The Specialty Equipment Market Association (SEMA) 45th annual trade show was held in Las Vegas, NV during Halloween week. This show already is the city's largest show of the year and adding in the festivities of Halloween just added to the mix of cars, parts and extravaganzas.
The SEMA show has been held in Las Vegas since 1977. The SEMA show takes up every inch of the 3.25 million square feet of convention center space and then uses huge portions of the paved parking lots to become road courses, dirt tracks and drifting slabs. Auto/Truck Round-Up Monthly was a featured magazine/media partner at SEMA and was available to the 60,000+ buyers. Meanwhile, the Sands Convention Center hosts the APPEX (Automotive Aftermarket Product Expo) trade show, with over 2 million square feet dedicated to cars. Together, these two shows combine to form the Automotive Aftermarket Industry Week..
This issue we'll focus on the car manufacturer's display, with nearly all the major manufacturers being there with both off the wall concept cars and some strictly stock units.
Chevrolet kicked off the proceedings with a media evening event Monday night before SEMA even opened; featuring Tony Stewart from NASCAR with a ZL1 Camaro, Erica Enders from NHRA touting the COPO Camaros and Guy Fieri from the Food Network with a Corvette! They showcased not only cars crafted for them but also numerous models of the current Chevy offerings. A personal highlight for me was seeing the last of the famous COPO 2012 Camaros built for the drag strip displayed as a red rag top! All of the other ‘69 limited editions were white hardtops, so this was very special and will be auctioned off for charity later on.
The balance of the week is car overload. The Chevrolet display had an awesome display of a ‘69 blue Camaro concept care standing next to a new 2013 Hot Wheels' edition Camaro. The similarities and contrasts were striking! They also had on one wall a video display with the iconic bowtie in a gold field. If you watched the display, it changed and showed subtle views of some classic Chevy's including the beloved front quarter panel of a ‘57 Chevy. They also were offering attendees a quick ride outside in the passenger seat of some current models.
Typically, Chrysler sets up a "MOPAR Alley" to connect two large halls and lines them up with both contemporary models and some classic iron with an overhead tent. But this year, I was disappointed to see just a line of cars along the walkway and some didn't even have signage to indicate why they were being showcased.
KIA was there and used the talents of West Coast Custom to customize some of their Soul and Forte models, some with a comic book hero focus.
Since this was the 80th anniversary of the ‘32 Ford, you'd expect a few of these iconic rods to be around. So Cal Ford debuted the "Coyote" a gold and white roadster which was built in Detroit and ZZ Top's Billy Gibbons was present for the unveiling. This car had a supercharger mated to the five liter engine with air conditioning and a manual top. Ford completely changes their floor display each night.
So for the four days of SEMA you get a different look! They also had on display a rare ‘31 Ford roadster pickup. A ‘40 coupe sponsored by Street Rodder magazine, was powered with another Ford Racing V8 Coyote engine and looked awesome in it’s copper hues.
Next issue we'll hit the aisles and snag looks at some awesome show cars.
See ya' on the road.