Shoutout to the guy who told me to ditch red-green combos entirely

I was redesigning my cleaning service flyer and kept using red text on green backgrounds for pricing. Looked fine to me but my buddy who is colorblind saw just two muddy blobs. He told me to try adding patterns or symbols next to the colors, so I put little dollar signs next to prices. Now I pair blue with orange instead and use icons for everything. Has anyone else found a color pair that works better than red-green for quick info?

2 comments

2 Comments

gonzalez.phoenix7h ago

That "gray mush" thing you mentioned is so real. I did a garage sale sign once with red and green marker and my friend was like "is that just a blob sale?" Now I just use black and yellow like a warning sign and it works for everything.

paul_burns10h ago

Oh man, your buddy saved you. I made the exact same mistake on a charity 5K flyer two years ago. I had red arrows pointing to green registration boxes and it totally worked in my head until someone handed me a photocopy and it was just gray mush. I swapped to a dark blue background with bright yellow text and it popped way better. The dollar sign trick is smart too, I started putting little shoe icons next to each race distance and it made everything so much clearer for everyone. Orange and blue is probably the safest combo I have found for anything with numbers or prices.