by Johnny Lucas

Prince William needs wheels. If I were him, I’d get a Mercedes Benz SLS AMG. That’s the gull wing roadster that is about as much of an in-your-face as a car can get.

Why? Prince William is now the monarchy’s great hope. His biggest advantages are that he’s not his father, he’s got a nice wife, and thirdly, he’s not his father. What a better way signal a break with the fusty direction that Charles is taking things than to get such a car. He would also get what anyone who buys such a car wants: attention.

Sure, it’s not the “greenest” of cars, but like all high performance rides, how many miles are actually going to be put on it anyway? It’s not the most expensive Benz, the SL 65 is about $50,000 more than the $200,000 he’d have to cough up for this piece of eye candy.

The Queen favours Land Rovers and Range Rovers when she’s not being driven in heritage-grade Rolls Royces or that Royal State Coach which is extremely low mileage despite its 350 years of service.

It’s time for the royal family to embrace globalism and realize the a Mercedes is about as British as any other car. Land Rover and Jaguar are now owned by Tata of India, most of a Rolls Royce is still assembled in England, but the company is a subsidiary of BMW. During WWII, you-know-who liked to ride around airing his little moustache in a Mercedes. That was a time when the British Royal family, properly known as the cadet branch of the Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg family changed its name to Windsor and would not come within 100 yards of a Benz. Those days are over, so over – and it’s time to send out that signal.

Inevitably there would be criticism of conspicuous consumption and of showing off. He could always say that his car cost less than 1/1000th of the cost of his wedding, but I have a better plan. William should announce that he will sell the vehicle, with proceeds going to charity, in two years – or on the birth of their first child. Normally the value of such a car would plummet the moment the buyer drives

it off the lot, but in this case, the Prince’s pre-owned wheels would undoubtedly go up in value.

If you could buy this car, drive it for two years and sell it for lots more than you paid for it, what would you do?