By the start of the 1980s, sales of the 2CV had started to wane. To tackle this, between 1983 and 1986 Citroën launched a series of special editions. It was a tactic already tried with some success with the 2CV Spot (1977), Dyane Caban (1977) and 2CV Charleston (1980) and with the GS Basalte (1978) and Visa Sextant (1980).
In 1983 Citroën sponsored a yacht, “France 3”, which was competing in trials to try to qualify for the America’s Cup, in Newport, Rhode Island.
To commemorate the sponsorship, a nautical-themed 2CV was launched (following on from the 2CV Spot, the launch brochure for which had a seaside theme, while the Dyane Caban was completely maritime-inspired).
The design was the work of the RSCG agency, not by Serge Gevin, who had designed the Caban and Charleston and would later design the Dolly. Citroën contributed 500 francs to the racing yacht for each 2CV France 3 sold.
The 2CV France 3 was based on a standard white 2CV6 Spécial, with matching wheels, headlamps and bumpers. The bonnet, hood and boot lid had two thick blue stripes down the centre (almost, but not exactly parallel on the bonnet) and there was a wave-like blue stripe down the sides. Each thick stripe was accompanied by two parallel thin blue stripes, one on each side. There was a large outline of the racing yacht on the left-hand side of the boot lid with “France 3” underneath.
Inside, the seats were unbleached white canvas with ocean blue stripes. Interestingly, the roof had the interior-fastening mechanism from the 2CV6 Club (at this time Citroën was receiving a number of complaints from British customers whose exterior-fastening hoods had been torn off by the wind during normal driving - Citroën declined to accept responsibility, but soon phased out the design for all models).
Citroën decided to offer the special edition to markets other than France but considered it necessary to change the name. For the British market the name “Beachcomber” was chosen and a sales brochure was shot on the promenade at Southwold with a row of beach huts in the background. For Germany, Spain, Austria and the Netherlands the name “Transat” was chosen. The names appeared on the bootlid instead of the much larger outline of the France 3 yacht that had appeared in France.
In Germany the Transat was produced in the opposite colours. It is rumoured that this is because it was felt a white car with blue stripes could be mistaken for a police car, which seems to be because they were green and white.
In 1984, by which time the America’s Cup had taken place (France 3 did not take part, as she had failed to qualify), Citroën produced a final 2,000 examples. This time round, very few were sold in France.