Category Archives: Full Throttle

Here’s how to get everyone to use signal lights
Full Throttle Jan 4, 2016

Overview

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Use: Media professionals looking to diversify their automotive readership with women authors who provide their views on a wide variety of topics.

What it is: Courtney Hansen, America’s favorite Garage Girl and the former host of The Learning Channel’s Overhaulin’ auto makeover show, a new-book author and the host of Spike TV’s weekend “Power Block,” has teamed up with Wheelbase Communications for this exclusive column. If you’re looking to build more regular readership and to bring more women into the pages of your print publication and Web pages with the help of a friendly and outgoing automotive celebrity, this bi-weekly column that alternates with our own Rhonda Wheeler is a must.

Product specifications

About 800-900 words; Word text file plus high-resolution art files for print and Web use.
Mac and PC layout with accompanying text and art files for maximum work flexibility.
High-resolution artwork suitable for print.
Coming soon! Multi-platform page layout that opens with either Quark Xpress or Adobe Indesign.

Description

It feels like the problem of people not using signal lights is actually getting worse and not better, but I have a way to fix it, once and for all. Make the fine $100,000. I’m only half joking. With $100,000 hanging in the balance of every lane change or turn, you would bet the problem with people not using their signals would come to an abrupt and full stop. Or, there would be no more need for state or federal tax. I figure the average trip to work for the average person would cost about $1.2 million plus the morning paper and coffee.

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What happens when the gas needle
and the ‘E’ collide?
Full Throttle Dec 28, 2015

Overview

Use: Media professionals looking to diversify their automotive readership with women authors who provide their views on a wide variety of topics.

Product specifications

About 800-900 words; Word text file plus high-resolution art files for print and Web use.
Mac and PC layout with accompanying text and art files for maximum work flexibility.
High-resolution artwork suitable for print.
Coming soon! Multi-platform page layout that opens with either Quark Xpress or Adobe Indesign.

Description

Perhaps it’s the drama that I fall for almost every time when the needle on the fuel gauge merges with the letter ‘E’. Yes, I’m one of THOSE people. Then the needle crosses the ‘E’ and we watch and wait, breathlessly, as the needle sinks lower and lower, until we can’t stand the suspense any longer and fill the tank again (or put in $5 so we can repeat the drama all over again). Every now and then, however, you’re bitten by your own negligence.

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Why is it snowing . . . inside the car?
Full Throttle Dec 21, 2015

Overview

Use: Media professionals looking to diversify their automotive readership with women authors who provide their views on a wide variety of topics.

Product specifications

About 800-900 words; Word text file plus high-resolution art files for print and Web use.
Mac and PC layout with accompanying text and art files for maximum work flexibility.
High-resolution artwork suitable for print.
Coming soon! Multi-platform page layout that opens with either Quark Xpress or Adobe Indesign.

Description

No good deed goes unpunished. Case in point: Let’s go back to the middle of winter when I was sitting in the car with my boss. It was snowing . . . inside the car. All I was trying to do was make up for being late that morning. My boss worked the early morning shift, beginning at 4 a.m. and finishing around noon. He lived near me and I knew he took the bus. So, I offered a ride and he accepted. I should have seen it coming when I drove to the office that morning. It was particularly cold with a heavy snowfall. The windshield kept fogging over, and I finally had to pull over and wait for it to completely clear.

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Sometimes road rage sneaks up . . .
behind you
Full Throttle Dec 14, 2015

Overview

Use: Media professionals looking to diversify their automotive readership with women authors who provide their views on a wide variety of topics.

Product specifications

About 800-900 words; Word text file plus high-resolution art files for print and Web use.
Mac and PC layout with accompanying text and art files for maximum work flexibility.
High-resolution artwork suitable for print.
Coming soon! Multi-platform page layout that opens with either Quark Xpress or Adobe Indesign.

Description

You never expect it to happen on a leisurely Sunday drive. My boyfriend and I were puttering along on our hometown’s long, four-lane boulevard, the road wide-open with just a scattering of weekend traffic. We were looking for a coffee shop, and maybe a few flea markets along the way. He was doing the speed limit — a fairly slow pace, even for him — when I noticed an odd movement in my passenger-side mirror.

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Mirror, mirror in my lap . . .
Full Throttle Dec 7, 2015

Overview

Use: Media professionals looking to diversify their automotive readership with women authors who provide their views on a wide variety of topics.

Product specifications

About 800-900 words; Word text file plus high-resolution art files for print and Web use.
Mac and PC layout with accompanying text and art files for maximum work flexibility.
High-resolution artwork suitable for print.
Coming soon! Multi-platform page layout that opens with either Quark Xpress or Adobe Indesign.

Description

I hate it when people say, “hey, don’t sweat the small stuff.” These people obviously don’t own a car. Because when it comes to mine, it’s all small stuff. That’s what makes me sweat.
Little things like the rear view mirror which, on a dark night a few weeks ago, decided to spontaneously detach itself from the windshield. Needless to say — but humorous to write — I wasn’t expecting this to happen.

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Squeegee kids might annoy you,
but ask yourself why they’re there
Full Throttle Nov 30, 2015

Overview

Use: Media professionals looking to diversify their automotive readership with women authors who provide their views on a wide variety of topics.

Product specifications

About 800-900 words; Word text file plus high-resolution art files for print and Web use.
Mac and PC layout with accompanying text and art files for maximum work flexibility.
High-resolution artwork suitable for print.
Coming soon! Multi-platform page layout that opens with either Quark Xpress or Adobe Indesign.

Description

The criminals were at it again, right in the middle of the street. “Yeah, he’s out there,” the officer sighed. “Washing windows illegally.” The cop and I, on foot, picked up our pace. He was going in for the collar. Down the street, a young guy jumped back onto the sidewalk and hastily poured out a bucket of mucky water, stashing the evidence behind a bus shelter. “Oh, he thinks I didn’t see him out there squeegeeing,” the cop laughed. “Now that’s where I have to let him know I know what’s going on.”

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Call 9-1-1, we need the jargon police
Full Throttle Nov 23, 2015

Overview

Use: Media professionals looking to diversify their automotive readership with women authors who provide their views on a wide variety of topics.

Product specifications

About 800-900 words; Word text file plus high-resolution art files for print and Web use.
Mac and PC layout with accompanying text and art files for maximum work flexibility.
High-resolution artwork suitable for print.
Coming soon! Multi-platform page layout that opens with either Quark Xpress or Adobe Indesign.

Description

Raise your hand if you don’t know what a “Hemi” is.
OK, allow me to rephrase that. In the privacy of your own home, with the lights off and with no one else watching, who’s willing to raise their hands because they don’t know what a Hemi is?
Of course with the lights off, I can’t see you, but if you don’t know what the word Hemi means, you’re hardly alone. Chrysler has spent years answering the question, “Does that have a Hemi?” but judging by the letters I get and the talk around the water cooler, the company still hasn’t spent enough time or ink telling anyone what a Hemi is and why they should want one.

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How automakers intend to move into
the transportation business
Full Throttle Nov 16, 2015

Overview

Use: Media professionals looking to diversify their automotive readership with women authors who provide their views on a wide variety of topics.

Product specifications

About 800-900 words; Word text file plus high-resolution art files for print and Web use.
Mac and PC layout with accompanying text and art files for maximum work flexibility.
High-resolution artwork suitable for print.
Coming soon! Multi-platform page layout that opens with either Quark Xpress or Adobe Indesign.

Description

After much rejoicing and high-fiving over a record-breaking sales year in 2015, there’s a lot of talk in the industry about what to do and where to go next. Sales might increase for 2016, but predictions are that the market is more likely to plateau. That’s not the news, though. Out of that discussion comes a revelatory thought: not everyone needs or wants to own a car, but everyone needs transportation. Ford boss Mark Fields recently put it into dollars and cents: the automotive-sales market is a $2.3-trillion pie, of which Ford has about six percent. The transportation-mobility sector is a $5.4-trillion pie and Ford has “almost none” of it.”

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How about, “look down before crossing”?
Full Throttle Nov 9, 2015

Overview

Use: Media professionals looking to diversify their automotive readership with women authors who provide their views on a wide variety of topics.

Product specifications

About 800-900 words; Word text file plus high-resolution art files for print and Web use.
Mac and PC layout with accompanying text and art files for maximum work flexibility.
High-resolution artwork suitable for print.
Coming soon! Multi-platform page layout that opens with either Quark Xpress or Adobe Indesign.

Description

When it comes to driving, the British are definitely doing something right.
I’m not talking about driving on the left side of the road. One heart-stopping ride tearing through London on the “wrong” side of the street and I vowed to stick with the subway for the duration of my visit. But what caught my eye were the signs. On every corner, every crosswalk, in the “tourist zone,” the Brits have painted huge reminders — right on the ground — reminding visiting pedestrians to “Look Left” or “Look Right” for traffic coming the other way before they step off the curb.

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How much branding is too much?
Full Throttle Nov 2, 2015

Overview

Use: Media professionals looking to diversify their automotive readership with women authors who provide their views on a wide variety of topics.

Product specifications

About 800-900 words; Word text file plus high-resolution art files for print and Web use.
Mac and PC layout with accompanying text and art files for maximum work flexibility.
High-resolution artwork suitable for print.
Coming soon! Multi-platform page layout that opens with either Quark Xpress or Adobe Indesign.

Description

Iconic cars being cast as the stars of TV shows and films is certainly not a new idea. Heck, the late, great George Barris is responsible for having created many of them, one of the most famous being the Batmobile. Then there’s Herbie the Love Bug, the Mini Coopers in “The Italian Job”, classic cars such as the Thunderbird in “American Graffiti”, Aston Martins in the Bond films and the Mustang driven by Steve McQueen in “Bullitt”. Those cars often drew more attention in the movies than the actors and storylines. Proof? The “Eleanor” Mustang from “Gone in 60 seconds.”