Build dates vs ship dates

[Mike Sal]

I've been sifting thru all the paperwork which came with my RQA 0330 1970 car. It's been fun learning the former owner's facination with the Avanti brand over the years. I have letters from Avanti Motors from 1974, 1975, 1979, 1983, and 1989....every time Art was thinking about buying another car. The sales guy, Charles Solliday, must have shook his head every time he saw Art's name on a letter.

in '79, Art came very close to trading RQA 0330 for a in a used '76 Avanti. I have the Avanti sales contracts which he filled out & signed, but must have got cold feet & didn't go thru with the deal. When Mr. Solliday sent Art the pricing information, he included a copy of the original build sheet for 0330.

The "date written" was typed 03 January, 1969. The "factory order No." has the date "Sept 1969" written in, and the "date shipped" box has 24 April, 1972 written in. The "destination" has "Ben Yokom" written in (the original owner).

Why would there have been such a lag between the build date and the ship date? This car is Monterey Green with a Green/ Souffle Cream interior with a "bright" Bigelow Lime green carpet. Is it possible that after the car was built, someone else got cold feet & didn't want it so it sat unsold for a while??

thanks,

Mike S

[Gunslinger]

Such a gap between build and shipping dates are not unknown with Avanti Motors. They built cars two ways...special order for a specific customer and on spec to inventory so cars were available for impulse sales or someone who didn't want to wait. It also wasn't unknown for Nate Altman to have an inventory car repainted as to sell it to someone who wanted a specific color. I've also heard that a couple of times cars that sat unsold for a couple of years were retitled and sold as a later year...how true that is I don't know.

A specific car could also have been designated as a demonstrator and sold later with some miles on it. There were also some Avanti dealers who kept cars in inventory and who knows how long it took some of them to sell?

Nate Altman supposedly kept files on every person who showed interest in an Avanti and their correspondence. At some point a large portion...up to maybe half...of all new Avanti sales went to established customers who wanted another Avanti or was trading their present car in.

[Mike Sal]

The build date on my B pillar is September '69, so that agrees with the build sheet.

The letters from Mr. Solliday included reprints from current magazines which did articles on the avanti and the company sales brochures.