Going into a supercar showroom is different. Not only because there's no sausage sizzle out the front, or balloons, or wacky waving inflatable arm-flailing tube men, or because the coffee is barista-made Italian espresso rather than Nespresso, or because the salespeople are called Flavio and Gianna rather than Kev and Shirl, or because the chairs are Poltrona Frau rather than Fantastic Furniture.
No, it's because the place smells of money and the stock looks like the Warhols, the Twomblys, the Richters, the Hirsts and the Basquiats in the Brandhorst Museum.
Phil started in the non-luxury car business in the non-luxury town of Cooma and at one stage had a Toyota dealership and competed against his wife, Kelva, who sold Fords. Anyway, Phil, a legend in the car caper and the doing good department, has lots of luxury dealerships and ordinary dealerships that sell Fiat Chrysler products such as Fiats and Jeeps.
I was in the Fezzer showroom because, for the first time, a car company had invited me to something that didn't involve lawyers and judges. The Roma comes out of Ferrari's new strategy. On Friday, shares were selling for an all-time record corona don't care price of $250.
Lucky Lou Camilleri and the boys on the exec team reckon there are 18 million high-net-worth individuals in the world and only .005 per cent of them own a Fezzer. You can see where this is going. It's the old Coopers China strategy.
Most of those really rich people don't want a real sports car. They want something like an Aston Martin that they can drive to Sant' Eustachio Il Caffe before they pretend to be Marcello Mastroianni or Anita Ekberg and head over to the Trevi to wade into the fountain in a ballgown.
Ferrari wants to extend its product range more in the GT class than the sports class. And unfortunately, they want the fleet to be 60 per cent hybrid. So, expect 10 new car launches in the next few years.
The most powerful brand in the world has the most pricing power in the world (30 per cent margins) so an entry level Portofino is "only" $400k and the Roma starts at $410k. The Roma is aimed at Porker Panamera and Aston (both around $400k) drivers.
The Roma is a stunningly beautiful car without the usual Ferrari "look at what I'm driving" shout. It takes some of its design cues from both brands. It has an Aston Martin shape (but with a baby shark front) and Porker spoiler and back seats.
The instrument display is a work of video art. All you need to know is packed on to a giant 40cm screen. The sound system can be tuned to tune out chatty passengers. Of course, the real reason to buy a Fezzer is because of the exhaust note. No other manufacturer has been able to match a noise that turns otherwise strong men, women and others into jelly.
Bottom line: this is a beautiful supercar that eats the Panamera and the top-of-the-line Astons but, if it was me, I'd buy the Tributo or spend somewhere in the low $300k for a 458.