roland_beech

Apologies to those who love their car colors, but I have to say would it kill Mazda to offer more choices?

I mean this is what you have for the '07 Rx-8

Black, White, Gray, Gray
Red
Dark Blue, Turqoise Blue

4 neutrals, 3 colors

...compare that to another car maker I'm considering, Lotus, where they offer twenty (20!) color choices

2 blacks
3 gray/silver
3 green (two variants on racing green and 'neon' green)
3 reds
4 blues
orange
yellow
gold
purple
white

...how is it that a tiny manufacturer like Lotus can understand that people's choice of color ranges widely and offers a vast array of really great/beautiful colors, yet Mazda offers so few, in such limited range, and discontinues colors just to seemingly annoy people? What, yellow rx8's were a good idea for 2004 models but a bad idea now?

Your choice with an rx8 is bland, blue or red.

I can't imagine it costs anything on the production side to have more colors, and I can only think it would make a significant improvement in sales.

One more rant: when dealers order cars why do they make dumb color choices? There's a dealer near me which has had two silver '06 rx8's and been unable to move them in over a year...so their first 07 model shows up and it's....silver. Ugh! Even in fact the exact same options package as the '06 they can't sell! Sheer Genius!

I have to think in particular a fairly high percentage of sports car buyers like colors that make the car even more visible?

Let's go look at Lamborghini...
4 gray
2 black
gold
2 yellow
2 blue
3 orange
red
white
purple
2 green

...19 colors

What gives Mazda? Then you go look at say a Mazda 3 and it comes in different colors based on the hatch vs 4 door etc. Crazy! You like that color? Too bad only offered on the other model.

You like the Mazdaspeed3? 4 colors only!

Ridiculous!

LiveToRev

You are comparing Mazda, a company that produces more cars than Lotus and Lamborghini combined per year, with the two car companies you mentioned that produces niche/specialty cars. Apples to oranges? I wouldn't be surprised that Lotus and Lamborghini offered more color choices than Mazda since their cars also carry a premium price.

TheKDog

Well you also have to consider the Shinka colors.

But the mustang also has more basic color choices:
2 Reds
2 Blues
2 Blacks
2 Silvers
White
Orange

The VR is cool but I would have liked a darker metallic red.

9krpmrx8

iTrader: (46)

I was crusing the Park today after a wash and my son spotted a great red Elise. I have seen plenty yellows and greens a local autcrosse but I never saw teh Lotus red and it is great. Really screams "sports car". I would like to see the 8 in the same orange color as the MSP.

saturn

I agree that the color selection is craptacular. They stole the flash of this car when they dropped Winning Blue and now all you have are boring, bland colors that you see everywhere on every car. It truly is depressing.

Clavius

Its most likely a cost cutting effort. The smaller lotus can offer wider colors since to my knowledge the cars are made to order pretty much so having more colors and painting them in the hopes they'll sell isnt a hinderance as opposed to Mazda. They could offer more colors but they run the risk of just producing a purely ugly color and no one buying them and hence being stuck with 'em.

Nopstnz

Yeah I was down at the marina today and spotted a tan aston martin db9. I slammed on the brakes and got out and took pictures. Once in a liftime will you see one of those where I live.

lone_wolf025

Believe it or not the light grey and dark grey are actually the most "popular" selling colors these days

ken-x8

Funny thing is, every time I see an RX-8 I wind up thinking "Wow - it looks good in that color!"

So they don't really need any more.

Considering the RX-8's production run - too many to custom paint each, too few to have a lot of variations in inventory - I'm surprised that they offer as many colors as they do.

Ken

map

Like phantom blue

JeRKy 8 Owner

What are you talking about? If there's one thing Mazda never ignored when it came to this car, it was color choices. Look at what the selection of colors has been over the span of 4 years:

Red, copper red, yellow, dark green, greenish blue, light blue, dark blue, dark purple (black cherry), silver, light gray (titanium), dark gray (galaxy), white, and black.

That's 13 color choices...12 if you don't count the slight changes they made to gray. If you missed out on some of them, that's your problem. Doesn't mean Mazda never offered them, now does it?

shaunv74

It's all a cost trade off. My guess is, Mazda would either have to make runs of a certain number of cars of each color in the paint booth on the assembly line and then clean out the sprayers and change over to a new color which is down time that must be paid for in the cost of the cars. Or have multiple paint booths (one for each color or groupings) and change them over less. So the more colors you add the more cost you need to absorb for each color to pay for it. The problem is they are not selling enough to justify more than a certain amount of paint colors at a given time, (more paint booths) and they cannot charge enough for the car (like a lamborghini) to absorb the cost of more paint colors (sprayer clean out and changeover).

andone

yeah i think its more important for the company to save some money on the choice of color, then offer so many colors like lotus of whatever.
you will never satisfy everybody.
so if you dont like any of the colors, get the 8 repainted....

and dont compare those companies....

New Yorker

So get the Lotus.

JRichter

Usually niche or low volume cars like Lotus of Lambo do offer more/specialty color choices. I'm sure everyone of these cars are made to order so no chance of a car with a funky color sitting on the lot with no one interested.

If your considering a Lotus over an RX-8 then there shouldn't be a problem. Who wouldn't take the Lotus if they had the oppertunity?

geaves

Hey guys,

I'm an old geezer, 52, and I've had my Rx8 for over two years now and until the Auto Show a couple of days ago I thought my Lightning Yellow was the best possible color for the 8 that I'd ever seen, but I really liked that new dark blue on the one they had there.

When shopping for the 8 I was looking at either black or gray or possibly silver, but when I saw that yellow one on the lot I couldn't believe how it brought out the lines of the car over the other colors.

I know the yellow is a hard sell for many, but it's just this old guy's opinion.

Enjoy,

Gary Eaves
South of St. Louis

Transam kid 01

iTrader: (1)

I'd love to see how this car looks in a SOM

mjd

I'm kind of disappointed in what they've done with the colors too. It just seems to me like this car needs to be bright. I have an '04 winning blue, and I had a hell of a time deciding on that color. I was torn between winning blue, yellow, red and green. Since there were so many of them too chose from on the lots that year, I pretty much decided on the spot when I bought the car and not ahead of time. The options I wanted were available on pretty much every color. If I had to do it again, I would have gotten yellow, just because of the rarity factor. All the colors now just seem to bland to me, except red. All the others just seem to blend in with every other car out there.

As a side note, has anyone seen one of the '07 chargers in that neon green color? That's hot! While I wouldn't buy that car, those Daytona model colors are all hot...green, yellow, orange.

roland_beech

I don't know how true that is -- the Lotus dealers around here seem to have a lot of inventory that isn't presold. I think there was even a bit of a squabble about Lotus making dealers order large numbers of cars

I believe that's a function of dealers ordering so many of those colors. For example here in the northern california bay area, a search for '06 leftover stock shows TONS of Galaxy Grey and Silver, quite a few Phantom Blue (not popular clearly), and a sprinkling of red and black. As far as I can tell there are ZERO Winning Blue Rx-8's left. Gee, I would bet a lot that if some of those lingering greys were WB they would be sold by now. You can also bet that if they had a couple of yellow 06's, orange 06's, green 06's they would also increase the chances of sales.

Then as I also related dealers are ordering '07's in the same exact colors and packages as '06's that they haven't been able to sell. This strikes me as unbelievable. I can only find three Stormy Blue cars in the entire bay area, but again a zillion greys, whites, blacks.

That's funny...yeah good business strategy for Mazda too. "hello mr. prospective 2007 rx8 buyer, you don't like the color choices...well if you missed out on some of them, that's your problem" yeah screw trying to meet the desires of the potential customer.

In fact why bother with the rx8 at all? "Hey prospective customer we made rotary engines a decade ago, if you missed out that's your problem..."

Oh yeah, and let's see two of those colors are Shinka only, and in this time they've had zero non-black like greens, orange, gold...and as has been pointed out they basically have zero bright colors offered this year.

Porsche 911? Apparently available in 19 colors too this year. Hmmm.

This is the heart of the issue. Maybe there is a cost factor, but I find it hard to believe. Say they only do a run of 200 for specialty colors...what that's hard to justify a "sprayer clean and changeover" for? It also offers the exclusivity of the 'shinka' tactic but without jacking up the costs (oh all right, charge a couple hundred extra for the bright colors). Heck they made 2000 shinkas a year didn't they?

How much does a "sprayer clean and changeover" cost really?

Lotus hand paints every car with water based paint, so yeah it's not the same assembly line approach exactly.

My belief is that if they offered the car in more diverse colors they would sell MORE. Maybe MANY MORE. Given the somewhat, ahem, low sales I would think that is a pretty easy risk to take, and given the preponderance of leftover bland colors, a pretty easy thing to suggest there's evidence in favor of.

In fact, my guess is the problem is ultimately CAUSED BY THE DEALERS! If dealers don't ask Mazda for more colors and just re-order the same old thing even when they don't sell Mazda may not get the message that bright colors could rock here.

Two of the most popular cars in the images section of this board appear to be Ezzy's custom orange car and the two-tone brownish 'Rockstar' car. Hmmm, go figure.

I'm not saying they can't still offer gray, black, white, etc for those who like that choice, just open it up by offering say another five bright colors.

Ah, I love the Lotus and am tempted but it's not very functional for someone like myself with three kids...basically I'd need to get the Lotus and a third car...

Exactly. You might go into the dealer thinking one thing and be blown away by a color you didn't expect. That's what happens when you get choices. My problem is I'm not blown away by *any* of the current options.

Right...most sports cars find a number of people who like the bright/hot colors and so offer them. I'm surprised frankly that people would ever suggest more choices/options is a bad thing...

shaunv74

Yep. Not disagreeing. Mazda should make more colors for the 8 and definitely different ones. Just speculating for you on why they may not be offering them.

Cartoonz

I think the RX-8 would look quite sickening in Krypton Green.
Winning blue with Chrome Orange stripes might be amusing though....

(a happy ex-Elise owner, now driving an MX-5)

prescriptionmazda

This thread makes me feel bad for actually liking brilliant black.

I prefer the more toned-down colors myself, but I'm lame like that.

Fuel4theFury

All i gotta say is if you dont like the color then go get a paint job. With a paint job you can get whatever color you like.

JeRKy 8 Owner

You're wrong. Top selling colors for the RX-8 back in 03-04 were red, gray, and silver...even when they had plenty of yellows and winning blues. I know a couple dealerships that still had several yellows sitting on their lots (which were only an 04 MY) that weren't even sold till 05. This color (which I own) is an eye sore on the road. Not as needy looking as some of the Lotus or Lambo colors, but it's definitely up there.

In 2005, if you went to look for an 8, there was a good chance you could still find yellow, which means that from 2003 to 2005, you had red, yellow, dark green, light blue, purple (shinka), silver, gray, white, and black available. The 8 wasn't selling due to extremely poor marketing, lack of horsepower, and perceived reliability issues with the rotary engine. Poor color choice? Yeah right. This car was/is better looking than all of the other vehicles in its price range. That still wasn't enough to do the job, obviously.

What do you mean go figure? No one can buy an 8 in those colors. They are custom. Of course those are going to be the most popular. Everyone on here has already seen everything else..because we own the car.


You snooze you lose. By the way, I missed out on the FDs myself, so don't feel bad. If yellow were still available today would you even purchase that color? I really don't know what to tell you here. Better luck next time.

By the way, it was hilarious to read your comparisons of Mazda to brands like Lamborguini, Lotus, and Porsche. Let's be more realistic and focus on the price range...

Ford Mustang? 10 colors currently available. Nissan 350Z? 8. Infinti G35 Coupe? 8. Honda S2000? 7. Mitsubishi Eclipse? 7. And guess what? None of those cars are available in more than two "bright" colors either.

Bottom line is, you clearly stated that you can afford a Lotus. That means you can afford to buy an 8 and then take into a body shop and get that custom screaming neon bright colored paint job you're dreaming about. Problem solved?

Gambit

I think the colors are generally good, but they ought to bring back the yellow