better than the Buick, hands down. No silly GP beak. It was the Oldsmobile Camcord a decade before either Camry or Accord.
Growing up in the Land of Olds, I saw that Chicago had a million Cutlass Supremes on the Tri-State, Eisenhower, Ryan, Edens and LSD. YUPPIES and aspiring YUPPIES drove them. Insurance salespeople, dentists and white collar managers bought Oldsmobiles like they were the latest album by Earth, Wind and Fire. When men drove them, they sprouted porn mustaches, gold chains and smelled like Jovan Musk. When ladies drove them, their hair feathered away from their faces and they smelled like, “Babe”. As a pre-teen, all this polyester, cocaine and quiche looked pretty dreadful.
Owns avocado green Cutlass Supreme