Coatings World - March 2011

BASF Coatings hosts

28 vocational school teachers at its international conference

Whether for repairing damage to the finish, refinishing scratches or fulfilling customers’ needs for tuning jobs, professional bodyshops are in demand around the globe. Unfortunately, however, uniform quality standards are not yet in place everywhere. To close this gap, BASF Coatings is committed to high-quality training, particularly with its STAMPP training program. The company recently hosted an international conference for vocational school teachers for the first time at its Münster production site. Twenty-eight school principals and teachers travelled to the site from Sweden, Denmark, Norway, France, Austria, Germany and Russia. “It’s often hard for teachers to remain in touch with industry. At our conference, the teachers were able to communicate intensively with experts,” said Kevin McDer-mott, head of the Coatings Refinish Academy. The program, for example, included a lecture on the latest innovations in the branch. In addition, the participants learned about state-of-the-art multiwork places and went on a guided tour of BASF Coatings’ Color Design Studio Europe. STAMPP, which stands for “STimulate and revAMp the Paint Profession,” is a program designed to publicize the spraypaint-ing profession and to encourage young people to choose this high-tech career path. BASF has a close cooperation with vocational schools and bodyshops. The company provides up-to-date and comprehensive learning materials for the one-year training program. STAMPP allows the trainees to specialize in the trade of automotive refinishing after they complete their basic technical training. The syllabus is based on European standards and it is adapted to the individual countries.

BASF is committed to training young spray painters all over the world.

tion and other general industrial markets, the company announced Tuesday. Isocoat Tintas e Vernizes Ltda. serves customers in Brazil, Argentina and Colombia. The company, which is located in Araçariguama, state of São Paulo, had 2010 sales of approximately $34 million, Valspar. “Isocoat further strengthens Valspar’s presence in the fast-growing coatings markets in Latin America,” said Gary Hendrickson, Valspar president and chief operating officer.

International Paint drives up prices International Paint Ltd. is set to initiate product price rises in response to spiraling global raw material costs. “During 2010 the cost of raw materials critical to the manufacture of both our marine and protective coatings product ranges in-

creased significantly,” said Paul Westcott,
marine and protective coatings commer-
cial director. “We have attempted to min-
imize the impact on our customers for as
long as possible by leveraging our buying
power and driving internal cost saving
measures. Unfortunately the increase in
costs shows no sign of abatement and
therefore regrettably we now have little
choice but to initiate a program of prod-
uct price rises.”
A familiar inflationary cycle is being
repeated across a broad spectrum of raw
material markets due to both supply and
demand dynamics. On the supply side, a
number of factors are at play including
shortages in raw material feedstocks, gen-
eral destocking in the supply chain, re-
duced raw material manufacturing
capacity and supply outages. Demand is
being driven by emerging market
economies in most cases from industries
outside of the coatings market and as ever
the price of oil remains a key driver. In ad-
dition to the tight supply and demand dy-
namics prices are being fueled by investor
activity in the commodity spot markets.

A number of raw materials key to the manufacture of both marine and protective coatings products have been affected by the inflationary drivers including, epoxy resins, titanium dioxide, solvents, copper and other metals.

Valspar buys Brazilian coatings maker Valspar Corp. has bought a Brazilian manufacturer of powder coatings used in appliances, building products, transporta-

NAD recommends Sherwin-Williams modify no-VOC claims for Harmony Paints

The National Advertising Division (NAD) of the Council of Better Business Bureaus has recommended that The Sherwin-Williams Company, maker of the Harmony line of paints, modify or discontinue advertising claims that the Harmony paint line is completely free of VOCs.

NAD, the advertising industry’s self-regulatory forum, reviewed express and implied claims made by Sherwin-Williams in website and print advertising following a challenge by Benjamin Moore & Co.

Benjamin Moore challenged the ex-
press claims:
“No-VOC formula.”
“Zero-VOC formula.”
“Formulated without silica and without
VOCs for better indoor air quality.”

NAD also reviewed the implied claim that the full line of Sherwin-Williams Harmony paints, including base paint and paint containing color, contain no VOCs.