At a recent gadget trade show I was collared by a lady who was keen to show me her company’s fabulously pink drill kit.

A glance at the press release reminds me that this DIY kit comes with its own pink tool case, pink safety googles and a bright pink power drill with a 12V motor and “an easy to change chuck mechanism – so no broken nails.”

As much as I hate ruining a French manicure with a problematical chuck mechanism, the product’s key selling point was clearly, in case you hadn’t noticed, its colour.

Colour is key
The same firm’s pink tool kit, by the way, includes not only a pink spirit level, pink hammer, pink pliers and screwdrivers, but also a handy vanity mirror in the roof of the toolbox. So you can, you know, check your hair before putting up those shelves.

The less said of the pink car kit, the better. At least its jumper cables were still colour-coded red and black, with just the handy drawstring pouch coming in a delicate pastel pink. The ice scraper, flashlight and phone charger? All similarly rose-coloured, funnily enough.

Why so much pink?

This girliest of hues doesn’t appear to be particularly fashionable. I haven’t been reading Vogue as religiously as I might, but a quick peek at the local Topshop’s window display indicates that pink is not especially hot this season.

Nor is pink particularly stylish. It’s pretty on toenails, as lip gloss, whatever – but gadgets and gizmos executed in lurid pink plastic?

Mobiles for ladies
Once, when I was selecting a handset in a Dutch mobile phone store, the shop assistant must have caught me glancing at a pink model (a shiny pink Nokia 7373, if memory serves). He charged over to me, approvingly commenting, “Oh yeah, that’s a real popular one. A real ladyphone.”

That’s when I noticed the sign above the cabinet that I had been standing near. Ladyphones, it read. That’s what they call them in the Netherlands. They actually have a word for them.

And there I’d been wondering why that particular display case was loaded up with Swarovski crystal phone charms.

Pink gizmo overload
So the point to which I am gradually getting: there are a lot of pink gadgets on the market. There are pink mobile phones, pink laptops, pink MP3 players, pink cameras, pink satnav devices, pink handheld gaming consoles. Pink power drills.

Admittedly, sometimes pink is just one alternative in a rainbow spectrum of available product shades. But sometimes it’s not. Sometimes your choice comes down to white, black or pink. Sometimes not even that.

Sometimes pink will be a special limited edition shade for a mobile handset. A special edition of Sony Ericsson’s S500i phone comes dotted with pink flowers - and with a Jemma Kidd Make Up School lip and nails kit.

Pink sells, apparently
I can only assume that people - that is, women - are buying these things, because the manufacturers are certainly happy to keep churning them out. And fair enough, I suppose, if they’re selling.

So why do these bright pink gizmos bug me at all? Maybe it’s just that pink’s never been my favourite colour.

Or maybe it’s because it’s just a little bit patronising, manufacturers feeling compelled to produce perfectly workable (and, frankly, sleeker and cooler-looking) silver gadgets in cutesy Barbie pink just so the ladies are aware that they can buy these things too.

On the other hand, maybe we do need to be reminded that these gadgets (“boys’ toys”, right?) are fundamentally unisex.

Boys' toys
With some very fine gadget publications regularly illustrating their covers with a bikini-clad glamour model (who happens to be brandishing, say, an ultraportable laptop in the most improbable way, like she was going to take her Asus Eee for a quick swim), you might start to think that consumer tech is only of interest or useful to blokes. 

Accordingly, the pink tool kit’s press release introduces its product as “for girls into a bit of DIY who don’t want to lose their feminine streak.”

I don’t know about the other girls (that is to say, women – I’m assuming children are not being encouraged to operate power tools) but I wouldn’t feel all that butch if forced to wield a green Bosch or an orange Black & Decker.

And then there’s just something frivolous about a hot pink laptop. Nothing against frivolity in general, but I’m not sure I’d want to whip one of those things out in an important meeting to give a Powerpoint presentation. (This is in an alternate universe where I give such presentations.)

Consumer's choice 
In the end, I know it comes down to a matter of choice - a matter of personal taste, even. I know most people opt for a regular, boringly black (or silver, or grey) mobile phone. I know a proportion of ladies must actually love pink technology. Fair play to them. I suppose it’s fun, it’s perky, it’s nice and girly.

But all I’m saying is this: if another shop assistant or PR agent presses me with a pink gadget, assuming I’m going to love it because I’m a female – never mind that it’s a plasticky, underpowered power drill or a sub-par fashion phone – I’m not going to be happy. That’s all I’m saying.