Etching Stain

I'll tell you right up front: stain does not, in any way, protect concrete. The only purpose of a stain treatment is to add color. Quikrete will tell you to seal the concrete after staining, using their Quikrete Garage Floor Stain Sealer. All of that being said, stain is pretty cool looking, gives your concrete a really interesting and unique color, and this product only actually needs one coat, which makes applying it very quick. Compared to other garage flooring solutions, staining is expensive, there's no doubt, and that doesn't even include sealant, which won't give you the same protection as epoxy paint. If you want your concrete to have an old world, earthy type look, then this is the only way to go. Keep in mind, though, that treated concrete cannot be stained, so don't try to put down a sealant and then stain it. You have to strip all the way down to the raw concrete first.