Message: Hello!
I hope that I have not missed the answer of this question in your shop. We are an internetshop in Sweden recently opened, you can visit us at www.kinn.com. 

Several clients have asked for Procion MX dyes, and I am trying to find an European supplier. Do you know who is the Wholesaler of Procion MX dyes in Europe? Do you know how to reach the fabricant - what is the name of the company?

I hope you are the right person to help me.

Dichlorotriazine dyes, which are what Procion MX dyes are, are manufactured by many different dye manufacturers in Asia. The European company that owns the Procion MX brand name is Dystar, but I've heard that they no longer manufacture them. Their web site lists four other classes of fiber reactive dyes under the name of Procion (Procion H-E, Procion H-EXL, Procion PX, and Procion XL+), but no Procion MX dye.

The European resellers of Procion MX type dyes that I currently know about are listed on my "Sources for Dyeing Supplies Around the World" page; scroll down for the section on European companies. You can see that a number of dye retailers are importing Jacquard brand Procion MX dyes from the US, apparently including Patchworkshop.de, Fibrecrafts.com, Quiltundtextilkunst.de, Rainbowsilks.co.uk, and Zijdelings.com. Some other dye retailers, including Quiltundart.de and Atelier für handgefärbte Stoffe, sell Procion MX type dyes not found in the Jacquard line, such as blue MX-7RX (Colour Index reactive blue 161); here in the US this and a couple of other blue dyes are called the "German Blues", and we have assumed they were manufactured by BASF, but now that Dystar has taken over the dyes formerly produced by BASF, I do not know. Synesthesia Pigments & Dyes, in the Czech Republic, apparently manufactures their own dyes, but they have only a limited range of Procion MX type dyes, which they call Ostazin S. Their prices are truly excellent, though, vastly lower than those of the small jars of Jacquard dyes. If you are willing to repackage dye powder, your best prices by far will come from buying larger containers from dye manufacturers, whether in Europe, Asia, or the US, but if you do not wish to bother with repackaging dyes, the small jars offered by Jacquard and other US companies may be more suitable, as other dye suppliers have apparently found. I believe that the two-ounce jar size is the most popular, but dye manufacturers supply larger containers. I think that Synesthesia sells one-pound (half-kilo) packages, or at any rate certainly one-kilogram packages, but I think that Dystar sells only five-kilogram and larger containers of each dye color.

In many cases, it is more economical for an individual in Europe to mail-order two- to eight-ounce (60 to 250 gram) packages of dye internationally from PRO Chemical & Dye in the US, paying international shipping fees, than to buy 50 gram or 100 gram packages from any of the European dye retailers, because the prices charged by the latter are far higher. I don't know to what extent the customs tariffs in various countries may contribute to retail costs.

Good fiber reactive dye alternatives to Procion MX dyes, which like the Procion MX dyes can be used at warm room temperatures and do not require steaming on cotton, include the Cibacron F series by Ciba-Geigy, the Drimarene K dyes manufactured by Clariant and used in Dylon dyes, Levafix E by Dystar, and Vinyl Sulfone (Remazol) dyes. (Remazol is a Dystar trademark, but, like dichlorotriazine dyes, vinyl sulfones are made by many manufacturers.)

Also see "Who is the manufacter of Procion MX Dyes?", from the July 7, 2006 entry in this blog.

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