5 Of Our Favorite Factory-Offered Graphics Packages

They say it's the clothes that make the man, but is the same true of cars? The beauty and iconic status of a car can definitely be affected by the various accouterments fitted as part of an option package. Take the above 1973 Porsche 911 Carrera 2.7 RS, for example. A standard Porsche 911 is iconic, but add on the ducktail wing, the color contrast wheels, and—perhaps most importantly—the bold "Carrera" rocker decals, and you've got a car that stops enthusiasts in their tracks. Would this car be as visually interesting without its factory-fitted graphics? I would argue not. This is exemplary of the difference that can be made with a few yards of cut vinyl, but as iconic as it is, the Carrera RS is not even in my top five favorite factory-fit graphics packages.

Below I've compiled a handful of my personal favorites for your perusal. Perhaps you'll agree with me, or maybe you have a different opinion. Don't worry, that has always been allowed. Feel free to sound off in the comments at the bottom to tell us all what your favorites are.

Nissan really knocked it out of the park with this red-white-and-blue desert ripper livery for its short-lived Hardbody Desert Runner off-road option. Before the lifestyle crowd started driving their TRXs and Raptors to Starbucks, the off-road truck craze was aimed at relatively tiny machines, like the D21-chassis Nissan Hardbody. 

In addition to off-road suspension, spotlights, a bed rack with a mounted spare, and copious extra trim, the Hardbody got one of the coolest angular 1980s graphics packages of all time. There's no hiding in (or from) this truck. It'll go anywhere and announce itself visually the whole way. I like a truck that is honest about what it is, and the giant "DESERT RUNNER" emblazoned on the front fenders seriously tickles my brain's happy zones. 

As with any good graphic package, the underlying car (or in this case truck) has to be at least a modicum of cool for the graphic gamble to clear, and clear this one does. 

While Porsche's Carrera 2.7 RS may be the most iconic, my personal favorite Porsche graphic is this ghost stripe applied to the full length of 1976 and 1977 911 Turbo models. 

These were the early non-intercooled 3-liter models, which are the slowest, but perhaps most violent of the bunch. The stripe is definitely noticeable on any color 911 Turbo, but from far away it just kind of looks like a gray stripe. As you get closer, you see that the full length of the stripe is itself made up of hundreds of tiny little stripes inside the stripe. And on the rear quarter panel is an eponymous "turbo" script in an incredibly 1970s font. This is a subtle but very cool touch on an incredibly unsubtle car. Porsche really cooked with this one. 

Bring back side stripes. It's just the most visually stunning way to show your car is cooler than everyone else's. 

You had to have known this was coming. After all, there has never been a more iconic graphic package for any car in history than Pontiac's incredible Screaming Chicken. 

Has any car ever worn its intentions on its sleeve quite like the Pontiac Trans Am? Division boss at the time Bill Mitchell didn't like the design, claiming it was far too large and in-your-face. Turns out, that's what people wanted, and these optional $55 hood decals sold by the thousands. Now etched in the pop culture history books as associated with Burt Reynolds' booze-runner Bandit, the phoenix graphic is as much a part of American history as the ratification of the Constitution or the Bay of Pigs. 

So many other cars deserved a hood graphic as radical as this one, but nobody else got it like Pontiac did. While the brand is long gone today, the legacy of the phoenix graphic lives on in our collective memory. 

Keep it simple, stupid. There's just something about the 1970 Ford Mustang Boss 302 and its crisp black decal package. Designed for Ford's racing team to run for the 1970 Trans Am season, the street Boss 302 was the kind of street-going homologation special we dream about, and the road car's graphic package perfectly aped the race car's simple design line for line. 

With a slew of over-the-roof skunk stripes across the top of the car, a wide one flanked on either side by a narrower strip, themselves flanked by a pair of pinstripes, Ford could have simply ended it there and been okay, but it wasn't enough. The iconic Boss 302 hockey stick stripes down the side are the added level of flair that the car needed. In my eyes, this is just perfect. 

Ford was really on to something in the late 1960s and early 1970s with some of the coolest muscle machines and track terrors out there. Nothing else from this era could touch it. 

She's an icon. She's a legend. She is the moment. She's the 1998 Corvette Indianapolis 500 Pace Car. 

I know many of you will scoff at the eye-searing juxtaposition of deep purple paint and bright yellow stripes with color-matched wheels, but this is the most audacious graphic package ever applied by any automotive factory anywhere in the world, and for that reason I am forced to love it. There's just something about a Corvette Pace Car that brings out the tacky, kitschy, gaudy, and gauche, in the most American way possible. This is the perfect car to drive to a Hobby Lobby or a Cracker Barrel on your way home from a Saturday morning Cars & Coffee. Jorts and New Balances, courtesy of Walmart, natch. 

Nobody did it quite like Chevy – and with Chevrolet as the only automaker to pace the Indy 500 since 2002, it doesn't seem like anyone will be able to any time soon.