New car prices before the Internet
05/26/2023
Of course, 50 or more years ago there was no internet. If you wanted to find out the price of a new car, you could go to the nearest authorized dealer or even the importer. But if you wanted to compare the prices of different vehicles, you had to rely on compendiums that listed the individual prices. The Automobil Revue did this in its catalog, for example, but there were also much more compact and less expensive price overviews.
In the fifties and sixties, the "Motor Reporter" was published in Switzerland. For 1.50 francs you could buy a small booklet in A5 format with around 30 to 50 pages. In addition to the price overviews, the individual issues always featured editorial content, be it new releases or concept cars. And, in addition to the prices for cars, there were also prices for mopeds, trucks and tractors. An entertaining thing.
We have put together some sample pages, e.g. 1955 with vehicles from Nash to Wolseley and Rootes vehicles separately.
The 1960 edition shows the various Autobianchi models, as well as cars from BMW, Borgward and Citroën/Panhard.
And a double-page spread from 1961 shows the prices for Ford, Goggomobil, Lancia and Maserati, for example.
Zwischengas readers don't have to run to the nearest flea market to research new car prices from back then. There is a special new car price search that points to pages in the magazine archive with price tables.
