Festool Green

P

Packard

Member
Joined
Nov 6, 2020
Messages
5,127
Location
Hudson Valley, NY
Several companies have trademarked their “official color”. Tiffany has trademarked their turquoise color for their boxes, UPS trademarked their brown, Barbie has trademarked their pink.

All those colors have an official Pantone color number.

And while there is a RAL (RAL 6018) number associated with Festool Green, it is just a very close match. It is not an exact designated color. Nor are their gray or beige colors trademarked.

You would think that since their product is closely identified with the green they would take possession of it. Others have done so:

Post-it (yellow)
John Deere (green)
Home Depot (orange)
John Deere (green)
Owens Corning (pink)





 
Last edited:
In Europe trademarking a colour is not without its challenges. There is a EU-authority, but also national institutions, and a lot of history, which means that a certain colour may have been in use by a company in certain areas, while that same colour could be the mainstay of another company on the other side of the continent. Conflict waiting to happen.
Also: culture. Europe’s is very diverse, not like the US. Colours have certain annotations and those differ across countries and populations.

And on a personal note: I think that trademarking a colour should be prohibited.
 
bertv said:
And on a personal note: I think that trademarking a colour should be prohibited.
Click to expand...
I agree. It is like trademarking the word “sky”. The word belongs to all mankind.

But I’m surprised that they don’t have a designated RAL# or Pantone #. They have a close match RAL#.
 
I was surprised to see Harley Davidson Orange missing from that list. They went crazy about trademarking a lot of things, years ago.

A lot of companies/entities have trademarked (or tried too) some really strange things.
A few years ago, The Ohio State University trademarked "THE" in front of the name. Apparently, some T-shirt sellers were short cutting the license, by selling apparel with just "THE" (in the correct font) They did the copyright to cut that off. It took something like 3 years.

I can see at least starting with standardized colors, for the tan and gray, but that tan was well-known for yellowing, over time. You missed the Limited Addition Blue..... ;)
I remember hunting down the green RAL number years ago, but never did see an official Pantone number?
You would think that would be easy. There are thousands of Pantone colors
 
Cadbury famously had a trademark war running for many years on the colour purple which they eventually gave up as it was unenforceable.
 
Packard said:
I agree. It is like trademarking the word “sky”. The word belongs to all mankind.

But I’m surprised that they don’t have a designated RAL# or Pantone #. They have a close match RAL#.
Click to expand...

Not RAL, but they use the most import standard for colours in the Printing Industry: Pantone. Festool Green is Pantone 359.

The equivalent in Filament (3D printing) is Peak Green/Light Green by eSUN (which is even advertised as Pantone 359C — where C stands for Coated, as in Coated Paper).
 
bertv said:
Not RAL, but they use the most import standard for colours in the Printing Industry: Pantone. Festool Green is Pantone 359.

The equivalent in Filament (3D printing) is Peak Green/Light Green by eSUN (which is even advertised as Pantone 359C — where C stands for Coated, as in Coated Paper).
Click to expand...
I’m not sure I agree. RAL colors are most typically used in the industrial field. Pantone colors (PMS for Pantone Matching System) is typically used by graphic artists and designers.

Apparently, for a fee, Pantone and RAL will create color chips to exactly match the desired colors. In many cases, the standard RAL or PMS colors are close enough. Festool’s RAL (from what I have read) is one of those “close enough” colors.

The colors on the list in my first post all have the exact designated color and are not “close enough” colors.

I am more familiar with the PMS system. If you want to have something injection molded to a specification, you can e-mail the part drawing to the molder, and specify the PMS number. The molder will know the exact color to mold to. He can order the resin to the PMS number from the resin supplier. This eliminates the wasted time and cost for shipping samples back and forth for approval.

I would note that PMS samples are painted on paper (for paint) and are molded in a stepped gage for plastic. Apparently the appearance of color in molded parts can vary according to the thickness of the finished product. They don’t use printed colors for plastic color specs.

I bought my mother a full set of colors from Pantone. They came in an approximately 4” x 6” box with a long Chicago screw in one corner. Back in the 1980s it cost me about $75.00. So painting colors on paper is more expensive than printing colors on paper.

In any case, my understanding is that there is no official RAL number for Festool’s green. The RAL number is a very close match for Festool’s green. If someone has something that they have 3D printed in RAL 6018 (the number most often stated as the Festool Green), I would be interested in hearing if it is a close match or a perfect match.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top