Warm Glow of Colgate Explained

Forget the billions spent to create the Marlboro man or the marketing genius that made Coca-Cola a classic. Forget the hearty taste of Campbell’s soup or the clean, healthy feel of Colgate toothpaste.

These top-selling brands have one thing in common: They’re packaged in red.

“Red is warm and bright,” said John Steel, Colgate-Palmolive Co.’s senior vice president for global marketing and sales. “It’s not intimidating. Yellow is intimidating in packages. And red, of course, is the lifeblood. It’s the Red Cross. It’s the motherhood, apple pie color. It invokes good feelings.”

Colgate is the No. 1 toothpaste company in the world and is the fourth-most recognized brand globally behind Coke, Pepsi and Kodak, Steel said.

Packaging experts and color psychologists say there is indeed a close link between a product’s color--specifically red--and consumer buying preference. It’s the trait people remember first, before a product’s shape, symbol or name.

One theory says consumers are drawn to red because the color evokes feelings of warmth, passion and sensuality. Another theory says people eat more often in the presence of red.

Cheskin-Masten ImageNet, a San Francisco color research firm, has found that although red remains a popular color, it is no longer America’s favorite, having given way to the more conservative and toned-down blue. Red was America’s favorite color from the 1950s to the mid-1980s.

Stan Gross, president of Stan Gross Associates, a Haverford, Pa., consulting firm, said people tend to link colors to nature. For instance, red is linked to blood, blue to sky or ocean, brown to earth, green to vegetables, yellow to sunshine and white to dairy products.

When a manufacturer wants the product to send a message of healthy eating, green is more appropriate, Gross said. Green is the color for Healthy Choice packages and SnackWell’s line of reduced-fat cookies and crackers.