If you think back, you may remember a few years ago a little event known as the Covid-19 pandemic.
You probably don’t have to think hard on this one. While the most severe times from Covid are (hopefully) behind us, the impact and realities of this world-wide event are in many ways still being played out on a daily basis in countless ways.
Today, we thought we’d share some of the experiences we experienced in the swimming pool industry after the pandemic hit.
Probably the best way to describe the impact that the swimming pool industry had from the pandemic was that it was a “fortunate victim”.
While many industries’ client base and demand all but completely dried up overnight (think travel and tourism, hospitality, retail, entertainment and so on), the exact opposite happened to the pool industry.
It exploded with demand!
Overnight everyone wanted a pool (or a hot tub).
Looking back, it made sense.
If we were all going to be locked up in our homes for an extended amount of time what better way to make the home a more enjoyable place than to install a pool.
It was a realization that countless people came to almost all at once… and that was big part of the problem.
As this demand was skyrocketing to levels never seen or imagined before, the actual workforce was drying up. Many workers didn’t want to risk getting Covid.
On top of this, the supply chain (a word we are all familiar with now) was by all but completely broken. Things such as steel and accessories were simply in very short supply, or even periodically entirely unavailable. This was in large part due to the fact that like most industries, many of the materials and manufactured items come from China, and we all know the struggles that country has experienced from Covid.
On top of this, a hurricane hit a Louisiana chlorine manufacturing company that was responsible for a large percentage of the industries’ chlorine; and while this was not directly related to Covid, it definitely came at a bad time.
So, while our phone was ringing off the hook and leads were pouring in, the manpower and materials were extremely limited.
This led to the pool installation waitlists which at one point had extended to over two years! It also created a lot of juggling, hustling, stress and headaches.
While we will be the first people to admit that the alternative was much less attractive, having a huge amount of demand for your product, and being unable to fulfill it is an extremely frustrating thing.
Fast forward to today, while Hollandia is still loaded with business, we have managed to catch up and get things a bit more under control. If you want a swimming pool, we can install one in a reasonable amount of time.
While in the final analysis, we consider ourselves fortunate when compared to other industries that were hit much hard than we were, anyone in the swimming pool industry would tell you that the first couple of years of Covid-19 were very trying and we are excited to start getting back to serving our valued customers as we were pre-pandemic.
