Once upon a time, certain colors were rolling representations of a brand or model.
Range Rovers were often green. Many a Mercedes was emblazoned in gold or brown. Chrysler minivans could be had in a baby blue or a Barney purple, and everything from a Chevy pickup truck to a Toyota MR2 could be given a bright yellow paint job that ranged somewhere between ‘mustard’ and ‘zonker’.
Now whenever I get these colors at my lot, they don’t sell. Not even if I zonk them with a lower price.
I have a green 1998 Volvo V70 wagon with all the options, a dealer maintenance history, and a reasonable 166k miles. All for $2300.
It won’t sell for the same reason why the kermit green 1999 Isuzu Rodeo 4WD won’t sell. Nobody wants that color. At least not in the last six months.
Now before you think I am losing my marbles as a longtime car dealer, let me just say that the Volvo wagon cost me all of $1115 at a Carmax auction while the Rodeo is a trade-in that I did manage to finance to a local pastor for a bit over a year.
Despite the calls for eternal damnation that quickly followed my repossession of that Isuzu, I am not hurting for anything at this point with either one of the two vehicles. Although my weakness for Volvo wagons may eventually have terminal consequences on my bottom line, and a 14 year old green Isuzu isn’t exactly the embodiment of anything good to me other than a marketing train wreck.
To be brutally blunt, I just don’t want to keep staring at these two wallflowers when I do my daily walk around the lot. Other dealers in my neck of the woods also have the exact same type of predicament when it comes to their inventory. Some of the great colors of yesteryear are no longer considered even passable to the modern day consumer.
Take a 2007 Volvo S80 in gold. Let me rephrase that. Would you please take a 2007 Volvo S80 in gold with 105k for all of $11,000?
A friend of mine bought it nearly a year ago for that price. Since then it has gone from $15,995 to $14,995… to beg… to plead… to back of the lot… to a 4000 pound barnacle on his balance sheet. He can’t sell it. I have driven it several times (he knows I have a weakness for Volvos) and to be frank, I believe this car is an infinitely better value than say, a 2007 Camry XLE with the same level of mileage.
However no Camry is considered gold these days. It’s a ‘champagne’ car . I took note of this salient fact when I bought her a Camry at an auto auction near West Palm Beach not too long ago. My marching orders were to find her a ‘gold’ car she could use to transport her friends to the usual blue plate specials and B-list shows that are apparently popular in her neck of the woods.
Once I transported that ‘better be gold’ car from the auction to the nearby retirement community, the car all of a sudden became ‘champagne’ to all of her friends.
Champagne is a reminder of those old black and white movies of the 1930’s thru 1950’s. Where ladies and men dressed in their finest unbreathable outfits, and talked with thick Transatlantic accents about nothing in particular.
Champagne represents the good life of the silver screen to my mom’s generation. While gold is something you keep in the safety deposit box at the local bank.
When I took my mom out the other day, she saw my friend come by in that gold Volvo and once again, fell in love with the color.
She will be trading the Camry straight up for the Volvo S80. A win-win for both parties. My mom gets a dealer maintained from day one, top of the line $60,000+ luxury car with an extended warranty that has a 5-star rating from a long list of actual owners. While my friend gets a car that he can market to a sub-prime customer for what will hopefully yield a mid-five figure profit.
Now I just need to find two people that like the color green. Something tells me I’ll be waiting for quite a while.
I love that wagon, but I fear the costs of Volvo repairs.
Why? ford parts are cheap.
These cars have LOTS of Volvo only stuff, Bryce, and it NOT cheap.
Much less to repair than a merc or bimmer. The problem is the so called specialists soak the un suspecting when they come rolling in, in a volvo. Parts can be had reasonably cheap from fcp groton, ebay and even IPD is a good source.
Standing by for the onslaught of green Volvo wagon aficionados in 3, 2, 1…
If one of my kids needed a car today I’d go over to Steve’s place for the Volvo wagon. Non-turbo automatic Volvos are great kid cars and at $2300 I wouldn’t feel too bad when the kid wrecks it. It looks great in green and would feel right at home next to my Boston Green ’96 Z3.
A few years ago I really wanted to buy a Volvo S80 in light silvery green but didn’t because as much as I liked the way it looked and how comfortable the interior was it just didn’t drive well. The transmission felt like it came out of a 1990 VW Passat (not a good thing) and the car needed another 50+ horsepower.
If only it were a green, diesel Volvo wagon with manual trans. Thousands, errrrr 2 people in the universe would be interested.
Neither of whom would be actually inclined to open up their wallets and take out the purchase price.
But they will stay on these boards and shill for them endlessly. They will also demand 400 hp, soft touch interior and a $17,000 base price.
I would be one of the two interested parties. Its to bad they didnt offer them kitted like that in NA. If they did Im sure that would be all I would ever buy.
Seems to me that eBay Motors was invented for just that kind of car – the one that someone, somewhere wants badly but can’t find and someone far away has but can’t sell locally.
Wait, isnt it still SirPaul week…howja sneak this in?
?? If you’re seeing my name up on too many posts this week, my apologies, but I can assure you that’s more out of necessity than design. But we’ve had at least a half dozen posts since Monday morning that weren’t mine. Would you like to see your name on one? It can be daunting to get up in the morning and look at an empty Posts Calender….I welcome all the help I can get.
“Now whenever I get these colors at my lot, they don’t sell…”
THAT, my friends, is why we are drowning in a sea of silver, black, gray, white and tan.
Me? Although I really am fond of certain grays – my 2012 Impala is Ashen Gray – I prefer reds, and surely a greater yellow than Goldwood Yellow on my avatar has never been made!
Smaller cars look good in loud colors. Big cars used to back in the day, but even tough I like my Impalas red, like dad’s 1966, mine just wouldn’t look right in bright red even though I do see lots of them.
Tell me about it. When looking for a used car, color choices often have to take a back seat to mileage, condition and desired equipment (read: manual transmission).
Which is why my Ranger is white, my xB is black, and the Solstice is metallic gray (happily, a shade or two too dark to call silver).
And I wondered why I loved my red Porsche so much. Right now my driveway bores me to tears.
My parents would often buy a car in green or brown to shave a bit off the price.I never liked the horrid Ludlow Green on Mum’s Ford Cortina Mk 1.
I find the Volvo wagon perfectly acceptable in green. But then I also enjoyed driving a Chevy Colorado painted DOT-yellow. Yeah, that cost me at trade-in.
My previous vehicle was a 2006 Ranger, in “screaming yellow”. I don’t think I took a hit when I traded it in, but I got a good deal when I bought it new – the build sticker said it was built in July 2005 and I bought it in July 2006. It was pretty much the only one in my area equipped the way I wanted – all the other leftovers were either strippers or loaded, mine was right in the middle like I wanted.
My parents had a bright-yellow Gremlin when I was growing up, so I figured I would keep on the tradition of owning a bright yellow car. The only thing is that I got pulled over a bunch more times in that truck than any other vehicle.
I tried to sell a 323 Mazda with 23,000 kms on it and couldnt get a bite I tried hawking it around some used car dealers and all said the same nice car awful shade of green we cant sell those I did in the end way too cheap for a nearly unused car.
Export the Volvo wagon to Portland, we love green cars, at least based on the prevalence of green Subaru Outbacks.
I don’t find anything offensive about the colors on any of the pictured vehicles, except maybe the Isuzu just a bit. I think I actually prefer that green over the turquoise on my mom’s Jimmy, which I think was called “Laguna Green”.
In which case you’re the only person ever to have posted on an internet car blog not to find a beige Camry offensive.
It’s a bland color, which isn’t the same thing as offensive. It is also an ugly car though. Now, the hot pink Aztek I saw a couple months ago, THAT was offensive.
This is why you don’t let your Aquarian mother pick out her new car. In addition to the craptastic nature of the S-Blazer, I believe GM only offered this shade of Resale Leprosy Green (actually “Bright Teal”) for about six months in 1992.
Of course, of the three vehicles my Dad wrote a check for that day, this is the one that’s stuck around.
Damn Steve, I would have snapped up that Volvo two weeks ago…
We finally ditched our S70 (bought new) at 70k and needing complete ac and abs systems. I’m guessing that your wagon has had all the bugs worked out of it. Love the way ours drove (a slow tank, excellent seats).
Keep posting Paul. I always enjoy seeing your name on the byline. Hey maybe you should expand into current car news…..
An old friend who sold cars one told me that “Price overcomes color every time”. Based on many cars I have seen I believe him.
How much would you have to knock off the price to get them to sell/rent?
I often seek out different colours. I’d rather not own a white, silver or brown if possible. That green looks good on the Volvo. The Isuzu is a little off the wall but I could still handle it.
I had a Ford Escort wagon in a similar gold colour to that Volvo – I hated with a passion. Looked like finely polished poo.
Emerald green has always been my favorite color on cars. It has a certain elegance to it. A shame you can’t get it on just about any car in 2013. If I were in the market for a ’98 Volvo, I’d take that one.
+1: my favorite color of them all. In 1973, GM offered this color and Oldsmobile actually called it “Emerald Green”. Color is usually a deciding factor in my car purchases.
The gold, silver, yellow, black, and beige/tan vehicles in the current fleet were purchased only because each car’s inherent coolness was high enough to offset its nasty color.
The dark green on the Volvo was everywhere in the 90s. I think because it is so identified with that era, it makes anything wearing it look old. Chrysler put a dark green on their minivans a couple of years ago, and I hardly saw any.
I suddenly realized that that champaigne/gold/beige/metallic tan that was EVERYWHERE in the 90s and early 2000s has suddenly vanished from the color palette.
Every time I see a Toyota Venza in metallic brown, I think about how unsellable it will be in 6 years.
Oddly to me that is the only color that makes the venza look acceptable.
I don’t mind it myself. Reminds me of my mom’s 72 Dodge Coronet. A good color for a beater because it hides rust nicely.
always found that british racing green, hunter green, to be good looking colors. Mazda was all over that in the early 90s. I remember that teal, turqoiuse shit that was common on Fords trucks mainly, and Chryslers LH platforms, and neons, as well as Mazdas. I think early mid 90s.
God that was a horrible color.
There’s a guy named Tom who frequents this web site that loves Volvo station wagons, especially green ones. Tom, this Volvo has your name written all over it.
Hey I like it Kevin, but I’ve been there, done that. Here’s my ’99 S70 AWD, in “Desert Wind,” which was a green/gold pearlescent color. Loved it but too many things broke, so it was traded for my current longroof after about 3.5 years.
I learned from a small used car dealer near 30 years ago that green cars don’t sell, or at least for a price anywhere near the exact same car in any other color, so it is best to stay far far away from them. He also shared that red was the best color to maximize the sales price.
Had to laugh about the pastor and the eternal damnation. Doesn’t he know that his own breach of contract is sort of the same as bearing false witness?
Render unto Caesar’s that which is Caesars, and render unto Steven that which is Steven’s.
Or taketh the bus.
That is one of the reasons I’ve stayed away from working on pastor’s vehicles. They will call you all sorts of things and lay a heavy guilt trip on you if you won’t do the work at well below your regular rate or free. If I was a member of their church I could maybe see it but playing the clergy card to fix your luxury car doesn’t work on me.
A sin is digital: it either “is” or it “isn’t” 😛
I’m glad gold/champagne vehicles have gone out of style (well, everywhere but the retirement communities, I suppose.) To me, gold screams “nineties.” I even remember in the late ’90s Chrysler would run ads of their full art deco line-up (PT Cruiser, post-facelift gen-1 Sebring convertible, Concorde, LHS, etc.) in gold. Blech.
Around here, I don’t see too many new silver cars. It seems people associate silver with the oughts. Gray rules the day around here. I heard it referred to as “Recession Gray” somewhere, and that seems about right.
Contrary to may around here, I don’t find forest greens – or greens of any shade – an attractive color. But I do like the reemergence of nice shades of brown lately. And not just because it’s the cool thing to say as an enthusiast.
I find it so hard to fathom that people reduced to a Buy Here – Pay Here lot can actually say: “…oh, wait. It’s (fill in the color here)! Never mind.”
I would be a total failure in your business, Mr. Lang. I can never understand why people’s I.Q.’s drop 50 pts when it comes to automobiles.
You just gotta think…like a “buy here, pay here” customer.
Never mind the mechanicals. Never mind the mileage. Is it CUTE? Is it a chick magnet, or does the prospect think so? Does it have an automatic tranny, so he (or more likely, she) can actually drive it?
And it it in a “cute color”? THAT is what they look for; in a car; in a mate; in a job. It’s why they are where they are.
The problem, color-wise, is that the new-car market is the new-car market; the used-car market is the used-car market; and never the twain shall meet. A new-car buyer is looking for any number of things; any combination of things; but often car COLOR is low on the priority.
The buyer may want value; he may want status. He may want the image of a car that’s popular…the white Lincoln or the pink Cadillac. But he’s buying; depending on the model and time of year, he may or may not be able to negotiate towards a rig his color.
As opposed to the used-car buyer. Now…a used-car purchaser may or may not be unsophisticated; but when he winds up at a lot like Steve’s, he probably isn’t the most savvy with money or hardware. He/she just wants something he can DRIVE.
That means, automatic; minimum of model-quirks (no Saab floor-ignitions) and in a pleasing color.
Meaning, probably a primary tint…many such buyers are just overaged children. Shiny, or seemingly so…lotta buffing. No understatement – like some Euro brands. Orphans may be harder to sell; but when someone’s gotten “credit” from you, he probably won’t care. Hey, it starts, don’t it?
My suggestion: Make friends with a MAACO manager…now that Earl Schieb has gone on to the Great Beyond. You get a car in a dog-color…have it painted, quick! Preferably at a jobber’s rate.
Had a teal blue 74 US import MGB for sale.
For a friend
Everybody who was after the car talked about Greeeeen
No luggage rack on the boot (I hate those) , another `must have` for roadster fanatics.
Except for this German guy, he took one look at it and said “Thank God it is not green”
Paid the money and drove off into the sunset.
Sent me an e-mail months later to say it was such a great car.
That Rodeo is a terrible colour… But lower it a lot, black-out the B and C pillars and attach a large diameter exhaust and I guarantee you’ll flick it off in no time! (Caution: guarantee may not exist).
The green Volvo, on the other hand, is a simply gorgeous colour, I can’t believe it hasn’t sold. Stick a bunch of postage stamps on it and mail it to me in New Zealand if you want!
I’ve had 3 gold cars – a Mk I Ford Escort (UK model), and two Ford Sierras. The Escort was genuine darkish gold, while both Sierras were champagne – the genuine champagne with pink in the mix. Wouldn’t go near a gold car now unless it was a Mk V Ford Cortina Ghia in the factory dark gold.
My current car’s white, with silver encircling the bottom 30cm or so. I hate white but it was cheap… My favourite colour was the gorgeous blue-green on my grandparents’ former Volvo 164E. If I was buying now though, I’d get dark blue (as I have the last two times I got new company cars) – the dark blue on my old ’08 Mazda 6 was beautiful, the chrome window surrounds really popped.
Green is my favorite car color. Not not those greens. The Volvo is so dark as to appear flat black, IMHO. There’s little hue, and no life in it. The Isuzu, on the other hand, is just nervous, overenthusiastic, with too much intensity. We had the true & good emerald shade early on: British Racing Green, should have stuck with it.
And how fast would a black Rodeo sell? How many buyers are out there deliberately shopping for an orphan SUV from the last century?
Just repainted my ’96 850R wagon in that green color – bought it new in the same color. My wife’s ’96 850 sedan was advertised as “Champagne Gold” – I bought it (and the wagon) sight unseen new from Tourist and Diplomat sales. When I first saw the sedan on the pier in Baltimore, my first thought was “Not champagne; beer.” I guess the two of them together apparently scream “Nineties.”
With regard to the metallic dark green – it has a tiny amount of gold metalflake. The result is that in bright sun, the car appears almost black. In low light, the green shines brightly.