Pantone (PMS) Color Matching

The Pantone Matching System (PMS) is a color system shared world wide by those in the graphic printing industry.  It’s more robost than other color systems such as CMYK or RGB.  It’s often thought that providing CMYK percentages (cyan, magenta, yellow, and black) or RGB values (red, green, blue) is good enough to achieve a specific color match on a printed product, however, that unfortunately doesn’t typically work.  A variety of material and machine types are used for printing and each absorb and deposit inks in different ways on different substrates.  The suggested ink percentages or values to achieve a certain color will need to be adjusted in the artwork file accordingly based on the substrate being printed on, the color of the substrate, the sheen of the substrate, the particular printer, and its inks.  Therefore, if you have a very specific set of colors used in your corporate brand, it’s recommended that you supply your PMS colors in order to achieve the most accurate match.

For us, the process of Pantone matching is pretty labor intensive.  We print color swatches from your artwork design and compare them to our Pantone Coated and Uncoated swatch books.  This is why using RGB or CYMK values won’t work, as there is no physical and universal swatch book to compare printed products to in order to ensure accurate colors once printed.  It sometimes requires multiple test prints and adjustments in order to achive the correct color due to all the variables of each job (such as the substrate, background color, your artwork, etc.), therefore, we charge a $50.00 fee for each set of PMS colors you need matched.  This fee is only applied to your initial order.  Once the color is correctly matched, we can proceed with printing your entire order and then will save your color settings in your print-ready production file so they’ll automatically print correctly the next time you reorder.

Contact us if you have any questions about color matching or how to obtain your Pantone Color numbers (some examples would be 123C or 428U).  Not all products require color matching, such as engraved name badges or name plates.  However, if you’re interested in ordering a color match for your other full color badges, plates, or signs, you may do so here.