Car Dispatch
The seven sevens doesn’t get you to Tel Aviv anymore.
Where’d Tel Aviv Car Service go? Over the past 25 years, thanks to those ubiquitous low-rent TV ads, it has become part of our urban consciousness. But recently it was renamed Dial 7, after the company’s well-worn seven-sevens phone number. Was the company, which has received hate mail during these terror-alert times, de-Semiticizing its brand? “If we wanted to change the name for political reasons, we would have done it a long time ago,” says a Dial 7 spokesperson. “The phone number is so distinctive, we’re hoping that the number alone is enough. Just like when you see the bull’s-eye, you know it’s Target.” Such rechristening doesn’t appear to be any sort of trend. As the guy answering the phone at Tel Aviv Towing and Collision on East 116th put it, “I don’t care. If they don’t like the name, it’s not my problem.”

EDITED BY CARL SWANSON

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