1981 Cadillac Fleetwood Brougham D'elegance Coupe 2-door 5.7l on 2040-cars

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Cadillac considering ultra-luxe, $100k+ Escalade

The Cadillac Escalade has pushed incrementally up-market over the years. From its humble Chevy/GMC truck underpinnings, the latest Escalade starts at $72,970 and tops out at $96,940. But according to the latest reports, Cadillac is weighing an even more upscale version. Though the exact nature of the upgrades that would push the Escalade further up-market remain unknown – and perhaps undecided at this point – the impetus for such a move is crystal clear. European luxury SUVs keep getting more and more expensive, both from established players and new challengers. Bentley just launched the Bentayga, and other luxury marques like Rolls-Royce, Aston Martin, Jaguar, Maserati, and Lamborghini are all getting into the game. All the while manufacturers like Land Rover and Mercedes-Benz keep rolling out ever more expensive offerings, like the Range Rover Autobiography and anticipating forthcoming Maybach sport-ute. To challenge those European imports with their astronomic price tags, Cadillac could go with an even higher trim level than its existing Platinum spec – or it could go with a more powerful, performance-oriented Escalade V or Vsport. Getting that big a vehicle to hustle would require a lot of power, but then General Motors has never been one to shy away from slotting a bigger engine into its vehicles. One thing's for certain though, and that's that Cadillac isn't quite done with pushing the Escalade higher up the market.

Al Capone’s bulletproof 1928 Cadillac Town Sedan is back on the market

It turns out that infamous mob boss Al Capone played an early role in the development of the modern armored executive car, and now there’s another chance to own his bulletproof 1928 Cadillac Town Sedan, which is being offered by Celebrity Cars of Las Vegas for a cool $1 million. It was last seen netting $341,000 at auction by RM SothebyÂ’s in 2012 and does not appear to have undergone significant restoration since then, raising the question of why its value has jumped nearly threefold. Painted green with a black roof, fenders and bumpers, the car is said to be the earliest surviving bulletproof vehicle, with nearly inch-thick glass and once lined (but no longer; read on) with nearly 3,000 pounds of asbestos-wrapped steel armor plating. It features a rear window rigged to drop quickly, so the tough guys in the rear seats could fire on any pursuers. Heavy spring lifts operated the side windows, which were also rigged to raise higher than usual to reveal a circular cutout big enough for the muzzle of a machine gun. In this case, the factory specs may be the least interesting part of the car, though it is undeniably a looker. It features a Series 341-A, 90-bhp, 341 cubic-inch L-head V8 engine mated to a three-speed manual, with a beam front axle and full-floating rear axle with semi-elliptical leaf springs and four-wheel mechanical drum brakes. It has only 1,111 miles on the odometer, having spent much of its history in museums or on display at carnivals and amusement parks. ItÂ’s believed to have flown under the fedsÂ’ radar in a Chicago garage owned by Emil Denemark, a known mafia associate and South Side Cadillac dealer who was related to Capone by marriage, when the mob boss began his slide into legal troubles leading up to his eventual felony conviction and jail time. In 2008, an elderly man named Richard “Cappy” Capstran told a friend that he had once helped his father install armor plating on a Cadillac owned by Al Capone. His father, Ernest Capstran, had repaired another of CaponeÂ’s vehicles and earned the mobsterÂ’s business fortifying the brand-new Cadillac. “My dad said, ‘We donÂ’t do that kind of work here.Â’ And they (CaponeÂ’s men) said, ‘You do now,’” Richard Capstran recalled in a recorded interview, per SothebyÂ’s. CaponeÂ’s associates reportedly also backed the car into the shop so no one could see what kind of work was being done to it.

New Cadillac ELR ad more educational, less controversial than 'Poolside'

Cadillac's first TV commercial for its ELR plug-in hybrid, Poolside, was a smash hit, in that a lot of people saw and talked about it. The 60-second spot didn't say the car was a plug-in, took potshots at the work ethic of all non-Americans and has raked in over a million views on YouTube (you can add one more here). Caddy's new ELR video will get a lot less media attention, but that's exactly the point. Cadillac claims it was happy with the way actor Neil McDonough strutted his way into the controversial ELR discussion. This time around, though, the coupe gets promoted in a more traditional way: with information about the car and what it can do - you know, drive on electricity, capture braking energy into the battery, go further on gas power when needed, those kinds of things – courtesy of GM's executive chief engineer for electrified vehicles, Pam Fletcher. The tone of the video has not been changed because of the Poolside controversy. David Caldwell, manager of Cadillac communications, tells AutoblogGreen that the new video is not destined for TV and is completely different because it's meant for a different audience. "It doesn't have any direct relation to Poolside," he says. "TV advertising is not necessarily the heart of marketing something like the ELR. Notwithstanding the fact that we had a very thought-provoking ad [laughs]." "We definitely have a need to communicate what the ELR is" - Cadillac's David Caldwell The way you reach out to people via the web is different than the mass-media techniques used in spots like Poolside during big TV events (it aired during the Winter Olympics). The two video spots are different because you need to offer different information in different ways, for example having an ELR website as well as an iPad filled with ELR information at the dealership. For Cadillac, TV is "not going to be the predominant methodology," used to sell the ELR, Caldwell said, "the web is closer to what you need to do to reach people. We definitely have a need to communicate what the ELR is. It's not television advertising at all." Caldwell said a handful of other short videos similar to the new one will go live in the near future, showcasing design and powertrain aspects of the car. Keep an eye out for them – just don't look for them on TV. You can watch the new video below.