Jeep Adds One Color to Gladiator. That’s It. That’s the Headline.
This post is less about bringing breaking news to the B&B and more about giving your author a chance to run photos of a Jeep in an obnoxious color which he greatly enjoys. The brand calls it High Velocity Yellow; I call it fantastic.
But I’ll never understand why the marketing mavens at Jeep didn’t grab the opportunity to call it Highlighter Yellow. Alas. In any event, there’s little chance anyone who selects this shade from the growing palette of colors available on the Gladiator will lose their vehicle in a parking lot – or on the sand dunes for that matter. This thing should be the lead vehicle in all off-road sessions, by the way. It’d save money on those tall orange flags.
Speaking of money, this paint option – like so many these days – is an extra cost line item to the tune of $395. For those keeping track at home, this is the first yellow paint available on the Gladiator, though similar hues have been slathered on Wrangler over the years. Anyone who fronts for the option should also check boxes for a body-colored roof and color-keyed fender flares for maximum effect.
If this retina-searing hue is too much for yer eyes, know there are other paint colors with entertaining names on the Gladiator roster. Firecracker Red has been around for ages, as have Sarge Green and Sting-Grey. The eye-popping Hydro Blue is the same paint that’s on this writer’s Trailhawk currently sitting in his driveway.
Even though it is tough to draw any conclusions on year-over-year sales numbers thanks to a myriad of issues that have plunged dealers into a bizzarro-world environment, it’s worth noting that Stellantis retail sales were down almost a quarter in Q2 this year compared to last. Total sales were off 16 percent. Gladiator has shifted about 40,000 units so far in 2022 compared to about 50,000 in the same timeframe twelve months ago. Jeep’s best-seller is far-and-away the Grand Cherokee, at 134,369 units, about 35k up on the Wrangler. Those roles were reversed in 2021. Keep in mind that while Jeep breaks out Wagoneer and Grand Wagoneer stats (17k and 7k, respectively), there’s no delineation of two-row GC and three-row GCL numbers.
High Velocity Yellow is available now on ’23 Gladiators in all trims including Sport, Overland, Rubicon, and Mojave.
[Images: Jeep]
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Matthew buys, sells, fixes, & races cars. As a human index of auto & auction knowledge, he is fond of making money and offering loud opinions.
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This would be a good colour for anyone that would actually use their truck offroad, on gravel roads, in the winter or poor visibility situations.
Chevy used to sell almost this exact color on the Sonic, Bolt, and Camaro, as "Shock." And I have a story about that.
I bought my Bolt in 2019. Unsurprisingly the best deal came from the highest-volume Bolt dealer in my very EV-friendly area. They had huge inventory; I bought right when Chevy started offering major incentives, and the car had been priced too high to sell well until that point.
Half the inventory had a nice mix of trims and colors, and I was able to find the exact dark-gray-on-white Premier I wanted. But the real mystery was the other half of the inventory. It was something like 40 cars, all Shock on black, split between LT and Premier. You could get an additional $2000 or so off the already low selling price if you bought one of them. (Neither my wife nor I thought the deal worth it.) The cars were real and in the flesh; a couple were out front, but behind the showroom, there was an entire row of them.
When I took delivery, I asked the salesman how on earth they had ended up with so many. He told me in a low voice that a previous sales manager had screwed up order forms for a huge batch of cars that were supposed to be white, and that no one noticed until a couple transporters loaded with chartreuse Bolts actually showed up at the dealer. Long story short, there was no way to change the order. They eventually sold all the cars and you still see them more often than you'd expect in the area.