Do "Color of the Year" Announcements Actually Influence Trends?

If trend forecasters are to be believed, 2025 is about to be awash in color. What color that is, though, is up for debate. Sherwin-Williams thinks it’s Upward, the kind of light, beachy blue that the brand says we find "when we slow down, take a breath, and allow the mind to clear." At Behr, it’s the deep ruby-red Rumors, a shade that, like Glidden and Krylon’s respective Color of the Year picks, Purple Basil and Hammered Black, slots in perfectly with TikTok’s "Dark Academia" look or the emerging "castlecore" aesthetic. Trend forecasting company WGSN’s Color of the Year selection, Future Dusk, is similarly moody, while Diamond Vogel took a page from the Great Brat Green Takeover of 2024 with a more toned-down, mossy hue. 

Meanwhile, Pantone, the behemoth of Color of the Year announcements, claims 2025 will be all about Mocha Mousse; Benjamin Moore and Dunn-Edwards also put forward Mocha Mousse-esque taupes and dusty-clay colors. Pantone says its toasty hue—which marks the first time the company has chosen a shade of brown in the 25-year history of its Color of the Year tradition—"nurtures us" while "answering our desire for comfort." Some people say it evokes "comfort food" or "1990s java and internet cafe vibes"—others think it reminds more of "what happens after comfort eating." (Cue one of the top words of 2024: "enshittification.")

With the veritable rainbow of supposedly "must-have" colors thrown at consumers every year as the Next Big Thing for our walls and furniture to our clothing, how can anyone be expected to tell what’s real from what’s marketing hype? Or, is it actually all marketing hype? The companies that make these predictions will tell you the answer to the latter question is: no.

Glidden color expert and marketing manager Ashley McCollum says that the paint brand’s Color of the Year assertions are based on demographic and lifestyle trends, societal influences, and the textile market. "We’re not just putting up a board and pinning up some swatches and throwing a dart to see where it lands," she says. This year, McCollum says, consumers are valuing individual choices, increased self-reliance, and are looking for increased comfort and safety. You can interpret that in different ways—one person’s safety is another’s ‘gone too far’—but McCollum says Glidden believes that a color like Purple Basil reflects a consumer’s desire to nurture themselves in their home, resale value be damned.

Zoom out to a macro level, where climate change is an increasing concern and the United States’s place in the world is seemingly more unsure than ever, and that could be why a good portion of the 2025 Color of the Year picks seem to pull from nature, whether they’re shades of purple, blue, black, green, or brown. Botanical colors are soothing and secure, and they make us feel cozy, no matter what turmoil might be roiling elsewhere. Diamond Vogel senior marketing manager Sandy Agar-Studelska explains: "The more muted your color, the easier it becomes to live with," adding that hues like Diamond Vogel’s Rediscover or Pantone’s Mocha Mousse are "embracing and calm" and remind us that home is (ideally) a place to destress and take care of ourselves.

But though most color experts and trend forecasters say their picks are backed in research and data, the scope of that research and data tends to be hidden behind a veil of proprietary science, expensive consulting fees, and vague suggestions of "trend forecasting." Meanwhile, anointing a hue as Color of the Year can really hone consumers’ attention, to the extent, in many cases, of influencing their purchases. Both McCollum and Agar-Studelska say that their paint brands do a major marketing push for their chosen colors both online and in stores, adding that getting a color in front of consumers can increase its sales. And it goes beyond paint: Once Pantone’s Color of the Year is announced each December, the internet gets flooded with listicles of shoppable products like pillows, cars, even hair dye colors, that supposedly match the hue to a tee. Pantone actually collaborates with brands to release products in its signature color; in 2025, this included Joybird sofas, Motorola cell phones, Libratone headphones, and more—all in Mocha Mousse.

Consumers may even be subconsciously influenced by Color of the Year selections whether or not they tune into the announcements. Wallpaper designer Fiona Howard says that even for those less likely to search for something like "Mocha Mousse" specifically, "as the trend seeps into everything from the clothes in the shops to the new tablecloth they buy, the colors that start to percolate through will influence their thinking as they choose and purchase." She adds: "They might be unaware of Mocha Mousse, but they will start to desire products in soft coffee browns." Leo Livshetz, cofounder and CEO of cruelty-free blanket company UnHide, says that the Marshmallow throw in Mocha Sharpei has been one of the brand’s bestsellers for months now, much before the headlines that proliferated after Pantone’s Mocha Mousse announcement. Colors like mocha, he says, are "neither here nor there," allowing them to work in a variety of rooms and with a variety of pieces, adding: "[A color like] mocha just feels like an escape to a quieter, earthier time."

It’s helpful, Howard says, to think of the various Color of the Year selections as pieces of a larger mood board. They’re not absolutes, but more of an indication of the state of the aesthetic zeitgeist. "It helps the market focus so that we’re all singing from the same song sheet," she says. "Every designer and company will interpret [a color] slightly differently and put their own twist on it, but the design industry is moving in the same direction, which helps the consumer in their choices." 

Color of the Year announcements can also help smaller retailers know what to keep on hand. Jacob Musselman, news and digital editor for the North American Hardware and Paint Association, which keeps a robust roundup of all the Color of the Year reports, says that independent stores can use the predictions to help guide stock toward what’s trending. Importantly, the annual tide of color announcements can also help consumers know what’s over. "Millennial gray has been very popular for the last several years, and especially with a lot of new-builds," Musselman says. "People are tired of it. They think it’s sterile. And I think that’s the purpose of these colors of the year, just to show customers that there are a lot of other options out there."

But as cultural sway has moved more and more out of the direct hands of corporations, it’s now increasingly celebrities and content creators that shape (and predict) trends—and at a much quicker pace. Charli XCX’s Brat green had a stronghold on the aesthetic landscape for a good portion of 2024, a year when a slew of pop artists branded entire album rollouts around specific colors. Though one could argue that not a ton of people actually painted their living rooms with the neon-green hue, it was certainly more impactful than 2024’s Pantone Color of Year, Peach Fuzz, which is pleasant enough, but didn’t really move the needle.

Ultimately, at the core, every brand’s Color of the Year hoopla is really about one thing: Driving consumer dollars toward something new, something flashy, something that a buyer might think could bring them joy, peace, or—in the case of most of this year’s colors—comfort. Lucinda Law, color expert and former president of marketing and sales for Color Me Beautiful, a popular color consultancy company from the ’80s, says without these major marketing schemes, there’d be no excitement about what’s "the newest and latest and coolest."

Law says she’s a bit underwhelmed by this year’s picks, which she doesn’t think take a lot of risks. ("Imagine telling people that the color they need to buy this season is beige," she jokes in reference to the muted Mocha Mousse. "I’ve had brown eyeliner in my cosmetics bag for thirty years.")

It’s all about how brands make existing products—paints, cell phones, couches, wallpaper, shoes—feel somehow new. "How can we make someone get rid of their perfectly good widget in favor of a Mocha Mousse widget?" Law says. "We’re all so jaded and bombarded with color upon color, product upon product. How do you differentiate? How do you pull something out of that plethora of color and noise and confusion? A color of the year, of course."

Top photo courtesy Benjamin Moore

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