Amicale Citroën Internationale (ACI) - bringing together the Citroen clubs of the world » 90 Years

Looking back: 90 Years of Automobiles Citroën in Hungary

S. Joest ACI Communications — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 04:55:17 +0000

Enjoy the celebrations of 90 Years of Citroën in Hungary!

In Hungary, the Citroën club enthusiasts have done a lot to entertain the audience on the Budapest Oldtimer Expo (www.oldtimerexpo.hu) and create an atmosphere of excitement and fun.

This video shown below and recorded in 2009 was presented to the Amicale Citroën Internationale (ACI) Delegates during the Annual General Meeting January 2010 in Paris.

or check out our YouTube channel and add us as a friend on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/user/AmicaleCitroen

Argentina celebrates 90 Years of Creative Technology

S. Joest ACI Communications — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 12:20:39 +0000

Ignacio N. Graciano from Citroen Club Argentina shares his report with all Citroen lovers around the globe:

Dear ACI Delegates,

in this section I will shortly tell you about the celebration of 90 Years of Citroen which has been realized in the planetaroy of Buenos Aires on 14-Nov-2009.

The celebration was jointly organized both by Citroen Argentina and the Citroën Club of Buenos Aires. They managed to get a nice selection of cars:

Starting from the Type C3 1925 up to the latest C4 Picasso 2009, as well as the Type AC4, Traction Avant 7C Cabriolet, 11BL, 11B Cabriolet, 2CV, 3CV, 2CV6 Charleston, an SM which arrived from our neighbor country Uruguay, CX, ZX, Xantia, C5, GS, DS 19, Méhari, Ami 8, Xsara VTS, and a Dyane.

These cars were set up into two groups: one group was set up for an exhibition, while the other half was set to run as a parade to go around the city. After the parade was over, all care were met at the planetary. Here, the Argentina director of Citroen, Luis Marie Basavilbaso, handed over some awards for a “concours of design” related to “creative technology”, the new brand slogan of Automobiles Citroen.

This event was joined with another called “The Museum’s Night” into which the planetary played also a vital role as well as three Citroen cars: The previously mentioned Type C3 1925, a 1975 3CV (which had been sold as 2CV6 in Europe) and a C4 2008 model cutaway model which allowed to get some insights into the production process of the factory which is near Buenos Aires.

I hope you like our contribution, with Best Regards,

Ignacio N. Graciano
Citroen Club Argentina
quaidejavel2002@yahoo.fr

A slideshow of pictures taken at the event is available on YouTube at
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YtSb9oSDbY0

France: 90 years old and not one wrinkle

S. Joest ACI Communications — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 09:18:39 +0000

This article on the 90 years of Citroën in France is reproduced here in English translation with the gracious permission of Marc Ouayoun, a well known French car collector. It first appeared on his blog.

Nothing is riskier than planning the celebration of an event: We all have in mind memories of an event that was well organized and long anticipated which in the end fell flat. Conversely an unexpected event can prove to be unforgettable because it’s spontaneous and genuine.

Certain glum souls will no doubt have asked themselves about the legitimacy of an anniversary celebrated by Citroën in 2009, the 90 years of a tumultuous history just like that of the 20th century which saw the birth of this brand. Others will not miss the opportunity to say: “Why not the Centennial like everyone else?

For my part, I am of the opinion that the best events are those where you have something to celebrate. And 2009 is certainly a great year for the Citroën brand. The double chevrons, borne aloft by a particularly clever publicity campaign with inspired flair, plus a huge communication effort and obvious quality, is flying on its own and henceforth is carried along by a following wind. Communication, high visibility, newsworthy events; the work of the teams seems to be in sync with the products, modern. fresh and logical.

But, in the end, isn’t this all a bit quick?

The evolution of the image of the brand is spectacular, even for me who has often wished for a renaissance of Citroën on this site. Indeed, the biggest challenge will be to commit to that over time, to create solid foundations which will last in an un-certain automotive world, at the dawn of huge upheaval. The task will be difficult but most assuredly exciting.

Back to the 90th anniversary celebrations. Started at Retromobile, presented in different media and conveyed through the distribution network, the celebration saw its high point this weekend with the parade of the 90th anniversary.

Having participated nearly a year ago in the initial thinking by a working group which combined the manufacturer, collectors and the Amicale Citroën Internation-ale, I couldn’t wait for the weekend of October 3. I have to say that I was not dis-appointed either as a collector / participant or as an observer of the double chev-rons. It was a magnificent day!

The rendezvous was set for 11:00 a.m. for the assembling of the cars at the Foun-tains of Trocadero: 90 models (in fact there were more than 100) for 90 years. The organization was virually perfect and the parking of the cars done to the near-est inch. The collection of the emblematic models of the brand were represented by one or several versions: From the Type A of 1919 to the XM; through the Rosa-lie, Traction Avant, 2CV and other DS’s. The link with the present line was done through the new C3 and DS3. As to the future, it was symbolized by 2 very dis-tinctive concept cars: la Révolte recently introduced in Frankfurt and the spec-tacular “GT by Citroën.

At 5:00 p.m. the temporary exhibit was open to the public and soon the area was filled with hundreds of onlookers who had come to admire the creativity of Citroën. Very rapidly each car was surrounded by a crowd. Many visitors evoked a memory, an anecdote associated with the DS, the 2CV or an Ami Six recalled; going on holidays; the sunday outing with Uncle Hubert; going back to school with Grandma; the call of the family doctor and other slices of life. Few brands can boast of such a presence in the collective memory.

At 7:30 the departure in a convoy behind the GT. Very quickly we were caught up in Paris traffic jams and dumbfounded bystanders witnessed some unlikely scenes. A Citroën Autocar type U23 from 1947 going along flat out in a bus lane; a ZX Rallye Raid behind the C4 of Sebastien Loeb; a Rosalie stopped, hood up near the Bastille or another long line of DS’s yellow headlights glowing waiting for the green light beside the Samaritaine.

Once at the Place de la Bastille, we turned around and headed in a scattered fash-ion back to the Champs-Elyseés to wind up this unforgettable day at C42, showcase of the brand on the most beautiful avenue in the world. Even there, the sight of all our old cars parked together at the Pierre Charron Facility reminded me of the uniqueness of this rolling heritage flanked by the double chevrons.

After years of indifference, even rejection of the past, at times a burden, the brand is, from hereon in, not afraid to face its past and to find in it a source of in-spiration: a Citroën brand freed from inhibitions and determined to write a new chapter in its already rich history. Let’s wish it all success. The rendezvous is set for the 100 years in 2019!

Find some photos from that event on the blogsite at http://citropersoboulot.typepad.com/.

Austria celebrates 90 Years of Citroen

S. Joest ACI Communications — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 09:19:28 +0000

The idea of Citroen Austria’s PR directress of celebrating the 90th anniversary of Citroen was a convoi of 90 Citroen cars through Vienna center; about 75 – 80 historical vehicles which should have been organized by the Austrian Citroen Clubs, the rest to 90 would be filled with modern cars up to the new DS3.

The date of this event had to be coordinated with Citroen France and so the clubs were informed in the middle of september, the event would take place on october, 9th.

Within two weeks the clubs had gathered 90 historical cars, beginning with a C3 of 1925 up to the XM – an impressing result. So it was a convoi of 90 old cars + a few new ones, which promenaded through Vienna with a police escort. The commitment of Citroen Austria was really high: All participants (about 150 persons) were invited to have breakfast and in the early afternoon an after-convoy-dinner, a lottery offered nice prices to all of them and in a few weeks every participant will receive a convoy – DVD.

Result: a really nice day which showed the good team-work between Citroen Austria and our club scene.

Best regards from Austria
(see you in next February)
Manfred Buchgeher

visit: www.oecc.org
contact: manfred@oecc.at

90 Years Of Citroen in Germany

S. Joest ACI Communications — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 18:19:50 +0000

While many markets have been active to celebrate the company’s anniversary around October 3rd, this date has been tricky for Germany as this is the unification day and thus a public holiday. Therefore, we have been striving for different alternatives and focused on a big public event in spring this year.

Worlds leading vintage car trade fair, the “Technoclassica” in Essen, has been in 2009 a great place to show off both historical anniversaries as well as activities of German Citroen car clubs to the almost 170.000 visitors.

Well-known as the “Citroen-Strasse”, the 20-year-old association of all major clubs from Germany was showing off double-fold. 75 years of Traction Avant were celebrated with a TA Gauloises cabriolet, a Faux Cabriolet, Commerciale, Normale and Legere. On the other half of the booth, the 90 years of Automobiles Citroen retrospective started with a chassis number #189 Type A 1919, Panhard DB Le Mans cabriolet, DS19, CX Prestige, SM, and not to forget the well-beloved 2CV Charleston.

Supported by the new brand claim “Creative Technologie”, Citroen Germany presented three cars from the Conservatoire, a 1919 Type A Chassis “#1″, the original 1934 “salon de l’Automobile” Traction Avant 7A display with its separate engine, C-Sportlounge prototype (2005), as well as the newest model, the C3 Picasso Exclusive (2009).

On TC, overall more than 230 amateur clubs of almost all car manufacturers have presented their activities and celebrated worlds largest “family reunion” of the club scene. “The clubs are the foundation of the vintage car scene“, says Horst Brüning, chairman of the world association of vintage car clubs (FIVA, Fédération des Véhicules Anciens). “At the Technoclassica they make a significant contribution to creating an automotive journey through the last century“. Amongst them are the 12 leading German Citroen clubs.

In cooperation with the German subsidiary of Automobiles Citroen over more than a decade, the show has once more confirmed the successful partnership between the clubs and the manufacturer on joint public activities involving the history of the famous brand.

Thomas Albrecht, head of press at Citroen Germany, says: “I am delighted that there is such good co-operation between the German Citroën Clubs. TechnoClassica is really an international showcase. Especially the German brands like to show off here, and we’re proud to fly our flag on this occasion. Heritage gets ever more important if you want to appeal to people’s emotions, and we have such a lot to say on that account. Thanks to the excellent teamwork with and between the Clubs, our brand is able to put up a worthy display year after year.”

As one of the great takeaways from that show, Citroen Germany has launched a retrospective brochure about the anniversary which you will find attached to this report (PDF download). It’s been distributed in Austria and German-speaking Switzerland as well, and the Dutch, Norwegian, and Swiss subsidiary are preparing or have prepared translations of this document for their markets.

The spirit of creating results by working together as a team has been the basis for “Citroen-Strasse”. Lets quote the head of the “Citroen-Strasse” organisation: “Club separation has not been an issue for us for almost 20 years now. Since many years it does not matter whether eg. a CX must be presented by a CX club member – when its the right car we strive to bring it to the show, regardless from which club it is. Organized by a great team of friends, we share common resources and celebrate a good time – not to forget some “savoir vivre” with “Vin Traction Avant” or “Chateau DS”, cheese, baguettes and alikes, and all that in front of a French bistro scenery. Did I mention there were some cars?”

Similar says organizer Leon Franssen from SIHA, the Techno-Classica show owner: “Despite hard basic conditions, our exhibitors noticed a heavy demand and respectable sales conclusions. Customers have more expertise than they used to have, they are also more demanding and critical, they check and compare more intensely than before. But they also accept adequate prices for decent quality“.

Next TC will take place 7-11 April 2010 at Messe Essen. Why not already plan for your next trip to Germany in spring 2010, and have a look?

Contact the Germany delegates for more activities around the double chevron: info@amicale-citroen.de

On behalf of the ACI Germany delegates, Stephan Joest, who is also the project manager of the Technoclassica Citroen club stand.

On the “Traction Avant!” club Germany homepage you can find a selection of pictures in their gallery, please check out:

http://tractionavant.com/

On the same website you will also find the PDF download of the “90 years” anniversary brochure (German language though).

90 Years Of Innovation in UK

S. Joest ACI Communications — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 14:03:43 +0000

Mick Popka from UK sent us his report from the island’s jubilee activities: The UK celebration of Citroen’s 90th Birthday was held at the world famous”Ace Cafe” in London http://www.ace-cafe-london.com/ …

Primary Organisation with Citroen UK was undertaken by the Citroen Car Club with representatives from both Deux Chevaux Club of Great Britain and the Traction Owners Club.

The event was held at 16:00 – 20:00 on Saturday 3rd October and saw a full range of vehicles attending from a "B" Series to a C4 WRC.

The Cafe, located on the North Circular Road, was a Citroen Dealer in the 1950′s and has many associations with motoring and the automobile.

The event was hosted on behalf of Citroen UK by Mike Brewer, a UK TV Motoring presenter.

Mike and his team produced a short film of the event for Citroen, which can be found here:

Citroen held a competition for the best cars on show, which was judged by the Motoring Expert, John Sinister. Awards were given and canapes and later hot food food were provided by Citroen to all attendees, together with a celebration plaque (attached).

Later in the evening a "Croisiere Blanche" (White Cruise) was held through the street of London with over 100 cars attending and this was followed by refreshments and vehicle viewings at Citroen’s West London Garage.

The motoring press in their following editions gave quite a lot of exposure to the event, some of which which can be viewed here, together with the Citroen Video of the event:

http://www.traction-owners.co.uk/social/2009/90th_Celebrations/90thcelebration.htm

Regards
Mick Popka
Webmonkey

www.icccr2012.org.uk

www.traction-owners.co.uk

See you in Yorkshire in 2012 for the 15th ICCCR!

90 years of Citroen in Slovenia

S. Joest ACI Communications — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 12:55:57 +0000

The 90 years celebration in Slovenia:

A press conference with different cars from our club:

Link to PR conference

In each Citroen Showroom in Slovenia there was at least one classic Citroen, the collaboration betwen Citroen Slovenija and our club was perfect – and the action was very successful with a lot of media feedback:

www.citroen-pla.net

Greetings from Slovenia,
Ales

90 years of Citroen in Czech Republic

S. Joest ACI Communications — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 14:15:53 +0000

Hello ACI Delegates and all Citroenists!

This is a small report from the celebration of 90th anniversary of Citroen in Czech Republic. This celebration was composed of two main events. The first organised Nezavisly 2CV Klub Praha Sunday the 4th of October…

About 25 cars from Tractions to XMs and 60 members of all Citroen clubs came to celebrate – we make a visit of museum Praga ( old czech cars ) near Prague, then we made the parade of Citroens through the center and old city with 20 minutes for making some snaps before the Prague Castle and in the afternoon all cars was parked by the river Vltava and we have booked the boat for our members for a 2 hours promenade with the dinner.

The second event organised Citroen Czech Republic one week after, Saturday the 10th and we have presented more than 20 old cars before the Tower Petrin ( it´s a small copy of Eiffel Tower ). Here was also the program for the public – the entrance to the tower was free whole day and also some films about the history of Citroen and new types of the mark were here presented.

In the evening all cars with drivers made a parade through historical center of Prague ( we have transported the journalist and their families ) and we was invited for the dinner with the representants of Citroen to the restaurant near the river.

At 8 p.m. the Tower of Petrin was iluminated like Eiffel Tower in Paris in the thirties! The lights was there untill Sunday 3 a.m.

(A link to the pictures will be published soon).

Norway celebrated 90 years of Citroen

S. Joest ACI Communications — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 10:38:05 +0000

Dear fellow ACI Delegates and Citroën friends!

Last weekend the Norwegian clubs and enthusiasts celebrated 90 years of Citroën together with Citroën of Norway. We had a great time together, and I would like to share some of the moments with you.

Photos are available on the 2CV Club’s discussion board: http://www.2cvforum.no/index.php?action=gallery;cat=2

The board itself is mainly in Norwegian, but I think these pics speak for themselves.

Hopefully this report can be used when it is time to start planning for the 100 years anniversary in 2019, so I will point out the good and bad experiences we got from planning and carrying out this project.

First of all: Collaborating with Citroën on such an event was a new and positive experience for us. The relationship between Citroën and the clubs did really get a boost from this, and hopefully we will be able to build on this for the years to come. Citroën of Norway took care of advertising, booking the venue for our classic car exhibition and organised music and entertainment, and of course birthday cake for everyone.

During the weekend we had a parade on Saturday, visiting a French cheese shop and bakery. The purpose of this was our cars being present in the city centre of Oslo, and of course we turned a lot of heads. We ended up at Citroën headquarters enjoying a wonderful lunch based on the goods we had collected on our way there. A lovely day in the autumn sun. On Sunday we organised a classic car exhibition, inviting the public to come and see Citroën’s history. The oldest car present was an early ’34 Traction Avant, and in total there were 33 cars present. The clubs did a good job gathering examples of different models from each decade from the 30ies and up to present day. In addition to this, local collectors showed up with their Citroëns too. Sadly, the weather was not at all as nice as the day before, with heavy rains making it a cold and wet experience.

What we feel could be done different next time:

Time of the year: October in Norway means winter is right around the corner. Again, this means a lot of collectors have put their cars away for the season. It would have been much easier to gather cars for the exhibition and parade if we could have done this in August or even September.

Time for planning: From what we understand, the guidelines for this event was published from Citroën Paris to Citroën Norway late May or even June. The effect of this was that nothing really happened until after summer holidays in August/September. We did our best given the circumstances, but I think this could have been even bigger and better if there had been more time for planning and organizing.

That said, the Norwegian clubs and collectors are really enthusiastic about the improved relationship with Citroën and hope this will continue to improve over the years to come.

I hope the rest of you also have been able to take part in celebrating Citroën, and hope to meet you all on the next AGM in January (?) 2010.

All the Best,

Morten P Ruud
ACI Delegate
President, 2CV Club of Norway

120 Years Eiffeltower, 90 Years Citroen: Oct 22 celebration

S. Joest ACI Communications — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 10:36:47 +0000

To celebrate 90 years of Citroën and 120 years of the world famous Eiffel Tower, the two are joining forces again, after 75 years, in a stunning display of ‘Créative Technologie’ on Oct 22nd, 2009.

Every night for three months from 22nd October, a special 12-minute light show will take place on the Eiffel Tower – one minute for each decade the ‘Iron Lady’ has stood proudly in the heart of Paris.

At 8.00pm on 22nd October – to mark the first of these displays – Citroën will be streaming live footage of the event from webcams mounted in 10 new Citroën C3’s, which will be positioned at key vantage points around the tower itself.

The footage will be broadcast at http://www.toureiffel.citroen.com/, and visitors to the site will be able to change viewpoints to take in the display from all angles. As well as taking advantage of the new C3’s sensational ‘Zenith’ windscreen, the webcam pictures will be displayed in vertical 9:16 format – a revolution for internet video.

The Zenith windscreen on the new C3 – Citroën’s latest model – provides a driving experience like no other, with a huge glass screen that soars above the heads of front occupants offering unprecedented levels of visibility – perfect for admiring the full height of the Eiffel Tower and the new light show in all its glory.

Citroën and the Eiffel Tower enjoyed a historic partnership for almost ten years between 1925 & 1934, when André Citroën had the Company’s name displayed in lights on the iconic structure. A total of 250,000 light bulbs and 600 kilometres of electric flex were used to make the 30 metre high letters. The spectacle was recorded in the Guinness Book of Records as the world’s largest advertising sign.. The illuminations were so bright that Charles Lindbergh used the tower as beacon when coming into land after his solo flight across the Atlantic.