Like it never happened: Restore and rejuvenate any surface

By Dani Sheehan. 

See why Sherwin-Williams backs this line of cleaning products and add them to your toolkit today. 

Picture this: You pull up to your friend’s shop in your company car, expecting to get some advice for your customer on how to remove graffiti from some metal panels. When you arrive, your friend sprays white and red oil-based paint, tagging the hood, covering the sides, and giving the car a fresh – albeit, unwanted – new look. Then, he tells you not to worry about it and invites you to look at some demos, talk about the customer issue and maybe grab some lunch. You're apprehensive, but would you trust him? 

What if your friend was Paul Watts, owner of Watts Removal Products?  

Well, in this case, it was, and the company car belonged to Mark McDonald of Sherwin-Williams. To this day, Mark still trusts Paul when it comes to cleaning up metal. In fact, Sherwin-Williams only has two approved cleaning recommendations that won’t void your warranty: soap and water, and Watts Removal Products. We recently caught up with Paul Watts and Chris Morris, chief revenue officer, to talk more about their products and why they’re so highly regarded in the metal industry. 

If you’re wondering what happened to the Sherwin-Williams car, Paul tells us, “We came back to the shop, and I said, ‘Mark, this is all you need. It’s not that your coil coated metal panels need any type of topcoat or any type of clear coat on top of them. But what you’re missing is the right cleaning product.’ I busted out our CLEANSWEEP®, and all the paint came off like butter. HIs car looked brand new again and he was sold on that.”  

Since then, Watts developed a line of products to help contractors in the field clean, maintain, troubleshoot and remove any mark off any surface – especially metal roofing. They are volatile organic compound (VOC) compliant, water soluble, biodegradable and non-toxic. Their products have been put through 2,500 hours of testing in Sherwin-Williams labs to gain their global specification for Sherwin-Williams coil coated metal panels around the world. CLEANSWEEP is one of their most popular products, and Paul explains, “It restores and rejuvenates the panels back to their original condition. So, CLEANSWEEP is specifically for paint overspray adhesive where we can get the adhesive residue off the panels that some of the contractors leave on too long without damaging them.” 

For your overall maintenance cleaning solution, Paul recommends their CROSSOVER® multi-surface graffiti remover. Don’t be fooled by the name. It’ll remove biological growth, oxidation, chalking and tiger striping. Overall, it’s a more docile product compared to CLEANSWEEP.  

Chris adds, “The CLEANSWEEP product is your most versatile. So, for example, if we’re going to take permanent marker and write on a dry-erase board, you’d be able to wipe it off... Or maybe you know someone who puts on this beautiful new metal roof, and they decide to paint their siding with a sprayer. With CLEANSWEEP you’re able to simply apply it [to the overspray] and wipe it right off.” 

Paul and Chris love it when their products can come to the rescue, but don’t wait to use them as a last resort on a mistake. By carrying their maintenance kits with you on the job, you can limit the number of callbacks. Chris explains, “We want to be more proactive, and we really want contractors to know that oopsies are going to happen on the job, which they know... But if a contractor can fix it on site with the maintenance kit in his truck, then to the homeowner, it never happened. It looks great, and job well done.” 

With Watts Removal Products, you can remove any mark from any surface. Find before and after photos, short demo videos for how to use and information about their partnership with Sherwin-Williams when you search their website for the perfect solution.