Advanced Paint Sales Training Now Available

If you want to differentiate your paint business from everyone else in the market, you’ll need competent and confident employees. The North American Hardware and Paint Association (NHPA) now offers another tool for your training arsenal. Advanced Paint Sales is a series of four courses focused on paint-specific product knowledge and customer service. The courses are an update of the Coatings Specialist and Paint Customer Service Specialist courses, previously offered by NHPA. After taking these courses, paint sales associates will have a foundational understanding of color, paint, primers, stains and related sundries. They will also gain paint-specific selling skills to help them serve the unique needs of the paint customer.

Advanced Paint Sales offers updated content, a refreshed layout, shorter modules, interactive learning, a mobile friendly format and printable study guides. Content updates were developed with assistance from Brian George, director of purchasing at O’Leary Paint in Lansing, Michigan, and James Alberts, vice president of sales and operations at O’Leary Paint. 

Advanced Paint Sales includes four courses: 

• Coatings is an introduction to the makeup and features of paint, such as durability, coverage and hide. This course also discusses primers and stains.
• Paint Applicators and Other Sundries will cover the benefits and uses of the common sundry products. 
• Color explains the color wheel, color combinations and lighting so sales associates can help customers design the best color scheme for their project. 
• Paint Customer Service offers selling skills specific to paint sales that will help sales associates recommend the right products.

NHPA has also published the Paint Problem Solver, a reference guide that helps paint sales associates identify common causes and recommended solutions for a wide range of interior and exterior paint performance problems. Full color photos and detailed explanations make it easy for sales associates to help customers identify why paint is failing and find the correct product for remediation. The Paint Problem Solver is available online and as a printable guide. It also includes a glossary of common paint terms used in retail. 

Both Advanced Paint Sales and the Paint Problem Solver are available to NHPA Premier Members through NHPA’s online learning management system. If you are not a Premier Member but would like to learn more, visit YourNHPA.org/membership.