Stacks of Vintage Car Advertising Show the Wild Cost of Options in the ‘60s and ‘70s

Advertising a vehicle in 2025 is markedly different than it was 40 or 50 years ago. These days, a sure fire way to reach the masses is to strike gold with a viral video, preferably with the help of someone with over a million followers on TikTok. Almost all information is digital, from online configurators to virtual showrooms. It’s immersive, tech forward, and serves up the type of minute detail sought by savvy shoppers in 2025. 

It’s also a lot more sterile than the old days. Back then, printing shops hummed with the production of glossy brochures, multi-page troves of information, detailing everything from option packages to tow ratings. Paint combinations, upholstery choices, powertrain possibilities — it was all there in full colour pages over which gearheads could pore and salesmen could jot numbers.

This was not a cheap endeavour, especially since car companies tend to make changes to their wares each model year. Decades ago, those changes could be comprehensive from one year to the next. Scads of boxes full of brochures appeared annually, usually in the autumn when Detroit typically rolled out its new models, but as time progressed and vehicles were introduced year-round, it turned into a constant stream of new brochures. That stream gradually turned into a trickle until the faucet was shut off for good, not long after we worried about Y2K. The internet is cheaper, and could be updated for free ad infinitum, so brochures went away.

Thanks for nothing, accountants.

This explains why we were apoplectic with excitement when, about five years ago, we stumbled onto a treasure trove containing thousands of brochures, all originally collected by a gearhead who had visited just about every dealer in Halifax each September to stock up on stacks of liminal literature. Some of these old-school brochures bordered on works of art, either thanks to incredible photo compositions or because they were literally art created by a talented person with an easel. Some of them, especially ones for popular cars like the ‘68 Dodge Charger, are now worth a bundle to collectors.

Earlier this year, a reader reached out to us after reading our original post about those newly unearthed brochures. They had been sorting and organizing the estate of a loved one, found a trove of brochures, and asked if we would like to see them. And, oh yeah, they added: Mom was a big gearhead who loved cars.

A couple of days and a twist of the proverbial key in my Dodge Challenger later, we found ourselves in rural Nova Scotia, listening to the family regale us about how Mom would harangue hapless salesmen by knowing exactly what she wanted. From trim levels to interior comforts and right down to a locking differential in the car’s rear end, their mom would spell out precisely what was required in the next family car. Remember, there was no shortage of rampant sexism in the late '60s and early ‘70s, especially in car dealerships when salesmen (and it was men) wore plenty of polyester and chomped big cigars. Dealing with a (gasp!) female who knew more about cars than they did must have been jarring to the dinosaurs that typically inhabited the showroom floor in those days.

Oh, to have been a fly on the wall during those meetings.

According to the handwritten price and option lists tucked amongst the brochures, Mom seemed to appreciate practical features such as power steering and power brakes, specs that appeared on nearly every tally. No one can blame her for wanting a skiff of comfort in what would be a daily driver.

But Mom was also a gearhead and an informed one, at that. Getting traction to the ground efficiently was top of mind with a locking rear end sitting at or near the top of every shopping list. Depending on brand, it was denoted by names like Sure Grip at Chrysler or Trak at other brands. From disc brakes and road wheels to a tachometer and rear defroster, Mom’s specifications would likely appeal to our car-loving readers even today. We’ll gloss over the selection of vinyl roof coverings on a Charger as a style preference of the era.

How do prices compare to the many tens of thousands of dollars that customers shell out today for a new vehicle? It seems the base price of a Dodge Charger circa the late ‘60s was $3,915, or about $33,000 in today’s money. That sum is certainly lower than the average transaction price in 2025, but a quick look at the options list tells a more complete story.

Want a simple AM stereo? That’ll be $187 or a stunning $1,550 today. Power steering was the equivalent of about $800, a tachometer/clock combo cost $375 in 2025 dollars, and even a centre console set Mom back $48 (an estimated $400 these days). All told, the sticker on that Charger jumped $729 or roughly 20 per cent of the original tag. Adding that same ratio of options cost to a modern car would be like tacking $11,000 worth of options onto a base RAV4 plug-in hybrid. Mom noted in the margins that a tach and clock were standard equipment in the $3,169 Mazda 808 coupe, thank you very much.

As for the brochures themselves, we’ll reiterate our observations from when we found that trove of memorabilia five years ago. Some of the pieces were lovingly crafted with thick paper and featured elaborate photos of people and places. More than one, especially from the late ‘60s and early ‘70s, could easily have passed as album covers, such are the composition and colour of the lead photo. Not everything was better in the so-called Good Old Days, but we’ll make a case that stacks of full-colour car brochures beats a TikTok video with a million likes.

And we’re sure Mom would have agreed.