Jerry and Janice Huot drove their 2014 Mitsubishi Mirage 414,000 miles – through six grueling winters in rural Minnesota – and the only reason they didn’t go farther was a too-good-to-refuse offer from White Bear Mitsubishi dealer principal Richard Herod III to trade in the Plasma Purple sub-compact for a new 2020 Mirage earlier this year.
On the way to 414,000 miles, the Purple Won was a commercial delivery vehicle, hauled rocks and mulch for a
MMNA: When, where and why did you buy the Purple Won?
Janice: We went to White Bear Mitsubishi, which was near to where we lived, looking to trade in my Cadillac for something with better fuel economy. Right in the middle of the showroom was this little purple Mirage that got 44 mpg. I’d had an Outlander Sport and Montero Sport before and loved them, so it seemed like a good choice. We drove the Mirage home that day, right off the showroom floor.
MMNA: How did you accumulate so many miles in such a short period of time?
Jerry: I started using the Mirage for my business. I am a courier. I deliver samples from various doctors’ offices to labs, so I drive up and down the state and around town in Minneapolis all the time. The Mirage never missed a beat. It got me up and out of our gravel driveway, even in the middle of winter, when others got stuck in the snow.
MMNA: So did you baby the car?
Jerry: No way! It was stored outside year-round. I used it to haul rocks and mulch for our yard. All we did was routine maintenance. We had to replace the wheel bearings sometime after 150,000 miles, and the starter motor was replaced at somewhere between 200,000 and 300,000 miles, but that was all covered under warranty.
1 Otherwise, regular oil changes seemed to do the trick.
MMNA: What’s your best memory of owning the Purple Won?
Jerry: I always loved the comments at gas stations and grocery stores and waves from people as I’d drive by. Kids would always stop and point. Everybody seemed to love that car; it would make everyone smile whenever they saw it.
MMNA: Why did you trade in the Purple Won?
Jerry: I didn’t plan to. I had brought it into the dealership for regular service and was saying hello to all the people we’ve gotten to know there when Richard (Herrod III, dealer principal) came by. When he heard about how many miles we had on the car, he said he wanted to use it for advertising, so he worked with us to get great deal on a new 2020 Mirage.