General Paints was established in 1953 by Ronan O'Connor, who set up his company in a section of a Famine Workhouse, dating from 1841, in Celbridge, Co. Kildare. The original products produced were gloss paints, oxides, machinery enamels, undercoats and roadline paints, and all products were oil based. In the late 1950's the company began manufacturing decorative paint for houses and in the 1960's General Paints introduced tinting systems to Ireland.

With the advent of emulsion technology from America in the 1960s General Paints became the first European paint company to manufacture a water-based paint using a pure acrylic resin, and is today arguably the leading specialist in acrylic paint technology in British and Irish Isles. Colortrend's acrylic emulsion paints are widely specified by architects and interior designers because of their superior benefits. These include superb colour retention, durability, good adhesion, alkali resistance and scrub resistance. General Paints Limited main brand - Colortrend -includes full product lines of 100% pure acrylic paints. Today water-based paints make up 90% of our decorative house paints.

While General Paints Limited continues to be progressive and technologically focused we have remained true to our original core values of quality and competitiveness supported by technical expertise and the best customer service.

We now focus our energy in three broad areas of activity: retailing paint through company owned stores; supplying paint to independent paint retailers and supplying customised industrial coatings.

Supplying Customised Industrial Coatings

In the 1980's the Irish market demand for high performance and locally produced industrial coatings led General Paints Limited into the manufacture of customised products for the industrial sector. Our success in this venture is reflected in the fact that specialist industrial coatings now account for a significant amount of our total business.

Today, General Paints Limited manufactures a wide variety of industrial coatings, from traditional synthetic oxides to special long-life polyurethane coatings for the protection and decoration of industrial surfaces.

We have earned our reputation in the area of substrate protection as the coating supplier for many prestigious contracts including The Ha'Penny Bridge and Sean Heuston Bridge over the River Liffey in Dublin for Dublin City Council and The Turner Green House and The Palm House in Dublin's Botanic Gardens for the OPW

We also offer our services as an industrial coatings expert manufacturer, with two laboraratories, one each for powder and wet products, we can offer our customers a wide range of technical services and in-dept customer support.