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Comment by captainmuon | Hacker News Reader

I wonder why they don't just charge more for the dyes (or the dye licenses, I think they are not making them themselves). I think it is bizarre that you should need a license to write down in a file "use this-and-that tube of color for printing this shape". If anything, they should be paying Adobe for including their colors.

Maybe this is a possible evolution? Third party ink producers create photoshop add-ins allowing you to specify their specific products - not just standardized colors but actual bottles? I mean you'd loose the benefit of Pantone standardization. But anyway I use the colors brands that my trusted printshop uses. If they tell me ACME ink 1234 is the same as Pantone ABCD then I just would replace that in the document and be done.

(Well to be honest for 99% of things I did spot colors (I think that's the term) are overkill anyway and my printshop guy just told me to use CYMK...)

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They charge designers $X000 for a book or a set of paint chips with swatches of all the colors, so I assume they are trying to continue that revenue stream in a subscription-based way.

You can find knockoff of very good quality for a few bucks. I think they can control it better through Adobe licensing.

Linus tech tips did a video on this recently: https://youtu.be/JF8UziDHqZo

The one they got was more like $10k.

That channel sure loves to waste money for the sake of "OMG LOOK $$$ WE GOT IT". Just stick to the tech and stay in your lane. This isn't what we meant when we said 'more RGB stuff'.

I assumed they didn't pay for any of this stuff and the vendors give them products to make a video about them.

In the Pantone video in question they say they paid thousands for it

Yeah I saw that. I assumed it was a lie. Maybe I'm giving them too much credit, lol

They tell you if the video is sponsored.

They're probably spending that money setting stuff up for their LTTStore stuff (see backpack, screwdrivers etc) so they might as well do a video about those things. I'm sure other manufacturers don't get the luxury of making money out of every business expense.

I enjoyed it, it's easy to skip videos that don't interest you.

The most common are the Pantone formula guide or bridge books, and those are closer to $300

It's still quite a bit, but even the FHI chip books are under $1k. You have to be doing something a bit nuts like getting the full plastic chip carousels to get up into the thousands.

I used to work as a GD professionally, Pantones/spot colours are incredibly important in the industry. Process printing (usually CMYK) is great, but often just not accurate enough, and I really doubt Coca Cola or whoever else would be too pleased with you swapping out their pantone colour for an alternative.

Just think of the companies whose brand is represent by color. Coca Cola is certainly one but there's John Deere green, UPS brown, Caterpillar yellow, T-mobile pink, and Home Depot orange. I'm sure there are many international firms as well. Color is just as important to these companies as is their logo and they want to be damn sure it is represented accurately everywhere.

> you'd loose the benefit of Pantone standardization

That's the point: these colors should be a standard. Standards can also be acquired for a fee. I also purchased physcial samples of Pantone colors. But paying an annual fee for the privilege of specifying a color in an app? No, thank you.

Colours can be a standard. Nothing's stopping anyone standardising what Pantone do.

Businesses want multiple revenue streams at different layers of the stack with different cycles. Charging developers, printers, consumable producers, hardware makers, etc... means Pantone can make money at every level and they can increase/decrease the price as those different layers as more or less spending capacity is available at that period in the cycle for that layer.

> Pantone can make money at every level

Yes, but there's something to be said of the "First one's free, kid" business model. Making it frictionless to get into your ecosystem usually results in many more sales in the end.

Fewer graphics designers using pantone colors means fewer products going out with pantone colors, which means fewer sales of pantone dyes.

Pantone never was free, just Adobe paid license fees and now isn't renewing their contract (which probably got higher fees)

Pantone is what the printers use. If you want to get the most accurate representation of your colors, you use Pantone. Pantone doesn't need to get you addicted; its target market already needs them.

You can care less about your colors, but for some categories of graphic designers, that's not an option.

> You can care less about your colors, but for some categories of graphic designers, that's not an option.

For many more, it IS an option. If it's trivial for them to select pantone colors for their designs, they probably will use them. If they don't have easy access to pantone colors, they'll just select an approximate shade they like.

In the former (frictionless) case, more pantone dyes may get used. In the later (current reality) case, they certainly will not. It's not a stretch to think that pantone may be cutting themselves off from a potential growth market, in exchange for a rather small amount of cash up-front.

Pantone isn't a startup; it's not really a "growth market". Print shops expect to be told Pantone colors. If you tell them something else, you're going to get the best match they can figure out.

Many designers won't care that their banners look slightly different from their tee-shirts and both are slightly different from their business cards. For others, though, they think the variation looks tacky and cheap.

Those are the ones who will pay. It's a very small fraction of their commission on a work.

What's a bad look for Pantone is how many people had been using their colors without really needing to, and still getting cut off. They would usually be fine with a "close enough" shade. I can't tell if that's Adobe's fault, Pantone's, or (probably) both.

Charging more for the dyes would impact the bottom line of very large business interests, namely, the chemical companies that make the inks, and the printing and publishing companies.

Forcing a contract graphic designer to pay $15/month for the privilege of being able to participate in designing stuff for print is much more palatable to business interests.

I think their businessmodel simply expired. They have to think of something new or end up like Kodak.

Pantone is still a massively relevant company, and that has no signs of changing

Do you think their business model expired or do you think the products and services they provide are obsolete?

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