China is famous for some things, chopsticks, gunpowder, fireworks, etc. It is not well known for its ample breasts (not for someone who grew up during the silicone Baywatch/Hollywood era of the 80′s and 90′s anyway), but that’s changing at a rapid pace thanks to auto makers being increasingly eager to have their models bare flesh at auto shows.

China is fairly conservative on the surface, but dig away at the facade and its sometimes more liberal, more open than the West. Would I know where to find a prostitute in London? No idea. Would I know where to find one in Shanghai or Beijing? Most likely yes due to the number of call cards that get thrown on me when leaving an auto exhibition, usually young guys throw them through the car window when leaving the events area, Shanghai Auto Show is particularly bad for this.

The government doesn’t like this though, after the Beijing Auto Show where much flesh was on display, the government sent down a notice saying organizers and automakers should be more modest in their marketing activities. Chengdu Auto Show recently grabbed the headlines thanks to the daring clothes it chose to have its models don to promote the imported Kia Sorento, it seems that Chengdu is far from the control of the Central Government and chose to flout the rules, soon after the auto show concluded Kia’s import company that handles the models and showing of imported car models at auto shows was politely told it wasn’t welcome back to Chengdu. Oh dear.

Bare chested models seem to be grabbing the headlines better and faster than the new, or facelifted cars, so I doubt this activity is going to be going away anytime soon, in fact I think we will see a lot more of it. Will more models be willing to share their assets with the media? You betcha.