"All-new" usually isn't!

There it was again. "The all-new ________!"
This came as I browsed through the newspaper ads for automobiles.
You could fill in almost any brand in the blank above.

So why is it the copywriters need to call something "all new" or "all-new" (some use the hyphen, some don't), when, at best, there may be some parts that are different from those that have gone before?

An "all new" car to me might be one with a wooden box on top of a platform powered by centipedes instead of wheels and an engine. It might be a large rubbber ball powered only by rays from the moon in which the driver sits and steers by shifting weight from one side to the other or forward or backward.

But it is definitely not a car whose interior has been slightly modified from last year's model by increasing the size of the seats or adding an odometer that blinks when you've reached your destination.

I guess it's sheer laziness on the part of copywriters. "All new" comes easily to the tongue and the computer when thinking about something different.

So there may be new parts, modified design and changes in the metal shell, but for the most part, "all new" usually isn't. Especially when it's applied to the automotive world.