The 1969 Pink Rear-Loading Volkswagen Beach Bomb prototype is its official name and it is rare because only an estimated 200 were ever cast, none of them released to the public and only two pink versions are known to be in existence – making those two pinkies currently hold a value estimated to be $175,000 apiece according to Hot Wheels collectible expert, Bruce Pascal.
At the time it was released, Hot Wheels was heavily promoting use of their vehicles on tracks with supercharger units that would accelerate the cars when they encountered them – but the 1969 Rear-Loading Volkswagen Beach Bombs had two problems, they were too wide to fit through the superchargers and their high center of gravity meant they tipped off the track before they could even make it to the supercharger. If you were a kid running your cars on the track through your supercharger in 1969 – this was unacceptable. There were no hoarding collector types back in the day to swoon over this rarity, it was merely considered to be a failure for use on the track.
So Mattel made a newer, different version that did fit through the superchargers and put the surfboards in a side pocket instead of sticking out the back – but still made only a few of those, so those are collectible and valuable as well – just not as much as the original pink, rear-loading version.