BUSINESS BYTE: Harris Paints reinvents colour

Regional paint manufacturer and retailer, Harris Paints, has reinvented the way they make paint. An advanced new patent-pending paint system and colour platform has been launched around the Region, most recently in Anguilla, St Vincent, Grenada, St Lucia, Dominica and St Kitts and Nevis – which produces the brand’s best-ever product performance.

This new proprietary platform, called Quantum i12 Technology, is good news for local decorators and contractors alike. As a result of this latest innovation, Harris Paints attests to bolder, brighter colours which cover in fewer coats, and have been independently proven to result in exceptional long-lasting exterior fade resistance, especially in shades typically most vulnerable to the sun, such as reds and oranges.

What is more, with this new tech, potential supply issues should be vastly reduced.

Colour Technology Manager for Harris Paints, Don Gooding explained, “the new system allows store staff to tint any colour from any brand using just one base. This is virtually unheard of in the industry, where most paint stores operate on a traditional tint system that requires at least four (4) bases to ensure they can tint the colour that customers want. This often results in colours being unavailable when stocks of a particular base run out, or in bad matches from trying to force a colour into an available base. Our platform reimagines and simplifies the whole paint process and in the end the customer benefits from these new efficiencies”.

The new tint system that is reshaping the paint experience, both in front of and behind paint counters around the region, first became a key initiative for Harris in 2018. It brings together engineering, chemistry, colour science, pigments and special formulations to produce better-than-ever colour results for customers.

Tinters across the region have been impressed with their system and the specialized new tint machines from Italy that are used, giving rave reviews for their ease of operation and reliability. Naturally, there can be some doubts at first. Lead Tinter, Leslie Warner from TDC in St Kitts, expressed he was nervous that pastel colours might come out too light, but after seeing how the whole system worked, he was very pleased with the results.

Harris Paints worked closely alongside several international partners to harness and adapt emerging technologies to develop the superior, new colour system that is applied from factory to in-store environments. The research and development team was led by Vice President of Technical Services and Innovation, Charles Kirton who has been the
man behind Harris Paints formulations for 40 years. Kirton was the first to see the opportunity and has been credited with an international patent for creating a formulation key to the colour process.

Innovation is not new to Harris Paints. The brand, which is celebrating over 50 years of coating the Caribbean, has been a leading authority in emulsion technology introducing at least a dozen ground-breaking product innovations across the region over the years.

“At Harris innovation is in our DNA” claims CEO Kenyon. “In our 50th year, it’s tremendous to both celebrate all that has been accomplished and to look forward to an exciting future based on this new colour technology platform. It delivers such significant benefits we expect it will likely lead to a significant step change in the future of the industry.
The first of the next-generation one-base products currently available from leading dealers are Harris Paints’ top sellers and high-quality emulsions: Ulttima Plus Flat, Satin and Porch & Patio paints. Consumers and contractors around the Region that may not traditionally be Harris users are encouraged to try the paints from this new system for themselves and see the difference that Quantum i12 is making in terms of real-life performance.