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Re: color change button?

for

From: Jeremy Echols
Date: Sep 27, 2017 3:37PM

It's only anecdotal, but I find that even with glasses and "good enough" vision, contrast is a killer for me. I don't know why; I don't need glasses to drive, and I can even read without glasses if the font isn't too small. But I have a lot of trouble when contrast is low. Even sometimes AA-compliant contrast ratios are hard for me if the font is too thin. There are sites I've hacked with the Stylish plugin, but oftentimes I just don't bother wasting the time, and leave the site. If you're selling something that's available elsewhere, I'd likely go to a competitor. That could be a case for fixing contrast.

-----Original Message-----
From: WebAIM-Forum [mailto: <EMAIL REMOVED> ] On Behalf Of Tomlins Diane
Sent: Wednesday, September 27, 2017 2:21 PM
To: WebAIM Discussion List < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
Subject: [WebAIM] color change button?

Hi everyone,
We are working on the branding colors for our many divisions' websites to meet the Level AA contrast ratios. As you might expect, some marketing people are unhappy about this and pushing back. In most cases, the color change is fairly subtle, it's not like these are drastic color changes (except for one site that uses a screaming orange!)

So, one of those folks pushing back has suggested that we provide a mechanism that would allow a visitor to change the colors to our compliant colors if they need it. Our answer to that idea is that it's not an acceptable solution, the colors need to be accessible to begin with. This person went as far as to suggest that we are making their sites ugly just to cater to "the 1% who need it".. I was kind of gob-smacked by that response, especially when this person goes on to say " we take accessibility very serious but..." - smh.

They are now asking for facts or something to back up WHY this color change button cannot be used. I provided quite a few statistics to refute the 1% comment as they clearly have no idea how many people are affected and can benefit from good color contrast.

Anyway, I'm interested in your input/opinion on this idea.. has anyone ever done such a thing?? I think I know what the arguments are against it, but some of you may have different ones :)

Thank you!
Diane R Tomlins
HCA IT&S | Digital Media
Accessibility SME