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Thanks very much …It’s been fun, and, I’LL GET BACK WITH IT!!

Drawing in new members is probably more effectively accomplished when Avanti owners take their cars to shows or just park them in the driveway to allow the public to become familiar with the car. When owners sell an Avanti, telling the new owner about the AOAI also plants the membership seed. As with other vintage car clubs I belong to, owners are aging out and younger car enthusiasts are not replacing them. Hence the membership decline. Look at pictures taken at any Avanti gathering. All you see are old people. When I started attending local Avanti events back in the 1970s, most of the attendees were about my age - people like Ed Reynolds and John Meyer. Now, I'm almost 50 years older and most of the people I met at the recent Palm Springs event were about my age. We're an aging group and need to make the Avanti relevant to a younger population.

MFG, the Trivia sub-forum was a great idea and keeps folks checking back frequently. Ideally, after they check Trivia, they scroll through a few other sub-forums to see what's new. We had a trivia quiz at the recent Palm Springs Avanti meet. I should post some of the questions.

Sorry Ron. I don't use the other site,,, just the Avanti stuff.

I’m not sure if this is a good idea or not. I’m definitely a dinosaur when it comes to computers. However, I do compliment you for attempting to advance the AOAI. I tried to do the same several years ago by starting the ‘Avanti Trivia’ section… which turned out to be a moderate success! Before trivia started up, this forum was lucky to get one or two posts a week.. and that was on a GOOD week! So, best of luck with your AOAI club endeavors…. Good group of people here!…. Ed

My thoughts would be to move it to the AOAI main website. There is a long game here. It's not just about car and parts sales, it's about bringing new members into the organization which is desperately needed. Facebook / Instagram will be one tool. The other is to educate car owners about the Avanti Automobile through those platforms and the website. I'm willing to spend my own money on Facebook ads to promote these sites and get some new people interested.

So the For Sale section disappears? What replaces it?

The forums would lose the Cars for Sale section. The fee would only be for sellers that are not members. The fee would make them members to sell the car(s). The fee would go to supporting the AOAI organization.

If you are an AOAI member, then there wouldn't be any cost. The fee would be for non members.

If I had to pay to be on this ''For Sale ''section, I would likely opt out. Yes, I bought 2 vehicles off of the site , but I seem to be the exception rather than the rule, How many Avanti owners would do the same? Unknown.

Regardless of where the suggested page would be posted, it duplicates an existing "Cars for Sale" AOAI forum feature and monetizes the process. Having two features doing the same thing (one free, one pay a fee) on the AOAI site makes no sense to me. Dropping the free sale forum and adding a pay as you go feature is an idea, just not a good one.

Yes, I agree. In a few conversations that I have had with those who listed their cars in the AOAI magazine and this forum, they were successful in selling their car without going to Facebook or a dealer. My thoughts are that AOAI members are a focused group of individuals who either are interested in their next car or may know someone who is interested, so it makes sense for anyone who wants to sell their car to offer it in this environment. My recent experience with selling the 89 thru Gateway Classic cars was that there were many interested calls from lookers or potential buyers who didn't know what an Avanti was. The gentleman who bought the car didn't know either, his wife just loved the look.

The goal would be to create the selling page on the AOAI website, not this Forum.

I feel this idea goes beyond the scope of the Avanti forum. There are already numerous established venues available for selling an Avanti. Turning it into a business venture and monetizing a "Cars for Sale" aspect that already exists on the forum is a step backward.

People who buy and sell vehicles regularly will be sensitive to the cost of a listing. Widows and/or geezers like me who are just considering thinning out their herd of vehicles won't care much about whether the fee is $25 or $100 -- they just want to get rid of the car.

KISS Method. Me personally I've bought 2 Avanti's right off this sites "For Sale" section. It's cost the Sellers $0.oo. Take that as You will. The 2 Avantis are the 2002 and the 1973 (which is listed now). On a different front I'm on a (semi) popular Porsche 928 site... I've had the same car up "For Sale" 2 separate times.. Both times there have been ''lookers'' (35-40 views) but I've never had so much as a comment or question..So why would I use such a source of that manner to sell an item? From a Buyers point of view, It's an easy way to find a good priced vehicle... since no one else reacts to the ad's. I suspect the same happens here.. No serious lookers.. But I really don't know that to be true. Seems research needs to be done to track effectiveness.

Selling an Avanti can be challenging for many and sometimes an interested buyer never sees a car that is for sale. Since these cars are being sold through fragmented methods throughout the country, one thought is to create a marketplace connected to the AOAI website (not forums) to bring sellers and buyers together to facilitate the selling and purchase of these cars. While this would take quite a bit of effort and time to get started, it could end up benefitting all concerned. Besides the back-end programming of the website, we would need to contact anyone who is selling an Avanti and encourage them to list their car with AOAI. This includes individuals, used car dealers and national classic car dealers. A thought to go along with this is to charge a nominal fee for the listing. Just thinking out loud this could be a simple $25 fee paid to AOAI as a basic 12-month sales membership for a single car sale, or a higher $$ multicar fee for a dealer who could list as many Avanti's as he had for sale over a period of a year. These low-cost memberships would keep AOAI as a non-profit automobile club yet provide some income to offset the ever-rising cost of doing business. In addition, what if some of you were interested in becoming a paid expert advisor for a buyer who is looking at a car but needs help due to a lack of knowledge? The advisor would charge a fee to discuss the vehicles condition, review photos and make suggestions as to what the buyer should do next. On the reverse side, a seller could ask the advisor for help as well. The advisor would have a profile on the site with fees advertised and the ability to take internet payments such as Zelle, Venmo, Cash App, etc. I am interested in positive thoughts and comments from you about how this could work in your mind and ideas not mentioned here. I know all about the amount of work and time that this would take and about the number of sellers who wouldn't want to spend the time or money to participate. So please, if this is not of any interest to you, then thanks for reading. One more thing to support this. I have worked for nearly 18 months trying to locate the owners of 2001-2007 Avanti's. In this journey, I have personally contacted every owner of these cars that we have found and had really good communication with them by phone or email. The last 2 that I found this year are widows who own these cars and would like to sell them. I mentioned the AOAI magazine and how they could use it to advertise their car for up to a year for free by joining AOAI for a year. Or they can pay AOAI $30 plus $15 a photo to list the car in the magazine for 2 issues. (this was the pricing that Lew provided on my inquiry). Within a couple of weeks, the 2 women became members. It seems to me that this is an opportunity here.

Nice solution/bracket. Thanks, --Dwight

Yes I believe it is. At some point the factory changed the wheel rims to Mustang Cobra ones. Also in the same book there is a photo of what I believe must be mine in Cancun being color sanded. The photo depicts it as a 2007 but I think that is an error.

Here is your car with Jeff Grohs at the factory! It's also on the "Avanti's 2000s" Facebook page.

I recently installed 51r in mine, was able to use factory mounting points, I made a bracket for across the top out of aluminum it has abit of a twist at the end to accept the hooked end of the hold down which angles down to factory reinforced hole in fender. Other than having to turn a few more threads on factory verticle hold down post no modification to car is needed.

Excellent review Ron of the development of the Mustang based Avantis. To confirm what you stated, John Hull's book "Avanti the Complete Story" shows several 2006 Avantis, some in prime coat, loaded on a transport destined for Mexico. I'm quite sure my 2006 coupe #4006 was one of them.

(Oh lord)

Thanks to all who responded! that is some important info that I was looking for!!!

Dwight… you are, of course, correct here. Grade school English really. It’s sad when technology replaces common sense!