Before putting on the new mechanic's glove the knifemaker's aunt bought to protect her hand against blisters, she made a small detour to get the leather originally intended for the nail knife experiment. Remember that plan? Present nail knives in their original sheaths next to nail knives in a color sheaths. The experiment got out of control early on and spiraled into too many variables, and too many choices for customers: too many colors, too many textures, too many differences to know which variable produced results.
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Original nail knife sheath and the proposed
leather in teal (also called turquoise) - a color chosen
after reading research about color preferences. |
The knifemaker has a regular sheath producer. In hindsight, the knifemaker's aunt should have presented a plan to use similar leather (to what she usually uses) in a different color and asked to have sheaths made. Here is the leather obtained and the sheaths usually made. If the same sheath maker could have used the same pattern, the same stitching technique, but used a different leather color, the show sale may have produced clearer results about whether or not color impacted customer choice.
After reading the University of Delaware paper,
Color Sells: How the Psychology of Color Influences Consumers, the knifemaker's aunt chose teal. Hopefully, the next selling opportunity at a large show in the fall can present clear data collection of how color makes, or does not make, a difference when purchasing a nail knife.
