Be it hot couture or home décor, colours are the cornerstone of innovation in the world of paints. In fact the paint industry is at an absolute cross road today. From the GDP soaring to real estate boom to competition heating up with new players in the fray, there are both challenges and opportunities. That’s exactly why the Asian Paints Colour of the Year announcement took absolute centrestage. It’s indicative of not just the socio-economic trends but also, in many ways, highlights the changing preferences.
I am sure you remember Meryl Streep explaining the evolution of a particular shade of blue in Devil Wears Prada, “that sweater is not just blue, it’s not turquoise, it’s not lapis, it’s actually cerulean.” Well, that’s pretty much the story of how Asian Paints zeroed in on Terra as the colour of the Year for 2024.
Speaking to Financial Express Online, Amit Syngle, Managing Director and CEO, of Asian Paints explained the intensive research that goes onto the whole process and why they coined the term colour intelligence, “We look at the socio-economic aspect to lifestyle to corporate trends and from departments, we start getting into the whole area of colour prints. So that’s the genesis. We form these stories, go to opinion leaders, go to a sociologist and meet a lot of style designers. Then our team kind of curates those stories and looks at what is the kind of colours, materials, textures, which kind of subsume under that, and therefore, this entire area is now called colour and material intelligence.”
Quite in line with expectation, the Colour of the year and the Wallpaper of the year for 2024 have significant nature elements incorporated in the core concept. Syngle reiterated the innovative ways of using the earth and the soil in furthering design experimentation as well as confirming to the sustainability goals undertaken by the paint major, “we are proud to showcase 3D structures with soil, soil bricks. The second area is we’ve looked at the whole area of going into the deep is what we call it and we get into the whole vastness of the ocean. The third area, the India futuristic is literally a confluence, retro futuristic. The last trend, which we are talking of, is called the Goblin. This is a trend where we look at possibility seeing how a lot of youngsters, especially the Gen Z, is kind of really coming about. They want to kind of go away from this whole area of perfection.” Not just in colours but also in spirit, Asian Paints looks at incorporating the casual cool aspect with poise and passion.
Like most other aspects, even the colour trends and the decision behind it is not uni-dimensional. Environmental concerns and sustainability practices now occupy a lot more mindspace and how exactly have they impacted the trends or the choice of colours? Syngle pointed out that “I think a lot of these areas are something which will always remain as the highlights in terms of defining some of the trends. So, if you look at most of the trends, some elements of this, whether it is green, sustainability, recyclability or even in terms of technology, they will subsume some of these elements in terms of the story which can come.”
The question then is what are the initiatives undertaken by Asian Paints, especially in its manufacturing processes to further the concept of sustainability from the showroom to shopfloor? Well, “essentially, you know, we are water positive today – we generate more water than we consume to the next section, we do a lot of water harvesting, we do a lot of work around removing the silt from the groundwater. And that has been the story of the brand in terms of how we have taken,” declared Syngle.
Speaking on where all this is leading to- the optimistic chief of Asian Paints said. “ I think it’s a really a golden period for all the construction industries.So housing, I think, is a big opportunity, which will kind of really further both fresh and repainting segments. I feel the whole area offers great opportunity.” Just to put in perspective, the paint major closed Q3 with 35% jump in net profit and delivered strong margin performance.