Unilever has fired the latest salvo in its soap war with Procter & Gamble by launching a washing powder just for dark colours.
Lever Faberge's Persil expects to introduce Black Velvet, a liquid detergent that contains less bleach than others, to the UK at the end of the summer.
It is the next stage in the battle to outdo its rival, Procter & Gamble, which owns detergent brands Ariel, Bold, Fairy, Lenor and Daz.
Procter & Gamble does not yet have a similar product for dark clothes in any markets while Unilever has already started to roll out Black Velvet in Europe.
The market for dark colours is one of the few remaining untapped areas not yet lining the supermarket shelves. This year's big product launch for both consumer giants has been liquid capsules.
A £2.5m marketing spend will launch the product to young, affluent British consumers - a generation notorious for wearing black and dark clothes.