Over the coming months I'll be addressing key business issues like raising investment capital, managing market cycles and developing brand loyalty. However before we get too involved in these complex subjects, I thought it best to take a quick look at the current position of The Building Experience and a few of the business and marketing decisions that have already been made.

The first of these is the decision to adopt a corporate colour. Some of you will be thinking I'm talking rubbish at this point and that corporate colour certainly wasn't covered in the last marketing book you studied. To the doubters i would say this, think of Easy Jet and Virgin. If you don't instantly think of orange and red, I'd be very surprised. It may not be possible to calculate the exact contribution that these colours make to the bottom line profit of these companies and wecan not even say whether or not they would have been less successful had they chosen a different colour. However, what we can say with utmost certainty is that these colours have played a huge role in developing the Easy Jet and Virgin brands.

Clearly for every company that has an instantly recognisable colour, there are several that do not, many of which are equally successful. Take Microsoft or Nike for example. So this begs the question, do we need a company colour and what will it give us? Brand development is obvious. It could also be argued that it gives a sense of credibility; "Not only do these guys have uniforms, a website and company vans, but they're all the same colour". 

It's unquestionable that having a company colour has benefits, but we have also seen that it is not essential. If you are reading this blog though, then you've been on The Building Experience website and may have been involved in your own construction project with us. Therefore you know that we have chosen purple as our corporate colour. I'd like to say it's the result of a comprehensive market survey or a brainstorming session at one of our board meetings, but this would be dishonest. The truth is The Building Experience was purple before it was even a registered company. The moment the business idea was created, it had a corporate colour of purple.

So where did this colour come from? Was it because purple creates a vision of high quality and class? Possibly. Was it because Nick Knowles looked so handsome in his purple t-shirt on DIY SOS? Definitely not. Was it because the creator of The Building Experience wore a purple blazer for 5 years at school and hasn't felt quite so comfortable in anything he's worn since? Quite likely. In fact, i can't say with certainty where the colour purple came from. Not all decisions are based on statistical studies or market research, sometimes they are just stumbled upon.

What's more important than where the decision came from, is whether or not the choice will prove popular and contribute to a successful company. So please let us know if you have any thoughts on the colour, or even if you think my theory regarding corporate colour is totally spurious. But one thing that's certain is The Building Experience colour is purple and that's definitely not up for debate.