Fall’s fashion trend colors have been decided and you’ll find these colors represented throughout the marketplace including make-up, hair accessories, clothing, and other consumer goods in the months to come.  Find out how to leverage color trends to engage clients and refresh your salon marketing plan.

This fall’s fashion colors are just about as far from the primaries embraced just a few seasons ago as you can get. In fact, whether Marsala, this year’s color of the year, is a red or a brown could be a topic of debate among stylists and salon clients. But one thing is clear, and that’s the reality that these fall trend colors will be the colors that consumers are looking for this fall, whether to accessorize their home, their hair, or to find something to wear.

The color experts at Pantone® have released their report on fashion and runway-inspired fall color trends for this year in the Pantone Fall 2015 Fashion Color Report.  The 2015 Color of the Year, Marsala, is the only hold- over from the spring palette, although fall’s fashion trend colors include some decidedly spring-like hues as well as colors you would expect to infuse autumn’s color palette.

Click on the graphic to open a full-size version in a new window. 

Based on Pantone®’s published color values, below I’ve listed CMYK, RGB and web colors that will match up to the colors listed among their top 10 trend colors for fall 2015 (or best match provided by photoshop!)

Marsala (2015 Color of the Year) Pantone 18-1438
#AB5E5F |  CMYK 33-73-60-4  |  RGB 171-94-95

Reflecting Pond Pantone 19-4326
#204253 | CMYK 87-61-44-41 | RGB 32-66-83

Stormy Weather Pantone 18-4214
#606F75 | CMYK 63-45-43-18 | RGB 96-111-117

Biscay Bay Pantone 18-4726
#008EA7 | CMYK 93-24-29-2 | RGB 0-142-167

Dried Herb Pantone 17-0627
#8B9068 | CMYK 45-31-65-10 | RGB 139-144-104

Desert Sage Pantone 16-0110
#A8BCAA | CMYK 36-16-35-0 | RGB 168-188-170

Oak Bluff Pantone 16-1144
#D8AE68 | CMYK 16-31-69-0 | RGB 216-174-104

Cadmium Orange Pantone 15-1340
#F5926C | CMYK 0-44-52-0 | RGB 248-161-122

Cashmere Rose Pantone 16-2215
#CD8AA8 | CMYK 18-53-14-0 | RGB 205-138-168

Amethyst Orchid Pantone 17-3628
#8A73B4 | CMYK 50-60-0-0 | RGB 138-115-180

How Do Seasonal Color Trends Impact the Salon and Spa Industry?

It’s fair to wonder whether you need to take note of seasonal color trends. After all, won’t they just change again in a few months? 

Though these trend colors may change in just a few months, salon and spa professionals still need to pay attention. These are the trend colors that salon clients will be clamoring for when it comes to makeup and accessories, and they are the trend colors that clients will want to look good in and that goes for hair color and style that pops and accentuates that look they are trying to achieve.

Even though these colors were inspired on the runway, they will come off the runway quickly and be in demand among consumers. Not only will they want to add clothing, personal accessories, hair accessories and more to their wardrobes, they will also be asking stylists to coordinate hair and makeup appropriately, as these become the next wedding trend colors or holiday and party looks of choice.

Can You Use Seasonal Color Trends to Better Communicate with Clients?

Definitely!

Color as a topic of discussion, in and of itself, can be used to stimulate engagement and discussion with your clients. For instance, how many times have you had a “miss” when it came to interpreting a client’s desire for hair color change?  Clients don’t always know what color they want, but they know what colors they like!

You can find out whether clients are drawn more to cool colors or warm, bold colors or soft, primary colors or completely complex hues and more simply by getting them to tell you about the colors in a given seasonal trend color palette that they “like” and “don’t like.”

You can help clients better-express their desires for hair color or makeup colors by talking about color associations, as well. For instance, instead of asking about a hair color per se, ask clients what type of food comes to mind when they are thinking of the hair color (or makeup color, etc.) they want.  Often times you will find that the color a client names in terms of hair color is far away from the color they actually perceive it to be.

Can You Use Seasonal Color Trends to Build Business?

You bet!

Infusing seasonal trend colors into your marketing (flyers, business cards, menus, website, ads, coupons, etc.) gives clients a new reason to sit up and take notice. Why? It’s human nature. As human beings we tend to ignore what we have seen before but when something changes (new color, new arrangement, new merchandising, signage, etc.) the brain sends a signal that there is something new and noteworthy.

You can quickly change the look of your salon at a low cost by repainting a focal wall, putting up new station and shelf talkers, point of service displays and other merchandising, or even changing out accents and accessories in your client waiting or treatment areas. One way to do this is by putting in pops of colors, and it’s smart to pick colors from among those that consumers will be seeing as on-trend in their favorite fashion and style magazines in the months that follow.

In addition, you can perk up merchandising and boost retail  sales at a low-cost by adding point of sale displays with items in trend colors (accessories, lip glosses, eye shadows, nail lacquers, etc.)

You can also use trend colors as inspiration for client events, special salon offers, or classes. For instance, you can have a class showing off use of trend colors in makeup or partner with a designers or retailer for a home-goods fashion show or clothing fashion show highlighting the season’s hottest trend colors.

Scratch a Client (or a Stylist) and Find a Favorite Color

One big reason that color discussion and updates will work to engage clients is a very simple one. Everyone has a favorite color. Think about it, from earliest childhood memories you knew your name, your age, and your favorite color. You may not have said so, but secretly believed that your favorite color was best. Color evokes memory and emotion. Color creates memory; in fact, consumers regularly point to color as the most influential visual aspect of decision making when it comes to what they shop for and buy.

Color has power, and you can use fall’s color trends to build business in your salon and engage clients throughout the season.

How do you use color to engage clients? Feel free to leave a comment below with some of the ways you have gotten clients to talk color in order to help sell services or help them choose the products they really wanted.   

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Elizabeth Kraus is the author of the 2015 Salon Marketing Calendar  called “Making the Cut.”

Written just for Independent Beauty Professionals, Making the Cut has hundreds of low-cost and no-cost marketing ideas which can help booth renters, salon suite owners, salon owners and salon managers engage, motivate and retain more clients in 2015!