OK, quiz time – what’s one of the cheapest, easiest, and most necessary mods you can do to your vehicle? If you said, “Get a good license plate frame!” then give yourself a pat on the back, because you get an “A”. License plate frames are one of the simplest things you can do to your vehicle that will enhance its appearance and also help protect its finish if you pick the right frame. Over the years, I’ve tried a metric shit-ton of frames that have ranged from sad to great, and while a handful were quite good and lasted a reasonable amount of time, most were a pile of suck that at the very least wasted my money, and at the worst damaged the car. Have no fear though, because all of my suffering and experience is yours for the taking and I’ll happily share what I’ve eventually come to find is the best kind of license plate frame you could possibly own. IMHO, of course.
Enter the Intermerge TPU license plate frame kit. The first thing to say about this kit is that it’s just one of many similar kits that you’ll find on Amazon, eBay and the like. All of them are pretty close in design, and likely quality too – I’d even bet they come from the same factory. That said, I can vouch for the Intermerge kit with 100% certainty. For $15, you get two quality TPU frames and some mounting screws to go along with them. I will say, I have no idea how good the screws are as I already had stainless screws on my car from the dealer, but the ones included with the kit look to be stainless, and at the very least are no worse than any other screws you’d get with any other kit. The frames themselves are very well molded, and fit a standard U.S. plate perfectly and slightly tightly. There’s a bit of left-right wiggle room designed in so when you mount the plate on your car you can slide it a bit in the frame to line it up perfectly before tightening everything down. There’s also a few drain holes molded in so that water will drain out of the bottom of the frame, plus there’s a raised pattern of lines molded in on the inside and outside so that when the plate is tightened down you still have some room for drainage between it and your car. The best thing though, is that because the frame is made of a soft material you will never scratch the paint of your car underneath the frame, you’ll never have the frame rust and stain your paint, and the frame doesn’t rattle or make noise when driving or opening and closing your trunk, if you have your plate mounted on it. All in all, these frames for the most part eliminate the various annoyances and damage that you can have with other hard plastic or metal frames, and that’s why they’re the best frames available in my opinion. I have one on my BRZ currently, and also on my wife’s Mazda CX-30. If you’re unsatisfied with the various frames you’ve come across so far, give these a spin and see for yourself if they’re the best frames for most needs.
