Bursting the Bubble: How Five Star Painting Help this Homeowner Repair their Plastic Shutters Blistering During the Winter

Authored by: Five Star Painting Franchise Owner, Scott Specker

One winter, we received a call from a customer that their shutters were bubbling. Before we go into further detail, please understand that any call we at Five Star Painting of Cumming receive during our Atlanta winter is cherished. The painting season slows for several reasons, including a slow-moving/real estate season, bad weather conditions, traveling individuals, etc.

This call was difficult as it was the first time this had occurred for our business location. At this point, we had been operating our Five Star Painting franchise for five years and were fortunate not to have a request that involved repairing paint bubbling.

The customer’s home was modest and located in the middle of our familiar territory in Forsyth County, or the city known as Cumming, Georgia. It was our typical customer; their home wasn't difficult to access and was simplistic. Five Star Painting prides itself on providing the best customer service in the residential and commercial painting industry. We were happy to help this customer repair the paint bubbling on their window shutters.

What is Paint Bubbling?

Paint bubbling is a sign that the paint is separating from the surface underneath. This can occur for several reasons, including moisture penetration, improper surface preparation, or a poorly applied paint job. Regardless of the reason, paint bubbling is bad because it can compromise the integrity of the paint job and lead to more serious problems down the line.

How Did Five Star Painting of Cummings Help This Customer by Repairing the Painting Bubbling on Their Window Shutters?

While on-site assessing the shutters, we indeed noticed large bubbles all over the plastic shutters. The window shutters were originally blue, and the customer wanted them black. It was a simple full house repaint service that we complete all year round, literally hundreds of times.

We immediately diagnosed the problem and began working to fix the issue. Repairing the paint bubbling involved:

1. Checking to see the type of paint we used.
2. Peeling back the bubble and looking at the underside of the bubble.
3. Confirming with the project manager who painted the house.
4. Checking the substrate (the thing we painted) to see if there was any underlying condition.
5. Checking to see if the condition was consistent all over the shutters.
6. If we can't diagnose the issue, we typically involve our paint manufacturer's representative. In this case, we did not need him.

After running through these diagnostics, we realized we needed to send a painter out, sand down these bubbles on the shutters and repaint.

To our and the customer’s surprise, when my single painter arrived the next day, we realized that old-school elbow grease would not solve the problem. We would be sanding shutters for at least a day, and further, the shutters were plastic. Taking a round sander to plastic shutters will produce the outcome that we were looking to achieve at my customer’s home.

Blistering Shutters Resolved and a Happy Customer

We asked the customer to discuss the situation. Again, since this was new to us, the customer was stunned by our professional, business-like, methodical approach. We told him “We could sand these down, or just replace the shutters.” Ultimately, we decided it would be best to replace the shutters for him.

Because of our customer service and ability to put the customer's needs before our own profit, this job led us to schedule more jobs on the street, as the customer was so happy and gracious enough to tell his neighbors about our business and craftsmanship. Contact us today if you have noticed the same blistering with your shutters while painting. We can help diagnose and repair the situation.