The UK vehicle manufacturer JLR has invested £65 million into a new paint system, allowing buyers to choose from nearly any colour imaginable.
The new equipment will be fitted to factories in Slovakia and the UK in a bid to entice luxury car buyers whilst cutting the emissions involved in producing new cars.
Andrea Debbane, Chief Sustainability Officer at JLR, highlighted that paint shops are one of the most polluting stages involved in making vehicles.
She explained: “JLR is seeing a significant increase in clients wanting to personalise their vehicles, so we are preparing to expand our facilities and offer thousands more paint options across our brands, but doing so in the most sustainable and efficient way possible.
“Paint shops are very energy intensive, accounting for around 80 percent of our operational emissions, so they represent our biggest opportunity.”
The investment comes as more luxury car buyers expect manufacturers to offer a wider range of colours for their models, which helps to make each example bespoke to the buyer.
According to the company, demand for bespoke colours, which are currently offered on the Range Rover SV, have doubled since 2022.
As a result, the investment, which will benefit the Castle Bromwich factory in Solihull and the Nitra plant in Slovakia, will help JLR produce more than 17,000 bespoke-colour cars each year whilst cutting down on energy and water use.
Drivers looking to give their new car a personal touch can visit their local Land Rover dealership, which claims to have an ‘almost infinite capability’ to match the shade of any colour a buyer wants.
Once ordered, the vehicle is sprayed via precise robotic arms and sent through a Smart Oven control system to dry the paintwork.
However, whilst most car buyers are used to paying around £1,000 above the standard price for metallic paint, drivers who wish to have a JLR model in bespoke paintwork will need an additional £70,000, driving up the cost of a full-size Range Rover to around £270,000.
2025 is set to be an interesting year for JLR, mostly due to the re-launch of the Jaguar brand. For the 2026 model year, the company will aim to compete with luxury brands, including Bentley and Porsche, with a range of all-electric models.
The brand’s first promotional video for the re-launch caused controversy for not featuring any vehicles, whilst also dropping several staples of the brand in the past, such as the famous leaping cat.
It is currently unknown what models Jaguar will sell when the company resumes producing cars toward the end of 2025, however an altered version of the Type 00 concept car is expected.
