It’s been quite the month, what with Jason’s heart exploding and David traveling to Hong Kong. In the background has been the anniversary of launching membership and the small concern (mostly in my head) that many of you wouldn’t renew. Not only have most of you renewed, we’ve also added a bunch of members. Thank you so much!
As a reminder, we are trying to build up membership so we can continue to hire interesting people to write interesting stories and make great videos. Membership doesn’t cover all of our costs (or even most of them), but it helps us resist plastering the page with so many ads that the site is unreadable or trying to force random SEO affiliate garbage down your gullet. If you’re not a member yet, please consider joining (or gifting a membership).
If your account isn’t up for renewal because you joined earlier this year, please make sure auto-renew is turned on. If you just joined or just renewed your account, a big thank you again! It’s awesome and it gives us the confidence to go even stronger in 2024 because we can forecast this portion of our revenue.
A little PSA: A few people have asked what they get for renewing. In addition to a surprise gift, all people renewing from Vinyl/Velour/RCL plans will get a new t-shirt and our plan is to send out a new member t-shirt to renewing members every year:
Because we still have a decent number of renewals to go, and because we’re switching fulfillment companies (and because Jason’s wife Sally was helping in the interim), we’re probably going to start fulfilling new orders and renewals around the new year. If you haven’t gotten a shirt yet please don’t worry, they’re coming!
And, again, I just want to express our gratitude both for your continued support of this website and for Jason and his family. This place feels like a Christmas/Hannukah/Happy Honda Days Miracle and it’s all because of y’all.
I really want to know if anyone has gotten the Rich Corinthian Leather membership.
Can I order a shirt in Puffalump size? Puff is the big reader in this household.
Auto-renew is on! And the card you have on file for me is the one that didn’t get stolen, so that’s even better.
I’ve been meaning to sign up since it launched, just haven’t been able to keep the adhd in check long enough to put in my card info before today :p
If y’all added a paypal button (even if it was slightly more expensive to cover the processing, which is probably against Paypal’s TOS ???? so you’d have to make it a different tier to get around that…) I’d have signed up forever ago :p
Call it the ADHD-friendly tier 🙂
Anyway, I just forced myself to sit down and get my card out, so +1 in house velour!
My wife got me my initial membership for Christmas last year, and I believe I got an email that auto-renewal is in fact, on. I assume that means I will be getting another year of Autopian this year for Christmas from my wife as well, even though she’s probably not aware of this?
We’ll cross that bridge once we get there.
My auto-renewal didn’t go through because I was THAT broke, but that’s been remedied now, so even more than most members have renewed!
I feel terrible about not joining yet, I love what you’re doing here.
If 2024 can be less of a dick to me than 2023 was I’ll sign up.
I might even submit an article if I get a few days of peace to do some writing.
There’s no shame in that! You have to take care of yourself before you can take care of others. It’s like the airline safety briefing: “put on your oxygen mask before helping others with their masks.”
And I’m looking forward to the article!
Damnit! That’s a cool shirt.
You got me.
It’ll go great with my NPR tote bag.
The check is in the mail.
You go, Otto – son of the Torch.
Shirt came last week and is awesome. The sticker is currently gracing the vent window of the Miata.
Love the shirt – the sticker is on my laptop for all to see.
The autopian t shirt. Will it… Teenager?!? Holy crap I’m old.
Otto looks a lot like his mom. Thanks goodness! 🙂
Did anyone notice how thrilled the kid in the top photo must be to be modeling the shirt? Perhaps it’s time to expand the definition of child abuse?
Happy Festivis Torch, and family of Torch. And get better soon.
I’m looking forward to my t-shirt! Even better if you get it to me by January 4th when I turn 69. I have zero issues with wearing age inappropriate clothing! But I’ll be happy whenever it gets here.
the Beatles wrote a song about getting our packages – The Long and Winding Road. Worth the wait, tho’ – I wish Otto had signed mine. Maybe with another level of membership?
There’s an idea!
I put an Autopian shirt on my holiday gift list last year and it indirectly resulted in my mom being kind of mean to Matt Hardigree over email, so I ended up cutting out the middleman and getting a membership.
That’s awesome. “Mom, no! They’re not weirdos or anything, really! NO, IT’S NOT A CULT!”
this sounds like a quality episode of Tales from the Emails
Thank you too! It’s also a FESTIVUS miracle!
I GOT A BIG BONE TO PICK WITH YOU, MACK HARDIGRAW
I joined up last year within a day or two of memberships opening up, and upgraded from Vinyl to Velour this year because you’ve delivered on content. I’m looking forward to the site continuing to grow and thrive, and a full and quick recovery for Torch.
The new shirt looks really cool, but I downgraded to Cloth specifically because I have too many t-shirts already. I would have asked for a tier where I can get just a car drawing and nothing else, but I think Jason has enough to do (or not do) for a while.
Yeah, that’s the only premium I’m interested in, but apparently those pictures almost killed him.
I admit I did speculate that someone asked him for a drawing of a Pontiac Aztek…..
Don’t forget to order a few 3xl t-shirts to offset the cost of oil changes we members can no longer do.
I hereby grant Autopian the right to debit my account tomorrow for another year of crazy automotive antics.
Just checked to be sure (it’s In ‘subscriptions’ if anyone is unsure as I was), and mine is on auto.
Definitely up for another Autopian shirt!
Me too.
Take your time on the fulfillment – no hurry. Jason & his family have way more important stuff to worry about than a t-shirt.
I am seriously looking forward to the new shirts! My childhood was all LEGO and cars.
Same here, with a side of Atari 2600/5200/ColecoVision.
thankfully, my adulthood is all LEGO and cars
I’m happy to help at my cloth level, aka cheap bastard level. You all are doing a great job and look forward to a new year of great content.
That design is so awesome!
I hope we eventually get to vote on potential t-shirt slogans; I for one would love an “installation is the reverse of removal” one.
That would be a great one!