The Sherwin-Williams Company has
completed the acquisition of the U.S./
Canada business of Consorcio Comex,
S.A. de C.V. Sherwin-Williams will pay
$90 million in cash and assume liabilities currently valued in the range of $75
million.
Sherwin-Williams and Comex remain
fully committed to securing regulatory
approval from the Federal Competition
Commission of Mexico for Sherwin-Williams to complete the acquisition of
the operations of Comex in Mexico. To
that end, the Stock Purchase Agreement
was amended to extend the exclusivity
period to March 31, 2014.
Comex operations in the U.S. and
Canada consist of 314 company operated stores – 234 in the U.S. and 80
in Canada – and eight manufacturing sites – five in the U.S. and three in
Canada. In addition, Comex supplies
paint and coatings products to approximately 1,500 external retail locations
in Canada. The company manufactures
and sells products under well-respected
brands such as Frazee, Kwal, Parker
Paints, General Paints, Color Wheel
and Para. Both Sherwin-Williams and
Comex place heavy emphasis on supplying high-quality architectural paints
and coatings products in the U.S. and
Canada, the company reported.
Chris Connor, chairman and CEO
of Sherwin-Williams, said, “This is an
exciting step forward in our ongoing effort to bring these two respected companies together. The Comex business
model in the U.S. and Canada is a good
strategic fit for Sherwin-Williams and
will improve our ability to serve customers in some of our most important
geographic markets.”
Axalta Coating Systems
Announces Cromax as
the New Brand Name for
DuPont Refinish
Axalta Coating Systems recently
announced Cromax as the new brand
name for DuPont Refinish, a leading
global brand of automotive refinish sys-
tems. Along with a bold new logo that
visually conveys the spirit of the brand;
the launch of Cromax is part of Axalta’s
on-going commitment to its customers to
be built for performance.
“The Cromax name and vibrant logo
provide a fresh, new look to a superb
line of refinish products that enjoy tre-
mendous loyalty among thousands of
body shop customers, distributors and
importers involved in the refinish busi-
ness around the world,” said Charles
Shaver, chairman and CEO of Axalta
Coating Systems. “Cromax is already
an established, well-known product
name in our key markets. Today, we’re
elevating the Cromax name to embrace
a portfolio of products that together
will provide our customers with choices
to support them from the front of the
body shop to the back.”
The Cromax family of brands prom-
ises improved productivity, backed by
products engineered for easy, quick
and accurate application, accord-
ing to the firm. Cromax includes all
of the product lines that are part of
the DuPont Refinish franchise today
such as Cromax Pro, Chroma Premier,
ChromaBase and Centari. Everything
about the individual product lines will
remain the same.
The complete roll out of the new
Cromax identity across the full port-
folio of products will take some time.
Recent announcement is the first step
in this process and more information
about Cromax will be communicated
throughout the remainder of 2013.
New Cromax product labels will begin
to appear in 2014 depending on loca-
tion. In the meantime, all products,
color tools and other resources with
the DuPont Refinish name may contin-
ue to be used by importers, distributors
or body shop customers.
ACA’s PaintCare Pilot
Program in Oregon Marks
its Third Anniversary
ACA’s PaintCare pilot program in Oregon
marked its third anniversary in July, and
recently submitted its annual report for
the program to the Oregon Department
of Environmental Quality (DEQ). The
report details all the operational aspects
and successes of the program’s third year,
including collection infrastructure, vol-
ume and disposition of paint collected,
program costs, and education and out-
reach activities.
In its third year, PaintCare maintained 100 collection sites, consisting
of both municipal and retail outlets,
with some new sites being added in
previously underserved areas. With
PaintCare’s infrastructure, 95 percent
of Oregon resident have access to a
permanent site within 15 miles of their
home. In addition, PaintCare continued its large volume direct pick-up
program for painting contractors, universities and other entities with large
volumes of postconsumer paint – 31
pick-ups were conducted. As expected,
collection volumes increases moderately from Year 2, with 580,693 gallons of postconsumer paint collected.
This takes the Oregon program to over
1.5 million gallons collected since its
launch. As in previous years, most of
the latex was recycled into new re-cycled-content paint, and almost all
of the alkyd paint was used for fuel
blending. An independent financial
audit deemed the program financially
sound, with approximately $950,000
Sherwin-Williams Completes Acquisition
of Comex U.S./Canada Business
