Only black BMW 501?
06/07/2013
Henry Ford is said to have said about the Ford Estate that it could be ordered in any color as long as it was black. Today we know that this quote is not entirely accurate, but the fact is that Ford initially produced all cars in the same color for reasons of efficiency.
When BMW introduced the BMW 501 30 years later, it was also only available in one color: black. This was probably fine for a state limousine, but it was unlikely to satisfy all customers. By 1954, the color palette had been significantly expanded to four (!) different colors: Gray-Green, Maroon, Green and (still) Black.
And despite the colorful palette, many 501s were still ordered in black.
You can find out more about the BMW 501 in our detailed report and, of course, the 1954 sales brochure can be found in the Zwischengas archive.
