MINI Owners Group - Specialty License Plate?

[Buffettbassman]

Has anyone thought about trying to get a Mini Owners Group specialty license plate like the one I have for the Harley Owners Group. Would love it!

This is Virginia, of course. The home of the vanity license plate.

[cmcveay]

I thought that was California?

 

Okay, this will require some legwork on the part of all of us Viriginia MINI owners.

 

To do this, you must have 350 paid applications and a design to submit for consideration.

 

The attached document provides the information on what is required and the process for for getting it done. I would think we'd also want to get Passport and Sterling involved so they could tell new owners about it. One great aspect is that you don't have to give up your personalized plate you have now as you can simply transfer it over to the new plate design. For that reason, we'd want to keep the maximum number of characters.

 

Not that we have that many but classic's would not count for the 350 to get this going as they are all running (or could be running) antique plates. If they are running regular registration, they would be eligible.

 

Anyone else out there like this idea?

 

Craig

Edited May 28, 2010 by cmcveay
Additional info

[Edge]

Love the idea (of course), it's been brought up before though... tough to get 350 people to agree to prepay to make this happen.

 

All I can think of to help is if the dealerships wanted to help front the money, but they may not immediately see the benefit to their business in doing so.

[TGGRRR (Ali)]

I would do it

 

349 to go

[carman63]

I'm in.

[RyanMBlue]

As long as I could keep my 7 character custom, I would be up for it.

[Mr EZ]

Would the plate have the DC Metom Miini logo on it. I'm in

[cmcveay]

I think we'd have to come up with something else to generate a wider interest. Something easy to associate to MINI/Mini ownership. Something fun? I have no drawing skills so I can't offer up any ideas but if anyone has something in mind, please share. Yes, keeping 7 characters is an absolute must! Looking at the various plates that are out there, maybe we could go with a silhouette of a classic and new mini behind the numbers and "Mini/MINI" below. We can't put anything to either side as that will reduce the number of characters.

Edited May 28, 2010 by cmcveay

[Buffettbassman]

Based on my previous experiences with doing this, I was thinking we might want to approach BMW to use the Mini logo like the BMW Owners Group did.

 

I went to college with several high ranking execs working at the US BMW - MINI Headquarters in NJ. Let me make some phone calls/e-mails. If not, we'll need someone to come up with some artwork. I'd be more than willing to do the legwork with the local Mini dealers and with BMW/MINI

 

Having done this before, here's how it goes:

 

The Harley Owners Group used the logo approved by H-D and needed their permission as well to use it.

 

I (we - the Parrothead Clubs) did a similar thing with the Parrotheads plate - Jimmy Buffett had to approve the use of the logo and the name "Parrotheads" since it's a licensed trademark to Margaritaville Holdings. That took about a year and finally Jimmy himself intervened after someone made contact with him. Then it took about 6 months to get 350. A record actually...

 

The other one I worked on was for Oceana Naval Air Station when I was stationed there and took at about four years. The only place you could pick up the application form for pre-payment was at the main gate of the airbase. In retrospect, probably should have passed on that one:banghead:

[Buffettbassman]

In case anyone's interested, the word I get back from BMW is they will not authorize the use of the MINI logo for any reason.

[cmcveay]

Well, there is the option of a profile, something like HRMINI has on their hats and stuff... Can anyone think of any copyright issues with that?

[keckert]

I would buy one so if you're looking for names for the 350, I'm in.

[Poison Ivy]

You could count on me! Love this idea!

[cmcveay]

The latest we had on this was that BMW wouldn't authorize the use of the MINI wings logo for the plates and since it's trademarked, that's a requirement. Unlike Harley who is willing to market their brand in many ways, BMW has made the choice to maintain pretty tight control over their trademarked "stuff".

[TGGRRR (Ali)]

The latest we had on this was that BMW wouldn't authorize the use of the MINI wings logo for the plates and since it's trademarked, that's a requirement. Unlike Harley who is willing to market their brand in many ways, BMW has made the choice to maintain pretty tight control over their trademarked "stuff".

 

 

Boooo Hssssssss:tomato:

 

Please note: boos, hsssses and tomatoes are not being thrown at the messenger...

[cmcveay]

I know, you are throwing at the message and I agree.

 

Not long ago, Marty mentioned a proven marketing strategy that MINI USA should consider. MINI USA should have dealerships start promoting a line of dealership specific Tshirts and they can market them nationwide. That would be a "draw" to get people into the dealerships. The strategy has worked very well for HD as they have people walk in for Tshirts and walk out with bikes pretty much every day of the week!

 

Allowing the use of the MINI wings Logo for something like a license plate sure seems like it would be a good idea.

[Scavenger]

I was playing around on the VA site tonight, and thought I'd post a few screenshots of some I thought of.

[TATTRAT]

My sense of humor holds me back from some of the best plates I like. A MINI-centric plate would be awesome for a platform!

[TGGRRR (Ali)]

I love Dale's plate

Haulin S