Inside Pantone, the Company That Turns Color Into Money | WSJ The Economics Of

When I started sharing my artwork online, I had to learn this whole new concept colour calibration and reproduction. Basically, you need to calibrate scanners, monitors and printers to match how human eyes see the reproduction of an original artwork on matte paper, glossy paper, polyester shirt, cotton tshirt, website etc. Very fascinating topic and I totally get what Pantone is trying to sell.

I worked for a packaging company, Multi Packaging Solutions, for over a decade that used Pantone colors regularly based on the requirements of our customers. Every time we had to change over a spot color required by a customer on one of our KBA printing, presses, (much like the ones on the video) it was very time consuming. We instead began blending and mixing colors on press to achieve a very close match. We approached Pantone about integrating it into their standards, and they said no. So we developed our own system called Echo color match and began implementing it at other facilities, and familiarizing our customers with it. By not needing to change colors we saved a great deal of money and pass the savings onto the customers. Pantone realized that this would be a problem for them, and eventually acquiesced and They can now use the Pantone trademark on these mixed colors.

The Pantone Color of the Year: Peach Fuzz, reminds me of the late 1980's. Back in those days, peach, mauve, country blue, tans and browns, were the popular colors. We could buy everything in peach from clothing to bath towels to even peach colored toilet paper (yes, really). Once again, history repeats itself.

5:06 “Your book is exposed to air and it can oxidize and then what you see in your book can visually change when you look at it so then you won’t accurately know if that’s the exact color that you are looking for. So for that reason it is important to keep getting fresh books so that you can view them accurately.” So, basically, the color mavens at Pantone, the company that sells color consistency, after six decades in that business, can’t come up with fairly durable colors for their books that don’t force you to keep getting fresh ones? Or simply don’t want to, because it cuts into their profits. I wonder which one it is.

They make it sound like Pantone book are actually constant. They are FAR from consistent. They can’t even keep a color consistent through a series of books printed at the same time. It’s very well known in any industry that has to actually match these colors and seek the same color to the same customer over years. I work for an ink manufacturer. We make the ink for the large printing presses. We had to come up with our own system of standardizing Pantone colors because every book is different. Customers order a specific color, we would match it to our book, they would complain, we would compare our book to theirs and they would be completely different. We would have to start adding their job name to the color number and make it a custom match and save a standard wet sample that we can match every time they order. If your procedure was to simply match to the book you would have non stop customer complaints. Their book is different than yours. All books change over time, like the lady said. It’s ridiculous. I’m sure it was a major improvement from what was done before Pantone, but it’s far from as good as they made it sound.

There's genuine fascination for colour in that exec, and Pantone is a stellar example of doing focus and marketing right.

We need this level of standardization for clothing sizes...

An unknown corner of the world for me - Pantone is a company that always existed in the periphery of my awareness! Great video!

I think there was a lawsuit between Tiffany and Korean Air, where the latter’s color resembled too closely of Tiffany Blue, I think in the end Korean Air won, cuz one industry is in Jewelry and the other is Airline.

this is fascinating, I wondered how Pantone still made money after digital printing took over. There is nothing like a printed piece that uses a solid color ink Pantone though. Fuji also made incredible inks. Way different than Pantone too.

This was really interesting. Of course, I know the name but never really knew what their company actually did. Really interesting.

This is real: “This file has Pantone colors that have been removed and replaced with black due to changes in Pantone's licensing with Adobe. To resolve, click "Learn more ".-“ - Why are we okay with a company like this controlling our use of COLORS??!!! (Shades, etc.) NO greedy corporation should have such a right. If this was true investigative journalism, why wasn’t this uncovered/a topic here???

Very innovative and necessary for today's world of custom colors!

But can they explain why their customers will need to purchase Pantone Connect licenses to access Pantone colors in Adobe Creative Cloud products?

Pantone has always been mesmerizing to me. I could watch them mix colors 24/7

I used to joke that 3 janitors deep in the nite throwing drunken darts are how yearly Pantone palettes are chosen.

Fascinating, love this episode!

Obsessed! I am constanting double checking logo colors for clients to make sure I am using their exact logo colors. I had no idea one man was responsible for my need for color accuracy. This was entirely fascinating! ❤🧡💛

Fascinating. Color makes life so much better...and happier!😊 I only speak for myself!

Since I started to learn drawing, I have become aware of the Pantone Color Guides but had a question why they are so expensive. I eventually got the answer from this video.