In a recent two-day meeting with other pool professionals, we had one rule: We could no longer use the “C” word when we presented an analysis of our company to the group. No longer using Covid as a crutch is understandable. We need to move on, but it does not mean our current business and marketing strategy is still not directly affected by Covid.
When the government directed people to stay home in early 2020, my kneejerk reaction was that I would potentially lose my business. I could not fathom a world where people would be thinking about our products and services while dealing with the death, sickness, fear and tumult created from the world- wide pandemic. Hindsight is 20/20, and I was wrong. However, before my epic miscalculation, I met with my employees to deliver what could best be characterized as the “emergency plan” for the survival of the business.
I had it all planned out. Before I laid anyone off, I would start with benefits like insurance and PTO. From there, I would cut my own salary and reduce expenses anywhere I could before any employees lost their jobs. I allowed employees to express their own concerns and how they felt about their safety coming to work. It was an emotional meeting, but everyone was on board to keep going.
A few weeks later, the error of my miscalculation was on full display. Business was booming. We did what other companies were doing: We added curb-side pickup, chemical deliveries, rearranged the flow of traffic and placed barriers between customers and employees in the store, added e-commerce to our website, printed “legal” orders classifying us as “essential workers” for our techs to place in the vehicles to ease fears of being questioned by authorities, made safety red shirts with a social distancing message, and whatever else we could do to make our customers and employees feel comfortable. As 2020 ended, our inventory was wiped out, our employees were exhausted, and I, as the owner, was in what I call “the post-Covid haze.”
As I reflected on 2020, a short poem I read in college called “The Red Wheelbarrow” by Carlos Williams kept running through my mind:
so much depends upon
a red wheel barrow
glazed with rain water
beside the white chickens
I would never pretend to understand the depths of this poem, but in the fall of 2020, I could not get the poem out of my mind. It reminded me of the circle of life. A farm teeming with life, tools for the hard work needed to make a successful farm, and the blessing of the perfect amount of rain to grow crops and sustain life rather than destroy them. I know…I know…what the heck does this have to do with Covid and my response to it as a business owner? Simply put, so much depended on the hard work of our employees and so much depended on something completely out of our control. Covid, like rain, can be a destructive force, but in a paradoxical and convoluted way, it brought life to our business and our industry. It was a paradox for which I could find no reconciliation, but in the end, I wanted to celebrate the year with my company.
My fiancé did a water painting inspired by William’s poem. From there, we created cards with the painting on the front and the words “so much depends…” alongside it. I personally finished that phrase for each employee with a long and personal hand-written note of appreciation. During the three- day celebration at a cabin in Gatlinburg, we had a canvas made with the poem, and we even had cookies made with the red wheelbarrow on them. The address to the employees on the first night of the trip was very different from the one I had given just eight months earlier — one inspired by my own experience of the pandemic as a business owner and my explanation of why I chose the poem as the theme for the year.
A personal, emotional response to art can become part of a company’s identity. A poem (above), a painting and textiles (above) conveyed a powerful message in a time of crisis for Isaacs Pools & Spas.
By January of 2021, I had reconciled with the new reality that Covid changed our industry in good and bad ways. I had no idea where things would go, but I knew I would need to be flexible and adaptable.
The physical and mental damage caused by Covid aside, our industry’s supply chain problems were exacerbated by the storm damage to a chemical plant in Louisiana and
by the unprecedented deep freeze in Texas in 2021, which destroyed significant amounts of pool equipment and severely damaged the plants that provide petrochemical products and resin to our industry. Consequently, both my chemical provider and hot tub manufacturer began allocating products. Equipment providers had lead times that, in most cases, exceeded one year. Major online retailers were out of stock on most chemicals, which brought in customers we have never seen. It left us in a precarious position because our preference was to take care of our long- term customers.
Like any owner, I explored alternative suppliers for every product, but ultimately chose to sell through what we had. Chemicals were less of a concern; I wanted to avoid the long- term complications of asking our operations team to manage a slew of new products — new training, new relationships and contacts, new websites and passwords, new ordering systems, and new warranty-claim procedures. To put it another way, I did not feel that the short-term increase in additional sales would be worth the major disruption to my operation team and the subsequent risk to my company’s reputation when we couldn’t provide timely and adequate service for those items.
The challenges have continued to this day. The “artificial” spike in demand from Covid has declined over the last couple of years and appears to be leveling out. Inflation has forced us to have a laser focus on COGS and expenses to maintain reasonable profits. Supply chains have improved but remain unsteady. What’s interesting, challenging, and perhaps unsettling is how Covid- related issues have been compounded by the chemical warehouse fire last fall and the current administration’s tariff policy this year. The last five years have felt like “one darn thing after another.” It has created additional stress for us as we work to keep product on the shelves during our busy season and keep our prices adjusted in real time to protect the bottom line.
One thing is certain about our industry post-Covid: A light was cast upon our industry. The word is out. People want our products. Investors are increasingly seeking out manufacturers, distributors, and even local pool and spa companies. This is good news; it says to me that we have a viable and investible business. We did see a lot of new customers between 2020 and 2023. More pools and hot tubs were built and sold into backyards than any time I can remember. We knew we had arrived as an industry when a New York Times article, quoting an industry manufacturer, said that aboveground pools are like toilet paper and masks; they can’t be found anywhere!
Even though the peak demand we saw during the pandemic has subsided, our industry does have momentum. I will end with four strategies we have adopted to keep that momentum going.
- We made a tactical effort to utilize CRM to manage the influx of new customers and leads. We are not new to CRM, but have certainly never used it to its full potential. We have built in the automation for contacting our customers via text and email with pre-sale and post-sale campaigns.
- To protect the bottom line in the era of inflationary pressures and pricing volatility, we are laser focused on managing COGS and expenses. We do this in a four- hour monthly meeting in which we take a deep dive into those two items and how they compare to the company’s budget. We appointed supervisors for each of these categories. The controller focuses entirely on COGS. All department managers focus on expenses. We report to one another and are accountable to each other.
- Let’s all be honest: Some of the pools, pool equipment, and spas sold during Covid have issues because of manufacturing challenges. Add that to record sales, and it equals a great time to grow your service department. Our service department continues to grow, so we continue to invest in people, equipment, training, and consultation about our internal processes. Over the last four years, the service department has grown on average between 15 and 20% each year.
- There are record numbers of new pool and spa owners who lack the knowledge to properly care for a pool or spa. Translation: Customers need help keeping their pools and spas clean and chemically treated. A few years ago, we created a department of four people who do nothing but clean pools and spas. Even without advertising this, its year-over-year growth is 80%.
My post-Covid haze cleared up over time, and I came to grips with the fact that Covid wreaked havoc on people while simultaneously creating unprecedented opportunity for our industry. Still, the impact of Covid on our world and our industry will go down as an epoch-making event when the histories of this decade are written. I would argue that the terms “pre-Covid” and “post-Covid” are how we will talk about our industry and our companies for years to come.
This article first appeared in the October 2025 issue of AQUA Magazine — the top resource for retailers, builders and service pros in the pool and spa industry. Subscriptions to the print magazine are free to all industry professionals. Click here to subscribe.
