Sherwin Williams DeckScapes Stain Review 2.4/5 (78)

I have put it on twice in one year and looks horrible after a few months. Going to try something else, for sure!!

We bought the Deck scapes toner in Natural 3 years ago. I go in in last week buy another 5 gallon on the natural toner, thinking nothing of it. I take it home, open it , and it doesn't look like the same color. Take it back in , and they proceed to tell me that since Ive bought it they have reformulated it due to government regulations. Proceed to tell me that this toner named "Natural" is the closest replacement color. My question is, why would they keep the same name…..when its not the same color?? Very misleading. We are now having a hard time matching another color to what we have already restaind(we had some old left over that we used : ( , which now has been reformulated) Any suggestions?

We have used this product several times as we are a professional painting company & it works great if the surface is properly prepped.

Typical reasons why paint is peeling etc
-Your newly installed deck/fence is pressure treated and must be left to dry out/weather for 1 year.
-You have recently had a new deck/fence installed & its not pressure treated so you go ahead & paint it but new lumber needs to weather for approxmately 3 months…we prefer to let it weather for 6 months.
-Your deck/fence that has been weathering for years and you decide its time to seal it with stain but you didnt do the following, treat it with deckwash then pressure wash to remove all the dirt, dust & grease that has accumulated over the past few years.
-You decided to use a high grit palm sander to open up the woodgrain on your new deck so you could stain now instead of waiting for it to weather but after sanding you didnt give it an extremely good rinse to remove the dust.
-Wood was to damp.
-You applied in direct sun, high heat…stain wont properly bond to the surface if it dries instantly…

Ottawa

If you have any questions or concerns about your project please let us know as we are more than happy to offer our advice.

Very disappointed – Last October I stained my deck – the wood was old as it had been built several years ago but the staff at Sherwin Williams told me it would be fine. It was a lot of back breaking work as I am a senior but I was happy with the way it looked until this spring. As soon as the snow melted, I noticed that it was peeling everywhere. Some areas are bare and others are peeling – mostly down the centre of each board. I was advised at the store to just brush the loose flakes off and apply a new (even more expensive) product over top. I was going to try that but it is like a rubbery coating and will not brush off – it just pulls back in strips so I think I will have to try a stripper – as was suggested by a competitive store. What a waste of time and money!

I applied this stain on my deck two years ago and am terribly unhappy with the results. The deck surface was treated lumber and the posts and portions of the railing are rough cedar and top railing is smooth cedar. I was told the cedar could be stained immediately, which I did. The rough cedar posts are holding up well. The rough cedar railing is pealing about 25% and the top smooth cedar has lost the majority of the stain after two seasons. At the end of the first season the smooth cedar was already peeling terribly. A Sherwin Williams rep came out and told me I probably used too heavy of a coat and it was probably too hot when I stained. I disagree that I used too much stain. I stained the railing in the shade and in the evenings so I'm not sure I agree with the temp comment either.

I waited about 10 months to stain the deck surface and of course it was sunny when I did a majority of the staining. After the first season I had probably 40% peeling and after the next season it was probably 75% peeling. My deck that was stunning after initially being stained now looks terrible. I have since stripped it and will be staining with a different product soon.

I live in Kansas where we get harsh winters and very hot summers. Sherwin Williams did provide me with stripper and neutralizing products for free to accommodate my complaint. The amount of time I've wasted because of the poor performance of this product is substantial.

I have experienced the fun in waiting to get my deck replaced and stained after almost 2 years after it was initially stained with the deckscapes stain. I prepped the new pressure treated wood after it had dried out for almost 10 months from installing it myself. Within 3 weeks, I had what looked like muddy feet had walked across the whole deck appearing. Shortly after that the stain started peeling up. I followed all preparations before applying the stain as its a big deck and I wasn't about to do it over again. I got every excuse possible as to why the stain didn't work and all of it was aimed at me in an attempt to get out of covering the warranty. The manager was unprofessional and started coming across as the customer coming into his store are mostly idiots with no qualifications to do the work. I was eventually asked how much painting and staining experience I had as that was his way of determining if I was qualified. I have painted many houses along with stained furniture. Am I a pro, probably not but I'm not a beginner either. I'll be up front with anyone who asks. The manager kept pressuring me to accept a gallon of stain along with his low-grade stripper as settlement. I stopped accepting his phone calls and emails as it eventually became condescending in tone. I wrote Sherwin Williams corporate office in detail about my experience with the manager and stain in a certified letter. That finally got somewhere and stuck a nerve for someone to get this handled. At that point, it was approaching a year and the stain looked like paint you would see on a one hundred year old barn. No resemblance to the original look after being applied. The contractor and manager came out to my house to look at the job to see what it would cost to strip, sand and stain the deck. Once again the manager was trying to leverage the contractor into saying it was how I applied it as being the cause of the failure. The contractor said he has no obligation to take any side of either party and said his honest opinion is that the stain failed because of its make up and not by how it was applied. The contractor came back out to strip the deck to see how easy it would be to get the job done. After almost an hour of 4 applications of Sherwin Williams best stripper, it still had green stain in the pores of the wood that would be visible even after sanding. The contractor refused to do the rest of the work by just staining over the old stain that wouldn't come off. I suggested after calculating out the time to strip the deck with labor as being almost 3 times what it would cost to replace the wood with brand new wood. The other contractor came out and installed the new… Read more »

After reading all these reviews I'm a bit on the fence about what to use on our new house's front porch. (still not moved in yet)

On our current home we tried most of the major brands of deck treatments from Thompson's, Olympic, Cabots & Behr. None lasted much more than 2yrs even if we bought the best grade of their product. Then two years ago we redid our deck again and a gent came along and made an offer to pressure wash our house. When finished we discussed the fact that I was going to retreat my deck and he asked what we were using. He offered he'd gone to the new water based Deckscape from Sherwin Williams and was having good success with it. When I told him I was using 4 gallons each time I redid our old deck he was agast and told me that if I'd by just two gallons of Deckscape in an opaque he would not only cover our entire deck but the front porch and steps as well. I thought he was crazy and took him up on his offer.
Well, he was good to his word, did it all and had a little left over. He said if you put it on too thick it would just peel off.

Its been two years and the front porch looks almost as good as the day he put it on. But it is under an overhang. The back deck still looks ok but I think we'll go ahead and do it again while it still looks ok just to keep it so. It is unshielded and bakes in full sun all day throughout the summer and then gets covered in leaves and/or snow & ice in the winter so it is never going to last as long as the front porch.

I've decided not much is going to hold up real long when its out in the elements but our experience so far is that the opaque water based Deckscapes has been the best. We also liked that it seemed to soak in and cure without the fumes the previous oil based products did and has lasted better as well.

I'm going to research a bit more but think I may use it on the new house since the porch also is protected by an overhang here.

used this for 2 years in a row. The water stops beading up after 2 months and the deck peels like a grape after a year. Very, very disaponited, but a bit better then thomspons water seal..

We are building a brand new deck in the upper peninsula of Michigan and will be using treated cedar. What stain do you recommend. We would like a semi-transparent stain and our builder is recommending Sherman Williams Deckscapes stain, but after reading the reviews we aren't sure what to use. Our builder said he would put 2 coats of deckscape stain on the treated cedar and that should last 7 – 10 years. What do you think?

Just had my deck stained in redwood oil based toner….it is orange!! Help, what can I do to get this changed?

I wasn't just burned once by SW Deckscapes but burned twice. I first applied it in the summer of 2010 and by March of 2011 it began peeling. Of course Sherwin Williams said it was an application issue but would give me 4 free gallons. I waited over a year and then had a professional strip, clean and re-apply the deckscape stain. Surprise but in March of 2013 my deck began peeling a second time. Sherwin Williams once again is saying it's an application issue. I have been a loyal SW customer painting my whole house inside and out with their paint. I am so disgusted with the results of this product and their reluctance to admit this product stinks that I am boycotting Sherwin Williams completely.

Applied this stain exactly one year ago. As of now it is peeling on the top of the railing and over most of the floor area on a large deck. Spent 3 weeks prepping and then applying the stain. At summer's end it was fine. Now it is a mess. Peels up in strips in some areas, flakes off in others.

I got some Deckscapes stain recently from Sherwin Williams, and it says "Premium Oil-Based Formula". I do not recall seeing any "waterborne" Deckscapes at the S-W store that I went to (not that I was looking for water-based). Do they make both types, or did they switch from water-based to oil-based fairly recently? Can anybody tell me how the OIL-based SW Deckscapes stain performs? (The stain I have just says "Redwood Toner" but I would say it is semi-transparent.) I am making redwood planters as gifts, and I want to use a stain that holds up well to moisture and UV fade. So far I have had no problems with it, but I have only several months experience with it, and have only used the stain on items that are indoors, outdoors but under cover, or outdoors but coated with spar urethane varnish. Thanks for any input.

I see this review and many of the comments are for the SW Deckscapes Toner. SW advertises their Semi-Transparent stains as having much better durability and UV protection. Have you reviewed or used the SW Deckscapes Waterborne Semi-Transparent? (I have an agreement with my painter to use this product, but I just found your site and I'm wondering if I should hassle him with trying to switch to a TWP product. I live in KY, PTP 2 y/o deck in 1/2 intense sun, 1/2 shade. It's never been treated.) THANK YOU!

Yikes, Was told to check this product out by my painter, but have to admit it concerns me that there has not been one positive comment on this product. I have over 1200 sq. ft. that needs to be done, I get full sun all day and year long and do not want to have to do this every year! Not to mention the cost of labor and product to do this and have it not hold up..What products have people had good results with?