1.0 Appearance propertiesThe iconic Pink and Blue stripes of the company are used on many a substrate including, thin and thick glossy card (carrier bags), plastic (stickers), cardboard (labels and tags and seasonal handbooks) and even various fabrics for products. These are the substrates I was able to gather. Each of these substrates has its own total appearance qualities and therefore it is subsequently harder for Jack Wills to manufacture a consistently coloured brand as they have to alter inks for each speci�c product. To begin with, the easiest way to assess the current di�erences is to make a visual assessment of colour di�erence using colorimetric, colourist, emotional and graphic terms. Then, one is able to make quality control acceptability and percep-tibility judgements on whether a brand is consistent.

1.1 ColourObviously to make a decision on whether the pink and blue stripes on each substrate are a visual match, the ideal arrangement would be for there to be no gap between and so I put them side-by-side. It was clear to me that there must be a lightness di�erence between the large and small carrier bag as the pink on the larger one looked colder and lighter, this must have meant that there was at least a 0.8 dE* between them as the di�erence could be seen with just the human eye without any technical equipment. In terms of the variations of blue throughout the substrates I chose to measure, it was clear that when printed on plastic, it was a lot darker than on other substrates and the blue on the small carrier bag was a lot stronger than others variations; this could be possible colour �delity a�ecting quality of reproduction.

1.2 Gloss, Texture and ShapeThe majority of substrates I collected were that of a matt gloss and do not have a high re�ectance value. Absolutely none have even specular gloss, at most contrast gloss on the surfaces of stickers or small carrier bags. The same happened with texture in that all substrates ideally were smooth and clinical looking in keeping with the modernistic brand with the exception of only the thicker cardboard used for tags.

‘Jack Wills is a middle-tier British clothing brand aimed at university students. The fashion label uses the brand and registered trademark "Jack Wills – University Out�tters" to re�ect the inspiration behind the brand.’ Made up of 49 stores mainly in the university towns of the UK including 2 in Ireland and 13 in the USA, Jack Wills clings to the ‘Fabulously British’ concept. Created in Devon in 1999, even when some adver-tising campaigns were considered to have content too mature for its young audience, the word-of-mouth approach to events, the use of seasonnaires and seasonal handbooks has made this clothing, home ware and accessory brand ever popular.

2.0 Performance RequirementsThe life cycle and usage of a carrier bag is much smaller than that of the fabric on a sofa and so this is another issue for Jack Wills to think about; wash-fastness. Colourfastness relates to how well the colour on a substrate lasts whilst being manufactured and used. Grey scales can be used to test the degree of change that has occurred under for instance light or weather conditions.

2.1 Brand RequirementsFrom a marketing strategy perspective, the pink and blue stripes of Jack Wills are required to o�er a sense of identity after the word-of-mouth advertising approach. Such a strong identity can even sometimes produce feelings of need and end up creating crazes, obsessions and addictions. It is so easy when prod-ucts from clothing to home ware and even to technology are available to want to purchase everything to match; this serves Jack Wills well and even more accentuates the need for a consistent colour scheme.

3.0 Methods of specifyingOne way of specifying colour is to �nd physical samples from a colour atlas such as the Pantone Matching System, NCS or Munsell Colour System which and try to recognise which is the closest match using the human eye using their various notation systems. But these do not get an exact speci�cation by any means. Another method consists of spectral colour measurement, taking into account re�ectance, transmittance and spectral power distribution but these require veri�cation from national standards. A possibility of newer technology includes camera based measurement using ‘Digieye’ to take measurements of colour and even texture. However, given that I had physical samples collected and they were of a small and man-ageable size and so the simplest and quickest method for colour specifying was to use a colorimeter. These measure the tristimulus values (L*, a* and b*) with which I can compare each substrate to each other and produce an outcome and suggestions for Jack Wills to create a more colour consistent brand. Using a colorimeter these were the results that I found:

L* a* b* c* h° Large Carrier Bag

65.92 24.52 00.94 24.54 2.20

Small Carrier Bag

69.68 23.47 -2.92 23.65 352.89

Handbook Page

73.86 21.61 -4.87 22.15 347.29

Cardboard Tag

57.57 23.15 4.86 23.65 11.87

Sticker 67.40 25.76 -3.17 25.95 352.97 Picture of Sofa in Handbook

84.61 7.16 -4.99 8.73 325.11

L* a* b* c* h°

Large Carrier Bag

33.52 -1.17 -5.73 5.85 258.45

Small Carrier Bag

33.33 -5.31 -9.48 10.87 240.74

Handbook Page

39.93 0.29 -8.95 8.95 271.86

Cardboard Tag

35.28 -1.69 -6.67 6.88 255.77

Sticker 24.78 5.74 -5.93 8.25 314.08

Picture of Sofa in Handbook

39.29 0.63 -6.70 6.73 275.38

4.0 Quality controlOf course for Jack Wills to design, manufacture, market and sell products that are of the highest standard of colour consistency there needs to be forms of control. It is all to do with correct digital colour commu-nication. The designer is responsible for selecting the correct RGB gamut whether it is sRGB or AdobeRGB, adjusting the white point and the power law response of the device and saving the work in the correct format. Also, the substrate, properties of inks and thickness of ink layers should be taken into account by manufacturers and material suppliers as the transition between RGB design and CMYK print can prove di�cult. The ICC colour management model and ICC pro�ling would help at all of these stages. If wash fastness and colourfastness were taken into account at the early stages of Jack Wills design and manufac-ture the storage and vending process might not be detrimental to the professionalism of the brand and also, the end user would be happier with a seemingly higher quality product and would return to shop again.

To say that anything above a 0.8 is a visible di�erence according to the human eye, it is clear that Jack Wills have a very inconsistent colour scheme currently. For instance, the pink used on the picture of a Jack Wills sofa in the Christmas handbook 2012 is nearly 25 shades lighter than a cardboard tag. Those �gures are frankly ridiculous for such a thriving brand. For Jack Wills to take full advantage of its growing fan base, this is the type of issue that could de�nitely be resolved.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Wills - Quote

http://foxtrotbravo.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/jack-wills-autumn-lookbook.html - Stylist Looks

https://twitter.com/JackWillsUSA - Striped Jack Wills logo source (edited by self )

http://malarianomore.org.uk/themes/fashion/jack-wills - Plain Jack Wills logo