This Is Why It's In Trouble: Nissan Spent Two Years Developing A Paint Color
Read the full story on The Auto Wire
It's no secret Nissan is in a serious financial crisis, so see the company put out a splashy release about how it took two years and a ton of money to develop a new paint color is really something. It's not too dissimilar to American automotive executives showing up on Capitol Hill driving fancy prototype cars before begging Congress for a bailout.We think Nissan can't read the room, and we're not just talking about the resources spent on this paint development process. Maybe had it been a really fantastic paint that would've helped the automaker sell a ton of cars, we don't really know what paint would do that, it would be fine. But it spent a lot of time and money developing a new shade of blue.
Nissan even admits right up front in the press release that gray, silver, black, and white rule the market these days. So instead of playing things conservatively when it's on the financial brink, the company blows a wad of money on a new color, called Aurora Blue Metallic, and brags about how the new Murano comes in that and 11 other colors.
Surely Nissan dealers will love having all these Muranos in unpopular colors while people ask if they have any more in white, black, gray, or silver. This is just such a stupid plan, it sums up so much of what's wrong with the company these days.
All automakers, and companies in general, learn a lot by listening to what consumers want, then delivering just that in the best way possible. It's like Nissan has decided to tell people their desire for a 'boring' grayscale color is wrong as it pushes this blue that it's bragging about looking so different in sunlight versus nighttime lighting.
Maybe Nissan should be figuring out how to make transmissions that don't grenade themselves at 80,000 miles instead of developing a shade a blue that looks slightly different than others.
Image via Nissan
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