No need to code. It can all be done from the plist:
(1) Set “View controller-based status bar appearance” to “NO”
(2) Set “Status bar style” to “Opaque black style“.
Raw values are:
UIViewControllerBasedStatusBarAppearance = NO
UIStatusBarStyle = UIStatusBarStyleBlackOpaque
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/17678881/how-to-change-status-bar-text-color-in-ios-7