Cloudy rearrangement: gray is young again as a car color AllNews

Occasionally, automakers alert news outlets when they are about to announce something important. A few weeks ago, Aries did just that. We brightened up here Autoblog: What big news would come? The reveal of the little Ram pickup? The Hurricane inline six goes into the Ram 1500? We have anticipated these developments. Instead it was this: a special edition for the TRX and Rebel called the Lunar Edition – an appearance package based around a paint color called Ceramic Gray.

More gray paint is not the excitement we expected.

It is called the Lunar Edition because the moon’s surface is gray. When Buzz Aldrin surveyed that stark landscape in 1969, he called it “beautiful desolation.” It seems like a bad connotation if you’re trying to sell trucks, but the Aries marketing people might be too young to remember that.

However, it turns out that Ceramic Gray is kind of interesting – part of a new generation of gray paint on cars. For perhaps the first time, gray draws attention on the road.

Until now, gray was one of the most boring colors an automaker had to offer. Maybe not as bad as the proverbial beige Camry, but close. Anonymously. Boring. Discrete. Actually a non-color. Gray is achromatic, between black and white. Or gray can be achieved by basically using all the colors, as if you took all the food in your fridge and kissed it in the blender. And about that tasty.

Yet gray is the third most popular car color, and we never got it. White is the best seller, with 26% of the car market. Nothing wrong with white. It has good visibility and can paradoxically look clean even when it’s dirty, so that’s nice. And white is often a complimentary color option. Black is next with 22%. Black cars look great, at least for the first half hour after you wash them. Everyone owns a black car once in their life, and once is generally enough.

And then there’s gray, at 18.4%. This means that almost 1 in 5 cars are grey. If you put gray and silver together – the difference can sometimes be a, well, gray area – it’s almost 1 in 3 cars. And for decades, grays have been an everyday medium to dark anthracite metallic. Millions of Mercedes, Audi and BMWs wear that colour. Around the office we call the white-silver-grey-black spectrum the ‘German rainbow’. Together they make up an astonishing 78.6% of all car sales in the US.

The actually colors that surround us in our natural world are also rancid, with blue at 9.5%, red at 8.6%, and others such as orange, green, or yellow at less than a percentage point each. Besides, these nicer colors help a vehicle retain its value. Gray is not good for that, although black is a really expensive choice.

BMW i4 in Brooklyn Grey, a more modern take on the old ‘German rainbow’. The new i5, just unveiled on Wednesday, wears a cool gray that looks more traditionally metallic.

Why grey?

A long-standing myth claimed that dogs could only see in black and white. So, what, were people picking out cars that they thought their dogs would like? The best guesses as to why gray is so popular are (a) that dealers often order it as a non-controversial choice that won’t hang on the lot, so car buyers took what they could get. Or, (b) buyers just don’t care, or it doesn’t matter.

In my opinion, gray is a security issue. Anecdotally, when I overlooked an oncoming vehicle at first glance, it was dark, gray. Here in Seattle, or anywhere else on a bleak winter day, a gray car is a boring hazard—gray against gray pavement, gray skies, gray buildings. Fortunately, daytime running lights helped a lot. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety shared some research on car color safety, indicating that white or yellow are the safest colors (note that fire trucks are lime yellow these days). But it was difficult for researchers to pinpoint the safety issue. Different drivers, different weather, etc., create confusing variables. However, if light colors seem to offer a slight advantage, it’s reasonable to think the opposite for dark colors.

Note that deer hunters and road workers do not wear gray safety vests.

Given the unclear science regarding car color safety, IIHS says buyers shouldn’t get too hung up on color, but rather focus on buying a car with great headlights, solid crash test scores, and advanced safety features. But hey, a light color won’t hurt.

New day for gray

Suddenly, however, the pallor over gray has lifted. Gray became cool. All around us on the road, gray paint jobs bear little resemblance to the previous ones. Many are solid colors or “pearls” rather than metallics. Some lean towards blue or green, and in lighter, cool tones, seemingly matte or creamy, reminiscent of the ‘milk paint’ finishes on furniture.

Why is gray so popular and what’s going on with these new shades? Here’s the view of Laurie Pressman, vice president of the Pantone Color Institute, who reads into it quite a bit:

“One of the reasons colors in the gray family are popular in cars is because they’re just so comfortable to live with, and as an asset we typically hold for an extended period of time, it’s important that the color we choose stands the test of time, which the grays do.

“There is also a strong psychological appeal to the grays. Whether it’s a cool shade of gray that leans towards the blue or lavender side or a brown-tinted gray infused with warmth, colors in the gray family signify a level of exalted minimalism and understated chic as sturdy and eternal.

“And then there are the silvery and pearlescent and iridescent shimmering grays whose message of sleek modernity and futuristic looks spark our imaginations to envision new futures in fantasy sci-fi or a journey into the greater galaxy.”

Of course you can still buy one of the old, dark Germanic grays, for example a new BMW 3 Series in Dravit gray metallic. But you can also get it in lighter, fresher, modern Brooklyn Grey. The just-revealed 2024 BMW 5 Series was shown in something similar to Brooklyn, but glossier. The i7 just revealed is also gray, but a bit more traditional.

You can get your Kia K5, Telluride or most of the lineup in a smooth, intriguing Wolf Gray. The Stinger comes in Ceramic Silver (Ceramic is the same name used by Ram).

A Honda Accord looks sleek in Urban Gray Pearl, or a Civic in bluish Sonic Gray Pearl.

I would like a GT-350 in traditional Shelby white and blue, but Avalanche Gray on that car was sharp and Avalanche appears on other Ford models like the Ranger or F-150. Volvo currently offers Thunder Gray Metallic; he used to combine Osmium Gray with his Amber interior, a striking combination.

For years we’ve had dark, dull – Buzz Aldrin would say desolate – gray cars. Automakers are finally offering something better for those who say gray is okay.

Then again, a few days after Ram announced the Lunar Edition, it rolled out the Ram Rebel 1500 Havoc Special Edition – in vibrant Baja Yellow. So you can always choose a real color.