1969 Mini Cooper S Pickup Truck

This has to be one of our favorite "Finds of the Day" by Hemmings.  A pristine 1969 Mini Cooper S pickup for sale on Hemmings.com.

This factory built pickup has been restored to a condition that has won "Best in Class" in every car show entered.

From the seller's description:

Original, restored ’69 shell and VIN plate, with sliding glass windows, exposed hinges, etc. No rust ever and no bondo used in restoration.

This is the only known example of what is essentially now a 2000 model Mini Cooper 1275 S pickup. It is extremely nimble and very quick, due to the very reliable twin-point fuel injection.

Mini pickups were manufactured between 1961-1982 and were built on the extended van platform. Out of the millions of Minis sold throughout the world, there were 521,494 vans built, but only 58,179 pickups. Since the pickup was used mostly as an open-haul work vehicle in rainy Great Britain, most pickups deteriorated beyond the possibility of restoration and there are only a handful of nice, solid ones left, most likely less than 500 in the world. Only a handful of those nice ones have been completely restored to a high level of quality.

If you want attention at car shows and on the road, this is the vehicle that keeps people looking, circling, asking questions, and oohing and aahing. It has sat next to exotic Italian coach-built supercars, with this little pickup drawing most of the love.

It certainly caught our attention.

Source: Hemmings.com

Mini MINIs Are Used During Track & Field Events at London Olympics

In a very creative branding move by Olympic sponsor BMW, a small fleet of radio controlled MINI Coopers have been retrieving javelins, hammer, discus and shot during the London 2012 Olympics.  The "mini MINIs", as they are being called, will also put in time at the Paralympic games.

From the BMW press release:

This specially developed and designed radio controlled electric car will be used on the field of play in the Olympic Stadium to ferry javelins, discuses, hammers and shots back from the field to the throwing area, saving valuable time during competition. 

Three Mini MINIs will be deployed for this crucial task and will be operated by Games Makers assigned and trained for this duty. The cars are roughly a quarter scale of the full-sized car and carry the athletic equipment situated inside, accessible through the adapted sunroof.




The battery powered cars can run for 35 minutes before needing to be recharged and they even have working headlights!

Here are a couple of videos showing the cars in action:





Source: BMW

MINI of Murray Grand Opening

MINI of Murray has motored down the street a bit into a new facility at 4767 South State Street in Murray, Utah. To celebrate the move, along with the 10 year anniversary of MINI in America, they will be holding a grand opening party Thursday, June 7th from 5 to 8 p.m. It sounds as though it will be quite the event with valet, red carpet paparazzi, wine and beer tasting, food and more food, and prizes galore (according to their Facebook page).


With the growth in popularity of the Mini Cooper brand the next step for this Salt Lake City car dealership was its own dedicated facility for sales, service and accessories. In this new facility they will be able to stretch out a bit with the full line of MINIs including the hardtop, coupe, convertible, roadster, Clubman, Countryman and the John Cooper Works.



The first U.S. Mini dealership opened in San Francisco in 2002 amid some critics who said the Mini brand didn't stand a chance in the States.  Ten years later the premium small car from BMW is still going strong.

Take a look at this video to see the progression of the new building construction over the last few months.  Congratulations to MINI of Murray on the brand new home of your own!