©South Bend Tribune -- April 25, 1999

The AVX was designed by Tom Kellogg, a member of the famous Raymond Loewy team that designed the original Studebaker Avanti.
Photo provided

Avanti design lives on in look-alikes

By PAUL DODSON
Tribune Business Writer

The Avanti legend lives on, sort of.

A company in Lancaster, Pa., is selling an automobile called the AVX, which the company claims "truly represents the evolution of the Avanti look."

The company, AVX Inc., said its vehicle was designed by Tom Kellogg, a member of the famous Raymond Loewy team that designed the original Studebaker Avanti.

The Avanti is a sporty car Studebaker Corp. began producing in 1962 in South Bend when the venerable company was on its deathbed.

At that time, Kellogg was a young designer just out of college. He recalls that "our task was to create a forward-thinking car that would capture the country's attention and help save Studebaker."

Even though the Avanti attracted much favorable attention and demand, its small-volume production was not enough to save the company. Studebaker stopped making cars in its longtime South Bend home in 1964.

The introduction of the AVX is similar to how small shops have kept the Avanti tradition going after car production was restarted in 1965 as the Avanti II.

AVX is in limited production in Lang's Custom Auto Body shop in Harrisburg, Pa.

AVX Inc. claims designer Kellogg "has taken all of the elements of classic Avanti styling--including the wedge shape, the forward rake, the 'Coke bottle' effect and the asymmetrical hood -- and moved them forward three decades. Once again, the result is automotive sculpture."

The name AVX, which stands for AVanti eXperimental, is used because AVX Inc. does not own the Avanti brand name.

The AVX is essentially a 1998 Pontiac Firebird with a fiberglass body. Lang's Custom Auto strips the Firebird of its sheet metal outer skin and then fits the AVX fiberglass skin on the chassis. The shop also revamps the interior, depending on customer specifications.

James Bunting, president of AVX Inc., said production is limited to two cars per month and that there is a five-month wait between order and delivery.

The cost is $57,000 for a coupe, $58,000 for a T-top and $65,000 for a convertible.

The vehicle comes with a variety of Pontiac engine options. And if you want the 650-horsepower supercharged engine package, that will cost an additional $20,799.

Bunting said he commissioned Kellogg to do one AVX as Bunting's personal car. "But when others saw the car, they wanted their own," said Bunting. That led to creation of AVX Inc. with production of AVX cars beginning in 1996.

Bunting declined to reveal how many AVX cars have been produced to date. He said the company will continue to limit production. "Our target is 25 cars per year," he said.

The cars are sold directly from the factory.

However, Bunting said the company is not taking new orders for cars at this time. "We are in the process of relocating to a bigger shop. We can't take new orders until July," he said.

Bunting does not expect to see a huge market for the AVX. However, he does expect a constant but moderate demand.

"It's a specialty car. It is a special person who decides to build a custom car for themselves, which is what they do. They have to wait months and it is going to cost them a lot of money," he said.

"It takes a long time to build these cars. They are built in a rod and custom shop that builds high-end custom cars from scratch," he said.

It all sounds like what entrepreneurs Nathan and Leo Altman did to keep Avanti alive some 34 years ago. The former Studebaker automobile dealers set up a small vehicle assembly shop on Lafayette Boulevard in South Bend.

That car-making operation went through ownership changes and financial difficulties but managed to stay alive in South Bend until the late 1980s when owner J.J. Cafaro moved the operation to Youngstown, Ohio.

Avanti production quietly ceased in Youngstown around 1991.