This is an update to an older question admitting a trivial example to answer it.
Suppose $G$ is a finite simple graph. Let $h(G)$ denote the Hadwiger number of $G$; that is, the maximum $n\in\mathbb{N}$ such that $K_n$ is a minor of $G$.
Given an integer $n \geq 3$, is there a graph $G = (V,E)$ with $\chi(G) = n$ and with the following property?
There are two non-adjacent vertices $v, w\in V$ such that when $v$ and $w$ are identified, the Hadwiger number of the resulting graph is smaller than $h(G)$.