Color is unquestionably the most dominant non-verbal form of communication in logo designing. Our brains are prepared to respond to colors. It conveys meaning and message in a logo design instantly. The subconscious messages we get from color contours our thoughts. Our basic survival depends on color identification.

Take for instance, we stop our cars for red lights and we resume driving when the light goes back to green, the bottom line is that color is a very essential part of our every day lives. It is significant for designers to use color suitably and recognize the meaning behind the colors they select.

Let us see in detail what is the meaning of colors used frequently in logo designs.

RED

Red stands for alertness, action, exploration, adventure, aggressive, blood, danger, drive, energy, excitement, love, passion, strength, and vitality. Red is a passionate color. It can indicate contradictory sentiments from blood and warfare to love and passion. It is used in logo design to grasp the spectator’s attention and is known to raise one’s blood pressure. Red Bull gets a double dose of red in its logo and is a great color choice for a logo that represents an energy drink company especially for users between the age of 18 to 39-year-old young males and females. The company markets the drink as, “Red Bull vitalizes body and mind” and “Red Bull gives you WIIINGS!”  These two slogans clearly emphasizes on why RED color selected for the logo design for the brand.

Red Bull- Energy drinks logo design

PINK

Pink indicates approval, appreciation, fragile, femininity, floral, tender, girly, gratitude, innocence, romantic, soft, and serenity. Pink is a feminine color that conjures up feelings of innocence and delicateness. It is a softer version of red that can swirl up visions of little girls, bubble-gum and cotton candy. The color pink is also widely associated with breast cancer awareness. It is commonly used in logos to add a feminine flare to the design. Barbie has always been a favorite of every little girl worldwide. Pink has always been a very prominent color in Mattel’s Barbie logo and supporting branding material. It is the right color for toy manufactured especially for little girls. The typeface/ typography font in the logo compliments the color choice and helps to reinforce the brand’s position.

Barbie typeface / typography logo design

ORANGE

The color Orange represents affordability, inspiration, fun, cheerful, lighthearted, vivacious, and youthful. Orange is made of red and yellow and can signify attributes from both colors. Orange is less intense than red but still packs a lot of punch. It is more playful and youthful than red. It is generally found in logos designed to portray playfulness or stimulate emotions and even appetites.

Orange is an ideal color selection for Nickelodeon logo whose target audience is children. Orange is fun, lighthearted, and youthful which reflects the TV channel’s programming. The design of the Nickelodeon logo supports the youthful theme with the paint splashed background and playful typography.

Nickelodeon’s Orange logo

YELLOW

Yellow portrays vigilance, cheerfulness, weakness, inquisitiveness, happiness, ecstasy, mischievous and warmth. The color Yellow, much like red, can have contradictory messages. It can represent sunshine and happiness or caution and cowardice. Yellow is bright and highly visible which is why it can often be found on caution and other road signs. Yellow is used in logo design to grab attention, create happiness and warmth.
We all know the successful McDonald’s fast food chain and their slogan “I’m Lovin’ It”.

They have used analogous color on the logo. McDonald’s main idea behind using yellow the brand is the focus is on children, liveliness, and pleasure. The red works well as an accent color and has been know to raise ones blood pressure and stir up appetite. Many other foods restaurants have followed this color combination after McDonalds.

McDonald’s Yellow logo

GREEN

Green represents life, freshness, health, environment, nature, healing, serenity, and rejuvenation. It is a restful and soothing color but can also represent envy and naïveté. You can often find it used in companies that want to portray themselves as eco-friendly. Green is appropriate logo color choice for a TV channel whose programming focuses solely on nature and animals. There is a significant amount of controversy surrounding this logo. I think we can agree that the various tones of green are right on for this channel. The color conjures up imagery of jungles, grasses, and nature in general.

Animal Planet eco-friendly logo design

BLUE

Blue represents calmness, confident, loyal, success, power, and can stir up images of influence, success, and security. It is perhaps the most popular color in logo design and in corporate companies, government, health, and fortune 500 company logos. The blue in the IBM logo design represents company’s reputation of being non-threatening yet firm and established. In the new redesigned IBM logo, the solid plain alphabet fonts were replaced with eight parallel bars to represent “speed and dynamism” . While the logo typically is not used in its original blue today, it is still a very prominent color in the IBM brand.

IBM logo design

PURPLE

Purple means royalty, mystery, spirituality, justice, and sophistication. Purple has both warm and cool properties with its combination of red and blue color and is found in many education related and luxury product logos. The Hallmark Company uses the slogan “When you care enough to send the very best.” The use of the color purple in the logo supports the marketing message of the company. It implies royalty, expense, and sophistication that reinforced by the crown icon that linger over the typeface.

Hallmark Purple logo design

BLACK

Black is technically can be termed as absence of all color. It shows power, conjures authority, boldness, elegance, secrecy, and tradition. Black can be found in many logos for its boldness, simplicity, and sophistication. The James Bond 007 logo is solid black. The color choice for the classic spy movie’s logo works well. The color represents the authority, mystery, and sophistication that are associated with 007 movies. The gun has been so well incorporated in the logo design that even someone who does not know James Bond, can guess the type of movie it is. This logo is so simple, yet influential.

James Bond 007 logo design

GREY

Grey, is a shade somewhere amid black and white. It is also known as neutral and cool. Grey shows authority, corporate mentality, dullness, humility, practicality, respect, and somberness. Grey is frequently used in logo designs because it is neutral and works well with most other colors. The logo for the luxury brand Swarovski, maker of lead crystal glass, is grey. The grey represents the use of “lead” in their company product and exhibiting its pioneer position, respect, and authority that come from the history of the company that has been around for over one hundred years.

Swarovski Crystal logo design

WHITE

White is the universal color of peace and purity. It is found in logos as reversed text or negative space. White gives you an idea about of cleanliness, innocence, peace, purity, refined, sterile, simplicity, and truthfulness. This Vonde logo in White and Grey background represents the purity, innocence, and simplicity.

White logo design

These are the most basic colors found in many famous logo designs. The custom logo designer has to carefully brainstorm, generate, and create logos around the company product it will represent. Just remember, using color in the logos consists of culturally created ties that can change over time and location. It is by no means a precise science and still principally based on subjective facts.

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