Bootstrap navbar link color won't change

Question

I need to change my navbar links to white and space them out across the navbar. I have written code for this but I can't seem to figure out why/where it keeps getting overridden. The background of the navbar is an image and the links seem to change to white without the image in there, so is there a way to fix that and keep the image in the background?

Can anyone help me understand what I'm doing wrong?

.navbar {
  background-image: url("images/navbarbgnew.png");
  background-size: cover;
  margin: -30px 0 15px 0;
}

.navbar ul {
  display: flex;
  justify-content: space-around;
}

.navbar ul li a {
  color: #FFF;
  font-family: "Helvetica," sans-serif;
  font-weight: 600;
  font-size: 14px;
}

<nav class="navbar navbar-expand-md navbar-light bg-light mb-3">
  <button class="navbar-toggler" type="button" data-toggle="collapse" data-target="#navbarSupportedContent" aria-controls="navbarSupportedContent" aria-expanded="false" aria-label="Toggle navigation"><span class="navbar-toggler-icon"></span></button>
  <div class="collapse navbar-collapse" id="navbarSupportedContent">
    <ul class="nav navbar-nav">
      <li class="nav-item dropdown">
        <a class="nav-link dropdown-toggle" href="#" id="navbarDropdownMenuLink" data-toggle="dropdown" aria-haspopup="true" aria-expanded="false">
          BOOKS
        </a>
        <div class="dropdown-menu" aria-labelledby="navbarDropdownMenuLink">
          <a class="dropdown-item" href="#">Branding Sutra</a>
        </div>
      </li>
      <li class="nav-item dropdown">
        <a class="nav-link dropdown-toggle" href="#" id="navbarDropdownMenuLink" data-toggle="dropdown" aria-haspopup="true" aria-expanded="false">
          LEARNING LAB
        </a>
        <div class="dropdown-menu" aria-labelledby="navbarDropdownMenuLink">
          <a class="dropdown-item" href="#">Workshops</a>
          <a class="dropdown-item" href="#">Classes</a>
          <a class="dropdown-item" href="#">Audio Downloads</a>
        </div>
      </li>
      <li class="nav-item">
        <a class="nav-link" href="#">SERVICES</a>
      </li>
    </ul>
  </div>
</nav>

Answer 1

Can anyone help me understand what I'm doing wrong?

The specificity of your custom css rule must either match or exceed the specificity of the corresponding Bootstrap rule.

So, in this particular case you need a rule that looks like this:

.navbar-light .navbar-nav .nav-link {
    color: red;
}

Click "run code snippet" button below and expand to full page to verify that it works:

<link rel="stylesheet" href="https://maxcdn.bootstrapcdn.com/bootstrap/4.0.0/css/bootstrap.min.css" integrity="sha384-Gn5384xqQ1aoWXA+058RXPxPg6fy4IWvTNh0E263XmFcJlSAwiGgFAW/dAiS6JXm" crossorigin="anonymous">

<script src="https://code.jquery.com/jquery-3.2.1.slim.min.js" integrity="sha384-KJ3o2DKtIkvYIK3UENzmM7KCkRr/rE9/Qpg6aAZGJwFDMVNA/GpGFF93hXpG5KkN" crossorigin="anonymous"></script>
<script src="https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/popper.js/1.12.9/umd/popper.min.js" integrity="sha384-ApNbgh9B+Y1QKtv3Rn7W3mgPxhU9K/ScQsAP7hUibX39j7fakFPskvXusvfa0b4Q" crossorigin="anonymous"></script>
<script src="https://maxcdn.bootstrapcdn.com/bootstrap/4.0.0/js/bootstrap.min.js" integrity="sha384-JZR6Spejh4U02d8jOt6vLEHfe/JQGiRRSQQxSfFWpi1MquVdAyjUar5+76PVCmYl" crossorigin="anonymous"></script>
    
<style>
.navbar-light .navbar-nav .nav-link {
    color: red;
}
</style>

<nav class="navbar navbar-expand-md navbar-light bg-light mb-3">
    <button class="navbar-toggler" type="button" data-toggle="collapse" data-target="#navbarSupportedContent" aria-controls="navbarSupportedContent" aria-expanded="false" aria-label="Toggle navigation"><span class="navbar-toggler-icon"></span></button>
    <div class="collapse navbar-collapse" id="navbarSupportedContent">
        <ul class="nav navbar-nav">
            <li class="nav-item dropdown">
                <a class="nav-link dropdown-toggle" href="#" id="navbarDropdownMenuLink" data-toggle="dropdown" aria-haspopup="true" aria-expanded="false">
                    BOOKS
                </a>
                <div class="dropdown-menu" aria-labelledby="navbarDropdownMenuLink">
                    <a class="dropdown-item" href="#">Branding Sutra</a>
                </div>
            </li>
            <li class="nav-item dropdown">
                <a class="nav-link dropdown-toggle" href="#" id="navbarDropdownMenuLink" data-toggle="dropdown" aria-haspopup="true" aria-expanded="false">
                    LEARNING LAB
                </a>
                <div class="dropdown-menu" aria-labelledby="navbarDropdownMenuLink">
                    <a class="dropdown-item" href="#">Workshops</a>
                    <a class="dropdown-item" href="#">Classes</a>
                    <a class="dropdown-item" href="#">Audio Downloads</a>
                </div>
            </li>
            <li class="nav-item">
                <a class="nav-link" href="#">SERVICES</a>
            </li>
        </ul>
    </div>
</nav>

More info about CSS specificity:

https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/Specificity

And: CSS Specificity Calculator