Have you ever wondered why, when passing through the refrigerated aisle in the supermarket, meat has a specific illumination and vegetables another? The answer is purely biological: we eat through our eyes.
If the red of an entrecote looks slightly maroon or grayish, our brain triggers an ancient alarm signal: “danger, spoiled food”. At an international trade show like Alimentaria in Barcelona, where competition for the distributor’s attention is fierce, you can’t afford to have your star product look out of date on the giant screen of your stand.
At Edgar Vasquez Audiovisual Services we have detected that this is the number one mistake of first time exhibitors: investing thousands of euros in the design of the booth and the product, but renting a “standard” screen without professional calibration. The result is usually disastrous for the Corporate Image.
In this article, we are going to explain why color loyalty is your best sales tool and how we manage it technically to make your brand shine.
When a Marketing Manager plans his presence at a trade show, he often focuses on the size of the screen. “The bigger the better,” we are told. However, in the food industry, size matters less than truthfulness.
Imagine you have launched a new line of natural strawberry smoothies. The color of your actual product is a vibrant, appetizing pink. However, if you project the promotional video on a poorly configured LED screen (with a cold color temperature, typical of factory settings), that vibrant pink will transform into a purplish or bluish hue.
The result? The attendee passing in front of your stand in Barcelona will not think “how tasty”, but “that looks like a chemical”. Color calibration in an LED screen that shows food is not a technical luxury; it is a marketing necessity. It is the difference between generating desire or generating distrust.
Most LED screens offered by low-cost vendors are configured for text highlighting and contrast in office environments. They have a very high color temperature (bluish whites) so that Excel reads well.
But the food is not an Excel. Food is organic. It requires warm color temperatures, controlled saturation and millimeter-tuned white balance. If you don’t have a specialist technician adjusting this on-site, you’re losing money.
Allow us to share an anecdote that illustrates this point perfectly. Two editions ago, during the assembly at Alimentaria, we coincided in the aisle with a neighboring company selling premium acorn-fed Iberian ham.
They had contracted a service of modular led screen rental from a “quick and cheap” company. The technicians arrived, hung the modules, switched on and were gone in 30 minutes.
We, at our client’s booth (a tropical fruit brand), were in the middle of the installation process. Our team spent almost two hours on colorimetry alone.
When they turned on their screen, the Iberian ham, which in reality has an intense red and shiny fat, looked brownish, dull and sad on the video. The fat looked like gray wax. It was visually unpleasant.
In contrast, in our booth, the handles and pineapples looked almost three-dimensional. We had adjusted the gamma curve so that the yellows and oranges “popped” off the screen without saturating or “burning out.”
The Marketing Director of the ham company approached our technician, visibly concerned, and asked, “Why does your screen look like I can pick up fruit with my hand and mine looks like an old television?”
The answer was not in the brand of the screen (both were of similar quality), but in the comprehensive service and time spent. We don’t just “hang screens”; we manage your brand image. That’s the difference between a logistics provider and an audiovisual partner.
In order for you to understand what we ask our technicians to do when we perform a color calibration on a LED screen, here are the three fundamental pillars that we take care of in your event:
As mentioned, the computer standard is cool (6500K – 9000K). For food, especially bakery, meats and ready meals, we need to lower that temperature towards warmer tones (3200K – 5000K) or look for a pure neutral white that does not tint the product.
A pure white ensures that the surrounding colors are true. If the white “veers” to blue, your entire product will look “frozen”.
There is a fine line between a “vivid” color and a “radioactive” color. In vegetables, for example, a green that is too saturated looks artificial and transgenic. We look for naturalness.
Our professional video processors allow us to adjust the RGB (Red, Green, Blue) independently. We can boost the reds of a meat without the greens of the garnish fluorescing. This level of detail requires planning and time during setup.
There is a fine line between a “vivid” color and a “radioactive” color. In vegetables, for example, a green that is too saturated looks artificial and transgenic. We look for naturalness.
At a trade show, everyone is going to record you with their phone to upload to Instagram Stories or LinkedIn. If your screen has a low refresh rate, there will be ugly black streaks flashing on the visitor’s video.
This gives an image of neglect and obsolete technology. At Edgar Vasquez Audiovisual Services we guarantee equipment with high refresh rates (High Refresh Rate) so that your content looks crisp and smooth, both live and through the camera of an iPhone.
Fira Gran Via has powerful general lighting, but each location within the pavilion is different. There are areas with natural light coming in through the skylights and darker areas.
A successful color calibration for an LED screens cannot be brought “from home”. It must be done on site.
If there is a lot of ambient light, we need to increase the brightness (Nits) to maintain the contrast, but correct the color so that it does not “wash out”.
If the booth is dark and you are looking for an intimate atmosphere, excessive brightness will disturb the eye and destroy the blacks in the image.
Our technicians measure the ambient light of the enclosure before adjusting the screen. It is part of our safety and quality protocol. We leave nothing to chance.
We often receive last minute calls: “I need a screen for tomorrow in Alimentaria“. Our response, as a matter of quality policy, is usually that we cannot accept orders without due notice (minimum 48-72 hours).
The reason is simple: excellence cannot be improvised. To make your product look perfect, we need to:
Receive your content: Analyze the videos you are going to project: Are they dark? Do they have a lot of contrast?
Prepare the equipment: Configure the appropriate video processors and scalers on our vessel.
Plan the set-up: Coordinate with your booth set-up team to ensure a clean, unobstructed and safe installation.
Calibration Time: Set aside the necessary time at the fair for the imaging technician to work his magic.
Express” or “rush” service often means skipping steps. And in food, skipping the calibration step is to risk making your product look inedible.
You may think that hiring an audiovisual service with a dedicated technician and professional calibration is an extra expense. We invite you to see it as an investment in conversion.
How much does your stand cost? How much does the sales staff you have sent to Barcelona cost? How much is each qualified lead that comes in to ask questions?
If the screen is the largest visual element of your space (the “eye-catcher”), and it shows a poor image, you are devaluing all the previous investment. A clear image, with faithful and appealing colors, attracts attention, stops people in their tracks and facilitates the work of your salespeople.
To give you complete peace of mind about how we will manage your project, this is our standard workflow for clients in the food industry:
Technical Kick-off: We talked to you or your agency. What do you sell? Is it a fresh product, packaged, cooked?
File Review: You send us the graphic material. If we detect that the quality of the video is low, we will let you know in advance so that you can correct it.
Strategic Installation: We install the screen taking care of the integration with the decoration.
Colorimetric Adjustment: With the actual content playing, we adjust color curves until the product on screen is identical to the actual product you have on the counter.
Validation: You give the final go-ahead. We don’t leave until you say, “Yes, that’s exactly my brand color.”
This methodology allows us to ensure an impeccable result and avoid last minute surprises.
At an in-person event, perception is reality. Don’t let a technical misconfiguration ruin months of product development work. LED technology is fantastic, but it’s a tool that must be tamed by expert hands to serve your business objectives.
Color calibration for LED screens is the best kept secret of the stands that are always full. It’s not magic, it’s technique and attention to detail.
True Loyalty: Your product will look as it is, fresh and appetizing.
Premium image: No flickering, no dead pixels, no strange colors.
Integral Management: Transportation, assembly, adjustment and disassembly included.
No Stress: Qualified technicians who speak your language and the language of the fair.
Security: Equipment checked and with backup systems.
Aesthetics: Clean installation, concealed wiring and secure brackets.
Peace of mind: You take care of the customers; we take care of the technology.
Want your booth to stand out at the next trade show? Don’t compromise with the color of your product. Request here your customized technical proposal and let’s plan together the best visual configuration for your space.
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