The extremely offensive story that Phyllis tells about a pejorative, raced-based name for a product color is based in fact. Until the early-to-mid-twentieth century it was common for clothing, fabric, and paint companies (especially in England) to use the n-word in the name of a particular shade of brown. This occasionally reappears into the present-day: in 2017, Wal-Mart was forced to apologize when a second-party vendor on their website used the phrase to describe a hair-styling product's color, and in 2018, Groupon was obliged to pull a promotion that used the descriptor for footwear.