07-02-2025
A Car for Your Valentine: Window Shop with Car and Driver
Would it be Valentine's Day without Window Shop? We're not sure of the answer to that question, so it made no sense to take the risk. After a brief hiatus, the gang is back to buy one another gifts of used cars that cost no more than $14,000 in any random color, or $15,000 if the car came in some sweet shade of red.
During last year's heart-day-themed episode, senior editor Elana Scherr said, "Sometimes, you want to give someone a gift that they wouldn't think to buy for themselves." Taking her own best advice, she bought editor-in-chief Tony Quiroga a Nineties-era Rolls-Royce she found in Nebraska, justified with something about luxury and life at the top and movers and shakers, none of which moved him as much as talk of a retracting hood ornament.
Joey Capparella, Hearst Autos' head of ranking and other things, also took Elana's advice. However, he multiplied it by some large scientific constant in deciding to buy contributor Jonathon Ramsey a lurid red Mercury Cougar XR7. Ramsey, ever thankful, and known to be a fan of cougars, might have had to be convinced this was the Cougar for him.
Ramsey bought for executive editor K.C. Colwell. After ruing being given a mere $14,000 for the task of pleasing what might be Window Shop's most fastidious panelist, he settled on a hope, a prayer, and a deep bronze Porsche 928 with a manual transmission and some color-matched wheels. It just might have worked.
Colwell hit the shops for Scherr, returning from the Nineties with a lime green Alfa Romeo GTV Spider—a distant cousin by marriage to the Mopar family that Scherr normally finds most comfort in. This one was another hit of Scherr's year-old wisdom, the Alfa being a convertible and, in case we didn't mention it, lime green.
EIC Quiroga's famous line introducing his picks—"You guys wanna see the winner?"—finally had real red substance. Buying for Capparella, the honcho gifted a scarlet Lexus SC with a manual transmission, a car so nearly perfectly suited and perfectly timed that everyone was ready to end the show as soon as it appeared onscreen. Nearly.
Tune in to find out who won the box of chocolates, then tell us what you'd buy for the same money, and then heed Scherr's latest Valentine's Day wisdom: "Guys, if she has not told you she doesn't like flowers, buy your girlfriend flowers."
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