The Easiest Part of Challenge Coin Design?
Let’s say you’ve gone through the hard work of choosing a design for your challenge coin order. Perhaps you drew it yourself, or worked together with a team to get the very best image to convey your needs. Somewhere in your design is a representation of the American flag. It’s a symbol we’ve all seen millions of times, and the red, white and blue color scheme has been seen and memorized by all of us since elementary school. Representing the flag on your coin should be the easiest thing imaginable.
However, what do you do if the first proof you receive doesn’t look exactly like what you had in mind? Perhaps the tones of red and blue aren’t exactly what you see in your mind’s eye when you think of those colors on the flag. It’s in these instances that we turn to the Pantone Color Matching System to make sure that we can get the colors on your coin as exact as possible.
Simply saying that you want a portion of your coin to be red, for example, is just the beginning of the process of making sure we’re capable of delivering what you want. At the end of the day, there are many different versions and hues of red. To different people, anything from a slightly dark shade of pink all the way up to a deep burgundy might qualify as red. In order to make sure we’re capable of giving our customers what they want, we have to be certain that if they want Alabama Crimson Tide red, we don’t give them artwork using Coca-Cola red instead.
The Pantone Color Matching System
Since 1963, Pantone has worked to standardize color communication through the invention of a universal color language. The complete list of Pantone colors consists of over 1,000 colors, and that’s not even including things like metallic shimmer and other unique upgrades. It’s from this collection that we pull all of the colors that go into your challenge coin design.
If we stick with the example of reds from above, the good news is that whether your preferred red matches that on Alabama’s uniforms or on a Coke can, we’ve got you covered. When you tell our sales team that you’re looking for a brand specific color, our art team is well versed in finding the exact shade you’re looking for. Because both Coca-Cola and the University of Alabama have easily accessible brand guidelines, finding their exact shade of red is simple.
As you can see from the coin orders above, the exact shade of red used for Coca-Cola’s marketing efforts is something we keep on file and use for any and every order that comes in from the company. Because the coins are ordered by different customers for different facilities around the country, it’s easier to keep the color on file and assure the point of contact that we can get the exact color because we’ve made coins for different branches of the corporation in the past.
Picking the Right Colors for Your Custom Coin Design
While all color is a bit subjective, the good news is that you’re less likely to confuse a person when you specify something as simple as red, white and blue. But when it comes to more specific colors, for example if you ask for a light blue on part of your coin, then the easiest way to ensure you get the color you’re looking for is to give our sales team an example.
Because we use the Pantone color matching system, the best way to give our team an idea of the color you want is to tell them about a Fortune 500 company, or a sports team, or any popular and well known source that uses the kind of light blue you have in mind for your coin. Do you prefer the blue of the Twitter logo, Nestle’s brand or is your version of light blue the dark blue of the Detroit Tigers? Simply let us know, and our artists will match your specifications perfectly.
Colors Should Be the Least of Your Worries
Creating custom coins is a lot of fun. There’s a lot of responsibility that comes with taking someone’s vision and translating it into artwork on a coin face. We know that you have a lot of different decisions to make when it comes to the design of your challenge coin, and we strive to make the entire coin ordering process as simple as possible. That’s why we’ve made the process of getting the best color to match your design as easy as possible.
You focus on the shapes, symbols, logos, insignias, words and general overall design of your challenge coins, let us worry about getting the color exactly right in the end.
