Please Pick an Actual Color for Your Next Car Purchase
Our roads are becoming more monotone than ever before. iSeeCars recent study found that 80 percent of the cars on our roads are painted grayscale colors, with gray , white, black, and silver being the most popular “colors” in the country.
Gray has grown by a staggering 81.9 percent since 2004, while white gained 77.4 percent market share. Gold, purple, brown, beige, and yellow lost the most ground, with green being the only non-grayscale color to increase in recent times. The picture is essentially the same when the numbers are broken out by vehicle type, though truck buyers picked blue slightly more often in 2023 than 20 years prior.
The cause behind some of this is certainly buyers’ behavior, but it’s a bit of a chicken-or-egg scenario with dealers. People buy the cars that dealers stock, and an overly cautious store might only want colors it knows it can sell, leaving buyers with fewer choices. That same mentality also applies to people looking at vehicle resale values, leading them to buy “safe” colors in hopes that a later sale will be easier.
The funny thing about these trends is that automakers still offer a rainbow of color choices. iSeeCars pointed out that companies offer an average of 6.7 colors per model, down only slightly from 7.1 colors 20 years ago. Of course, I can’t really shout too loudly about this. I bought a black GR Corolla, but to be fair, it was the only one I could find without a markup. That said, I do hope you choose an actual color for your next car.
[Images: Chevrolet, BMW, Ford]
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Chris grew up in, under, and around cars, but took the long way around to becoming an automotive writer. After a career in technology consulting and a trip through business school, Chris began writing about the automotive industry as a way to reconnect with his passion and get behind the wheel of a new car every week. He focuses on taking complex industry stories and making them digestible by any reader. Just don’t expect him to stay away from high-mileage Porsches.
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I am starting to see some red emerging on the roads lately. We also have a lot of used import Toyota Aquas and some of them are in really cool colours, like orange, electric blue and bright yellow. What I really miss is colourful interiors, I'd love a bordello red crushed velvet interior, that'd sell me on an EV
When my '18 Torred Challenger was stolen back in Feb, I never expected to get it back in any kind of decent shape and had negotiated a deal to buy a '23 Scat Pack in Plum Crazy Purple. I almost bought my '18 in that color, but I worried I would get tired of it. I see a PCP Challenger all the time and like it, and the PCP car was equipped exactly as my present car is, so it was an easy choice. My car was found minutes after I had finished the negotiation, and 2 months later, about $2000 out of pocket, and the insurance paying about $12K in repairs, the car is back and is now a huge hassle to steal with a wheel lock, neutral release blocking plate, Carlock, and a Fast 5.0 throttle lock out. No cell phone with the correct code, all it does is idle.