Time. Nobody, it seems, has enough of it. That’s especially true if you’re running your own painting company. In this article, we dive into some of the best new tools and resources that can help paint pros be more efficient on the job site and in the office.

Trust tech

For 158 years, Sherwin-Williams has been working hand in hand with professional painting contractors to help them grow and improve their businesses. Getting on board with the latest technological advances in coatings products is one way to take your painting business to the next level. Another is adopting smarter, more efficient ways of doing business. In particular, today’s company owners are taking advantage of time- and labor-saving efficiencies that can be created from engaging digitally.

The Sherwin-Williams PRO+ program is a great example of how you can use these new digital tools and resources to be more productive and take more control over your daily workload.

To learn more about the latest time-saving tools and resources the PRO+ program offers, we sat down with Jill Waters, Director of Digital Adoption at Sherwin-Williams.

Prior to her current position, Jill had more than 20 years of experience working directly with painting contractors in several markets, from Atlanta and Orlando to Connecticut, Charlotte, North Carolina and Charleston, South Carolina. So she understands what these digital tools can do to help professional painting contractors make better use of their time and improve the efficiency of their businesses.

Let’s start with the basics. What is the Sherwin-Williams PRO+ program?

Sherwin-Williams PRO+ is an exclusive program designed to help pros manage and grow their business. This free program includes exclusive savings and 0% interest credit,1 personalized support, business tools, learning and development resources, and PRO+ductive Solutions to maximize your efficiency.

What’s new for PRO+ in 2024?

The first thing you’ll notice is the new PRO+ Dashboard landing page when you log in to your account at swproplus.com. The page has been redesigned to streamline everything for PRO+ customers and help them reorder supplies online. Customers who visit the page will now be greeted with a new PRO+ Dashboard that is personalized for their business and makes it easy for them to get to the features they use the most.

To name a few examples, that might include checking your account balances, making a payment, accessing and exporting invoices, quickly checking pricing on the products you use the most, or reordering frequently purchased and recently purchased products.

There’s also a new tool to help you create professional, customized and branded social media posts.

Does it cost anything to sign up for PRO+? Do you have to earn points to benefit?

No. It’s totally free to sign up for a PRO+ account. And unlike some other pro programs, there are no points to earn or track, and no minimum spending to achieve.

You can take full advantage of the benefits as soon as you sign up.

For pros who don’t yet have a PRO+ account, how do they get started?

They’ll just need to open a Sherwin-Williams PRO+ cash or credit account with us, and they will receive a text message to instantly register for online account access.

Existing Sherwin-Williams customers with an account can talk to their rep or store manager to get set up for online account access.

Once registered, they can make it even easier to run their business from anywhere by downloading the free SW PRO+App for their phone.

Any final thoughts?

PRO+ is really just an extension of our support for the professional painting contractor’s business. We want to allow pros to interact with us whenever and wherever they want to, on their terms.

Whether it’s business expansion or looking at their operations a little differently or anything else, our goal is to help them see those opportunities. Everything we do is to try to build partnerships with painting contractors and help them reach their business potential.

This article was originally published in the Spring 2024 issue of PPC magazine. ©2024 Fusable. Jill Waters was interviewed by Mike Starling, PPC Editor. Photography courtesy Sherwin-Williams. Read more stories about running your painting business in the PPC magazine archive.