I had a bad experience and hope to save others some money. My employer is painting the interior of our office building. I really like one of the colors and wanted to use it in my home. I got a paint chip from the building manger. It's PPG paints but I wanted to use Lowes'/Valspar paint instead.

I took it to Lowes and had the paint manager use their color match computer. I brought the gallon home and painted a wall. When it dried, it looked nothing like the wall at work, so I thought a second coat might help. Even after a second coat it didn't even come close to matching!

Today I went to PPG. The manager looked up my employer and gave me the exact paint they are using. He said the different paint brands have different base formulas, so even if you computer color match, the paint might not look at all the same on a wall. He also said the different "levels" of paint in even the same brand can look different. I got exactly the same level so this time I should be OK.

This was a painful lesson - both $38 for the paint painful, the time I spent painting, a quart of Kilz primer to cover up the color I don't like, and $20 for the new gallon. The good news is PPG gave me a discount because my employer has bought so much paint there!