You’d be forgiven for thinking you’d just stumbled upon a website aimed at a much younger audience. That’s stereotyping for you.
So why ‘the wonderfully pink MouseProud Blog’? Well, it all started with a jumper…
…which I wore to a 4Networking breakfast meeting in 2009, at Bristol Cribbs, at the time led by Matt Richardson of ChorusIT (on the left in the picture with Roger Green looking aghast).
People that know Matt will understand what I mean when I describe him as gregarious, outspoken and extroverted. His meetings were always well run and entertaining at the same time.
Matt resisted the temptation to comment on my pink jumper (Marks & Spencer Collezione) I was wearing that morning; for all of 10 minutes. Then it started. Alluding to (amongst other things) my clothes sense, colour-blindness and sexual orientation, his comments that peppered the rest of the meeting caught everybody else’s enthusiasm and the nickname ‘Pinky‘ was born!
You couldn’t pay for better PR.
From that and subsequent meetings, the nickname and jumper became trade mark quality, leading to my rebranding from boring grey website to the one you see here. The ‘wonderfully pink’ phrase was penned by Simon Bunker who was instrumental in helping me construct the site initially and has continued to be highly supportive of the blog.
Clients that I train on software and colleagues at 4Networking meetings now expect me to wear the trademark pink jumper (even in summer…), so I’ve expanded my wardrobe to allow for more shirts as well!
So there you have it. The story behind ‘Pinky’, why this website is the colour it is and the PR success that led to #Pinkwood.
Thank you Matt Richardson – its all your fault and I shall be forever grateful mate!
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