Trade paint or not?

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If you buy trade double galzing its cheap and cheerful. What about gloss paint and emulsion. I can get Johnstones trade gloss and emulsion at a discount. Is it better than normal buy off the shelf paint or not as good? Never sure when they say trade whether is better or not.
 
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If you buy trade double galzing its cheap and cheerful. What about gloss paint and emulsion. I can get Johnstones trade gloss and emulsion at a discount. Is it better than normal buy off the shelf paint or not as good? Never sure when they say trade whether is better or not.

Buy it. It's better.

I think "Trade" is the biggest misnomer when applied to paint. I've even worked on jobs and the customer has thought that it's cheap rubbish because it was "Trade".
Buying "trade" paint, is the only thing that's dearer to buy trade, than if you were to buy retail.

Crazy description of a product if you ask me. Causes more confusion than anything else.
 
I'll second that - as a DIY'er I no longer buy anything other than trade paint!

My fiance and I are slowly doing up our house room by room and switching from retail to trade paint is one of the best things we've ever done - yes you may pay a bit more per tin but you'll use a lot less tins.

e.g. We had our main bedroom reskimmed and it took 5 coats (+ miscoat) of retail paint to get a nice finish - it would have been more if we'd stuck with the B&Q stuff we started with but after the 3rd coat I gave up and got some dulux of the 'same' colour. In all 2.5 x 5ltr tins
Our second bedroom I bought one tin of supermatt from the dulux dec centre - miscoat then 2 coats later and it was all done!
 
From experience 'trade paint' is normally a far superior quality paint than 'regular' paint available from the DIY sheds. For instance the trade gloss paint I use has a glass-like finish to it, BUT, is much more difficult to apply than the regular paint. It is much more likley to 'run' than the non-drip gloss that seems popular to the DIY'er and takes longer to dry. Its a trade-off really between ease of application and overall finish.

If you are happy to use the trade stuff, then use it the results are normally better.
 
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I agree with all the above..

But I was once pulled up by a coustomer because I charged her ten quid for a 5 litre tin of white vinyl matt emulsion..she said she could have got it in B&Q for 9.99 (yeh I know!!!)

She said she wasnt quibling about the penny difference (hmmm :rolleyes: ) but though as I was in the trade I could have got it far cheaper (conveiniently forgetting the fact I saved her a trip to the shops by picking it up!)

I explained to her that the sheds get the paint for peanuts and I cant do anything about what they charge...but the main thing was trade paint is better quality and covered better.

But she came back with the point that if it needed two coats anyway of either paint then whats the difference...fair point IMO.

Quality wise I dont really think theres anything in it, most paint, even the home brand stuff in the sheds will last...its when you start buying un branded bargain bucket stuff your going to run into problems.

The main difference is in the application, opacity and odour..retail paint goes on easy, smells nice and has a jelly consistency..(which misleads people into thinking its thick..it is til you stir it)

In order for retail paint to have these qualities they have to add somthing...in order to add something you have to take something out..the pigment..hence the reason retail paints dont cover as well.

http://www.dulux.co.uk/advice/questions/faq/faq_005.jsp
 

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