Choosing a colour scale that survives the warehouse printer
Why we favour stepped yellow-to-red bands for geographic sales heatmap reporting when packs get photocopied on the shop floor.
Board packs leave the marketing suite and often meet a tired multifunction printer in a depot office. If your geographic sales heatmap relies on subtle teal gradients, the photocopy turns into a muddled grey.
Stepped bands beat smooth blends
We draw five or six distinct density steps. Each step should remain separable when converted to greyscale. Yellow-to-red sequences — familiar from classic map craft — hold up better than purple-to-green ramps that collapse under cheap toner.
Test before the board meeting
Print a draft on the same device the area managers use. If two adjacent bands merge, widen the step or darken the outline between them. A beautiful screen rendering that fails on paper wastes the briefing.
Keep the legend identical each quarter
When you refresh density, lock the scale. A darker shade must mean more volume, not a redesigned palette. That discipline is what makes a Quarterly Density Brief comparable to last winter’s pack.