Paint gloss and emulsion

[HappydaysArehere]

Has anyone used Wickes paint? Used gloss last year and I had trouble with a very long drying time. Has anyone else had similar trouble and has anyone used Wicks emulsion. Grateful for opinions.

Also, has anyone used Wilko paint? Anyone having trouble with Dulux paint? Having to travel to help daughter sort house out before selling it. Want to take the minimum time so don't fancy numerous coats. Be grateful for any input.

For emulsion, Wilko budget brand is very watery and you need lots of coats. Wickes own brand is often available in 15litre tubs, which can be good value if you have several rooms or lots of ceilings. Wickes often have a Reduced display near the door.

For gloss, Dulux Trade is very good. White paint is always cheaper than colours. It should have blue lids which indicate the anti-yellowing formula.

It does rather seem like cheap paint is cheap for a reason.

For indoors gloss paint, you can use the water-based acrylic primer undercoat, which dries fast and is quite soft. For outdoors, I'm sure oil (white sprit) undercoat and aluminium primer are more durable.

Keep searching online, Wickes, Homebase, B&Q, Wilko, looking for special offers, especially around sunny weekends and bank holidays.

If a quick, but effective paint job is required then Dulux and Crown's one coat paints work. We were on the second coat of hall, stairs and landings when we decided the colour was awful and after all that work I couldn't face two coats of the new colour so we used Crown Solo.

Expensive, compared with normal emulsion, but time-saving.

Thank you PigletJohn for your really useful input. We were especially interested in the blue lids. We had no idea about that. Thanks also for your other guidance. We are very grateful.
Wowfudge thank you for your advise on Crown Solo. The hall, stairs etc are a really hard, tedious job so you were really wise to cut the labour down. We will be trying to do the same.

There's a Crown or Dulux paint called Nutmeg which looks a lovely light creamy brown on the charts and the painted blocks in B&Q. Don't buy it - it's actually a god awful peach colour with more pink than orange in it! That was what we had to paint over. Turned out some friends had the same experience.

Thanks for the tip. I must admit having been fooled by colour charts when I have not bothered with the test pots. That Nutmeg is a definite no no. Sounds horrible and paint is so expensive.

PigletJohn, just to let you know. As we were walking around Wilkos collecting Dulux paint to take to our daughter's my DH spy's Wilkos special offer emulsion. "No, no" I exclaim "PigletJohn says it's a load of watery rubbish. Cheap for a reason." My DH remembers and agrees. Dulux remains in trolley. PigletJohns fame grows along with his fan club.

Wowfudge. Managed to get Dulux one coat yesterday. All we need is the energy and we are away. Got to gird our loins, etc. etc for our visit next week. "Oh! It's a far better thing I do than I have ever done before......."
How I hate decorating, especially when it's hot. I usually get going in the Spring if I plan it. Never mind, I am picturing your pristine hall and stairs and being encouraged. Thanks.

Decorating schmecorating - it's the clearing rooms and preparation that's a fag ime! Good luck.