Pantone’s new adhesive chip sheets make those broken-teeth perforated chip sheets obsolete.
The chip sheets we’ve all seen stashed on the shelves of ad agency and design shops are about to change. In the past they’ve been simply perforated and torn apart as needed, leaving a mess of chips lying around if they’re not taped to the client’s job jacket or other materials. I never used them much, and I’m glad I didn’t have to—I’m an organized guy, and don’t like a mess. Pantone has listened to customers and released PANTONE SOLID CHIPS peel and place coated chips, which are already adhesive-backed and can be peeled up multiple times for ease of use. Along with the sheets, Pantone has released new PANTONE palette cards that the chips can be stuck upon when shown to clients or filed away in the job jacket.
Removal and Sticking is Easy
The PANTONE SOLID CHIPS peel and place coated chips.
You won’t need glue or tape for these new chips—just peel and place. You can do this multiple times if you like, but you do get six chips per color so it’s not necessary. The cool thing about multiple peel-and-place is that you can peel a few chips, see how they work together, maybe stick a couple back on the backing sheets, then put the color selections on a palette card to show the client during a presentation. Each palette card holds five chips and has areas for the project information and date. The chip sheets are coated and easy to work with—each chip has a smooth edge so the rest of the page is intact and stays clean and neat. The chip sheet package also comes with a plastic sheet lifter you can stick chips onto for experimenting with color schemes. The concept of chips has not changed, but Pantone simply thought of a new solution to an old problem.
Pricing
PANTONE SOLID CHIPS peel and place coated chips are available right now for $179; you can see them on the Pantone website here. The package contains 30 palette cards as well as the plastic sheet and the PANTONE palette cards. Note that the only the coated chips are available as peel-and-place right now; you still have to deal with the snaggletoothed chip sheets if you want matte or the three-book set. According to the website, PANTONE SOLID CHIPS peel and place coated chips started shipping Monday, April 16.
My Opinion
It’s fun to watch a company take an established product and freshen it up with just a slight tweak to the fundamentals of it. Chip sheets have been around forever and they’ve always been perforated, at least for Pantone. Now they are adhesive-backed and made easier to use, and I expect the entire line of Pantone chips to go this way. It’s the same thing that happened to postage stamps: they used to require a lick to get them to stick, and that was just the way it had always been. They started showing up with adhesive backing maybe ten years ago, and now you can’t even find the old lick-and-stick stamps. I am sure Pantone perforated chips will follow that same path—and the price for peel-and-place chips is only $9 more than the perforated chips, so money is not really an issue. I expect these peel-and-place chips to become the status quo in agencies and design firms across the country.