Ford has teamed up with a bunch of different companies to think up unique products that help celebrate the 50th birthday of the mighty Mustang, but the joint effort between Ford and nail polish company OPI was certainly the most unusual thus far. When you think about the Ford Mustang, a whole lot of things come to mind…but pedicures and manicures likely isn’t one of them. However, with so many devout Mustang Women around the country combined with the high number of ladies who want to feed into their husband or boyfriend’s passion for a pony car, it makes good sense to offer up some 50 Year celebration items that cater to the female demographic.
The OPI Ford Mustang 50 Years Limited Edition Nail Polish
My wife informed me that OPI is well known in the nail polish world for offering tons of slight variations in colors with funky, unique names so the collection of OPI colors offered up as part of the Ford Mustang collection really fit into their lineup very well. OPI and FoMoCo decided on six colors for the Mustang nail polish collection including Race Red, 50 Years of Style (gold), Queen of the Road (Black), The Sky’s the Limit (Dark Blue), Girls Love Ponies (Hot Pink) and Angel with a Lead Foot (Pearl White). Each of these colors cost $9.50 a bottle and for those who can’t decide, the “Pony Pack” comes with Race Red, 50 Years of Style, Queen of the Road and The Sky’s the Limit while carrying a budget minded price that varies from $13.95 to $14.99 depending on where you buy them.
Since the OPI Ford Mustang collection went on sale on July 1st, more than 4,000,000 bottles of the Mustang-themed nail polish has been sold. Four million units sold sounds like a huge success and it is…but in speaking with a few female Mustang fans – Ford and OPI could have sold a whole lot more with a few simple changes.
Improving the OPI Ford Mustang Nail Polish Collection
In reading the comments of Mustang loving gals around the country, it seems that there are two major factors why more devout female Mustang fans didn’t rush out to buy the OPI Ford Mustang nail polish. Female Mustang lovers who haven’t purchased the OPI Mustang nail polish either haven’t done so because they either haven’t seen the product for sale at their local salon – or because their color of Mustang isn’t offered in the polish collection.
With the first problem, it seems that some of the female Mustang fans who wanted to buy the OPI Ford Mustang collection nail polish were unable to do so because they couldn’t find a shop in their area that sold it. While some Mustang fans could turn to eBay (or other online options) and some were able to find the Pony Packs at their local Walmart, some of the lovely ladies of the Mustang community couldn’t pick the Mustang collection at their local nail salon so they went with products that were available. Really, that is a hard problem to solve for an item like custom nail polish and it seems that the vast majority of female Mustang fans who get manicures or pedicures were able to pick their favorite color from the OPI Ford Mustang collection.
2015 Ford Mustang Galleries:
A first look at the 2015 Ford Mustang RTR
Live images from the 2015 Ford Mustang Detroit Debut
A look at the similarities in styling across the 2015 Ford Mustang trimlines
The 2015 Ford Mustang in Triple Yellow
The other critics of the OPI Ford Mustang nail polish collection often liked one or two of the colors, but they took issue with the fact that most of the colors were never Mustang options – and only one of the colors was an actual Ford Mustang color with the proper name.
The only actual Ford Mustang color with the proper name is Race Red and while Black has been one of the most popular colors over the past 50 years, it has never been called “Queen of the Road”. Also, while Ford has offered gold, pearl white and dark metallic blue over the past 5 decades, none of the color names used by OPI were ever Mustang names.
I spoke with diehard Mustang lover and writer for Ford Racing Nation/Power Automedia Bridget Davis – who happens to currently own a 2007 Ford Mustang V6 and a 2013 Ford Mustang GT…in Race Red. Bridget loves the Mustang and she likes the OPI Ford Mustang collection, but she believes that offering more actual Mustang colors would have allowed them to sell more bottles of nail polish to women who own Mustangs…and I totally agree. Colors like Grabber Blue, Competition Orange, Wimbledon White and Ingot Silver may not have grabbed the interest of the average manicure customer, but those colors and other colors sporting Mustang color names from the last 50 years would have had more female Mustang owners buying the OPI nail polish simply because it matches the color of their Mustang. Fortunately for Bridget, OPI offered Race Red to match her 2013 Mustang GT, but I saw plenty of ladies posting around the internet that they didn’t buy the Mustang nail polish because none of the colors were close to matching their Mustang.
Ultimately, Im sure that Ford and OPI are both happy with more than 4,000,000 bottles of the Ford Mustang nail polish collection being sold and for those Mustang fans who cannot get their exact color – six Mustang collection colors are better than no Mustang collection colors when trying to show off your extreme enthusiasm for America’s longest running car nameplate.