The Evolution of Crayon Colors

By Jake • January 19th, 2010 • 13 Comments

As a lover of data visualization, I couldn’t resist sharing this one from Stephen Von Worley depicting the evolution of beloved Crayola crayons from their humble roots as an eight-pack of fun in 1903 to today’s 120-pack.

Visualization by Stephen Von Worley

I’m a total data geek, which is why I love data visualizations. I couldn’t help looking for patterns and analyzing the official chronology of what has been added, retired, renamed, etc. in each iteration.

Some noteworthy nuggets I found:

Enjoy, and share any patterns or anomalies you see in these data. I love this stuff.


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  • http://empoprise-bi.blogspot.com/ John E. Bredehoft (Empoprises)

    I'm just guessing, but the Great Depression seems like a perfectly logical time to innovate, when you think about it. Imagine little Shirley tap dancing her way to Daddy Warbucks (I'm mixing and matching my Great Depression symbols here) and asking Daddy to buy a box of crayons. “Harumph!” says Daddy. “You have a perfectly good box of eight crayons here, if you just ignore the broken portions.” But if Shirley asks Daddy to buy the brand new 16 color box – something that they DON'T have in the home – then Daddy may perceive a more urgent need to buy the product. None of those broken crayons in the old crayon box is pink, after all.

  • http://theappslab.com Jake

    Sure, but the Daddy Warbuckses of the World were in the vast minority during the Great Depression. This is all conjecture, but I'm guessing crayons were a luxury item for most, dropping demand. Similarly, Crayola's R&D must have been affected by shrinking operating income.

    Otherwise, one these would have to be false, i.e. demand was steady or higher and/or creating new colors did not significantly impact the bottom line.

    I suppose a third option is that Crayola just innovated altruistically to brighten the color palette of children during bad times. The cynic in me is laughing.

  • Matt Rasmussen

    I thought color wasn't invented until the late 1950's/early 1960's when TV and movies became color. ;)

  • http://theappslab.com Jake

    Excellent point, so I guess this is revisionist history or interpretation of the many shades of gray they added.

  • Jim

    Ever seen this for a funny take on data visualisation:
    http://www.chrisjordan.com/current_set2.php?id=7
    Running the Numbers
    An American Self-Portrait

  • http://theappslab.com Jake

    Heavy stuff. Not sure I'd call it “funny”, at least not funny ha-ha :) Very cool depictions.

  • http://empoprise-bi.blogspot.com/ John E. Bredehoft (Empoprises)

    A former boss of mine gave a speech on paradigm shifts once, using as his example the beginning of the Wizard of Oz, when Dorothy's world suddenly goes from black & white to color.

  • http://theappslab.com Jake

    I suppose that would qualify. Although she goes back to black and white in the end, all the happier. I wonder how Kansas feels about that portrayal . . .

  • http://www.colormaven.wordpress.com/ Ms. Scully

    Yes, I love this graphic, a little more sophisticated than the one's I've been working on, but drawn from Crayola inspiration too!
    http://colormaven.wordpress.com/2010/01/23/cray…

  • http://theappslab.com Jake

    Interesting, especially concerning blue as a favorite color, wonder if that's an American thing or if it varies cultural/politically. Fun stuff.

    I keep hearing that people have gone to the Crayola Museum, something that has never occurred to me. Didn't even know they had one until I read that post.

  • http://theappslab.com Jake

    Interesting, especially concerning blue as a favorite color, wonder if that's an American thing or if it varies cultural/politically. Fun stuff.

    I keep hearing that people have gone to the Crayola Museum, something that has never occurred to me. Didn't even know they had one until I read that post.