The trade association long known as the Painting & Decorating Contractors of America (or PDCA), will now officially be called the Painting Contractors Association (PCA).

It’s a change that has been in the works for a few years, according to Executive Director Steve Skodak. The ‘Painting Contractors Association’ descriptor was introduced in June of 2018, so the name had been circulating without formal adoption for about a year. This summer, the organization made it official by changing its DBA (Doing Business As) paperwork, which Skodak hopes puts to rest some confusion over the past year.

“When we introduced the descriptor, (Painting Contractors Association) they [members and prospects] began asking why we are the ‘PDCA’ and not ‘PCA,’” Skodak said. “We also found that ‘Painting & Decorating Contractors of America’ did not accurately describe our organization as it is today. We serve painting contractors in the U.S., Canada and internationally, so we needed to simplify and clarify to both consumers and contractors who we are.”

The trade association’s website address has changed from pdca.org to PCApaintEd.org and visitors will be rerouted to the new site if they type in the old address. The logo has also been changed to reflect the name change.

The ‘decorator’ term’s origin

In a PaintEd podcast, Skodak clarified that those who do wallpaper and other decorator-type work will still be able to tap valuable content that applies to their field, just as they have in the past.

The ‘decorating’ term came about because in the 19th and early 20th century, painters in the U.K. were called decorators, Skodak explained.

“When the decorating portion of it was put into our name, it was a nod to the U.K., which had, at that time, the most robust apprenticeship programs out there, and so that was an attempt to get the folks—in particular a lot of immigrants coming into the U.S.—to know and understand what that is,” he said. “Currently ‘decorator’ means something else to most so, for us, we’re not eliminating our involvement with people who have decorating as a component of what they’re doing; we’re simply more accurately describing to the public and the prospect member who our audience is.”

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