Our population is increasingly diverse, and children are the leading edge of this transformation. In response to growing diversity, society is increasingly aware of the importance of representation and inclusion. Because when kids don’t feel represented, it can lead to feelings of invisibility and insignificance (Mastro 2017).

As a brand dedicated to – and beloved for – enabling kids’ creative self-expression, Crayola has a responsibility to ensure its products reflect the kids it serves. So, they partnered with inclusion & beauty experts to develop a new line of creative tools that represented global skin tones: Colors of the World (CotW).

To get the word out, we developed a launch campaign with the following primary objectives:

(1) Raise awareness with key audiences, including parents and teachers

(2) Drive purchase consideration prior to initial exclusive launch at Walmart to demonstrate product viability & bridge gap between PR launch and in-store release.

(3) Drive purchase across all key points of sale, including online & In-store at Walmart and Crayola.com

(4) Create excitement among parents, teachers and children about the power to accurately represent themselves in the world. And to share what COTW meant to them to inspire others.

To ensure CotW authentically represented kids' diversity, Crayola partnered with experts ranging from DEI thought leaders to color specialists from major cosmetics brands. They also conducted research with parents and teachers – our purchasers –to further inform product development.

This led to the creation of 24 new skin tone shades that represent over 80% of the global shade pallet, with appealing names to ensure every child would be excited to use the crayon that represents them.

We also needed a campaign that conveyed the transformative impact the product could have. So, we dug into the importance of representation for kids and discovered that it boils down to belonging: children need to be able to see themselves in the world to believe they have a place in it. This is especially critical when it comes to representing themselves – self-portraits are an important way kids explore their identity and sense of self.

Our strategic idea pays off this insight:

Help every child create their place in the world by giving them the power to color themselves into it.

To bring it to life, we built a campaign to flip the self-portrait into a movement and invite children to draw their #TrueSelfie.

“By creating a self-portrait, children learn who they are, how they want to present themselves and what’s important to them.” - Jeremy Newton, Chief Executive of The Prince’s Foundation for Children and the Arts

But for over 50+% of children in the US from diverse backgrounds, creating an accurate self-portrait has been nearly impossible – because they haven’t had the right colors. Meaning over 36 million kids can’t accurately represent themselves in this critical area of personal development. And when we don’t feel represented, we feel invisible and insignificant (Mastro 2017).

As a brand that stands for colorful self-expression for all children, Crayola was uniquely positioned to help tackle this challenge. So, they partnered with inclusion & beauty experts to develop a new line of creative tools that represented global skin tones: Colors of the World.

Our strategic campaign to launch the product began with reaching two key audiences: (a) parents who span the full spectrum of racial/ethnic identity in America & who are foundational to creating a more inclusive culture for children; and (b) teachers who are the primary gatekeepers to children's educational experiences, and whose buy-in was critical to our success.

To develop a campaign that spoke to them, we interrogated the importance of accurate self-representation. We discovered that when it comes to children, the importance of representation boils down to belonging.

Parents & teachers of young children today understand the need to be seen, and for children to be able to see themselves “fitting into” the world to believe they have a place in it (PBS News Hour interviews, 2019).

This insight led to the development of our strategic idea:

Help every child create their place in the world by giving them the power to color themselves into it

To bring our idea to life, we built a campaign to flip the self-portrait into a movement and invite children everywhere to draw their #TrueSelfie.

Beginning on May 21st, the United Nations World Day for Cultural Diversity, we delivered a highly strategic & flexible launch across PR, digital, social & influencers to keep pace with the constantly changing pandemic environment.

Within hours, we exceeded expectations, selling out of pre-sale inventory. Demand was so overwhelming, manufacturing was unable to keep up at some points. We also saw organic engagement from celebrities like Jennifer Anniston and Holly Robinson Peete. To date, Colors of the World has received over 5 billion impressions and over 3,000 PR placements.

With the help of the #TrueSelfie campaign, Colors of the World crayons became one of Crayola’s most successful product launches ever, selling over 11.5M units to date. The original crayons have been expanded into a line of products including colored pencils, paints and markers, and the product line has been introduced in markets around the world.