Whose job is it...

to name paint colours? And do they enjoy it?

I suppose it must be the marketing department, but I can't quite decide whether this is a great or awful job.

Naming the first hundred or so colours would have been fun, but after that it must have become quite a chore to avoid repeating names they've already used or being used by competitors.

This is probably why the sophisticated grey colour I'm considering for our bedroom goes by the awful name 'Quaker Drab'. All the good names for grey have already been used up - 'Night Jewels', 'Quartz Flint', 'Mineral Haze', or my favourite, 'Elephant's Breathe' - a name so great Farrow & Ball have registered it.






Why did Dulux decide to rename 'Cookie Dough' (much favoured by my family as I think my mum and both sisters have rooms in their houses painted this colour) as Cappuccino Candy 3 ? Has it improved sales? I want to know the answers.


This has just reminded me of the Ex who once woke me up in the middle of the night to ask why a banana wasn't called a 'yellow' when orange's were orange and called orange and lemon's lemon. He clearly had no future in the paint naming business.