Read Mumsnetters’ feedback on Valspar Premium Blend v700 Walls & Ceilings Paint - £300 voucher to be won for feedback NOW CLOSED

[JustineBMumsnet]

This is the feedback thread for the 250 MNers who have been testing Valspar Premium Blend v700 Walls & Ceilings Paint.

Here’s what Valspar have to say: “Blend v700 promises to give you ultimate coverage, pure colour, splatter resistance and allows walls to be wiped down without removing the paint. With excellent scrubbability and great stain resistance means Blend v700™ withstands the toughest household stains from felt tips to black coffee, making it perfect for busy homes and high-traffic rooms, such as children’s bedrooms, dining rooms and hallways. With long-term performance you can rely on, your colour will stay true for years to come.”

"As well as being available in a variety of finishes, including matt, mid-sheen and gloss, the Valspar unique colour matching technology can replicate any colour the eye can see - that's 2.2 million shades! Choose a colour that's personal to you and your family - be it the shade of a festive Christmas bauble, or a favourite ornament, simply take the item to your local B&Q and its exact colour can be scanned and recreated in paint form.”

Testers, answer the below questions, but also feel free to share any other comments you have on your experience:
1. How did you find choosing your colour? Did you choose from the 2,000 colours on the chip rack or did you match a colour sample? Were you happy with the colour of the paint and the service you received?
2. Which room did you decorate and why?
3. Please describe the overall experience of using Valspar Premium Blend v700 Walls & Ceilings Paint, thinking about the application and product quality.
4. Would you consider using Valspar Premium Blend v700 Walls & Ceilings Paint in your home again? If so, why? If not, why not?

Please also share your before and after photos of your project on this thread and complete the feedback survey when we email this to you.

All who complete the required feedback by the 11th April will be entered into a prize draw where one MNer will win a £300 voucher.

Thanks and good luck,

MNHQ

Standard Insight T&Cs apply

1. How did you find choosing your colour? Did you choose from the 2,000 colours on the chip rack or did you match a colour sample? Were you happy with the colour of the paint and the service you received?

My original plan was to let my daughter pick her own colour using an object or something that she could take in and be colour matched, that way the room really would have her stamp on it. When we went into store and saw the HUGE choice of colours already available on the chip rack she picked out a colour that she liked better than she had planed to have made. We were so shocked at the choice available to us. I liked how you could see how the colour would look in the different light and found the service to be an enjoyable one.

1. Which room did you decorate and why?

Decorated my daughters room, she was just moving rooms to have her first bedroom to herself after sharing, we had decided to take out the original fireplace and have the room replastered to make it into her very own bedroom.

1. Please describe the overall experience of using Valspar Premium Blend v700 Walls & Ceilings Paint, thinking about the application and product quality.

The walls had been replastered so I thought that the coverage would be poor at first and require more than one coat of paint"........ I was wrong. The paint has gone on fantastically and proved to be splatter free, this is a bonus for me because I am a messy decorator.
The paint doesn't have your usual chemical paint smell and that's great, especially when it will be my daughters room.

1. Would you consider using Valspar Premium Blend v700 Walls & Ceilings Paint in your home again? If so, why? If not, why not? Yes, I have found the quality to be far superior to the duluxe once that I have always used, and I love that the experience in store is one that feels personalised to you.

Some after photos

Okay here is a coverage note. In the grey wall (before) we had a mineral oil mark which came through despite sugar soaping with the Dulux paint. The blue Valspar has sealed and covered this. Which is impressive

So you can see before and after here. Grey wall is Dulux, blue wall Valspar

Place marking we picked and bought our paint last weekend and we're going to paint this weekend

1. How did you find choosing your colour? Did you choose from the 2,000 colours on the chip rack or did you match a colour sample? Were you happy with the colour of the paint and the service you received?

• I colour matched to Dulux Timeless as I knew I wanted more to complete the room and in case the Valspar was 't very good. The colour match was close (as far as you can tell with an off white) and the service at B&Q was fine.

1. Which room did you decorate and why? 12 year old son's bedroom prior to moving house. It was painted blue/white with outer space stickers!

1. Please describe the overall experience of using Valspar Premium Blend v700 Walls & Ceilings Paint, thinking about the application and product quality.

No problems with this. The paint seems thick/thickened but certainly didn't spatter. It dried less opaque that it looked at first. It took 3 coats to cover the dark blue, the third coat was insurance really. After 3 coats on a small wall there was less than a litre left.

1. Would you consider using Valspar Premium Blend v700 Walls & Ceilings Paint in your home again? If so, why? If not, why not?

Yes if I wanted a particular colour but I was shocked by the price of it. I bought a tin of normal Dulux to finish. This looked completely different when newly applied but dried to near identical.

To be honest I don't like those thick "set-yoghurt" paints and would rather use a good quality trade emulsion.

1. How did you find choosing your colour?

Easy as I wanted it to match up with my current bedding and accessories. I chose a colour from their chart Lilac Ice. I use B&Q often and the service is always very good, this time was no exception. The colour is lovely and I'm very pleased with it. I only got one wall done though, and will post the pic on my return from holiday. It was very easy to use and covered well so I am not worried about returning to finish off the decorating.

1. Which room did you decorate and why?

My bedroom, it hasn't been painted for quite a long time and really needed a freshen up.

1. Please describe the overall experience of using Valspar Premium Blend

Lovely paint, easy to use, covered well although because it is a darker colour than was on it will need two coats. I found it really easy to apply and when dry it has a nice texture.

1. Would you consider using Valspar Premium Blend again

Absolutely, I had never used this paint before But I would definitely consider it in the future. It will be interesting to see how the finish lasts! This has been a really great trial to be part of and I have enjoyed taking part. I will post on this thread again before the trial ends completely with an 'after pic'. Have already uploaded my before pics.

1. How did you find choosing your colour? Did you choose from the 2,000 colours on the chip rack or did you match a colour sample? Were you happy with the colour of the paint and the service you received?

We found it easy to find a colour we liked, we just wanted something bright and cheerful and there was lots to choose from. We chose from the chip rack. Really happy with the colour and the service was fine , no issues

1. Which room did you decorate and why?

We decorated the downstairs loo because it's the only room we haven't painted since we moved in and had decided it needed brightening up.

1. Please describe the overall experience of using Valspar Premium Blend v700 Walls & Ceilings Paint, thinking about the application and product quality.

The application and quality was good, good coverage. No issues at all.

1. Would you consider using Valspar Premium Blend v700 Walls & Ceilings Paint in your home again? If so, why? If not, why not? Yes we would consider using it but it is a little too expensive for us .

1. How did you find choosing your colour? Did you choose from the 2,000 colours on the chip rack or did you match a colour sample? Were you happy with the colour of the paint and the service you received?

I wanted a colour match for the kitchen extension, so it follows through as one room. It was a perfect match. Service was good- helpful and informative, not patronising (I know nothing about DIY).

1. Which room did you decorate and why?

I was originally going to do the living room, but needed paint for the recently completed conservatory/kitchen extension so we did this instead. Of course, this means the living room still needs doing (hint hint DH).

1. Please describe the overall experience of using Valspar Premium Blend v700 Walls & Ceilings Paint, thinking about the application and product quality.

Super easy, although I was using the paint on brand new walls. I'm a messy worker but managed to not splash it everywhere and it went on really well. The smell wasn't overpowering either.

1. Would you consider using Valspar Premium Blend v700 Walls & Ceilings Paint in your home again? If so, why? If not, why not?

Yes, I love the choice of colours, you can literally get any shade. DH would opt for cheaper if available though, but we would consider Valspar among others.

Pics to follow.

Before (blank walls, new build).
After- all done and furnished.
The other pic is meant to show the original colour and the new colour- they are a perfect match but the light doesn't show this at all.

1. How did you find choosing your colour? Did you choose from the 2,000 colours on the chip rack or did you match a colour sample? Were you happy with the colour of the paint and the service you received?

We chose a colour from the rack. The colour was 'morning glory'.

The woman at the Valspar desk was having a bit of a bad day and was pretty dismissive (not just to me - she laughed at the guy in front of me too). My husband asked her if she knew where the antimould additive was in the store, so we could add it. She told us that she had never heard of such a thing and we mustn't add anything to the paint. (So we went and bought it from a small local DIY store, where they had a choice of products and the guy gave advice about how to use it.)

They had run out of the Valspar rollers, which was a shame.

1. Which room did you decorate and why?

We have just had a small extension put in, so we decorated our old bathroom which now a bedroom.

1. Please describe the overall experience of using Valspar Premium Blend v700 Walls & Ceilings Paint, thinking about the application and product quality.

I don't want to be impolite given it was free (!) but we didn't find it brilliant. We knew it would not be a totally easy paint job given that it was going onto plastered walls, but we found that the paint slipped off very quickly.

We have finally managed to finish it, with 2 coats dragged from the tin. (The room is only 2m x 2m) Ideally it needs another coat, but I don't want to go back to the Valspar desk so I'm just going to leave it!

1. Would you consider using Valspar Premium Blend v700 Walls & Ceilings Paint in your home again? If so, why? If not, why not?

I don't think so, really. It was okay. Full disclaimer though - a couple of years ago, we were very lucky to be given a sample of Farrow and Ball paint for a Mumsnet review and so maybe we've just been a little bit spoilt!

Photos to follow.

Before and after shots here.

Finding the valspar area was easy it was huge in B&Q and there were plenty of colour swatches to choose from. It was very helpful to have the different light boxes so you could see how the colour would look under different light. I was overwhelmed with the colour choice and to think you could still go and pick any item to colour match. I would've done this but didn't have time to source the colour I really wanted but got a pretty good match with the standard off the shelf colour- although with valspar all paints are mixed to order.
The paintbrush and roller sets were a little harder to find as they weren't with all the other brands and then there was no paintbrush set, a member of staff informed me that they had been out of stock for quite a while
Applying the paint was easy and smooth and seemed to go really far we only needed the one tin!
Quite pricey paint but you get what you pay for and it was worth it. Easy paint job and great finish!

So I did the first coat last night over white paint and it definitely needs another coat . We also had the same issue as a pp where the paint came off if you rolled over it again after a minute or two.

About to tackle the bedroom today - here is the before photo! Boring magnolia about to be transformed into something a little more adventurous.

1. Choosing the colour was tricky although it really helped to have the cards in categories like neutrals, blues, pinks etc as I knew I don't want yellow or neutral at all. The guy in B and Q was really helpful and recommended matt silk for the room we wanted and seemed to know a lot about the paint. In the end I chose by the name - eternal optimist I think.

1. The hallway. I wanted to freshen this up and it was tired looking. I also wanted to add some nice bits and pieces to make it more attractive

1. So I was very worried by a pp ' experience as I am not very skilled in this area. Dh usually paints or wallpapers as I just get bored and don't have any attention to detail. This time he refused! As he wasn't here! So I actually made an effort and sanded stuff and filled holes first.

The good points were it's very not drippy so I didn't have to chuck my clothes away, and there are no runs down the wall. It also goes a very long way - we have half a tin left.

The minus points were coverage - it definitely needed a second coat and paint did come off when I went back over it. However the second coat is dry and it looks fab.

I would definitely buy this again if it was me painting.

1. How did you find choosing your colour? Did you choose from the 2,000 colours on the chip rack or did you match a colour sample? Were you happy with the colour of the paint and the service you received?

I like that you could see the colours under different lights and there was a great choice to pick from. Once we had narrowed it down to a rough colour we took a few of the chips home and I stuck them on the wall to get a feel for them whilst I painted the ceiling. We all finally agreed on Breezy Street.

1. Which room did you decorate and why?

We decorated my youngest daughters room as it hasn't been painted since we moved in 5 years ago and was in bad need of a freshen up as it can be quite a dull room.

1. Please describe the overall experience of using Valspar Premium Blend v700 Walls & Ceilings Paint, thinking about the application and product quality.

I found it easy to apply and managed to do 2 coats with the one tin of paint so was really pleased. It went on really well, was not too drippy and didn't have a strong paint smell. I found it also dried quite quickly.

1. Would you consider using Valspar Premium Blend v700 Walls & Ceilings Paint in your home again? If so, why? If not, why not?

Yes, I would recommend the paint.

How did you find choosing your colour?
We picked a pastel shade from the panatone collection, this wasn't available in the v700 blend so they colour matched the colour from the sample card.

Which room did you decorate and why?
We decorated what will be the playroom, we had an extension built last year so we are working our way around decorating.

Experience of using valspar v700
The paint went on easily initially it seemed to be darker and flatter in colour than I thought it was going to be but the colour changed as it dried to more like what I was expecting.
The paint is quite thick and after a while it dried onto the bottom of the roller tray it then peeled off onto the roller and left little bits of paint skin on the wall which was annoying.
I used the valspar roller which I was disappointed with it kept leaving bits of purple fluff on the wall which was annoying.
I've now used the whole tin on the first coat, I've painted over the white mist coat on the new plaster and you can still see buys of white coming through so it will need a second coat.

Would you use valspar paint in your house again?
Yes, overall I thought the paint was good quality and there are a wide selection of colours while we need a second coat the coverage is better than other brands we have used elsewhere in the house.

Before

After

Painting is done. The room is now an amazing bright yellow! It required two coats. I found the paint to be quite watery and in places I needed three or more coats to cover up colour differences on the original wall. If I was painting a dark wall with a lighter colour I think I'd put a base coat on first. It bubbled a bit sometimes as I was applying it but it went on very easily. The advantage to a watery paint is that it can be wiped off if paint goes somewhere it shouldn't and the brushes are easy to clean. As we chose the colour matching service I've taken some photos to show how close the match was. Pretty good I'd say!

1. How did you find choosing your colour? Did you choose from the 2,000 colours on the chip rack or did you match a colour sample? Were you happy with the colour of the paint and the service you received?

I let my 4 year old daughter choose the color from the chip rack. She wanted pink, and there was quite an assortment. We were able to find one she was happy with that wasn't too bright for our tastes. The service was quite good, and I was given good directions when looking for other supplies to help prepare the room.

1. Which room did you decorate and why?

I decorated my daughter's room. Her room is quite small, so I figured the amount of paint received would work. It was just enough. I would have only been able to paint a single wall in most of our rooms, and I wanted to do an entire room. As the before pictures show, her room was quite a mixture of colors, and some of the paint was chipping. I was happy to redo it in her style.

1. Please describe the overall experience of using Valspar Premium Blend v700 Walls & Ceilings Paint, thinking about the application and product quality.

I was impressed with the quality of this paint. There weren't many drips or splatters (but those that there were seemed to end up on us). We did end up with some paint where we didn't want it, but that was more down to mistakes in application. The paint does dry quickly, which led to some problems. There was a section my daughter started painting, and it was difficult to even it out because I didn't get to it soon enough. The roller was a bit of a challenge in a couple of places for similar reasons (we do have a few roller marks that didn't smooth out, but the tend to be where shelves will be covering). Cleaning up the paint is a real difficulty, especially any that got on hair or clothing. So be sure to cover up with clothes you don't care about. One of the aspects I was most impressed with is the coverage of the paint. We went with a rather light color on top of multiple colors. I debated getting a primer to start, but the information said it wasn't necessary. So I decided to test this by going without. As you can probably see, the first coat didn't completely cover everything. There is a definite white line from the stripe. But the second coat made all the difference. You cannot see the original wall colors at all. This was a pleasant surprise that massively impressed me. Also, this paint has a very low smell. We started painting with the window closed just because I had forgotten. Normally, the paint smell is so strong that windows are immediately opened in order to function. This really increased my confidence in using this in a child's room.

1. Would you consider using Valspar Premium Blend v700 Walls & Ceilings Paint in your home again? If so, why? If not, why not?

I would definitely consider using this paint again. It was a great quality paint. The only point against it was the cost. I don't know if I would be able to afford the amount of paint needed for a larger room. I would be more likely to use it for smaller rooms or accents in larger rooms. It is a fantastic product that I will definitely recommend to family and friends.

1. How did you find choosing your colour? Did you choose from the 2,000 colours on the chip rack or did you match a colour sample? Were you happy with the colour of the paint and the service you received?

I was impressed with the huge range of colours available. We'd decided to do ds's room and wanted a yellowy colour. There were so many different shades on the chip rack that we just chose from there. I was happy with the service and the colour. We went for melted butter in the end. Originally I was thinking of a pale lemon colour, but then decided to go for something a little brighter. One of the shop assistants warned me that the lights in the store made the colours look quite different, so I took a whole load of samples outside and studied them there. It was a sunny day, so I felt I had a good idea of the colour (I was also told that the samples are the actual paint, painted on, which certainly seemed true when I later compared my sample card with the finished walls) and I'm happy with the final colour. It's interesting to see that lots of pps have mentioned light boxes to view the colours under; there was no mention of this in the store I bought the paint from. Sounds like a good idea though, and I would have liked this.

1. Which room did you decorate and why?

We decorated my son's room as we had already been planning to do it anyway before becoming a product tester. We hadn't decorated it since before he was born. It was painted a fairly neutral colour, but cracks were appearing in the paint. Also we took down the border that we had up when he was a baby, and it left a few marks behind. We decided it was time to give the whole room a freshen up.

1. Please describe the overall experience of using Valspar Premium Blend v700 Walls & Ceilings Paint, thinking about the application and product quality.

I was impressed with the paint. I'd never used it before as we tend to buy Dulux. I thought it went on really smoothly and gave a good coverage. A little went a long way - we managed to do the whole room with the paint we were given. (Admittedly it's quite a small room!) the only issue I had was that when I first used the roller, a few bits of fluff came off. I panicked, thinking that having spent ages prepping the walls I was going to ruin it, but I was able to brush the bits of fluff away and just ran the roller over the area again and it was fine. After the first few 'rolls' the roller stopped shedding and was absolutely fine. In fact I really liked the fact that even if I went over an area later, it all dries really well giving a good finish.I

1. Would you consider using Valspar Premium Blend v700 Walls & Ceilings Paint in your home again? If so, why? If not, why not?

Yes, I loved the paint. I also love the idea of colour-matching, even though we didn't use it. I can imagine using it in future though, if I wanted a particular shade to match curtains or other furnishings.
I thought Valspar paint was great. My only reservation would be the price as it is expensive, but as it seems to give good coverage, it's worth it.

I'll upload the photos in a minute.

Here are some before, during and after photos!

Those were before and during, as i couldn't seem to load more! Here's the finished room.