A badge is what defines a car. When you see something for the first time, out there in the real world, you look to the badge to know what it is. Car companies spend millions of dollars and thousands of hours on testing and focus groups, just to get the right badge.
Zac brought up a great point today about badges and cars. Do you need a fun one to know you've got a fun car? What if my car is awesome, but my badge is boring? And who really cares about badges anyways? It's just a label, and we have too many labels in society as it is.
If we have to have a badge, though, we'd want it to be fun, to be cool, to be descriptive. That's why the Plymouth Road Runner gets my vote for the car with the best badge ever. All at once, you knew that the car was a speed demon, totally irreverent, and a total hoot. If it was called the IX-259 or whatever and it was spelled out in Times New Roman, you'd think it was from a labeling construct derivative of the Dewey Decimal System.
But it wasn't. It was the Road Runner. It had a silly badge, a silly name, and a silly cartoon. And that's what made it great.
Show us your favorite car badges in the comments!
Hat tip to CondemnedtoaSlowrolla!
Photo credit Flickr user Frazgo