Design Dimensions
A local green paint for the global market
By Isabel Berenguer AsuncionPhilippine Daily Inquirer
NVIRO has its own ready palette of paint colors to select from, making it easier for consumers to work with.
We’ve seen them slathered all over magazines and papers—advertisements and features for the “green” products now swarming the market, riding on the global rush to save the planet. Quite a far cry from only five years ago when suppliers hardly marketed their products as “green” products, even if they probably already were and when they did not have certificates or test results at hand to establish where they stood in the global effort of saving the environment.
Such movement, which by then was already a big deal the world over, is in its infancy in this country. While many products now claim to be environment-friendly, only a few can back up their assertions with real recognition from globally renowned certifying organizations. After all, becoming certified is an expensive and tedious process that only those seriously in pursuit of an exemplary product, will go through the eye of a needle.
Environment-friendly paint
A few months back, I came across Amon Marketing Corp.’s Nviro Paint, an environment-friendly paint that is quite new to the market but holds a lot of promise. While many other paint brands are under the umbrella of larger internationally known companies, Nviro was developed and manufactured locally. The paint though is at par with international paint brands, having an SGS certification for its production standards. World-class Pinoy indeed!
Nviro is also the first paint ever in the Philippines to be awarded the prestigious Green Choice seal. The “Green Choice” is the global association that labels, promotes and develops the “eco labeling” of a product, determining if the product has truly met the environmental leadership criteria required, which painstakingly starts from the formulation of the product, all the way through to its manufacturing and distribution.
What I think is most impressive about Nviro though is that the paint was developed not only as a stand-alone paint material, but as the final coating to an integrated method of preparation and application. It is a complete wall resurfacing system. Aside from the main top-coat paint, Nviro’s system includes concrete and wood primers, wall putties, wood glues, joint sealers, and even Bio-Organic Packaging Glue, which is probably one of the safest locally manufactured, packaging glues: nontoxic, odorless and solvent-free.
Training for workers, painters
Amon Marketing provides support to the construction site by providing training for the workers or painters that will deliver the execution of the preparation and the painting work. While other paint companies use generic materials, Nviro developed its own products to safeguard not only the consistency of quality throughout the many layers of preparation work, but also to ensure that the application of every layer of wall finish is absolutely environment-friendly and nontoxic.
While it is still trying to get its fair-share volume of buyers and consumers that the older and more popular brands currently enjoy, the value-for-money aspect is what I see driving this product into the market. Nviro does not contain harmful ingredients so common to paints: lead, mercury and toluene (a petroleum-derived solvent considered to be a neurotoxin), that can cause long-term irreversible damage to the human body.
This is a huge cost consideration when you take into account the cost of healthcare and the number of hours you would spend indoor. While its competitors may be cheaper on a per-square-meter cost, it is difficult to measure the returns on a product like this when you do not take account these other modest yet very real benefits to a locally produced sustainable paint.
At the end of the day, buying a locally manufactured “green” product is not solely about its environmental benefits. In the larger scheme of things, it’s also about providing for local employment, ensuring the health of your family, and promoting the Filipino as a world-class player in the field of building materials. With products like Nviro making its way into the market, the Filipino environmental contributions will finally be making their way into the global consciousness as well.
Call Amon Marketing at Tel. No. +632-8196-113 or through nviroproducts@ymail.com or inquiries@nviro.com.ph or visit its site at www.nviro.com.ph
Contact the author through designdimensions@abi.ph or through our Asuncion Berenguer Facebook account.
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Tags: property , `green’ paints
