There was some good news out of Italy the other day. Fiat announced that they’re done with making gray cars, and from now on will concentrate on the rest of the spectrum.
Maybe you saw the announcement on YouTube, as I did. Fiat’s CEO, Olivier François, climbs behind the wheel of a new, gray Fiat 600, which gets hoisted into the air and dunked in a giant can of orange paint. Rolling down his orange window, the CEO explains in Italian, with subtitles in English, that because Italy is “the land of colors,” Fiat will now be “the brand of colors” — even though, as he admits, other automakers offer gray because it sells well.
It’s all about brand-building, of course, and Fiat has done a good job of differentiating itself from other automakers with this ode to the colors of its native land. It’s landing well with its audience, too, judging by the comments section. One viewer, “andrewxaviermcelroy4700”, pretty much sums up the reactions: “It’s so refreshing to see an automaker embrace actual colors again. I hope more of them will follow Fiat’s lead.”
Is the world ready to start buying colorful cars again? We’ll see. My informal survey found that nine out of ten cars in my neighborhood lie somewhere on the gray scale, if you include silver, which I do. Guess there isn’t much of François’ “joy, optimism, love, passion, life” reflected in the parking lot of my local supermarket. I checked with Carfax, and I wasn’t imagining things. They report that black, white, silver, and gray account for nearly 75 percent of the 1.4 million used vehicles listed for sale on their site, with white (23.5 percent) edging out black (21.2 percent) for the top spot.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not anti-gray. I think that some cars look great in Sterling Gray Metallic, or Granite Crystal, or Silver Mist, or Starlight Gray, or Ceramic Pearl, or Silver Radiance (all actual shades of gray offered on 2024 vehicles). But can’t there be some room for reds, and blues, and greens, and even oranges, too?
I’ll admit that while I do pay attention to car colors, paint has never been a deciding factor in whether or not I buy a car. I’m what you might call “thrifty,” and if a used car can squeak through state inspection and is cheap enough, that’s good enough for me. It might just be that cars painted the more popular colors are worth more on the used-car market, and that my penchant for bargains has led me away from the safety of blandness. That’s probably how I’ve wound up driving the spectrum over the years.
Now that I’m counting them up, I’m surprised to realize that I’ve owned no fewer than four yellow cars, and I’m just about to buy a fifth. This, believe it or not, was no conscious choice, in spite of the color’s scarcity. There are so few yellow cars on the road that they’re generally lumped together with “other” in popularity rankings, polling at a practically invisible 1 percent. Scientifically speaking, the only possible explanation is that I was a cabbie in a previous life, or maybe a school bus driver.
In fact, my color wheel looks like Carfax’s, but in reverse. Blue and red are first and second on my list, which come in at fifth and sixth in their listings — not so different. Then things really get interesting. Yellow and green, both eentsy slivers on Carfax’s pie, are big, healthy slices on mine, coming in at third and fourth. Then come gray/silver, white, and, with one lone example, black. My observations on these colors: Yellow is easy to find in a parking lot, black is hard to keep clean, and white is much too good at showing rust. Yellow also manages to look clean during pollen season. Maybe it really is the best color, at least here in the Northeast.
Do you put gray at number one, and want me to see the light? If so, I invite you to send along a Dove Grey MGA, with red interior, to 222 Main Street, Bennington, Vermont. I promise to keep an open mind.
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