Holy Crap!! The price of Paint.....

ramenth said
Exactly.
You can run a cheaper line of paint, say Shopline or Omni, and have it look good, but will it last as long or be as durable as the higher line? There's a reason why it's cheaper and usually the paint manufacturer won't warranty their lower lines. You can spend half the price now and have it last ten years if maintained well or spend all of it up front and as long as it's maintained and have it last a life time, standing up to UV, chemical spills, acid rain, etc.
Take a look at it this way: used car dealers use a lower line. It's good enough to get a car off the lot without having to put a lot of money into it. Collision Pro shops, who have to warranty their work for the insurance company, use a high line. See the difference?

There is nothing wrong with most (not all) of the Shopline and some of the Omni paints from PPG. Most of the Shopline paints are actually PPG paints but relabeled without the warranty which is useless to the average guy, PPG will only warranty paint for the top end shops anyway so why pay for it especially if you are painting it yourself because they "will not" warranty anything done by the average person no matter what paint you use.

If you have a good PPG rep that is "honest" with you, they will tell you which Shopline paints are the same as the PPG label. Most paint suppliers won't tell you because they make more money off of the PPG label than the Shopeline. They have come out with a lot more in the Shopline in the last few years that is good paint. The Omni on the other hand I believe is becoming the bottom of the barrel.

That being said, you need to keep up with them to know what is the same because they change it periodically as they up grade or change the PPG line. What was the same paint 3 years ago may be a completely different paint today but still have the same Shopline or Omni label and part number. The Omni epoxy was the exact same epoxy as the PPG epoxy 5 years ago, but I was told they changed it since then and is no longer the same paint. I don't think I would use the Omni on anything I care about, I would however use the Shopline but I would check into it before buying it.