Mom life is hectic. Add the double pleasure of being a business owner, and once in a while, you’re gonna need an energy boost. But what’s a mom to do when her Bugatti doesn’t have a cup holder and she finds herself spilling a precious source of liquid wings? Ask Bugatti to make one, to which the design boss obliged.
Shannon Ralston is the CEO of San Antonio-based Angel Staffing, one of the leading healthcare staff providers in the nation. A philanthropist and animal conservationist, Ralston is also the mother of 12, including several children adopted from Haiti. Oh, and she owns a Bugatti Chiron, which a povvo like myself was unaware came without drink cubbies. Absolutely zero. Crazy to think when even teeny cars like the Mazda MX-5 manage one, even if it is dinky. I guess when your hypercar is capable of a 236-mph top speed, are you really gonna worry about a drink?
Yes, actually. Sometimes you do worry about a drink, especially one of those “sticky Austrian energy drinks,” as Bugatti Director of Design Frank Heyl describes the beverage that Ralston admittedly spilled.
In her social media plea, Ralston acknowledges that, yes, she knows “not to drink a Big Gulp while I’m driving the fastest car on earth”—Was she reprimanded before?!—but asks if she can at least get some kind of holder made for a water bottle. “I live in Texas!” she exclaims before blowing a kiss and name-dropping Heyl, Mate Rimac, Sasha Selipanov, and Dan Simon—all involved with the design development of the Chiron. “Come on, somebody help me,” she asks.
Lo and behold, the someone who comes to her aid is Heyl.
“The development team have been exceptionally busy to come up with a solution, and I think we have succeeded,” Heyl responded just a few days later. ” Just in time for Christmas, the design is ready. If you approve this [cupholder] design, we could mock up a rapid prototyping 3D printer part and ship it over to you for a first test fitment in January on your car.”
The solution is a clip-on, two-slot part that inserts into the driver’s door pocket, which happens to be where Ralston spilled her energy drink. And, so, in a Shyamalan-level plot twist, the origin of the problem is also the solution.
Heyl says the part can fit two different-sized drink containers. The larger one can accommodate a water bottle, while the smaller slot is perfect for the slim cans usually associated with Ralston’s apparent energy drink of choice. Heyl even customized the piece with Shannon’s name in hot pink, which matches the door detail color of her Chiron.
Honestly, it’s a fair and rather simple request. If you’re going to spend more than $3 million on a vehicle, in addition to transporting you from point A to point B in less than 2.3 seconds, the least it can do is offer a secure place for a water bottle. I personally don’t eat or drink in my sub-$30K car, though, unless I’m on a road trip with time constraints. If I owned a one-of-500 hypercar, hell, I might forego anything and everything that comes with a wrapper or cap.
Nevertheless, Bugatti made an owner’s Christmas wish come true. And who knows, if Ralston finds the design perfect (it likely is), who’s to say other Chiron owners won’t request one and end their collective thirst? A Christmas miracle!