Utah's new license plate is so popular, there's a waitlist for it

SALT LAKE CITY — It is the trendiest thing at the DMV.

Utah's new black and white license plate is so popular, there is now a six to eight week waitlist to get one.

"People love it!" Utah State Tax Commissioner John Valentine told FOX 13 News. "It looks really cool and it’s retro."

The license plate has been available for years, but only for vehicles classified as "vintage." Earlier this year, a new law went into effect making it available to cars, trucks and motorcycles as a specialty plate with proceeds benefiting the Utah State Historical Society. Since then, it has surged in popularity according to data provided to FOX 13 News by the Utah State Tax Commission (which oversees the Utah Division of Motor Vehicles).

"It’s actually the most popular plate right now in Utah," said Commissioner Valentine.

This month alone, the DMV had 10,613 requests for black and white plates. When the DMV averaged the specialty plate against others over the past four months? The black and white plate for vehicles had 5,087 requests on average compared to 357 for the vintage vehicle-specific plate, 130 requests for a firefighter specialty plate and 103 for the University of Utah plate. For motorcycles, the black and white plate had 443 requests, compared to 16 for vintage vehicle, and 23 for veteran designation motorcycle plates.

Ian Arbuckle said he is a fan.

"I've always loved the vintage plate. I have a '71 truck that has the vintage black plate on that. As soon as these came out to be used on any car? Since all my cars are black, I wanted a black plate," he told FOX 13 News on Thursday.

Commissioner Valentine said the DMV has an 11,000 plate back order right now for the specialty plate.

"The next time you have your renewal for your license plate? You make an application for a black plate instead of the Arches, Ski Utah or In God We Trust plate," he said. "But it’s not a standard plate so there’s an extra fee."

It costs about $50 more to get a specialty plate, which the state offers for various charitable causes (recently, the legislature approved one to help the Great Salt Lake). The Utah State Historical Society has gotten about $500,000 from the plate's sale, the commissioner said.

But there's something else the DMV would like you to be aware of: in that same law authorizing the black and white plate, there is a demand that vehicle owners remove any covers over their license plates. That is now a primary offense, meaning a police officer could pull you over and ticket you for it as a singular offense.

"The warning is please make certain you take the cover off all plates," Commissioner Valentine said. "Also as a reminder, it is an offense to drive around without a front license plate. A front license plate is a secondary offense."

That means if you're pulled over for say, speeding, an officer can notice you don't have a front license plate and then ticket you for that in addition to the primary offense.

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