Who is Resene? · exterior plasters. But customers were sceptical, so unsure were they that Ted would demonstrate his paint in paint stores and sometimes in the shop windows! He would

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Who is Resene? �

Who is Resene?

Stipplecote to SpaceCote and beyond – Resene product development

If there is one word that describes Resene, it is innovation. Since 1946 we have consistently introduced new paint products and systems to the New Zealand market and more recently Australia.

Ted Nightingale, our company’s founder was a builder in post war Wellington, New Zealand, who had developed a product that he named Stipplecote to protect and beautify exterior concrete and plaster. He made the product in an old concrete mixer in his garage in Eastbourne. Firstly he made it for himself, then as word spread, for other builders who had heard about the new paint.

Stipplecote was an innovative approach to a difficult problem (concrete was a relatively new building material and the paint systems available at the time would fail when applied over it). It wasn’t long before he made the decision to leave the building industry behind and to set up a company to manufacture Stipplecote. Resene’s first factory was in converted stables in Wellington’s Tinakori Road.

Ted was a tireless promoter of his ‘new’ product and visited architects and construction firms seeking orders and business.

He continued to develop new and innovative products for concrete, mainly admixtures for the concrete like Cemstik (to make it stronger and with fewer cracks) and forming agents like No Bond (these prevent the concrete formwork – basically a mould – from getting stuck to the concrete as it dries).

Ted saw the business as suppliers of concrete products to the construction industry. Later in life he would serve as President of the New Zealand Concrete Association for many years and owned a concrete business called Gorie Concrete.

However the business was to change forever when he developed a waterbased paint after a chance comment from a supplier that Cemstik might be able to be used as a paint.

Today with waterbased paint technology so common it is very hard to visualise the paint industry in 1950s New Zealand.

The only paints that were available were oil based and the Master Painter of the era would be skilled at creating colours and frequently the paint for the home or building owner.

Interior walls were invariably wallpapered as paint just wasn’t used inside except on ceilings (alkyd flat) and trims (full gloss enamel) and it usually had a high lead content.

After much experimentation Ted eventually made a waterbased paint in 1951, we believe the first in Australasia and probably the Southern Hemisphere. This was a huge achievement and remains largely unrecognised today.


Who is Resene?�

Who is Resene?

The first paint, Resene Semi Gloss Latex, was ideal for concrete and exterior plasters. But customers were sceptical, so unsure were they that Ted would demonstrate his paint in paint stores and sometimes in the shop windows! He would paint a wall and then dip the brush in water to clean it, and soon after he would spray water at the dried wall, much to the amazement of shoppers.

The cans shown here date back to the late 50s and early 60s. Of interest is the reference to “British” on two of the early cans which, other than being Ted’s birthplace, was there to build confidence. At the time if a product was “British” it was thought to be better!

Slowly the new waterborne paints gained acceptance, initially for use on concrete and plaster. Ted was joined in the business in the mid fifties by his son Tony who was behind the introduction of a gloss waterborne paint called Resene Hi-Glo in 1964. This paint was developed for weatherboards and galvanised iron roofing.

Many other products followed, most have been superceded while others, like Resene Hi-Glo, have undergone many changes but retain their original name.

In April 1971 Colin Gooch our Technical Director joined the company as head of the technical department - he was also the only person in the department at the time!

In that year he developed Resene Colorwood and introduced coloured tint bases, a world first that allowed Resene to get stronger, more durable colours.

In 1974 Colin developed Resene Galvo One, a primer for galvanised iron, that was light years ahead of its competition. Today Resene Galvo

One is the benchmark for roof primers. Significantly Resene Galvo One was lead free at a time when all other roof primers were lead based and was at the time a significant step in helping create a better, safer environment. In 1996 Resene gained Environmental Choice accreditation for our waterbased products, representing over 75% of our production.


Who is Resene? �

Who is Resene?

At Resene product development is driven by the following:

1. Feedback from the market, usually from the sales team on issues or problems such as tricky substrates that require a coating system or on products that need improving.

For example Resene Vinyl Wallpaper Sealer, Resene Smooth Surface Sealer and Resene Broadwall 3 in 1 (and Resene Broadwall Surface Prep) were developed to solve particular problems with respectively: Vinyl wallpapers, GRC (Glass Reinforced Concrete) and poor wallboard plastering.

2. New technology from suppliers that opens a door to new products or a way to improve existing ones.

We work closely with our key suppliers, in particular Rohm and Haas (who supply the resins used in many of our paints) and DuPont (who supply us the titanium dioxide [TiO2] which is the white powder that is mixed into most paint). They are recognised as the world leaders in their respective fields.

Our reputation with both companies is such that we have developed and helped market new technologies in conjuction with them. The most recognised being the waterborne enamel technology used in Resene Lustacryl, Resene Enamacryl, Resene SpaceCote and waterborne metallics.

3. Innovative thinking by people at Resene including our marketing, sales and technical teams. This is sometimes called “Blue Sky” thinking, a sort of ‘what if’ approach to innovative products.

We do a lot of things well in New Zealand and Australia and while making paint is definitely not the most glamorous, it is one of them. Overseas countries including those in Europe and the United States have lower consumer expectations of the paints available in their respective markets. Over time, New Zealand consumers in particular, have become used to high quality paint and demand has grown for durable coatings that will resist our harsh environment.


Who is Resene?�

Who is Resene?

Colour development – the history of the Resene Total Colour System

Stipplecote is basically a cement powder that is mixed with water and applied by brush to concrete and plaster. When Ted Nightingale developed it in the late 1940s it was only available in white, but even then there was demand for it to be supplied in more colours so he created a range of standard colours that were available off the shelf (essentially he mixed dry pigments like yellow ochre into the Stipplecote). A customer could use the standard colour or intermix to create additional shades.

With the introduction of the waterborne paint called Resene PVA Semi Gloss, more colours were needed and again these were created by using a series of standard colours and extending the range by offering intermixes. One of our first colour charts, is shown in the photo above.

In the mid 1960s the first colourants (or tinters as we refer to them) were developed and Resene was quick to see the potential

of them and were soon using them - first in the factory to make the standard colours, such as those shown on the early fandeck and the later Resene Hi-Glo chart, and not long after directly into finished cans of paint and with this innovation Australia and New Zealand’s first tinting system was introduced.

This was 15 years before tinting systems were common in Europe and the USA. Even today, New Zealand, Australia and to a lesser degree the UK are recognised as leaders in the adaptation and use of tinting systems and Resene was the first in Australasia to do so.

However tinting systems aren’t anything without colours and it was Tony Nightingale who saw the potential of colour and helped make it a key feature of our company – the face of the Resene brand.

Tony counted many architects amongst his friends and two of them paid him a visit in the mid 60s to ask if Resene could achieve some or all of the colours on the British Standard BS2660.

One had picked up a copy of the British Standard colours when he worked in England. These colours were developed to create a series of standard colours for the likes of gas and water pipes in buildings – useful if you don’t want to cut a gas pipe with a cutting torch with a naked flame!

Technically this was challenging but in 1969 Resene and Tony launched the 101 chart and it was an immediate success. It was described in one early 70s Listener magazine article as one of the 10 design ‘Must Haves’. This was because at the time it had the largest array of colours of any chart ever produced for commercial use.


Who is Resene? �

Who is Resene?

But the problem Resene found was that they needed to use a lot of tinter in the paint to achieve the colours (for some shades over half a litre of tinter was added per 4 litre can) and this ultimately affected the quality of the paint.

The problem is that adding tinter to paint is like adding water. It thins the paint and this affects the coverage so more coats will be needed. It also compromises the durability and performance of the paint (it will not last as long and can fail prematurely). This problem was made worse in New Zealand by our very high rates of U.V. light (40% higher than Europe), our proximity to the sea and the predominant use of timber on our houses.

This was a dilemma as Resene had created demand for strong colours for interior and exterior use and while Resene could produce them they did not have the same coverage and performance as lighter shades.

Colin Gooch and his team made two significant improvements to the system that eventually came to be named the Resene Total Colour System.

Firstly he introduced bases to the system, pastel tone through to ultra deep and in time a magenta base.

The development of bases allowed more tinter to be added to the paint. The coloured bases, for example magenta, meant reds were in effect already partially tinted and only required the bare minimum of tint added at the shop to achieve differing red or magenta shades – likewise for green tone and ochre tone.

The white bases are reductions from white with pastel base 20% weaker (or less white than white itself) and light tone 20% weaker than pastel tone (or 40% less than white) and so on.

Ultra deep tone has the lowest levels of white (TiO2) and some of the strongest colours are tinted from this base. The figure below shows the graduated reductions of the white bases.

white pastel light mid deep ultra deep tone tone tone tone tone

% w

hite


Who is Resene?�

Who is Resene?

Secondly, Resene adapted new high strength tinters from Germany to our system. These were initially only meant to be used in factory batches. They are 2 to 3 times stronger and more durable than other companies use in New Zealand and Australia.

The use of bases and high strength tinters (automotive grade) was a world first and allowed us to offer strong colours, which both lasted and covered in two coats.

Tinters – what are they?

The shots of concentrated colour that are added to paint are called tinters. Resene Total Colour System tinters are also known as colourants and typically only about 3-5% of their volume is highly concentrated pigment while the remaining 95-97% is a carrier for the pigment including glycols to make it stay liquid in the tinting canisters and coalescing agents to help it disperse in both waterborne and solventborne paints.

What Resene does differently is that Resene tinters use automotive grade pigments that are 2½ to 3 times stronger than those used by others in the paint industry.

This means they will last longer – retaining their original colour much longer with much less fading. This is particularly so with strong reds, yellows, blues and greens.

It also means that you can add more to a paint without overly diluting the paint.

Diluting or thinning the paint will reduce not only the film build but will dramatically affect its durability and the ability of the paint to cover (also called hiding).

This is why Resene are very strict about going over the tint limits set for Resene bases.


Who is Resene? �

Who is Resene?

Next in 1974 came the BS5252 range. Again this followed on from the BS2660 range and had 252 colours. No one in the world had offered a larger paint chart to the market, it was and still is a huge success.

In 1981 Tony started working on a new chart called the Resene Total colour chart. It was entirely our own work and relied heavily on the new high strength tinters. It was a massive chart with over 500 colours and set the standard for colour selection in the NZ market.

The chart essentially expanded the last (E) section of the 5252 range, which had always been limited by the availability of clean, clear, durable tinters.

With 9 of the 12 palettes dedicated to “bright” shades and only 3 to oxides (more greyed or muddied colours) the chart was designed to work in conjunction with or alongside the 5252 and 2660 ranges.

In the 1990s Resene observed that customers wanted to access fashion colours updated regularly and developed The Range fashion fandeck to enable customers to access a fresh range of colours each year selected based on international colour forecasts tailored for the local market.

The Range fashion fandeck incorporates the latest colour trends from overseas, traditional Australian and New Zealand favourites (Resene Spanish White for example) and when new tinters and colour bases allow, new colours in previously unattainable colour space. Over the past few years colours such as Wellywood, Tree Frog (acid yellow/green) and reds like Havoc and Roadster have been introduced to The Range.

The concept was extended to include The Range Whites and Neutrals and this too has been widely accepted.

However what The Range and the new colours did do was expose some of the deficiencies of the existing charts. Notably the Resene Total colour chart and in particular the coding system used alongside names to identify each colour.

As a result the Resene Total colour chart has been completely revamped in 2006 – its first major change in 25 years. The new collection includes many of the popular shades from The Range fandeck series with a total of over 1000 colours showcased in 56 palettes. The new collection was accompanied by a new, more sophisticated coding system to help make comparing colours easier.

Resene has started to market the Resene Total Colour System, incorporating colour charts and tools, formulations, tinters and all other colour related materials, internationally and has successfully sold it into China, India, Poland and the Dominican Republic.


Who is Resene?�

Who is Resene?

The people of Resene – innovative, committed, professional

Resene’s innovative approach doesn’t stop with our paint products and colour system, the culture of Resene, they way we do things, from promoting and marketing Resene through to sales and distribution (the Resene ColorShop concept) are highly innovative. Resene has always approached the market differently from our competitors. In the past because we had little or no choice and now because we appreciate the strong link between the paint and colours we sell and the way we promote and sell them.

We aim to lead the market and the Resene ColorShop and the people who work there are critical to the continued success of Resene.

So where has Resene come from? Earlier we talked about Ted Nightingale and how he developed new innovative paints in the late 40s for the New Zealand market. You may have picked up that he also promoted them directly to architects and engineers, this in itself was an innovative step. The manuals in the photo (right) are from the 60s and early 70s and were prepared for architects. Later he would promote directly to commercial painters and the rather dated advertisements below were from this era.

Resene grew by developing innovative products and working directly with architects and property owners on solutions.

The list of innovations is long but here is a taste of some key innovations in Resene’s history.

1. In the 50s and 60s Stipplecote and Resene were sold through distributors like Smith and Smith (they sell glass now but were major distributors of paint and wallpaper in their heyday) and numerous local paint stores like R P Edmonds in Wanganui. The photo on the right shows a typical paint store from this era.


Who is Resene? �

Who is Resene?

2. Most of our sales were handled through a distributor. But many doors were being closed on us due to pressure from the bigger paint companies. So much so that Ted and Tony pulled out of the distribution agreement and started selling direct to large commercial painters, mainly in the lower North Island.

This was highly unusual as virtually all paint sales at that time were channelled through distributors and the concept of a paint manufacturer going direct to their customers was unheard of – at least until Resene did it – yet today it is very much the accepted business model.

This photo from the early 70s (at right) shows our factory in Seaview, near Wellington, where we moved in 1961 and stayed until 1992 when we moved to our present location in Naenae (about 10 minutes away). The photo is notable in that it shows most of our car fleet – Tony’s, Colin’s and our Wellington and Lower Hutt Sales Rep’s car (only one at that time!)

3. The Resene ColorShop, of which there are now over 60 in New Zealand and Australia. When the Resene ColorShop at 23 Marion Street opened its doors in 1975 it was one of a kind!

Tony had brought a small handprinted wallpaper business called Mason Handprints (we had sold them the screenprinting paint they used for many years) and part of the sale was the lease on a two storied Edwardian Villa, which was the Mason Handprints Wellington showroom.

The photo at right shows the printing process in progress. While Mason Handprints ultimately ran out of steam, the drawdowns we supply to designers and our own Resene ColorShops are prepared today on the same tables.

Tony had the idea of selling our paint alongside the wallpaper and he coined the name Resene ColorShop and Resene took off in a new direction. The spelling of the word color without the “u” was done simply because Tony believed that it had better balance and looked better.

The concept was a success and we haven’t really looked back.

Today the Resene ColorShop bears little resemblance to the first store. The tinting and service area was about the same size of many of our lunch rooms nowadays and the décor has definitely changed many times over the years.


Who is Resene?�0

Who is Resene?

Our approach is that the Resene ColorShop won’t stay still, it will continue to evolve and grow. It is critical to the Resene brand and our ongoing success because Resene paints and colours are only available at your Resene ColorShop and selected stockists. Ultimately Resene will be judged on the experience our customers receive when they enter the Resene ColorShop.

4. Specifications - Resene will write a specification for an architect or property owner.

Forty years ago it would have been a painter who would have been contacted by a building owner. They would recommend what paints (and even colours) they would use.

Now it is paint companies who bear much of this responsibility and it was Resene who first promoted this service and has continued to do so with its sophisticated spec writing systems (including Resene EzySpec).

Resene and the people who work there are viewed as having the expertise and knowledge not only of paint systems but of the substrates they are applied over. You only need to have a look around a Resene ColorShop or warehouse to see the number and variety of different primers, undercoats, topcoats, specialist finishes and protective coatings available. Forty years ago most paint manufacturers would have only had 10 or 12 different paint products in total!

5. Testpots – In 1981 Tony introduced the little testpots to the New Zealand market. The response was phenomenal! And today the little black testpot has reached iconic status in New Zealand. We produce and sell thousands every day.


Who is Resene? ��

Who is Resene?

The scale of the testpot operation along with the number of colours available is huge and no other company has attempted to match it. The little testpot is a big part of the Resene story.

6. Advertising and marketing – Resene has always looked for innovative and clever ways to promote itself. In fact the style and nature of many of the ads actively supports one of the Resene brand’s key attributes – innovation. For example the use of airport baggage conveyor belts is widely recognised as a clever idea and the company’s reputation (brand) is enhanced as much by the idea as it is by the colours on the conveyor belt.

Alongside traditional media such as TV, radio, newspapers etc, Resene actively seeks sponsorship and marketing opportunities that support the brand.

But we are also good citizens and testament to this is the list of charitable donations and ongoing and generous support of Ronald McDonald houses, hospices and other such worthy causes.

7. Training – many organisations run training programmes but very few develop their own from scratch.

Resene have developed the Best System Selling Programme, which welds technical knowledge with sales skills.

8. Internet – Resene was one of the first paint companies to really grasp how the internet could alter the way we do business.

Today the Resene website contains thousands of pages on everything from virtual painting, colour, inspiration and paint ideas to paint data and specifications.


Who is Resene?��

Who is Resene?

Wallpaper

New Zealand homes used to be predominantly wallpapered, but its popularity has waned since the 1970s and has leveled off over the past decade.

Resene ColorShops have sold wallpaper from the very beginning. Our first Resene ColorShop at 23 Marion Street (a two storied Edwardian Villa) was actually a wallpaper showroom for Mason Handprints. When Tony Nightingale purchased the wallpaper company from Bill Mason the showroom came with it. Tony moved paint in alongside the wallpaper and the first Resene ColorShop was born (below left).

The wallpaper was a good fit with Resene. It was high quality, unique and had strong design. The designer and founder, Bill Mason is today recognised as a pioneer in NZ design.

Mostly Resene sell from wallpaper books (basically sample books) but Resene also have a small range of wallpapers that Resene sell from our own wallpaper book. Also in most of our stores Resene stock wallpaper rolls, mostly our own range.

Wallpaper and paint fit well together, most customers who plan on wallpapering will also look to redo the ceiling and/or woodwork (windows, doorframes, skirting boards etc).

Today it is not unusual for customers to wallpaper a room to set it apart from the rest of the house, for example, a semi formal dining room. Also popular are feature walls using design focused wallcoverings.

Most wallpaper is hung by professional tradespeople rather than DIYers. However most wallpaper is purchased by the customer with the contractor charging a fee for hanging it. This is unlike paint where normally the painter buys the paint on their own account and charges a rate, inclusive of the paint.



Who is Resene?

How Resene make paint – the condensed version

Paint is a complicated mixture of –

• Pigments, to give colour, hiding as well as offering corrosion protection for metal• Additives to help it dry, to flow, release bubbles (from entrapped air when rolled) and stop

mould growth etc• Binder, which holds everything together and gives durability• Diluent to keep it liquid until it is brushed and/or rolled onto a surface

Rather like making a cake or cocktail the ingredients are mixed together in the correct proportions, mixed or stirred to the right smoothness and consistency, then after a final laboratory test, canned off.

In reality it is somewhat more complicated.

First Resene need to decide what and how much to make, this is the job of our production planners who work closely with Sales and Marketing to ensure Resene have stock available for our Resene ColorShops and trade customers. They consider the season (no use making lots of roof paint in the middle of winter or making wintergrade product in the height of summer) as well as taking into account any sales promotions that are planned. Mainly, Resene look at historical sales data as this is a good indicator of future demand, in the same way we all know roughly how much bread and

milk to buy at home based on experience.

Resene also feed this information back to our purchasing team so Resene have the correct amount of raw materials and packaging etc. This is a massive undertaking as Resene have over 10,000 separate raw materials and items of packaging to keep track of.

fig 2

fig 3

fig 4

fig 5

fig 1



Who is Resene?

When it comes time to make the paint Resene use our own manufacturing plants, three are located alongside our head office at our Naenae site (fig 1) and the fourth, our solventborne plant in Upper Hutt (fig 2) about 15kms further up the valley from the Naenae plant. In addition Resene have plants on the Gold Coast in Australia (fig 3) and in Fiji (fig 4).

At our Naenae site Resene have the main plant, which Resene call our “big batch plant” (fig 5). Here Resene mainly make white and white tones. White tones (or bases) are very similar to the standard white but have less ‘whiteness’, or TiO2 (titanium dioxide), in them in order to make an efficient tinting system. Resene simply couldn’t tint a dark blue from our standard white (it has too much whiteness) so a dark blue usually comes off a deep tone base which contains only a fraction of the white pigment.

This is the plant capable of producing the largest volumes and the largest mixers and vats are sited here.

Also on the Naenae site is our small batch plant (fig 14) where Resene make smaller batches of mainly slower moving products and bases (all our red and yellow tone bases are made here for example).

The largest batch Resene make in this plant is 1500 litres, which was the size of the largest batch Resene used to make in our old Seaview plant before Resene moved to our current plant in Naenae (the old plant is shown above in fig 6).

Also at Naenae is our tinter manufacturing facility that manufactures for our own use and for our technology customers offshore.

Our Upper Hutt plant manufactures paints and coatings that contain solvents (other than water). Here Resene make traditional solventborne enamels and solventborne undercoats as well as industrial products for ourselves and our sister company, Resene Automotive and Performance Coatings (RAPC).

Earlier Resene talked about mixing the ingredients together rather like mixing a cake. This is a useful analogy because it identifies with three of the reasons why Resene make quality paint.

1. A cake needs a good recipe and so does good paint. At Resene we have a dedicated and talented Research and Development team who work closely with Sales and Marketing to develop ‘recipes’ for paint.

2. Resene use high quality raw materials, a great tasting cake or cocktail is a reflection of the ingredients. At Resene we do not skimp and have always aimed to make the best paint we could.

fig 6



Who is Resene?

For example our primer for timber, Resene Quick Dry Acrylic Primer Undercoat has an anti-corrosive ingredient to help prevent nails and screws from rusting. It costs more but the results are worth it.

3. A cake or meal will be ruined if it is not prepared and cooked well. Our paint manufacturing team have literally centuries of experience amongst them and are well trained and committed. Resene have state of the art manufacturing equipment and processes and the progress of the batch is checked every step of the way by our testing laboratories

Our raw materials are added in by weight and Resene use sophisticated load cells (fig 7) both our mill base and let down vats to ensure very high standards of accuracy. As far as Resene know we are the only company in Australasia to do this. (fig 7 shows one of the load cells.)

The following is a pictorial view of how Resene make a batch of Resene Lumbersider.

Step �Production planning advises the manufacturing team that a batch of Resene Lumbersider needs to be made, they also send a list of the raw materials, mostly powders such as TiO2 (titanium dioxide that is used in white paint and the tones such as mid tone) to the bulk store and the exact quantities needed are set aside and sent to the production team.

Step �Resene have a number of different mixers available ranging in size from the large 125 horsepower hydraulic mixers to smaller 25 horsepower mixers (Resene use these in the small batch factory) Resene Lumbersider White, one of our biggest sellers is made in the big batch factory.

All the powders are mixed together with small quantities of dispersants, wetting agents, defoamers and water into what Resene call a mill base. This is a very thick liquid – basically concentrated paint.

The mill base is not only mixed together but is finely ground by the mixer or disperser using a very powerful blade. Fig 8.

Fig 9 shows the operator cutting open a bag of TiO2 and in fig 10 pouring the contents into the mill base vat.

fig 10

fig 9

fig 8

fig 7



Who is Resene?

As well as powders and the paint resin Resene also add some liquids to the mill base. To speed things up Resene premix many of these in the exact proportions needed for use in our fast moving paint lines. These are stored in tanks (fig 11) below the main production platform and are pumped in as needed.

Step �Once the mill base has been tested and passed by the PV Lab in the production area it is pumped into a let down vat.

They range in size and the largest has a capacity of 12,000 litres. From there the mill base is mixed with the remaining resin which is pumped in from the resin tanks. Water (some of it recycled from when the vats are cleaned) is added and mixed together until it reaches the correct consistency and passes the final PV labs tests for opacity, colour strength and weight per litre.

Fig 12 & 13 show three of the 10,000 litre vats and a view of the main production platform with canning staff in the foreground and the mill base vats and 125 horse dispersers in the background.

Fig 14 shows the small batch facility where paint is made using the same process but in smaller vats that are moved from the dispersers to the mixing bay (unlike in the main plant where the vats are all fixed and paint is either pumped or gravity fed).

Step �Fig 15 shows the paint being canned off (again partially gravity feed). It is then tested in our Telarc Lab and sent through the bulk picking area of the main warehouse.

fig 15

fig 14

fig 13

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fig 11



Who is Resene?

Sustainability

Businesses, local and national governments and consumers are becoming increasingly aware of the issues facing the environment. Limited natural resources, global warming and waste reductions are all topical.

Resene has always had a commitment to do ‘the right thing’ and well before it became fashionable to be ‘green”.

When it comes to sustainability Resene have three main considerations.

Firstly, as a company Resene should manufacture our paints in a manner that has the least impact on the environment.

Secondly Resene market and promote paints and paint systems that are environmentally preferable.

For Resene this means:

• Introducing waterborne products that effectively replace solventborne paints and thereby reduce the solvents or VOCs released (Volatile Organic Content). Basically solvents can damage the ozone layer and the environment. The best examples are our waterborne enamels, Resene Enamacryl and Resene Lustacryl that now sell at three times the levels of traditional (solventborne) enamel paints Resene Super Gloss and Resene Lusta-Glo. (See fig d below.)

In 2006, 92% of the decorative paint Resene sold was waterborne and 8% solventborne.

1996 – 2006

Resene Lustacryl

Resene Lusta-Glo

Volu

me

fig d



Who is Resene?

• Reducing VOC levels in existing paints, including waterborne systems.

• Using high solids technology, particularly in protective and engineered coatings. The higher the volume solids of paint, the lower the VOC of the product will be. So for a product like Resene Alumastic, which is 83% volume solids for each litre applied onto steel, 830mls of the paint dries and stays on the surface and 170mls of solvent evaporates into the atmosphere. Compare this to moisture cured products for flooring, which are approximately 30% volume solids!

• Producing very durable, performance paints and paint systems. In essence if the paint lasts longer then it will not need to be repainted as frequently and this will be good for the environment. Sometimes this means accepting more VOCs in the paint system and balancing this against systems that will last not as long. This is especially true for the paint systems used on steel and galvanised iron (such as the Resene Alumastic mentioned earlier).

• Developing and promoting the Environmental Choice programme. Resene was the first paint company to have a comprehensive range of Environmental Choice approved paints.

• Resene actively removes hazardous ingredients from products wherever possible to minimise the risk of harm for the user and the environment. Resene removed lead from its paint in the late 1960s, while other manufacturers were still using it and well before any legislation banning its use.

Thirdly Resene focus on recycling and reuse. This makes good sense in our manufacturing facilities. Resene reuse all the solvents used for washing vats in our Upper Hutt plant, however the most dramatic example is the Resene Paintwise programme founded by Resene, which allows customers to return unwanted or unused paint that is then reused in a variety of areas and applications, such as graffiti abatement, as well as allowing the cans to be recycled.

Resene has shown a genuine commitment to reducing the impact of our business and our products on the environment and to promote safe products for our staff, customers and future generations.

Typically Resene takes bold and innovative steps such as the move to gain Environmental Choice approval for most of our waterborne products. It is over 10 years since Resene gained the accreditation and it wasn’t until nearly a decade later that other major paint manufacturers started taking the same step.

Resene Alumastic Moisture curing polurethane for floors

Solvent

Solvent

Solids content

Solids content



Who is Resene?

Health and safety

Resene takes a proactive and sensible approach to workplace health and safety and Resene aim to eliminate dangers from the workplace. For those that Resene cannot, our aim is to minimise the likelihood of any accidents resulting from the identified hazard occurring. Resene do this by training staff on potential issues and how to avoid injury through safe work practice.

Resene have identified the key dangers in our Resene ColorShops and new and existing Resene ColorShop staff will be shown the safety issues and how to avoid injury. There may be areas specific to particular Resene ColorShops and these are identified in each Resene ColorShop’s safety manual.

Notwithstanding this there are four health and safety issues that are common to all of our Resene ColorShops and represent well over 95% of all injuries. These are identified below:

1. Back and muscle strains and damage caused by poor lifting techniques.2. Eye damage caused by tinter or paint splashes when tinting paint (especially stains and

solventborne enamels).3. Injury caused by moving parts on the paint shaker.4. Trips and slips caused by obstructions (unattended leads, lifting carpet tiles etc).

The ColorShop Manager is responsible for the health and safety of the people working in their Resene ColorShop.

Any work related injuries need to be reported to the ColorShop Manager or in his or her absence, the designated person in charge.

© Copyright Resene Paints Limited, 2006.

All rights reserved. All information and material contained herein is subject to copyright and remains the exclusive property of Resene. This information and material is prepared for the exclusive use of Resene clients, for use with Resene products and services, on projects specified by Resene. All information and material must only be used for the purpose for which they have been expressly supplied. Resene reserves the right to take legal action for breach of these conditions and its rights.

In Australia: Call 1800 738 383 or visit www.resene.com.au

In New Zealand: Call 0800 RESENE or visit www.resene.co.nz

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Who is Resene? · exterior plasters. But customers were sceptical, so unsure were they that Ted would demonstrate his paint in paint stores and sometimes in the shop windows! He would