Just about every Mustang owner has a story about how their love affair with the car began.
Laura Slider's story began the day a red Mustang appeared in the driveway across the street.
"I've wanted one ever since I was 15," she says. "It was owned by a very cute boy that I liked. And then we rode in it and it was very fast and sporty and fun and pretty, and I thought, I want one someday."
Now, decades later, she has one. And, yes, it's red.
On Thursday, Ford Motor Co. will pull the veil off its redesigned Mustang for 2015. And for the first time in its nearly 50-year history, the iconic pony car will be sold in every region of the world.
For me, it started in childhood, and that Mustang Mach 1 from 1973, I think. That's a dream car. That's the dream.
Mustang fans the world over are both eager and anxious to see what Ford has changed in this beloved American icon — including members of the Mustang Club of Germany.
If American Mustang fans are hungry to see the new version, European fans are starved. Ford hasn't sold the Mustang there since 1979. Club member Susan Wurm says the Mustang is different from most of the cars on the road today.
"Mustang gives the emotions," she says. "It's an emotion to drive the Mustang. It's special."
They're lining up their classic Mustangs near a little office that serves as the headquarters in Siegen, Germany, near Cologne. President Ralf Wurm is grilling up some wurst.
While Moygib Soori, Timo Schneider and Michael Sommer wait for the meal, they talk about their first love.
"I saw a picture from '66 Mustang, and that was it," Soori says.
"You put the window down and the arm outside, and you hear the V8 engine," Schneider says. "It's very cool."
"For me it started in childhood, and that Mustang Mach 1 from 1973, I think," Sommer says. "That's a dream car. That's the dream."
No pressure there, Ford — just a little tweaking with people's dreams. Bill Visnic, senior editor at Edmunds.com, says this makes things tricky.
"It is a danger. It's a difficult, difficult thing to redesign an icon. The Mustang is really the one car that Ford has to get right," Visnic says. "The biggest cautionary tale for Ford designers is alienating people too much with way too drastic, I think, of a change."
Almost no details about the car have leaked, but some purists are howling at the rumor that the new Mustang borrows some design cues from the Ford Fusion.
Visnic says you could do worse than echo elements from another pretty car. The Mustang has to evolve to stay relevant, he says. Coupes have a naturally short shelf life, and Ford has to attract younger buyers who may not have a classic Mustang memory from their childhoods.
But the company says there is one thing it did not do and will never do — downplay the Mustang's American roots, says Roelant de Waard with Ford of Europe.
"The Mustang's appeal was always because it was an American icon, and it stood for American freedom, and of course also American performance," de Waard says.
So the important stuff — the V8 engine with a throaty growl, the rear-wheel drive, the long, expressive hood — that's all here to stay.
On Thursday, the Mustang goes on a global stage, with simultaneous reveals in Shanghai, Sydney, Barcelona, Los Angeles and New York, and at Ford's headquarters in Dearborn, Mich. It will be a test of whether an icon created 50 years ago still has the power to spark dreams.
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