You’re Driving Past Profit: Hidden Revenue on Your Pool Route

Ready to grow your pool business without adding long days or heavy labor? We break down a simple strategy to boost revenue using services already hiding along your route: hot tubs, water features, chemical-only tiers, and filter cleanings. With clear systems, tight pricing, and smarter routing, you can turn five- to seven-minute stops into reliable income and keep your energy high all week.

We start by sizing the opportunity around hot tubs and share a practical spa maintenance system: program consistent circulation, choose a primary sanitizer you can replicate at scale, and use compact cordless vacs for quick debris removal. You’ll learn why a mineral plus bromine floater pairs well with occasional liquid chlorine shocks, how to set a filter rinse cadence, and what to charge for standalone spas versus pool-and-spa bundles. For technical breakdowns like heaters and leaks, we explain how to partner with local specialists so you stay focused on maintenance and margins.

From there, we move to water features and fountains—another fast, visible win. We cover vacuum tools that work in shallow basins, why dichlor plus liquid chlorine beats trichlor in small systems, and how to price by size and time. Then we map out chemical-only service tiers clients love: from pure chemistry checks to baskets, skimming, and brushing. These short visits slot neatly between full-service pools, smoothing your day while lifting revenue per hour. Finally, we show how filter cleanings can be marketed as stand-alone work that often converts into full-service accounts, with fair pricing for quad-cartridge and DE systems and simple upsells when parts are worn.

• sizing the hot tub market and standardizing spa care
• setting spa runtime and picking a sanitizer system
• fast service flow, vacuum choices, and filter rinse cadence
• pricing standalone spas and bundling with pool service
• partnering with specialists for spa repairs
• adding water features with dichlor and liquid chlorine
• building chemical-only tiers to smooth the route
• selling filt

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Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome And Growth Focus
• 3:04 Coaching Program Invite
• 3:24 The Hot Tub Opportunity
• 6:46 Dialing In Spa Chemistry
• 10:41 Fast Service Workflow And Pricing
• 14:36 Repairs: Refer To Specialists
• 17:22 Route Strategy And Bundled Discounts
• 20:15 Water Features As Add-Ons

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 1:51

Hey, welcome to the Pool Guy Podcast Show. In this episode, I'm going to talk to you about some services that you may be leaving on the table or some ways you can expand, I should say, your pool service into other areas that already exist around you in your current community where you have your pool route and you can really capture some more business to expand your service with very little time actually invested in these new accounts. Are you a pool service pro looking to take your business to the next level? Join the pool guy coaching program. Get expert advice, business tips, exclusive content, and get direct support. From me, I'm a 35-year veteran in the industry. Whether you're starting out or scaling up, I've got the tools to help you succeed. Learn more at swimmingpoollearning.com. According to the research and the data, there are about six to seven million hot tubs across the USA. These are those fiberglass or sometimes they're made out of a composite material. But there are a ton of these across the US. And if you've ever been to your local fair, like here, there's the LA County Fair that I haven't been there in a long time, but I used to go there all the time. There's a lot of vendors there. California Spa's is one of the big ones, and they have these hot tubs set up everywhere. And they're pretty affordable if you buy them like at the fair, they bring them to your house. I think there were like three or four thousand the last time I was there, probably a little bit more now. And then you put these in your house, you have a dedicated 220 volt going to it. Sometimes you don't need that, depending on the spa manufacturer. And then you have this thing in your backyard, and after like a few weeks, when it starts to get cloudy and kind of ugly and murky, you're scratching your head wondering how to take care of this thing. Well, there are a lot of people like that that have these and they just leave them off, and sometimes they want to start them up again and start using them, and they don't know how to really maintain them properly. And they are a little bit difficult to maintain. I won't deny that. If you have a pool service and you've done these, they're not easy street, that's for sure. There's a lot of little things you have to do to maintain these things and keep them operating. Once you get a handle on it, though, and the basics are you have to have a program runtime all the time. So you want to program it and you have to kind of figure out each one is a little bit different. So go online and get the PDF manual. But the one of the keys is to have a runtime so that it's circulating, just like a pool would be circulating during the week. And then the other key is to figure out how you're going to primarily sanitize the spa. I find that the spa the uh frog mineral system is the combo. Let me actually get the actual one that I use so I can give it to you. I find this to be the easiest way to maintain these spas. So the one I use specifically is the frog serene floating system for hot tubs. It's basically your sanitizing minerals and bromine. So there's two cartridges. One is the mineral system, and then the other one is the bromine cartridge, and they float in the spa, and you can you know it's it's really something that is easy. And if you look on Amazon, they're getting it gets really good reviews, like almost 80% 4.5 stars. Really easy, kind of no-brainer, put it in there. And you can still, of course, shock the spa if you need to with liquid chlorine. So it's kind of an urban legend that has developed over this over time that you can't shock a spa with liquid chlorine if you're using like a bromine floater or bromine tablets in there, and that's not true. You can definitely shock it with liquid chlorine. You can, of course, go with a floater with dichlor tablets as well. There's all different ways you can maintain them. So once you find your kind of sweet spot on spa maintenance, go ahead and go with that. And the the problem you're gonna have is the usage, you know. If they if it's heavily used during the week, it's gonna take you some time to kind of get it adjusted, but you'll get it, you'll get the hang of it. And then cleaning it is fairly easy. Now, back when I first started, we used what was called the spa wand. Now they still make it, it's an ancient technology where you use kind of this suction you create by pulling on the top, and it's pretty ingenious. I think Polaris or Zodiac or Fluidia bought that and they're they sell that device under their moniker, Polaris moniker, still. But you don't need that, just get a water tech or coquito vacuum, and you can vacuum out the spas easily. So the actual point, I know I drifted here into some maintenance things, but I think it's important that you know that you can actually maintain these things for homeowners. But the nice thing about it is that once you get these dialed in, they're like a five or seven minute stop basically. You get there, you check the chemicals, you make sure the dispenser is working properly with the bromine and minerals. You add liquid coin if you need to to kind of clear it up, and then you can hose off the filter. Usually they're a tiny little filter, so maybe once every three weeks or month you hose off the filter, and they're pretty easy to maintain. Now, how much can you charge for this? Well, it just depends on your area, and if they fall into your route, you know, the average for LA County is$30 to$50 per visit, and most people will gravitate, I think, to your service if you're charging, you know,$120 or maybe$130 per per month to service these if they fit into your route. Some people in some areas, of course, you can charge more than that, and you just kind of have to set it by your market for these uh hot tubs. And of course, a lot of times you are doing maybe five or six of these a week, and that's pretty easy money added to your pool route with very little headache, maybe one or two of them are heavy use, and you have to really spend some time there. You know what I mean by that is you're spending the full seven minutes there versus the three or four minutes at the stop. So they're really easy, and I shouldn't say they're easy as far as maintaining the chemistry. That takes some time and effort to figure that out and get good at, but they're easy in the sense that you get in there, you you check the chemicals, you do whatever you need to do, and you get out of there relatively fast. And they're always covered, usually they're always heated, and it's something that if you have the runtime set and it's circulating really well, you're not gonna have a problem with it. Now, as far as fixing these things, this is where it gets kind of difficult because these take more of a specialty service, and so a lot of times you're gonna find someone in your area. I have someone in LA County that I use. If there's someone needs a spa service, like the heater's not working, or there's a leak inside there somewhere. I'll send them out there to do that because I can't fix these things. So don't worry about being able to fix them. You should be able to find someone who can fix them in your area. You can ask someone at your supplier, hey, you know anyone anyone who works on these you know hot tubs, or you can call like your local hot tub dealer here, it's cow spas, and they would probably refer you to someone that can fix these things. So don't worry about repairing them if there's a problem. You just need to know how to program them, how to put a time in there, and how to explain to the customer how to turn it on and turn the jets on. Very simple to do. Once you get you know a few of these under your belt, you'll be able to figure out each system. And in it, usually in your area, the manufacturer is dependent on your area. So a lot of Cal spas here in my area, and it's not gonna you're not gonna have a lot of divergence, you know, a lot of different systems that you have to learn, I don't think. At least in my area, they're all pretty similar. And it's a great way to build your route. So if you have like 50 or 60 service accounts, then you add 10 of these hot tubs on there, you've just grown your pool route uh income-wise really well, with very little time involved on your part, except driving to these stops, getting out and doing these hot tubs. Now you don't want to pick up hot tubs outside your service route, of course. That wouldn't be logical. You just want to make sure you kind of have them spat scattered about your service days, and so they're kind of on your route already. I wouldn't consider adding these in a new service area. There's that wouldn't be very um lucrative as far as time and money in that case, but you can find plenty of these in your service area on your service route pretty easily by advertising for them. And I've had people come out and just stop me, like, hey, do you do spas several times? And I go back there and I give them my bid for it. And some people may say, like, well, that seems kind of expensive, but you gotta explain to them that there's time involved, and you're you're going there and you're making sure that it's maintained and it's safe to swim in every week, and it, you know, there's no one that's gonna go there and do it any cheaper because then you're losing money at that point. Now, what if you have a customer that has a pool and one of these on the deck already and they want you to maintain it? For that, I do give a discount because I'm there already, and it's not a big deal for me to go to the spa and do the spa. Now, how much of a discount is up to you and your business, but if they have a spa or hot tub already separate from the pool and they want you to start maintaining it, definitely take that and give them a little discount because you're there already at the stop. I don't know, maybe charge them$100 a month or$90 a month for this hot tub since you're there doing the pool, and you know, you just want to be fair and you just don't want to lose that. You want to capture that extra money at that stop, of course. So, whatever you think is going to capture that, give them that number to get that hot tub and add that to your pool route because you're there already, so it's actually a perfect extra money kind of making. If you charge you know$90 and after one year, that's over a thousand dollars just by you being there in the backyard, so it's definitely lucrative. Other things you could take care of at properties, and I've had this also where there's no pool and there's no spa, but they have a water feature in front or a water feature in some part of their yard. Now, you may have some accounts where they have a pool and spa, and then one or two or three water features as well, and that's common in certain areas where they have the water features with the pool. And then, of course, you would charge separately to do the water feature service. The water tech devices come in handy for these to vacuum out the dirt, and you can also use the bottom feeder, which will vacuum down to as little as three inches of water, so it's great for getting debris out of these water features. And to me, I just like using dichlor and liquid chlorine in the water features. It seems to work really well, and it's something that I've been using. I wouldn't recommend using trichlor tablets because a lot of times these water features have a small motor and the trichlor has acid in it, and it'll drop the pH down pretty low in these water features or fountains with those motors built into them. So just be careful about that. You want to just use dichlor and liquid chlorine. The reason why I like dichlor is that it has some cyaneric acid in it, so it'll add some stabilizer to the water feature as well. And to me, it doesn't really matter if the cyaneric acid level is at 100 or 200. You don't have to worry about it too much if you're gonna be heavy with the dichlor and light with the liquid chlorine. No one's gonna be swimming in it except the birds, maybe, and so it doesn't have any effect, and no one's gonna be testing it, the health department or whatever. So you can if it even if it's at like a resort, you want to make sure that you're maintaining it so it's clear. And I found that dichlor and liquid chlorine are a perfect combination for these water features, and I you can keep them clear, and then you could charge depending on the size of it and the time it takes you to clean it. And it's really hard to gauge how much to charge for certain water features, in my opinion, until you actually start doing it. But you want to make sure you're paid for your time and effort, and probably similar, you know, if it's a small water feature like 250 gallons, like a hot tub. I wouldn't say that you shouldn't charge about what you would charge for a hot tub. That sounds logical. You know, a 400-gallon water feature, maybe charge what you would charge for a 400-gallon hot tub and so forth. But there are a lot of these out there as well in people's front yards, in the side yards, and try to capture some of these water features in fountains as well and bring them onto your route. Pretty lucrative, pretty easy, and it's really nice when you go to a stop and you're just like vacuuming the fountain in front and then you leave. Another segment that a lot of pool pros actually miss are the chemical-only service. And I've talked about this in other podcasts that the chemical-only service is a homeowner that doesn't want full service because he's maintaining his pool. Maybe he has a robot or he has a suction cleaner. There's no trees around there, so it's pretty debris-free. He may even have a solar power surface cleaner, and the pool is pretty easy to maintain, and he's technically savvy enough to maintain the pool and clean it, but he doesn't want to mess with chemicals, he doesn't have time, doesn't want to make the effort to go to the pool store. He doesn't want to do anything except just make sure the pool is maintained and he knows how to do that, but he doesn't want to do the chemistry. A really big market is out there for this, and depending on your area, certain areas have more chemical-only opportunities than others. But I wouldn't pass on these pools at all. You can make pretty good money doing just chemical-only stops. And what's nice about them is if you have 60 or 70 full service stops, and then you have 15 or 20 of these chemical-only stops, it really breaks up your day really well where you're doing four full service accounts, then you do a chemical-only, then maybe five more full service, then two more chemical-onlies, and it just makes your day really fast, and you're getting paid to do the chemical-only service, which is nice, and it's something that's going to make your route lighter, but also add income to your day because you're passing by these pools anyway. You might as well take them, do the chemical-only service, and then continue to the full service account at your next stop. And the nice thing about this, you can actually tier the chemical service depending on how much you want to do there. So you can do chemicals only, you can also have a second level, which is chemicals only, and you're cleaning out the baskets for the customer, pump basket, skimmer basket. You can do chemical only and baskets plus skimming the pool. And then you're getting closer to the full service at this point, but there is one more level. It's chemicals only, with brushing, netting, and checking the baskets. And the only thing missing, of course, is cleaning the tiles and doing the vacuuming of the pool, maintaining the cleaner and make sure everything's working, and also the filter service would be separate. And you can also offer that to the customer that you do filter service as well. And of course, that's one other area that you can actually make pretty good money doing, which is filter cleaning service. If you like clean filters, there's a big market for that as well. There was one summer where I needed extra money, and so I advertised that I do filter service on my truck, and I got quite a lot of homeowners that wanted me just to go back there to clean their filter. A lot of them didn't know how to clean the filter. Some were who knew homeowners that bought the house. Others were, hey, if this guy can clean the filter for me, that's great, I'll have him do it. Some were elderly, and then there were some that the filters weren't working properly, and I went there and cleaned them and fixed them, changed the grids out, ended up getting full service accounts out of these filter cleanings as well. So, this is a good service to offer too that you do filter cleanings for people, and a lot of times it turns into a full service account over time. When you get there and you're like, hey, the pool doesn't look that great, you know. You're gonna have to I can help you turn it around, and then I'll clean the filter. You charge them for that, of course, for the cleanup, and then they'll be like, Hey, the pool looks great with you cleaning it when you cleaned it, so let's just have you clean the pool every week. So the filter service is also something that you can offer if you have the time to offer it in your area. I definitely would offer filter cleaning service only, and you would want to charge, depending on your area, you know, anywhere from 85 to 120 dollars for the filter cleaning. This is a full-size filter, a quad cartridge filter or a D filter, a you know, a fairly good size D filter, and you can make pretty good money doing filter cleaning, plus you could land some service accounts as well. All these can be captured right in your service area with very little effort if you wanted to capture that market. And I kind of like it because it breaks up your day again. You're not doing like 14 full service pools, you're doing some spas and you're doing some chemical only's, and then maybe you're doing one or two filter cleans during that week, and it's a great way to make extra money without really spending a lot of extra time out there on your pool route, which is something that I think is great about these kind of hidden gems out there along your pool route. If you're looking for other podcasts, you can find those by going to my website, swingprolearning.com, on the banner, click on the podcast icon. There'll be over 1800 podcasts there for you. Also, if you're interested in my coaching program, you can learn more at poolguycoaching.com. Thanks for listening to this podcast. Have a good rest of your week and God bless.