Is the Pool Boom Over? What 2026 Means for Pool Pros

2026 is shaping up like a split-screen year for the pool industry: pool construction and remodeling cool off under higher interest rates, while the pool service business stays surprisingly steady because repairs and replacements don’t wait for “better timing.” I walk through what I’m seeing across the market and why some manufacturers are feeling real pressure even when service pros are still busy in the field.

We dig into how a soft building market creates a chain reaction: fewer new projects means fewer equipment orders, which leads to overstocked distributors and retail stores, and that eventually shows up in manufacturer numbers for major pool equipment brands. I also talk about the quieter forces that steer customer buying, like brand recognition from automatic pool cleaners and how product changes can ripple into pumps, filters, and other upgrades down the road.

Then we get practical for pool service operators. Inflation, fuel, and chemical costs keep climbing, and while we can often pass costs on, there’s a real price ceiling where customers push back or start shopping for discounted service. I share ways to protect profit without relying only on rate hikes, including trimming business “fat,” running tighter operations, and thinking about vehicles, debt, and efficiency like a larger company would.

If you want more straight talk on pool industry trends and how to stay profitable in 2026 and beyond, subscribe, share this with a pool pro friend, and leave a review so more service techs can find the show.

2026 brings a mixed picture for the pool industry: new pool construction slows under higher interest rates while pool service demand stays steady. I break down what manufacturer sales trends, retail overstock, and inflation mean for your pricing and your profit heading into 2027.
• higher interest rates cooling pool building and remodeling budgets  
• why manufacturers feel pain when distributors and retailers are overstocked  
• how pool service techs drive equipment sales at the point of failure  
• Fluidra, Hayward, and Pentair brand dynamics and the role of cleaners as a lead-in product  
• post-COVID build numbers returning toward pre-COVID levels and why service remains insulated  
• inflation, fuel, and chemical costs and how far price increases can realistically go  
• practical cost cutting ideas to protect margin without lowering service quality  
• treating a service company like a lean corporation instead of a household extension  
If you're looking for other podcasts, you can find this on my website, smallingfullearning.com. Click on the podcast icon icon there on the banner. And if you're interested in the coaching program that I offer, you can learn more at poolaicoaching.com.

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Transcript

Welcome And Coaching Program Pitch

SPEAKER_00 1:04

Hey, welcome to the Pool Game Play Cannes show. We're pretty far into the 2026 pool season, and I think this is a good time to kind of look at where the season is and what the future holds for the pool industry and how 2026 is kind of playing out in the industry overall. 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. And I'm going to say at the beginning here that 2026, if I can say the word, is kind of a mixed year. You have some weakness showing on some manufacturers, like for instance, Pentair is going to be down a little bit in sales this year. I think maybe 5-7% or even more in some cases. And that might have a lot to do with a downturn in pool construction and remodeling, which has definitely gone down in 2026. If you talk to any builders or remodelers, it's definitely a soft market. A lot of that has to do with the higher interest rates because a lot of the construction is based on borrowing money to pay for a new pool, remodeling, things like that. And if you're borrowing money at 8%

2026 Mixed Signals And Interest Rates

SPEAKER_00 2:31

versus 2 or 3%, which was what it was at before the rampant inflation we had because of the COVID-19 pandemic and the government printing money and really boosting up the economy, causing some pretty severe inflation, which we're in a more inflationary time this year because of the higher oil prices causing manufacture prices to go up. All that aside, it's basically one of those things where you can't get cheap money anymore to do any kind of remodeling or work. I know the turf company that I work with the last couple years they're down about 80 or 90% in sales because of the fact that you can't get cheap money to you know do these projects, and borrowing at 8% is hugely different than borrowing at 4%. So it makes sense that Penter, since they're one of the leaders in equipment, with Florida definitely having a pretty good year with their sales, but they're still going to suffer. Most of the manufacturers are going to suffer with the wholesale outlets being overstocked with products. Now, this may lead to some sale prices. I don't think it's going to lead to a downward trend in equipment pricing because there's a lot of factors that keep the price of equipment higher. The high cost of labor, the high cost of fuel, and there's still demand for it in the service industry. So our service end of it is definitely keeping the market floating because you know you are the boots on the ground when a customer's

Pentair Slowdown And Inventory Overhang

SPEAKER_00 4:02

pump goes out. And we have a much easier time of selling them a new pump when we're maintaining their pool than say a homeowner that's going into Leslie's, and their pump is kind of you know on its last leg, but they could probably push it off for a year and not really worry about it, and so they don't actually purchase a new pump on the spot and they kind of push it off, kick the can down the road. It's much harder to do when you're having your pool service and the pump needs to be replaced at that point, and we're pretty good at kind of pushing the customer to get the upgrade. So there's still gonna be pretty good sales in the service industry, and I think 2027 will probably trend very similar if the overstocking of the supply houses and the interest rates don't fall, and low-cost money is not available to do remodeling or building, it's gonna impact the industry next year as well. And I think rates are still going to be elevated, which makes borrowing money more expensive. So Pentare, of course, is suffering because of the slowdown in other sectors that are causing it to have an oversupply. If the retail stores aren't moving equipment and the wholesale locations have extra equipment, they're not going to be ordering more equipment, of course, and so that affects the manufacturers for sure. I did mention Floridra was having a pretty good year, but they're not really tied to the US market entirely. If you're not familiar, Florida bought Jandy, Polaris, Zodiac a few years ago, and they're actually a billion euro company, so they do a lot of business in Europe, and so I don't think they're completely tied into the US market, which is a good thing for them. If they have the European market and other markets available, I know they're in Australia too, then they don't have to really worry about just one area of sales because that gives them the advantage. Plus, they've cut like a hundred million euro in their business itself to kind of short themselves up and make them more profitable. And Hayward actually is probably doing pretty good this year as well. They have

Why Service Pros Still Drive Sales

SPEAKER_00 6:06

a lot of equipment and cleaners and things that customers like. I think Pinter might be suffering also from the fact that they discontinued a lot of their popular cleaners, the creepy crawly, the little rebel. Those things do have an effect on the industry. And I always thought that the automatic cleaners are really good lead-in for other pool equipment. Like if you have a you know a Polaris cleaner and you really like it, you'll look for equipment that's made by the same manufacturer. And Penthair was the actual leader in these in these kind of lead-in cleaners. So the creepy crawly, everyone knows what that is. Even customers that have other cleaners will call it creepy crawley. Hey, my creepy crawly is not working. It's not a creepy crawly, but they just call it that because it's such a brand name that's been, you know, batted about the pool sector for so long that it's kind of ingrained in everyone's head. And so for them to discontinue their premiere cleaner and a bunch of other cleaners might have a trickle-down effect on their equipment, maybe not a huge effect, but it's got to have some effect on the fact that now you're having Polaris and Hayward cleaners back there, the Hayward logos on everything. They go to look for equipment, they see the Hayward logo. Hey, that's my cleaner, that's the same thing that makes the cleaner. I'm gonna get this pump. So that may be a factor that is affecting them, but more or less, I think the builders that order Penta equipment aren't ordering as much equipment because they're not building as many pools and they don't have as many projects that they had in the years previously. I mean, if we use the COVID-19 pandemic as kind of like the reset mark, you know, before that, inflation was pretty low in the pool industry and pool

Fluidra Hayward And The Cleaner Effect

SPEAKER_00 7:48

building was pretty much stable. But of course, the COVID-19 pandemic, 2021, there was a peak of building where you had a ton of pools being built, and so we're down about 50% since that peak back in uh 2021. So there's been a big downturn, you know, since 2020, there's been 34% less permits pulled, and there's of course there's not a big backlog of construction like there was. I mean, back then there it was dramatic, like you know, it was like a year before you had your pool, even you had the ground broken because they had so much going on and there was so many builds that were in process. You couldn't even get equipment back then. I remember my installer, he said there was like 80 pools that were waiting for equipment for the next stage of building. This was Blue Haven pools here in my area. I don't think that's happening at this point, and I don't think a lot of people are getting the luxury pools that they used to get. You know, it's expensive already in California to get a basic pool built in. So I I really think that a lot of the bells and whistles are definitely not going to be added to pools anymore like they used to be. Everyone's trying to find ways to save some money because you're paying twice as much to borrow the same amount of money that you did back in 2021, which definitely has a dramatic effect on how much you can actually invest in your pool project in your backyard. I don't know if this is going to really affect the server side of things, but 2021 was definitely the peak. Everyone was getting a pool built, builders were going crazy, 2022 was really strong building. 2023 is when things started slowing down as rates started going up. And 2024 and 25 were definitely correction years in building. And I think this year, if you look at any kind of statistics, it's going to be down about 15% from 2025. But if you look pre-COVID, before the COVID pandemic, you had about 80,000 new pools being built across the country. And then, of course, during COVID, that number doubled, like 130,000, 140,000 pools being built. And I think this year is very similar to pre-COVID numbers. So will this affect the service side of things? Well, there's a lot of pools out there now, and there's a lot of opportunities still, but as things slow down, I'm not sure how slow things will get. I really don't think this has an immediate effect on the pool service. There's just a lot of pools out there already, and I think a lot of the effect of the new builds has kind of been absorbed by the industry already. I think again it affects more of the retailers like Leslie's and more of the pool builders themselves or the manufacturers, I should say, the supply equipment, the pool builders. If they're not ordering them, then the manufacturer has a backlog. They try to get rid of it. So there may be some opportunities for sales and lower prices, you know, equipment going on sale at the end of the season, things like that. But as far as the pool service industry, it's pretty stable, and there's actually been some growth

COVID Build Boom To New Normal

SPEAKER_00 11:24

this year, I think. If if the skimmer survey comes out next year, I think we're going to experience some growth in 2026, even though the sector as a whole is probably getting is pulling back somewhat. There's still a growth in the industry because there's still a lot of people that need pool service, people that can't do the pools themselves don't want to spend time doing it. And this year's inflation has been really no different than what we expect every year. Things are going to be more expensive and you have to pass those costs on to the customer. So we're one sector that can actually pass costs on still. If you go to your local mom and pop burger place, if you know the price of ground beef went up by, you know, what, a dollar a pound or whatever, you're gonna see that adjusted in your burger special. They're gonna raise the price to compensate. And we fortunately can still do that in the pool industry, where I don't think manufacturers can actually do that, they can't really compensate for excess inventory. And I think Pinterest actually feeling that this year that they've oversold basically, and the builders and the retail outlets have underperformed as far as their end of it. I've talked before about what to do in a down economy. Now I wouldn't say that the US economy is in a downturn

Inflation Pricing And The Pushback Wall

SPEAKER_00 12:47

in general, and I would say that a lot of the pressures that we're facing in industry are, of course, the fuel prices, which of course raised chemical prices and other prices as well. Which means that there's a certain wall that you may be hitting when you raise your prices. And this is something that kind of happened right after COVID when everyone started raising their prices. There's a wall that can be hit if your competitors don't keep up with you, and if there's a a lower cost alternative pool service company out there that's undercutting your area, that could be problematic. So that's probably the biggest concern that you would have as in the pool industry as on the service end of things is that as your costs go up and you're trying to pass these costs on to your customers, where is that threshold? Where is that wall where customers start to push back? You know, this happens in I use a restaurant example, and the same thing happens here when you're going to, you know, if you go to certain places in California, it's like really expensive for something that you kind of think, like, why is it cost so much for that burrito or you know that special? Why is it so inflated? Well, I mean, minimum wage is like $18 or $19 an hour. There's costs involved in higher rent costs in certain areas, all these things add up to the the food costing more, which means that you don't go out to eat at that restaurant as often as you used to before. But that can't be done in pool service. Customer is not going to say, come every other week and do the pool and charge me half. It doesn't work that way. So there is a wall where if the prices get too high, customers may start shopping around. And if everyone is charging similar prices, then no worries there. But there may be these companies that will give discounts, and I'm not sure how some of these companies actually make a profit when I see some of these advertisements. But you may have that as one of the things to worry about in 2027 as you finish out this year, going into next year. You know, where is the ceiling at? Where is the price ceiling? And I think that's the biggest concern that you would have to face if the fuel prices don't go back down, or if the costs of running your business don't stabilize, then you're gonna have to raise prices again. And this may be problematic. But on the very positive side, I think the pool industry or service part of the industry is very insulated from the economy, from these different changes from manufacturers not you know having too much inventory, pool builders slowing down. We don't feel the same effects, which is a good thing, and you can maybe get by with cutting some prices on your end, cutting some costs on your end to continue your business without really raising prices too much. You know, there's a lot of things that you can do. You can pay off some heavy interest loans that you you have. Maybe you you were gonna get a new truck, put it off for another year, and keep driving your current truck. I mean, there's some arguments that getting a hybrid truck is gonna save you more money, or you know, there's really not a pure electric truck besides a Cybertruck and the Rivian, and they're really super expensive, so you're not gonna save any money by going with one of those. But there is some argument that getting a hybrid truck to save money on fuel cost, minus you know, selling your vehicle for a down payment, putting that in there, the fuel savings may offset the payment, and you might be able to write off the cost of the vehicle more or less on your taxes, even though you're supposed to recapture the sale of

Cost Cutting To Stay Profitable

SPEAKER_00 16:37

your previous vehicle in your taxes, and a lot of people don't do that. There might be some argument in that arena as well that having a vehicle that is much more fuel economy, you know, even like a Ford Mavic, might be logical. You just have to run the numbers and see what works, but maybe on the back end of things in the off-season, run some numbers of how you can save some money, how you can offset some of your chemical costs and other costs in your business so that things are much more fine-tuned going forward. And this is what a lot of major companies do. I mentioned Florida cut 100 million euro out of their budget. You know, I know there were some layoffs here at the uh Florida office in my area. So there are some cost cutting that might have to be done. It's not always raise prices, raise prices, raise prices. There may be some fat you can trim in your business as well that could save you some money. And again, there may be a certain wall or limit you can get to. So you also have to look internally to ways of cutting costs without cutting your service efficiency to make things work. And I think a lot of manufacturers and retail pool stores are facing this. I mean, Leslie's closed 80 stores, and it's one of those things where making cuts will actually increase your profit margin in some cases, and your service business should be looking at things in the same kind of way. Run your service company like a major corporation, and I think you're going to benefit from that in the long run. Instead of running it like a kind of extension of your household economy, look at it more as a big company from you know, kind of an overview down and what you can do to make your company much more lean and efficient without necessarily always looking to raise prices. That's just my thought that yes, raising prices is kind of the cure all on one end, but also there's going to be a wall eventually that you're going to reach in your service area. And before you reach that wall, look internally as well. If you're looking for other podcasts, you can find this on my website, smallingfullearning.com. Click on the podcast icon icon there on the banner. And if you're interested in the coaching program that I offer, you can learn more at poolaicoaching.com. Thanks for listening to this podcast. Have you guys your week? God bless.