Woman’s Car Insurance – I write about cars, woman’s car insurance and all manner of motoring issues; that’s my job and I like it. I drive a V reg Vauxhall Astra that has been cleaned once in the two years that I have owned it, and I couldn’t tell you where the spark plugs were if you stuck my head under the bonnet and pointed.
Before I started my present line of work I was not “into cars”, but now, as I drive down the motorway, I can spot flame surfacing on a BMW Z4; I know that the Peugeot 107, Toyota Aygo and Citroen C1 are the exact same car; I recognise that the Fiat 500 and Grande Punto have breathed life into the square old bones of Fiat, and that the Smart 4×2 diesel is probably the cheapest car to run on the planet.
Believe me, I know a lot more, but I won’t bore you. My partner says I sound like Jeremy Clarkson, (just as long as I don’t look like him…which I don’t, thank goodness!) and my 15 year-old son seems mildly impressed.
Being a woman’s car insurance buyer as well, I have embraced the concept of shopping around. There’s nothing I like better than trying things on for size and saying, “Oh yes!” or, more often sadly, “Yeuch!”. However, with cars it’s a lot more fun. You can sit at your computer and try a car on.
Most top motor manufacturers have configurator programmes on their websites, so that you can make a car exactly how you want it, gauge how much it will cost, and see how it will look when it arrives, to be parked proudly outside your front door.
In the comfort of your own front room, you can choose the sportiest, most expensive BMW and put all the gadgets into its luxury interior. You can add the coolest alloys, the paint-job you like the best and all whilst not having a salesperson check out your battered Matalan snakeskin pumps, then roll their eyes to the ceiling.
Yes ladies, you can dream. I recently spent a lovely few minutes configuring a Fiat 500 1.4 16v Sport model, in Pasodoble Red, with red and black leather interior. I gave it 16″ 5 0-spoke alloy wheels with red painted brake callipers. I chose the full chrome body kit with chrome door mirrors; a snazzy white side stripe and side rubbing strip with the 500 logo.
I put in reverse parking sensors (yes, I’m a lady), automatic climate control, interscope Hi-Fi system and topped it off with an electric sunroof. They put it together in front of me and, all-in-all, I think it’s a work of art. It comes in at a mere £13,750 on-the-road price. Well, I can dream, can’t I?
Oddly, I recently found a website where you can do much the same for choosing clothes. On the H & M website, under the “Inspiration” link, you can go to the Dressing Room and configure a model in selected H & M clothes.
You can add your own face to the model, (thankfully they didn’t require my hips and rather short legs) then you dress the model in the items on offer. You can change the colours of each item and get a 360 degree view of your chosen outfit. And all without having to wriggle out of your jeans in a 3×3 box shielded only by a flimsy curtain with half the curtain hooks missing. Bliss!
So, this is the future of shopping; virtual trying on. Of course in the case of the car I didn’t have the money for the look, and in the case of the clothes I didn’t have the legs, but hey-ho, I’m still dreaming. And when I get my head out of the clouds, I’ll get back to researching woman’s car insurance and save myself enough money to make some of my dreams a reality.