Brand Colors - 88 Consumer Packaged Products
Study
In the spring of 2008 I studied the packaging of eighty-eight consumer products. I walked around a grocery store (with permission) with a clipborad and a set of criteria and recorded what I saw. I also studied each product's Web site.
The four criterion were: 1. Primary brand color, 2. Secondary brand color used, 3. Serif or san serif typeface?, 4. Flash or static web site?
Brand Colors in Use
Of the eighty-eight products studied, more than half (57%) used blue or red as their primary brand color. The results are as follows:
Trends
Interestingly, many American products rely on the patriotic colors of our flag for their primary brand color. The following product picures of several brand category leaders demonstrates this finding.
- Many Web sites were Flash-based, and a lot were designed and directed toward kids.
- Whole wheat products frequently used brown.
- Reduced fat products frequently used green as a secondary or tertiary color on packaging.
- Type was mostly white when used on colored backgrounds.
Color Usage and Popularity
Serif or Sans Serif Typeface
Of the eighty-eight products studied:
- Serif 40%
- Sans Serif 47%
- Script 13%
Flash or HTML Web Sites
- Flash-based Web site 66%
- HTML-based Web site 34%