Classic TV: Buying a Volkswagen from an Old Lady

While our team has produced a number of guides on how to make sure the used or classic car you’re buying is a good ‘un, sometimes, there can be more to the story than initially meets the eye.

At least, that’s what one of Volkswagen’s best-known humorous commercials would suggest. Rolled out in the Netherlands in 2010, the commercial unsurprisingly gained popularity online given its perhaps far-fetched premise.

Titled ‘Buying a Volkswagen from an Old Lady’, it shows a man and his teenage son looking to buy the latter his first car, a Mk3 Golf. As soon as the seller answers the front door and they see that it is an old lady, the father gives a gleeful double thumbs-up before they inspect the car.

While everything checks out at first glance, the seller’s rowdy flashbacks paint a different story. See for yourself below:

Translated from the original Dutch, the tagline makes the intended point clear: “Not every old lady is trustworthy – luckily every Golf is.”

With how successful this commercial was, Volkswagen delivered a sequel in 2022 titled ‘Bring Back the Energy’.

Showing the aftermath and seeming regret of the sale of her much-adored Mk3 Golf, a test drive of the new ID.4 GTX clearly conjured up many of those same memories.

Sub-Editor & Writer

Patrick is an automotive journalist with nearly a decade’s experience across a range of online, print, and broadcast media titles, having road tested over 500 new and classic cars in that time.

After starting out with The Adelaide Hills Weekender Herald newspaper while still studying, he has since contributed to the likes of DriveTribe, Finder, Supercar Blondie, Exhaust Notes Australia, and WhichCar before joining the Retro Rides team. He also launched the car review website Drive Section in 2019 and automotive adventure site Essential Drives in 2024, and has experience in journalism education and academia.

At Retro Rides, Patrick oversees website publishing and content creation. If you have a story you think would be of interest to our audience, he’s your best point of contact at [email protected].

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