Ok, I admit it: I’m obsessed with Pantone 021C. Creating collateral and staging based on it; agonising over printed swatches of it; applying it to walls; sourcing products in it – the list goes on.

This all began when I joined Semantico. Pantone 021C (hereafter known as 021) is our corporate colour; the zesty, vibrant orange that defines our brand.  It produces strong reactions: some love it, some don’t; but it’s difficult to ignore. Personally, I’m a fan (but then I would say that, being the Marketing Manager).

My recent orange obsession began with our S3UG conference, held in June of this year. We wanted to give our esteemed guests a lovely thank you and so I sourced some Pantone 021 notebooks. Having got the books, the team looked at ways to Semantico-ize them. To brand or not to brand?

We said no, as in a way the Semantico logo was already on them. They were the correct shade of orange (tick) and more excitingly (I need to get out more) the printed 021 name on the book subliminally, and rather cleverly referenced our corporate brand (gold star!). More importantly, these little books embodied our brand values: they were quirky, quality and smart, with clever design credentials – just like us!

My vision was to extend our Pantone collection to include mugs and espresso cups in lively 021 for exclusive use by visitors to Semantico Towers. Rather disappointingly this came to a crashing halt when I discovered the range had been discontinued in 2010. Undeterred I scoured the four corners of the interweb and  sourced enough china to cater a very small meeting. I have since found a further two mugs at an independent retailer in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Enough was enough, I was descending into 021 mania. My brand quest for china was at an end (for now at least).

Joking, notebooks, and china aside, at Semantico we know the importance and power of brand. It is key to our business and as such, we understand that it’s more than printing the correct shade of orange or sourcing the most thoughtful corporate gift. Our brand speaks of promises about the services and goods we offer. It is not just our company name and logo; it represents who we are and what we do and therefore needs to be consistently expressed across a variety of communication channels. This involves everything from our appearance at Frankfurt Book Fair to our blog posts, from our product managers to our product launches.

You could accuse us of being pedantic, even a touch obsessive, but our brand, and yours, matters. The devil is in the detail and that’s why the little things are important.