Automotive paints 2022: Blue in top 5 new cars

Blue is the only chromatic shade that has made it into the top 5 colors for new cars in Europe since 2007. There are more than 20,000 different shades of blue, which poses a particular repair challenge for paint stores.

The color blue is often associated with longevity, according to the symbolism of traditional Chinese culture. This sense of durability is also confirmed by the 70th edition of the Global Study of the Most Popular Automotive Colors 2022 by Axalta, a leading global supplier of liquid and powder coatings. The study suggests that blue is the only chromatic color that has made it into the top 5 colors for new cars in Europe since 2007. In 2022, blue ranked fourth on the European popularity scale after gray (27%), black (22%) and white (21%), with an eleven percent share of new car sales. "Blue," a word derived from the Old High German blao for shimmering and shining, is one of the primary colors in the traditional three-color theory: red, yellow, blue. In the refinish industry, however, it is anything but simply a primary color.

Blue has the largest share among all refinish colors, with over 20,000 different shades ranging from light baby blue to dark midnight blue. Thousands of shades underscore the range and complexity of the blue spectrum. It includes highly chromatic blues, as well as colored aluminum and glass flake effect pigments in various shades of blue.

With so many different shades of blue on the road today, paint stores in the region are dealing with an increasing number of chromatic repairs. However, shades of blue, especially the darker gradations, can be difficult to repair. That's where Axalta's cloud-based digital color management comes in, as Sandra Piwonski, color service manager Germany, Axalta Refinish, explains. "Body and paint stores no longer have to rely on the human eye to find color. Our digital color management technology enables paint shops to implement the entire color finding process completely digitally and one hundred percent wirelessly. We introduced this innovation in 2019 as the first company in the paint industry to do so."

Painters use Axalta's latest digital colorimeter, the Acquire Color Compact, to measure the hue and effects of vehicle paint. The instrument sends the measurement results wirelessly to Axalta's global and continuously updated online color form database. Axalta's paint lab works tirelessly to ensure that some 20,000 global color developments are added to the database each year - including shades of blue. Refinishers need only scan, select the formula and mix the shade. This allows them to achieve the perfect shade accuracy for every color gradation and effect. For most shades, there's no need for on-screen comparisons.

Sandra Piwonski explains, "The days of hue cards, cables, PCs and on-screen hue checking are over. It really is that simple: scan, search and mix. Axalta's Digital Tint Management is a culmination of digital services that enable paint shops to become more accurate, efficient and profitable. This is achieved by reducing lost work time and streamlining store operations."

Around 2200 BC - at about the same time as the pyramids were built - the Egyptians succeeded in producing what is considered the first synthetically produced color pigment, Egyptian blue. To this day, the color blue has lost none of its appeal. Axalta has just announced its car color of the year 2023: Techno Blue. It is an extravagant, complex and ultra-modern blue with hue shift effects that embodies the transition from the real to the virtual world.

Sandra Piwonski concludes, "The color blue has a long, rich and impressive tradition. The fact that it is still popular in our region today as a color for new cars testifies to its own longevity. This is also true of those from antiquity to Picasso who sought ways to work with and present these important, yet unusual and diverse, blue pigments. As a global color expert, Axalta sees its role as enabling auto body and paint stores to repair all shades of blue without difficulty." (OM-04/23)