Option prices on McLaren's, are they just daft???

[Streetrod]

Before I start I just want to say I love Mclaren's but I do wonder how marketing come up with their pricing sometimes. Check out the cost of the paint on this LT:

http://www.supervettura.com/mclaren-675lt-spider-a...

Could someone please explain why companies charge such prices as only the few would be willing to pay this kind of silly money. Would it not make better sense to price the options more attractively that way more people would spend the money and more revenue would be generated??

[Streetrod]

What bugs me about the paint cost on this car is that you could have ordered the exact same paint on a TVR a number of years ago for a fraction of the cost. You could also have got it on a recent Japanese small car, I cant remember the exact model.

Personally I would like options to actually reflect the production costs plus a decent profit for the manufacturer, not the wholesale ripoff we are seeing in the markets at the moment.

And this is not just a McLaren problem, all car makers seem to think this sort of pricing is fair game

[Streetrod]

Daisy Duke said:

Sarnie said:

lee_fr200 said:

Idiocy!

I'd rather just get a cheap colour then have it wrapped in that colour changing vinyl probably cost 5k as opposed to 29k

Whilst true, it's just not how people with £400K+ to spend on a car think.........

Well some do actually. Whilst it's easy to let enthusiasm to get the better of you, not everyone loses their sense of perspective when ordering such cars.

Streetrod said:

What bugs me about the paint cost on this car is that you could have ordered the exact same paint on a TVR a number of years ago for a fraction of the cost. You could also have got it on a recent Japanese small car, I cant remember the exact model.

Personally I would like options to actually reflect the production costs plus a decent profit for the manufacturer, not the wholesale ripoff we are seeing in the markets at the moment.

And this is not just a McLaren problem, all car makers seem to think this sort of pricing is fair game

Totally agree. Whilst I understand that manufacturers need to make a profit from their options, some seem to seize the opportunity to really take the piss and charge out of all proportion to what it costs to produce, particularly wrt anything classed as bespoke.

It's concerning how quickly it becomes the norm too - that McLaren colour doesn't look at all outrageous to me as the 918 colour option was £42k IIRC. And you should se the NFGT option prices, I shudder to think what they'll want for a custom colour (I've been warned that it'll be a lot!) when they want £10k to paint a stripe on it. Hence I'm very tempted to get a no cost colour and then wrap it in any design I like, particularly as it sounds like the whole car will require a paint protection wrap anyway.

Seriously, £10k for a stripe!! As this is what gets me. I have painted a number of cars over the years, some to show standard. A stripe is one of the simplest graphics to paint and only takes minutes to mask off especially if the panel can be removed from the car. The actual paint required would only take a fraction of a paint guns cup and once masked the process to spray will take no more than a minute. Then all you have to do is remove the masking tape and cover the panel in clear coat. Total job time no more than an hour, and they want to charge £10k for that, what a joke...

[Streetrod]

At the end of the day its a wonderful spec and I love the colour. If I was in the market I would snap it up. The only thing I would change given a choice is that I would have preferred a coupe over a spider.

Just out of interest can anyone tell me how much this car would have listed at compared to its for sale price?

[Streetrod]

As you can see above, the classic example, I would be surprised if the option of the paint on that Rover was more than £1000, and its the exact same stuff as on the Mclaren


On another note. Looking at the prices of LT's in the classifieds, why the huge variations, and its not just down to spec

[Streetrod]

woppum said:

lee_fr200 said:

Idiocy!

I'd rather just get a cheap colour then have it wrapped in that colour changing vinyl probably cost 5k as opposed to 29k

If you think you can get vinyl that looks anything like a posh paint you are seriously uninformed. Calling someone an idiot for it shows your ignorance in my view. Mclaren paint is seriously special. When you go to see MSO and what they do it makes you understand. Some of these paints are 500 hours worth of work. Some sticky plastic wrap won't give you the same effect

McLaren's paint finishes are certainly good they sure are not the best straight from the factory. Special jobs out of MSO may be better but I have never seen one raw from the factory, only ones that have been paint corrected and had PPF applied so I can’t comment on those.

The 500 hour jobs Woppum I suspect are where they are applying multiply colours onto a car so involving a lot of masking etc. I have never spent that amount of time on a single colour paint job even those requiring a different colour base coat to the final top coat plus lacquer.

The 675LT example at the beginning of this thread needs a certain skill level to apply well but is certainly not the most difficult paint to apply

[Streetrod]

TooMany2cvs said:

woppum said:

The paint in this thread is not 500 hours as far as I know, the 500 hour paint is the velocity 720.

Even then, Autocar reckoned 300 hours.
http://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/motor-shows-gene...

Still sounds like bks. Eight full-time weeks for somebody?

I agree, I was thinking about this again and actually calculated who many man weeks 500 hours was and came to the same conclusion as you.

I have only seen pics of the MSO car but from descriptions it appears to be a fade away paint job. The master of this technique is a guy called Gene Winfield, now 89 years old. He basically invented the technique back in the forties and is still called upon today to produce show wining paint jobs. I suspect if he saw the MSO car he would describe the paint job as "Basic" and no way would it have taken anywhere near 500 hours to complete.

Modern paints are easier to use and apply, but for a manufacturer like McLaren to offer this kind of personalised service they are to be applauded, I just think they are exaggerating the time taken to justify the asking price

[Streetrod]

Beefmeister said:

Streetrod said:

I agree, I was thinking about this again and actually calculated who many man weeks 500 hours was and came to the same conclusion as you.

I have only seen pics of the MSO car but from descriptions it appears to be a fade away paint job. The master of this technique is a guy called Gene Winfield, now 89 years old. He basically invented the technique back in the forties and is still called upon today to produce show wining paint jobs. I suspect if he saw the MSO car he would describe the paint job as "Basic" and no way would it have taken anywhere near 500 hours to complete.

Modern paints are easier to use and apply, but for a manufacturer like McLaren to offer this kind of personalised service they are to be applauded, I just think they are exaggerating the time taken to justify the asking price

I appreciate you have expertise in the field, but with the greatest respect you can't pass comnent on a complex paint job like the Velocity 720S until you have seen it with your own eyes.

I did say my comments were only based on the pics I have seen, so yes I was making an educated guess.

But correct me if I am wrong, the MSO car starts at the front as a translucent red over the carbon therefore revealing the weave underneath. Then as you move towards the rear of the car the colour becomes a solid metallic. If this is the case then my comments stand.

The paints used in a situation like this are called Candies. In the can they look like thin ink. As you spray them on the colour gets deeper and you see less of what is underneath, in this case the carbon. So the painter can create different effects depending on the number of layers of paint and the nature of what is underneath. If I am wrong I am happy to stand corrected

Edited by Streetrod on Saturday 25th March 17:28