Everyone a Painter

Never before has the paint industry had such a winter. Said the Glidden Co.'s President Dwight P. Joyce: "We used to spend the winter building up an inventory for spring. Now our plants are busy turning out latex-based paints which we sell as fast as we can make them."

The $1 billion paint industry gets most of the credit for the drastic change in its market. By plugging new, easy-to-apply paints and labor-saving devices, it now sells 75% of its paint direct to householders, not to journeymen painters. And thanks to the high cost of painters, the industry is well on its way toward making every amateur an expert.

The biggest change, and the one that has boomed year-round painting, is paint with a rubber, instead of an oil, base. These paints are virtually odorless, will dry in an hour or so with windows closed. They are easy to apply, and it is almost impossible to leave brush marks with them. A year ago, only a handful of paint companies were marketing rubber-based paints. Now there are about 50, and in another year, more than 1,000 are expected to be cashing in on the bonanza.

Pigs & Nylon. Many companies have started selling rollers which take the backache out of painting walls and ceilings. Said an executive of W. P. Fuller & Co., the largest West Coast paint firm: "Our goal has been to sell not only paint, but a state of mind. Painting has always been a messy, dirty, disagreeable job. With rollers, it's a cinch for the housewife."

Rollers have been around for years. But the old-style roller was hardly an improvement on the brush; it still had to be dipped in a pan, would drip paint. The newer rollers, made by Cleveland's Kenwill Corp. and others, hold the paint inside the cylinder, let it out through holes onto a rubber or fabric sleeve so that it can be rolled on walls or ceilings without dripping. Even the big brush makers like Rubberset Co. are beginning to sell rollers. But brush makers are not giving up the battle. Sears, Roebuck recently began selling a brand-new 4-in. wall brush that can be broken down into two smaller brushes simply by unscrewing the handle. Next week Pittsburgh Plate Glass Co. is introducing a shed-proof, synthetic-bristled 7-incher for only $3.69 (v. $25 and up for 5-in. pig-bristle brushes).

Color & Confusion. Competition in the paint industry, long confined to quality, has spilled over into color. Companies like Glidden and Sherwin-Williams now put out elaborate sample books, complete with swatches of color and detailed advice to help housewives do a complete decorating job themselves. Housewives are no longer restricted to a small choice of colors. To help them further, Colorizer Associates has begun selling 16 pigments in tubes that can be mixed easily with a base paint. When one tube is added to a can, the color is guaranteed to match a color chart.

Other specialized paints:

P: Sapolin Co.'s "Rite-on-Green," for nurseries, school rooms, etc. It dries with a green, slatelike finish, on which chalk marks can be made and erased.

P: Du Font's titanium-based paint, for exteriors. It "cleans" itself over the years by powdering off with the dirt.

P: Devoe & Raynolds' white wall and ceiling paint, which contains DDT, will kill insects, be effective for as long as five years.

Next on the schedule of paint companies is the development of a rubber-based paint for exteriors. Present-day rubber paints are not good for this purpose, since they hold moisture and blister outdoors. When this drawback is overcome, many paint companies expect oil-based paints to be pushed out of the market entirely.

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