Last week the lowes store when asked for some paint (it was their paint color they sold) – they used the paper printed color chip and used their “matching” machine and read the paper sample color to choose the paint additives to get the color.
I thought for all “their” paint the computer had that info
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I had a Behr vendor @ HD do the swap-a-roo on me one time. I chose a Glidden swatch, he was only one present behind counter. I left it w/ him, continued shopping, came back, and there was my color, mixed in a $25 Behr gallon. What-the-hay I figure, compared to my labor charge, the paint is the cheap part.
Gang-
Believe it or not, the colors you choose are a TRADEMARKED entity. Yes, it is a color and for the life of me I can't fathom how they can claim it is trademarked. (Must be how the Native Americans felt when the white man said you have to buy this land.)
So since it is a trademark, you can't simply have the formula transfered into a different manf. You have to 'color match' it into a different brand.
And lets find out who makes those S T U P I D names for paint and shoot them!!!
Added later: Paint that dries naturally (slowly) will look different than that that was force dried under a hairdryer, so don't trust a quick test. Also lots of the intense colors require tinted primers in order to come out as expected.
Edited 7/25/2005 10:44 pm ET by wango1
i'll bet they do.
just like at the real paint stores.
it's all in the training.
carpenter in transition
Paint matching can be weird. One of my stepdaughters had a fender bender, and the shop that did the paint work came up with an absolutely perfect match in daylight. She was very happy.
Then she went shopping at night. Under mercury vapor lights in the parking lot, the colors didn't match at all. She was very unhappy.
-- J.S.
As an aside, I have endured the pain of trying to match a quart 'special mix' with a gallon of the same formula from both Lowe's & HD. It seems that there is an ever so slight difference in the mix that the colors never match!! Just an FYI.
How many times have you bought the exact paint (brand, base, gloss) represented by the chip, but hold the chip to the wall (properly painted and well-dried) and they don't match - sometimes by quite a lot. Paint optically-matched to the chip is often closer and sometimes perfect. So, if you like the chip, use the chip.
We've had HD, and several others, mix proprietary designer shades into pretty much any other paint. If the kid at the counter won't do it, lap the store again and ask the other kid.
Good check: have the kid scan the chip, then compare the tint recipe to the catalogued tint recipe before mixing. May not know which is miscalibrated (reader or chip production) but if the two aren't the same you may be in for a matching problem and may want to shell out $3 for a sample pot of each. {grin}
Hey all:Well, you might want to check out Farrow and Ball. I will say right up front that the paint is expensive . . . . but it is the best paint that I have ever worked with. If I can cover French Yellow with red paint in 2 coats without a primer coat, the paint could cost 200 bucks per gallon and it would save money.The paint is made with a clay base . . . . the pigment is ground ulta fine and is attached to the clay rather than suspended. In the ulta flat (which IS washable BTW), there is no latex or vinyl so no odour and no gas off. The palette is predetermined - about 140 colours and 7 finishes. The paint is made in England in batches of 1000's of gallons - no mixing at the store. So if you want Barney purple or McDonalds Red you are likely SOL. Too bad for you. Try it, you might like it. I'm a convert of about 5 years. Wont' use anything but. Charge the HO for it, explain right up fron that the paint cost is the smallest part of the painting cost and hardly anyone barks. They afterwards have all thanked me. The paint looks a hundred times better than BM or C2 which I used full time before.
'
I'm 41, I'm old, and cantankerousMark
F&B colours are nice and they DO for sure stock wee little samplers (I think free) and sell smaller cans.
never heard of farrow and ball; it sounds great.
there definitely is a difference between the better paints and even the best sold at Lowe's and home depot. i buy a lot of ooops paint for art projects and freelance scenic work. am used to carrying 4 or more gallons of behr to the car in one trip. a few months back i stopped in a posh interior design shop and checked their oops corner- i started to pick up a gallon and thought it was glued to the floor. pratt and lambert; it weighed a ton. haven't used it yet, but based on weight alone, i can see how it's denser and would cover better.
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favorite goofy color name: "rin tin tan" (1970's united paint co)
favorite serious color names: "wafting pollen" (aaachoo! united paint) and "relentless olive" (sherwin williams)
favorite "huh?" color names: "bamboo" (it was mauve!?! (sears brand 1980s) and "wishful blue" (it wished it was blue, but it was purple) now play "what's my hue?" (no peeking at your fan books!).
what color do you think these real names describe???
1. "single feather"--
2. "notable hue" --
3. "imagine" --
Edited 7/27/2005 12:06 am ET by MSM
Single feather – a light gray
notable hue - yellow
imagine - had to be a blueHow close am I?
sorry,
Single feather – yellow
notable hue - cold grey (not particularly notable)
imagine - you'dda thunk blue, but it's warm grey, kind of khaki
I had a chance last year to tour a plant that actually makes the paint chips for many of the major brands....there are only 5-6 companies in the world that do this, and this company is one of the largest....close to 30% market share, something like that.
Got a chance to see their colour matching lab; one of the most advanced labs in the world, state of the art, experts in there who do nothing all day but match colours, make samples, and courier them to their clients around the world. It takes these guys several attempts.....I think we were told 6 on average.....to get a real match and an okay. We were looking at their manufacturing and quality systems.....they're trying to get things dialed in so their system is so good they won't need to ship the samples around. They do real paint chips, and 6-colour printing. Very impressive. This is the company
Anyway, since then I've had a tempered view of what it is possible for the guy on a paint counter to achieve, given the machines,different runs of basic materials, etc....I think they do their best, and it's usually good enough for most eyes, but that true match is really difficult to get.
cabinetmaker/college woodworking instructor. Cape Breton, N.S
I used to use Pratt & Lambert all the time because a dealer was right by work. It was nice stuff.
The mention reminds me of a curiosity from way back. For some reason, I was in a different shop with a sample I painted with P&L -- maybe I was trying to find something that wouldn't clash. But the paint dealer got all excited about the P&L sample. Can't remember for exactly the term he used, but it was something like best 'self-levelling' he'd ever seen. Does that make any sense? Maybe it hides brushstrokes? Someone here might know.
A few observations from a guy who works behind the paint desk at Home Depot:
1. The paint companies will often change the formula or base tint on their colors every few years without actually changing the name. Therefore, the "Toasted Sesame" that you bought two years ago now has two more shots of raw umber in it or is being shot into an accent base that is slightly different. When a customer hands me an old paint tag or can that is a few years old I always compare the formula on the old tag with the formula that the computer associates with the paint name. If they are different I generally manually type in the formula to get an exact match on tints and then "quick dry" the paint to ensure the bases are the same. If not, I go with the altered "new" formula and check again. This may be what the associate at Lowe's was doing, although I am always wary of the color matching system - it is always only ever "very very close"; never as exact as a formula match.
2. Not sure how Lowe's does it, but Home Depot has competitor formulas in their computer - you don't have to match the paint chip with the spectrophotometer. If you want Kwal Howell's "Botany Beige", we can type it into the computer and shoot an exact match into Behr paint. No trademark issues involved that I am aware of. However, at least at The Home Depot, we can't match our own competitor's colors (ie take a Glidden color and shoot it into Behr base). Policies may differ from one store to the next, however.
3. Even with exact matches and computers dispensing from mechanized tint dispensers, it's a good idea to get all the paint you're going to need for a project and mix it together (when it's feasible).