Owners go for Light Brown Vehicles

01/06/97

The Associated Press reports that earth tones like light brown and green have become the most popular car colors in North America for the first time in 20 years.

According to DuPont Automotive's annual survey, light brown reportedly topped the color chart for luxury cars in 1996, while dark green was the favorite for full-size and sport/compact cars. DuPont Automotive is a major automotive paint supplier.

Bob Daily, DuPont's color styling and marketing manager, said, "reminiscent of the '70s interest in earth tones, we're seeing a trend toward natural tones. We see more consumers showing interest in shades of golds, light browns and copper as well as the special-effect finishes that will link nature and technology themes."

Car colors may recall the seventies, but their names have been updated. Manager Mark Jones at Don Massey Cadillac in Plymouth, Mich., says customers are ordering calypso green and polo green, while salesman Joe Palazzolo at Roy O'Brien Ford in St. Clair Shores, Mich. is selling browns called "champagne" and "saddle."

Palazzolo said, "It used to be old-fogeyish. Now it's chic, like it's classy."

DuPont said white remained the favorite color of truck and van buyers, with dark green a close second. Black also remained a strong choice, taking a spot among the top five for the year.

Wayne Youngblood, sales manager for Bavarian Motor Village in Eastpointe, Mich., said his customers still like black most and white second. He says that those choices are partially due to the fact that about 65 percent of his customers are male. To them, says Youngblood, driving a black BMW says "authority, strength, stature, respect."

Youngblood indicates that his experience hasn't stopped BMW from experimenting with a new palette for their 1997 models. He said new colors for the German autos include technoviolet, Aspen silver and aubergine (dark red).

Greens re-emerged as popular colors in 1990 and have garnered increasing attention ever since. In 1996, dark green covered 21.2 percent of sport and compact cars, 18.8 percent of full-size and midsize cars, 20.7 percent of trucks and vans and 11.8 percent of luxury cars.

Other findings from the DuPont Automotive survey include:

* black placed in the top three colors in three different categories;

* light brown gained popularity in the full/intermediate and sport/compact categories on the strength of its popularity with luxury cars buyers;

* bright and medium red dropped across all categories, but dark red gained in the luxury, full/intermediate, and truck/van categories;

* white showed itself a consistent top-three finisher in each vehicle category over the last 15 years (metallic white jumped significantly in the luxury category for 1996);

* blues are making a small comeback, with darker shades outselling light blues and teals.

Paul Dever -- The Auto Channel