Jeep Grand Cherokee black pack adds equipment and eye candy

The 2023 Jeep Grand Cherokee is now available with an optional black pack, adding $4250 to the price of both the five- and seven-seat large SUVs.

Dubbed the Black Appearance Group, the option pack adds more street cred to the mid-spec Jeep Grand Cherokee Limited models, replacing the shiny chrome and silver exterior elements with black accents.

Along with dark grille, badges, bumper inserts and window surrounds, there are gloss-black 20-inch alloy wheels plus black roof rails, while interior equipment levels are boosted by the standard fitment of popular options like a digital head-up display, dual-pane sunroof and, for seven-seat Grand Cherokee L variants, a rear-facing interior camera.

Before on-road costs are added, that takes the price of the five-seat Jeep Grand Cherokee Limited to $88,200 plus on-road costs, with the seven-seater priced at and $93,000 plus ORCs.

Sales of the more expensive new-generation WL Jeep Grand Cherokee have slumped by more than 30 per cent in 2023, despite its release just over a year ago in mid-2022 and generous discounts of up $13,000, with just 805 units sold in the first seven months of this year compared to 1157 last year.

The Grand Cherokee’s share of the large SUV market segment has also almost halved in the same period, from nine to five per cent, allowing the Compass small SUV replace it as Jeep Australia’s best-selling model.

That’s a far cry from 2014, when the Jeep Grand Cherokee was Australia’s most popular large SUV, outpacing even the evergreen Toyota Prado with annual sales of more than 16,000 vehicles.

Toyota Prado v Jeep Grand Cherokee 2022 Comparison

A big part of the Grand Cherokee’s sales deceleration is the lack of a turbo-diesel engine. The big Jeep is only available with a 3.6-litre petrol V6 (210kW/344Nm), offering a much lower towing capacity than its diesel forebear.

Jeep will soon release a fuel-sipping 4xe plug-in hybrid version of the Grand Cherokee and it will be spruiked as the new towing champion in the range thanks to an advanced four-cylinder PHEV powertrain outputting 280kW/637Nm, but it will carry a huge price premium at around $130,000.