The Pool Guy Podcast Show

A lot of residential pool techs learn water chemistry the hard way: a few rules of thumb, a few opinions from the internet, and a lot of costly guessing when something won’t clear up. We wanted to change that conversation, so we brought Terry Arko back on to share real news about a new training rollout that preserves Bob Lowry’s legacy while making it easier for today’s pool service pros to actual...

Summer doesn’t “start” on a date for pool pros, it starts the moment the water warms and your easy week turns into a sprint. Terry Arco from HASA joins me to unpack what really changes when pools transition from spring to summer, and why the industry can feel like feast or famine depending on weather, bather load, and how prepared you are before the rush hits. We get specific about summer pool car...

Filter cleaning is where “simple maintenance” turns into stuck lids, mangled threads, mystery leaks, and the one moment on a job that can actually hurt you. We walk through the common pool filter problems that almost never get talked about, especially on D.E. filters and quad cartridge filters with metal clamps and spring barrel nuts, and we share the exact fixes we use when a filter top refuses t...

A cancellation can feel personal, but the real damage is mathematical: lost monthly recurring revenue, a broken pool route, and extra drive time that quietly drains profit. We dig into what actually makes pool service customers pull the plug, and it’s not the knee-jerk “they found someone cheaper” story most of us tell ourselves. Homeowners often tolerate bad pool maintenance longer than you’d exp...

A pool doesn’t turn cloudy for no reason, and it rarely gets fixed by “just add more chlorine.” When water looks dull, hazy, or starts showing algae, we use a simple three-step reset that gets results fast because it treats the whole pool system: filtration, sanitation, and circulation. We start where most people don’t: the filter. A dirty sand filter, DE filter, or cartridge filter can choke off...

A pool cleaner purchase is rarely just a purchase. It’s a long-term decision about repairs, downtime, and whether the “convenient” option becomes the most expensive option three seasons later. We walk through the real-world tradeoffs between suction side cleaners, pressure side cleaners, corded robotic pool cleaners, and the ever-popular cordless robotic pool cleaner. I break down why suction clea...

Eyeballing pool chemicals feels fast, but it can quietly wreck your results and your margins. I walk through the most common pool water chemistry mistakes I see on pool routes, starting with the habit of default dosing: “a quart of acid,” “half a gallon of chlorine,” and other shortcuts that ignore what the water is actually doing. With today’s chemical prices, accuracy matters, and the good news...

The fastest way to get hurt on a pool route is to treat “routine” like it means “safe.” We’re talking about the real hazards that show up behind the gate, the ones that don’t always look dangerous until the moment they are: the quiet dog watching you work, the safety net that has to be re-tensioned just right, the open gate you swear you’ll close “in a second.” I share the practical rules I use to...

One rushed hire can undo years of hard-earned trust on your pool route. We break down how we train and onboard a new pool service employee so customers still get the same clean water, the same reliable routine, and the same professional experience they expect from us. We start with a realistic training timeline (and why three to four weeks of ride-alongs is often the sweet spot), plus the mindset...

Algae that won’t quit is usually trying to tell you something, and a lot of the time that “something” is phosphates. We dig into the real role phosphates play in pool water chemistry, why they’re measured in parts per billion, and why they don’t simply disappear through evaporation or time. If you’ve ever had a pool that looks balanced but still blooms, or you watch chlorine vanish day after day,...

Your pool service route isn’t just a weekly schedule, it’s an asset that can be worth real money if you can prove it. We sit down with Niki Acosta and Hal Denbar from Skimmer to get specific about what actually increases a pool service business valuation, and what quietly destroys it when a buyer starts digging. If you’ve ever wondered whether you can build something you can sell, this conversatio...

The fastest way to lose a new pool service customer is painfully simple: let the call go to voicemail while you’re out on route. I sit down with Niki Acosta and Hal Denbar from Skimmer to talk about a practical use of AI that actually earns its keep, an AI phone receptionist built specifically for pool businesses. We get into what AI should do for operators, save time, reduce interruptions, and st...

Some pools look like they should be easy wins until you’re standing there with a tile brush, extra chlorine, and a customer who expects miracles. We get real about the “lost causes” every pool service pro eventually faces and how to handle them without wrecking your schedule or your reputation. We start with calcium buildup on pool tile, where the honest answer sometimes is: you’re not brushing th...

One cheap tool upgrade can save you the most expensive thing on your route: time. We get practical about the small pool service choices that prevent “can you come back today?” calls, starting with something many homeowners overlook a usable telescopic pole and a real leaf rake. When customers can skim the surface, pull debris off the bottom, and clean up before a party, your weekly service holds b...

A customer tells you “no” on a repair you know matters. Now what? We dig into the uncomfortable but real part of running a pool service business: handling resistant customers who don’t want to fix equipment, don’t want to spend money, or don’t understand the risk you’re trying to prevent. I walk through how I think about customer service in a safety-driven trade, and why the phrase “the customer i...

A pump that won’t prime, a lid that won’t budge, and a pad visit that’s suddenly running long, this is where small, practical know-how saves the day. We walk through the real-world pool pump fixes that most techs only learn after enough scraped knuckles and repeat trips, and we keep it focused on what actually works when you’re standing in front of the equipment. We dig into stuck pump lids on com...

Your pool route can chew you up if you let it, and it usually starts with something you do every day without thinking: using your bare hands around chlorine and acid. I break down a hard lesson from early on when latex gloves made my hands worse by trapping chlorinated water against my skin, then share the simple switch that actually protects you long-term. We talk nitrile coated work gloves for h...

Your pool problems might not be a “bad product” or a “bad test kit” problem. Sometimes the real issue is simple: the homeowner is unknowingly sabotaging the pool between service visits. We walk through the patterns we see constantly in the field and how they snowball into cloudy water, stubborn algae, and chemistry that never seems to hold. We start with pool filters, because filtration problems h...

Your pool’s pressure gauge can save you hours of guesswork, or it can trick you into cleaning the wrong thing at the wrong time. We walk through what pool filter PSI (pounds per square inch) actually means, why higher pressure usually equals more restriction and less circulation, and how that loss of flow shows up in real life: cloudier water, weak returns, a spa spillway that barely spills, and c...

“Shock the pool” is one of the most overused phrases in pool care, and it causes a lot of bad advice. We walk through what shocking really is: raising free chlorine to a level that actually matches the pool’s chlorine demand, then giving it time to work and verifying it with testing instead of wishful thinking. If you’ve ever added gallons of chlorine and still seen the test read zero, we explain...

A green pool can make a customer feel defeated, but for a skilled pool service pro it can become the moment they finally trust you for weekly service. I’m breaking down the “amazing moments” that turn chaos into clarity, starting with the two green pool cleanup strategies that matter most: floc with aluminum sulfate when you can vacuum to waste, and shock and awe when you need a fast kill and stro...

Zero free chlorine is not a small problem, it’s the moment a pool can start compounding into cloudiness, chloramines, and an algae bloom. We break down what’s really happening when a pool “zeroes out,” why filtration can suddenly struggle, and how to bring sanitizer back fast without guessing and hoping for the best.  We start with the must-have testing mindset: total chlorine, free chlorine, and...

Your saltwater pool can look perfect on the surface while the sanitizer quietly drops to zero, and when that happens most people blame the salt level. I go straight to the real weak link: the salt chlorine generator cell. After 35 years in the pool industry, I’ve seen the same failure patterns repeat, from undersized cells that can’t keep up in summer to perfectly sized systems that still lose the...

High cyanuric acid can turn a perfectly maintained pool into a weekly battle where chlorine “won’t hold” and algae feels one step away. I walk through a practical option many pool pros consider when CYA gets out of control: switching from trichlor tablets to cal hypo tablets. The promise is simple, no more stabilizer added with every tablet, but the decision is not as clean as it sounds. We dig in...

Salt pools get marketed like a break from chlorine, but the truth is simpler: a salt system is still a chlorine factory, and many homeowners end up swimming in higher chlorine than they realize. We sit down with Todd Garino, founder of the Low-Chlo Sanitizer System, to talk about a different path, mineral-based pool sanitation designed to keep residential pools clear and safe while targeting low f...