For most parents, car shopping starts long before they ever step foot in a dealership. It starts with Facebook posts asking for recommendations, group texts with friends, hours of scrolling reviews, debates over myriad features: third rows, trunk space, cup holders, whether a stroller will actually fit behind the seats…
Kelly Stumpe has seen it all. The St. Louis native behind The Car Mom built a national following by reviewing vehicles from a parent’s perspective, focusing less on horsepower and towing capacity and more on the details that families actually care about.
Now, she’s bringing that approach back to her hometown with the fourth annual Car Mom Auto Show, returning to Queeny Park on June 13. “We’re trying to streamline the process for families,” Stumpe says. “You can quickly take cars on and off your list without having to spend weeks driving to different dealerships.”
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Why parents keep showing up
Stumpe launched The Car Mom after noticing a gap in the car-buying conversation. As both a car salesperson and a mom, she watched parents flock to Facebook groups to ask the same question: What’s the best family vehicle?
The problem was that every answer depended on who was answering. “Everyone loved their car the most,” she says. “There wasn’t one place families could go to get unbiased reviews from a real mother’s perspective.”
Today, her reviews reach hundreds of thousands of followers nationwide. That growth surprised even Stumpe. When she launched The Car Mom in 2020, she assumed that her audience would primarily be local parents. Within months, however, she realized that the appeal extended far beyond St. Louis. Today, families travel from across the country to attend the Auto Show, with roughly 20–30 percent of attendees coming from outside Missouri. For Stumpe, it’s become an opportunity to showcase her hometown alongside the vehicles themselves.
The Auto Show is designed to bring that same information offline, allowing families to climb into vehicles, compare layouts, and test real-world functionality without bouncing from dealership to dealership. Instead of spending multiple weekends driving around town, parents can evaluate more than 20 vehicles in a single afternoon.
What to test before you buy
While many shoppers focus on exterior styling or dashboard technology, Stumpe encourages families to pay attention to the places they’ll spend the most time: the second and third rows.
At the Auto Show, vehicles are outfitted with car seats and families queue to see the back seats while envisioning daily life. “It makes me so proud when there’s a line seven families deep waiting to sit in the third row,” Stumpe says with a laugh.
Among the features that she recommends evaluating:
- Third-row access with car seats installed
- Cargo space for strollers, sports equipment, and groceries
- Visibility from the driver’s seat
- Booster-seat accessibility
- Charging ports and storage solutions
- Comfort for second- and third-row passengers
One surprising lesson she’s learned as a mother of four is that booster seats can sometimes be more challenging than traditional car seats. Many parents assume that the transition out of a car seat makes life easier. In reality, Stumpe says, booster seats introduce a new set of challenges because children must access and buckle seat belts independently every day. A poorly placed buckle or narrow seat can quickly become a source of frustration. “It’s just one thing many families don’t think about until they’re living it,” she says.
Think beyond today’s needs
If there’s one mistake that Stumpe repeatedly sees, it’s families shopping only for their current stage of life. Children grow. Carpools change. New siblings arrive. Activities multiply.
“Every year, these cars are expected to do something different,” she says. “Families often buy for today and quickly outgrow the vehicle.”
Rather than asking whether a vehicle works right now, she encourages parents to think about where their family might be three, five, or six years down the road.
Safety is another area that Stumpe encourages parents to watch closely. She points to recent changes in crash-testing standards that place greater emphasis on how second-row passengers perform in collisions, something she hopes will push manufacturers to invest more heavily in the seats where children spend most of their time. As family vehicles continue to evolve, she expects second- and third-row safety features to become increasingly important considerations for parents.
More than an auto show
The Car Mom Auto Show is designed to feel less like a sales floor and more like a family outing. Alongside the vehicles, attendees will find local boutiques, food trucks, coffee, face painting, bubbles, cotton candy, snow cones, Disney princesses, superheroes, and other kid-friendly activities.
“I’m kind of toeing the line of, ‘Is it a carnival or is it an auto show?’” Stumpe says.
Kids are encouraged to participate, too. Stumpe often advises parents to let children climb into vehicles, test seating positions, and share their opinions about comfort and visibility. After all, she notes, they’re the ones spending much of their time in the back seat.
For Stumpe, the event isn’t about convincing families to buy a particular vehicle; it’s about helping them feel informed and confident.
The automotive industry has long carried a reputation for being intimidating, particularly for women. Stumpe hopes that families leave feeling exactly the opposite. “When you’ve done your research and know what you want, you walk into a dealership feeling empowered,” she says. “I want everyone to feel like they’re making the best decision for their family.”
The Car Mom Auto Show Presented by CapitalOne Auto Navigator
When: June 13, 10 a.m.–4 p.m.
Where: Queeny Park, 550 Weidman
Tickets: Ages 3 and under get in free with a paid ticket. Find more information at thecarmomofficial.com.
