I initially spent more than £400 on their matt white wall paint. It was horrible to work with since it did not stick on plaster walls. The walls were prepped for painting (sanded, dust and oil-free). In some places, it took around five coats to get decent coverage. Never the less, sometime after painting our walls, I was foolish enough to order wood paint from them. I was intending to use it for skirting boards and inside doors. I chose the FengShui white paint as their representative told me that the colour would be matching my wall paint. Unfortunately, it was not. It was a lot more yellow and looked entirely out of place. I decided to return one of the 1L cans I ordered but was slapped with a 25% return fee (or a handling fee, as they call it) and a delivery cost that made it unreasonable to return. I was disappointed because the can I wanted to return was only a couple of days old, never opened and still wrapped in the original film. I ended up selling it on eBay (luckily) and told their salesperson that I would rather donate the paint than send it back to them. Ultimately, they don’t have to charge a 25% fee for returns. It’s their choice to push their customers in a corner where it’s not viable to return anything. It just shows their level of greed.
Fast forward a few months, and we’re almost done with our renovation; however, we’ve damaged a few corners and decided to repaint them. This comes as no surprise since the paint it so weak that a light hit with anything will make it peal off. Of course, the leftover paint we had all started to smell rotten and grew mould a few weeks after we finished our renovation, so that had to be thrown out. Seriously, some food will last longer than this paint.
As a result, I checked Lakeland’s website only to find that they had removed the smaller paint can size from their website. This wasn’t a surprise to me since I already experienced how greedy they are. I reached out to them via email and was told by Adrian that “they can make the matt paint in 1L size as well; however, it is more than half the price of the 5L. Price-wise - including VAT the 1L is £43.73, and the 5L is £74.10”. Why? Are unit economics not supposed to come in play here? Again, they’re using this dodgy technique to make you buy more of their product. I ended up calling them, and Adrian took my order. I was not really willing to pay so much money for 1L of paint, but I thought to myself that I would just pay extra and draw the line here. A short while later I got another email from Adrian saying that “they just tried to process my order, but unfortunately the system is showing that my account or postcode is blocked. Unfortunately, there's nothing they can do about this. No payment will be taken, but they cannot process my order.” I then proceed to ask why they cannot process my order. They should be able to give me a simple answer; however, Ian West concluded that "he's sorry, but they can't process it".
How convenient? I must have hurt someone’s feelings when I last told them that I’d rather donate the paint than give them free money. They banned me for stating the obvious. It’s the first company I’ve ever come across that bans you for leaving a negative comment or stating the obvious. They never even apologised. It seems like this process is all too familiar to them.
The bottom line is this, my wife and I intended to be eco friendly and treat our health by painting our walls with a natural paint; however, we’ve wasted so much money, time and effort dealing with this horrible company and their paint that the entire intention seems meaningless. If anything, the stress has deteriorated out health. If you were thinking of buying Lakeland paints, I would urge you to reconsider and look elsewhere. It’s not worth it. Seriously.
P.S.Look at their Trustpilot reviews. 1 one-star review followed with a couple of five-star reviews. There is nothing in between. This pattern illustrates just how many companies deal with overwhelmingly negative reviews. They try to bury them in a sea of fake positive reviews. Don't be fooled.