Batman has the Batmobile, Oscar Meyer has the Weinermobile -- it only makes sense that L.L. Bean is bringing us the Bootmobile.
The Maine-based outdoor outfitter is marking their centennial this year, and they're celebrating by driving a giant boot-shaped truck through Times Square and lacing -- er, racing -- it through the streets of Manhattan.
From the trademark windows, green gas cap and tiny wheels, the Bootmobile appears to be cobbled together from a diesel Ford F-250 pickup. (It's an automatic, so no heel-and-toe downshifts.) In true Yankee fashion, it's wearing all-terrain tires, sports a Maine license plate and is missing a hubcap. It also has no trunk to speak of, which is sure to confuse the heck out of British tourists.
While L.L. Bean is now best known for selling sensible flannels and fleeces, founder Leon Leonwood Bean began the company in a single room selling a sole product -- a boot-tique, if you will. The Maine Hunting Shoe became an icon and was worn by Ernest Hemingway along with generations of New Englanders from Aroostook County, ME to Greenwich, CT.
Today the L.L. Bean boot is celebrated as durable and practical, the foot's answer to a Subaru. In fact, the two brands were tied for eight years before the carmaker decided that a Bean-branded Outback wouldn't fly in Florida. In New Hampshire and Vermont, however, it's still common to see entire families decked out in Bean whether they're headed for the mountains or the locally-owned organic co-op.
The Bootmobile is a one-off, but if L.L. Bean's marketing folks are smart, they'll make them available in upcoming catalogs. After Saab's demise, we'd bet there are plenty of disenfranchised Dartmouth professors in search of new wheels.
Photos: Jon Simon/Feature Photo Service for L.L. Bean
