1979 Volkswagen Super Beetle Convertible in rare triple white, coachwork by Karmann. Sold new at Mission Bay Volkswagen with the salesman’s card, original window sticker, and manuals with service stamps. The original sale price was $6,444.00, excluding sales tax and license. The brightly-trimmed interior features full carpeting and a wood-grained appliqué on the dashboard. Many of these final-year Super Beetle special editions were snapped up by collectors when new and put away as future collectibles, but this charming car has been driven 51,000 miles, attesting to its enjoyment factor.

Rare triple white special edition from the final year of production. Believed to be one of fewer than 2,000 built. Only 52,000 miles recorded.

Along with the Triple Black and Champagne special editions of the Super Beetle Convertible, the Triple White version represents one of Volkswagen’s final marketing efforts for this much-loved automotive icon. Super Beetles, with their more modern MacPherson strut and coil spring front suspension, rack-and-pinion steering, larger trunk and improved passenger amenities, had superseded the classic Bug in 1971, but ever-more-stringent U.S. emissions regulations meant the Super Beetle would be phased out of production after 1975 with the advent of new water-cooled designs. Although the sedan models had been discontinued, the last Super Beetle Convertible left the Karmann factory in Osnabrück on January 10, 1980, and was sent immediately to Volkswagen’s AutoMuseum in Wolfsburg. A few were sold in America as 1980 models, but these last remainders were, in actuality, 1979s in all regards.

Karmann was VW’s go-to manufacturer for its convertible models, and its well-designed folding top framework and extremely well-built, heavily-padded top with glass rear window set standards for quality of materials and workmanship. VW experts estimate that almost 11,000 Super Beetle convertibles were sold in 1979, with an additional 4,500 sold in early 1980, but that there were no more than 2,000 — and possibly as few as 1,000 — triple white convertibles. Dealers were reportedly allotted just one car apiece, making them highly collectable.