Janoschka magazine_Linked_V2_2017

issue #2 © l i n k e d 33
pretty in pink –
Football strips and Barbie dolls
A tribute to the days of
its foundation: a Juventus Turin
player in the pink jersey.
In many countries, it is the custom to announce the
birth of a baby with bow on the front door of the
house. Today’s rule: pink for a girl, blue for a boy. In
the past centuries, and even up to the 1940s, it was
the exact opposite. Blue, as the colour of the Virgin
Mary, was seen as particularly delicate and graceful.
It was reserved for little girls. Pink on the other hand
was, at least in Western society, the colour for little
boys. In the Rococo period, pink was even considered
the latest thing in men’s fashion for a while. An
equally very masculine use of colour: when Juventus
Turin was founded in 1897, its first football strips
were pink. The extent to which colour perception
has changed since then could be read in the vilifying
newspaper headlines when the club commemorated
this with its away kit for the 2015 season.
Nowadays, it is seen almost as natural that everything
that is pink should send little girls into a state of
ecstasy. Whether with the market launch of Barbie
in 1959 and since then, the consistent branding in
typical pink have contributed to this, or the phenomenon
just skilfully used it for its own purposes, one
thing is certain: Barbie, with her pink accessories, is
the world-famous role model for every pink fairy and
princess.
Marketing strategies that
hit the right tone
A large-scale international study at the turn of the millennium
provided insights into cross-cultural similarities,
as well as differences, in colour perception.
There was a special focus on the question of which
specific meaning consumers associated with individual
colours and, above all, colour combinations.
Only when this is known, can companies select the
colours which transpose their strategy onto a crosscultural
market in the most appropriate way. If there
are different colour perceptions between the cultures,
then an obvious step would be to adjust the branding,
packaging and products accordingly. A good example
of just such a strategy is McDonald’s: the company
adjusts both its websites and colour selection to suit
different countries.
That the colour pink literally makes hearts beat faster,
is called into question by medical research. It attests,
rather, to its relaxing effect. This was made use of by
some prisons. In a study of inmates in cells painted
pink, a long-term calming influence on anger, rage
and hostile behaviour could be observed.
PANTONE ®
C 219
All over the world, Barbie’s pink logo is the same.
Pantone 219c ensures that, no matter the substrate,
the Barbie pink does not change.