Yellow Made Margarine. White Made Pouches.

Margarine’s breakthrough wasn’t taste—it was color. For decades, U.S. “oleo” laws (pushed by dairy) forbade yellow coloring, so margarine had to be sold white—and in some places even dyed pink—making it look wrong next to golden butter. Manufacturers hacked around it with a dye capsule you’d knead into the brick at home. When federal restrictions were rolled back in 1950, pre-colored yellow margarine finally hit shelves, and the category (Parkay, Blue Bonnet, Imperial…) took off. The brain already had “butter = yellow” as its prototype; once margarine matched the cue, fluency clicked and adoption followed.

The sachet is deliberately, insistently white: lab-clean, non-staining, “not spit.” That color does triple duty. First, it’s a hygiene signal the eye trusts instantly. Second, it’s quality control—any contamination or off-drip pops against white. Third, it’s a mouth cue: the “security system” of taste/smell/trigeminal nerves is primed to accept a smooth, mint-clean, fabric-white packet that never surprises you.

Brands can shout on the can; the pouch itself whispers purity. After enough repetitions, users encode a template—matte white sachet, smooth sit, predictable onset. Try tinting the packet brown like dip or candy-bright and you trip prediction error: it looks like stain risk, youth bait, or a toy. Regulators see optics; retailers see risk; the mouth says “no thanks.” Variants will come and go, but the baseline will hold.

So here’s the long call: a century from now, the dominant nicotine pouch will still be white. The can art will evolve, flavors will rotate, compliance seals will change—but the little fabric flag that says “clean, spitless, known-good” will stay snow-quiet. Just as yellow unlocked margarine by matching the mind’s prototype for butter, white is becoming the prototype for modern oral nicotine. Dip’s brown era taught the market what to avoid; pouches’ white era teaches the market what to trust.