HASA IN THE SPOTLIGHT!

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www.ncprotraining.com today it's a lot like my the ins the in my
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brain how I have my computer set up it's a crazy place that's a scary place then
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hey everybody Welcome to the talking pools podcast I'm Rudy stankwitz and I
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am here with my co-host Miss Andrea nanini I am Andrea and not a bird have
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you been what have you been up to Andrea well I'm dialing in this route that I
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took over for this person you know trying to get things fixed back up and it's been a lot of work but I have had
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people come out and tell me like oh I've noticed the pool looks so much better these last couple of weeks thanks thank
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you that's that's me well there you go that's awesome yeah it's fun cool how
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about you anything crazy not really no you know just running through the gamut chugging along getting ready for the
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next chunk of my spine to be replaced to be honest with you we're getting some more titanium I think it's pretty cool
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by the end of the year I should be fairly similar to Wolverine that's what
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I'm shooting for I'm hoping that I get those skills in this one didn't happen in the last one but isn't the metal that
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he's that's the metal is called something crazy isn't it I'm not big on like comic books it's called something
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silly anyway are you gonna have this are you gonna have it shoot out of your back a big sword that comes out of your spine
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and then you can like you know attack people backwards yeah that's the goal I'm gonna run backwards
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at people take them out wipe them all out you could do like a backflip you know you could or maybe not hey we have
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a guest with us today we do have a guest who is it our guest is Mr Terry Arco and he's with hassa so
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welcome Terry thanks for joining us hey thanks Andrea and thanks Rudy glad to be here Terry for many many years yep he is
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a known entity in the pool industry yeah that's what they tell me a known entity
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a known entity if there was a mountain Rushmore of people in the industry Terry's face would be somewhere on my
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back of it maybe I don't know I feel sorry for wherever I would carve that but uh yeah
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we could carve your faces into tabs how about that there we go all right
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Terry's with hassa and we got a lot of news going on there there's been a lot
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of news about Hossa for about the last what is this 20 23 so for about the last
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three years past has been a fairly exciting place and I have to tell you
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and I told this to Terry once before probably the the whack where we had this conversation and they caught a lot of
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crap during the pandemic they did my honest opinion is no matter what anybody
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thinks about anything they got a lot of attention because they communicated well with everyone prices going up
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plastic shortage no labor no trucks they were very sure to make sure everybody
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knew what was going on and communicated every price increase that was coming as
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soon as they knew about it and because of that you became a Target
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you got all the love that's that that's pretty true
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um also you know throw on top of that in the midst of all that one of our main
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suppliers Chlor Alkali uh you know liquid chlorine depends on Chlor Alkali
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industry in a big way uh and one of our major Alkali suppliers
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um they blew a Transformer and uh shut down for I think that's what
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really did you end because I know well yeah I know going into I mean chemically
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yes but I know going into that year I was getting some attention because I said pull them again and everybody
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thought that was cool and I know you guys were like look we are not going to run out of liquid fluorine we're not going to do it it's going to be here
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we're gonna have it we're going to have it and all of a sudden guess what yep I was going on podcasts saying it and we
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were putting up post and and it was true I mean things were tight but we were we
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looked and we were like yeah we're good we're we're not going to run out of liquid we're gonna make it until
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one day uh the the week before the 4th of July of all things uh we get this we
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get this uh you know Force Major notice from our main supplier one of our main
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suppliers the biggest supplier for us really I mean we have others but
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um yeah that they're down they they can't provide and that just you know
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what is the atmosphere in the offices like before you put that information out
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to your customers I mean that must have just been a tremendous oh moment
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well yeah as you could imagine and uh as I said that's not the only supplier
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um that there is but that was for HASA and for many uh municipalities on the west coast and
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so forth um a really huge supplier uh so there was a lot of scramble you know there was a lot of go to other places
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but the problem there was uh everybody else was scrambling too and uh it was
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like get in line and uh when you consider also that you know the EPA is going to get involved in this and the
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EPA is going to say you know human safety and drinking water is going to come before before everything else
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so now you really get it in line you know like oh well you know pools yeah you know okay pools are maybe important
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but they're not as important as drinking water so uh you're gonna take you know a little uh back of the line in comparison
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to that and we had to do that and that meant um you know uh that meant basically
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having to uh you know have shortages it meant um you know having to sort of
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consolidate what we did and who we delivered to and how much we delivered to our Distributors and uh that that was
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hard that was a hard time how challenging was it to ration those Supply I mean was that did you send to
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some Distributors and not to others did we try to celebrate the same amount was it based on sales percent I mean how did
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we ration that well that was that was the idea the idea was you know we did
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not want to play favorites with anybody we wanted everyone every distributor every whoever we dealt with who was a
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customer of hassa we wanted them all to at least get some rather than you know
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uh you know somebody gets some but then somebody else doesn't
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um so we rationed it out so that every one of our customers got they got they got Lakewood they got
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Supply but it may not have been the amount they wanted um and I mean that was just that was the
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way it was we gave everybody a little and that's how it went now I know there
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are a lot of people that feel like felt like still feel like that Hasa screwed them over during that
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time how are those relationships have going now are they on the repair are they on
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the mend or where are we at they're they're beyond the repair in the mend uh and I think I'll I'll tell you that um
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what you stated in the beginning there is because you know we could have and and I'll tell you there was other
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shortages related to um chlorine and chlorine shortages uh
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overall um even supplies uh even things like PVC pipe uh you know all sorts of things
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um equipment those sorts of things so this was all going on it wasn't just Hassan it wasn't just the liquid
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chlorine it just was exasperated by what had happened what we kind of heard was and we maybe even got some advice like
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you know uh don't do anything you know just uh go into hiding you know
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go dark don't don't do anything and a lot of companies were doing that they did a lot of Manufacturers we didn't
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hear a peep from right and we could have done that and and believe me that kind
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of was on the table that sort of decision of you know well maybe we shouldn't what what do we do what and uh
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our CEO Chris Brink um it's a great guy you know and he said no no we're we're facing this head-on
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and we're gonna get out there we're going to get in front of it we're going to just tell people everything we can about what's going on and what we're
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doing and as much as possible uh the main thing I think was really that because I'll tell you man uh I
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didn't want to open my computer up in the morning during that time because I don't blame you uh the the you know just
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what we were taking on social media uh deserved or undeserved or whatever it was it was pretty brutal
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um and but you know credit uh our CEO Chris Brink again you know he said regardless because there's people who
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said well you know just just turn it off don't pay any attention to it just you know be silent and he said no we're
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going to address it and the main thing that we wanted to address was to say you know hey yeah we know this hurts you
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know it's hurting us too I mean I don't realize but it is hurting us we know it's hurting you the main thing here is
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what we want to tell you is we hear you we're listening to you you know and so
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we're going to address it we're going to listen to your complaints we're going to listen to all the things you have to say
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and and then we're going to address those things in a manner or a way that I
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think allows you to kind of see that you know uh we're not just ignoring you we're not just slapping you off uh you
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know we we understand your concerns we understand what's going on and so you know we're gonna get out and we're going
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to speak to it uh and we're going to do everything we can to help during this time and I think we did that in a really
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good way on a positive of way uh and because we did that in a positive much
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in a little while so it's been a while since I've seen you guys up in the crosshairs there was a trade show season
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that hit right after that time and of course then then it's like we even had to make the
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decisions of showing up do we want to be there do we do we want to see these people face to face and what you know
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and it was almost kind of like you're thinking uh you know it's the end of Frankenstein and here come the villagers
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with the Torches and the pitchforks just to give you an example uh so that the first one of the first early trade shows
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after we had were kind of still dealing with the damage of this um was the one in Monterey the pie show
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and uh first day I get there and I mean I had just barely got there and I'm
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checking into my hotel and I get in an elevator and the this guy walks on the elevator and of course I've got a shirt
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on it says HASA so I guess I'm really a Target you know and the guy looks at me and goes hey so
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are you guys going to have any chlorine this year and that was the first thing and I'm just kind of like
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you know you kind of threw me back you know and I said well that's the plan you know um but to answer your question
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um yeah we I think we've gotten over that hump in a big way so
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um on that on that same line I know everywhere every type of chlorine Every
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chemical the pricing has gone up yeah do you foresee any relief on the pricing in
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the future um you know that that that's a that's a
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really difficult question to answer and it's because uh we're living in a really funky world
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right now you know I mean that's all I can say uh and I personally between you
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and me I mean I can't trust the world at all anymore if even if I did at any time it's hard to trust what's going to
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happen um and I think anybody uh that's aware and has any sense of awareness can look
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around and see that you know uh that things are just you know they're crazy right now supplies crazy and and and uh
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you know inflation and um you know just to solve that so
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um I can tell you we have no plans at this point uh to do a price increase
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um the price increases that what about the other other way
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that's another one where I don't have a crystal ball or or you know I'm not prophetic in any way since reform I I
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think that if there was any possibility that that could happen um it would probably be considered or
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looked at again I mean the way things are now I don't see that and I don't see that happening anywhere with anybody in
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the world I mean our listeners you know are pretty good at putting things together and everybody saw bio lab
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Factory Burns to the ground we know all of the weight of satisfying
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all of those customers when on the liquid and Cal hypo markets so everybody had to assume a lot more but guess what
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there's the factory now yes right so there's a factory now so yes would lead people to think okay
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there might be some decline in price on the horizon now
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I've never seen pricing go down in the industry but I've also never seen pricing go up like it has in the past
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three years either sure and I think one of my I guess initial responses to uh if
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somebody you know you saying that to me or if anyone to say that to me about you know well now we have the new plan you
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know that's okay but here's something to consider is what was
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the cost of that new plant um and not only that what is what are
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they having to pay who knows uh to EPA or whatever you know
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uh that is probably more than maybe uh when the old facility
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was there what they had to do uh so you know I think it's not as simple as you
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know hey you had this manufacturing plant that was 60 of the supply
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um and boom they burnt to the ground now they're back so it's going to be business as usual I mean I think that's
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kind of back in the day they'd build a bridge they'd put a toll booth on it and they told everybody in the community you
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know what it's just to pay for the bridge but you know what those toll booths never went away yeah that's like
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that's correct like income tax paying for the war or like uh fpl's hurricane
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tax I'm not sure if that ever went away well you're still going to have hurricanes right so well they it wasn't
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a thing until Francis and Gene hit and then it was like oh you know and then
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that was just a thing that never went away so since we're talking about chemicals um what so now that orenda is
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is part of hassa what benefits do you
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see as a result so we me and Rudy were wondering like how is the um
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you're kind of in disagreement about the chemicals and and stuff like that so how
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we were talking about how we thought you were going to reconcile that
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yeah um good questions both yeah you have very a very different belief system the
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house is more old school traditional chemical values or rendez traditionally been outside the box let's say so are we
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going to reel them in are we going to let them survive as a separate entity are we going to pull them over into the Hostile way what's going on people want
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to know yeah so I think uh let's address the uh the benefits I think that was the first
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question that was that was asked and uh I think really for um
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Hasa overall because primarily we're Hoss's big
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thing is juice you know we're providing liquid we're providing muriatic acid uh
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overall um that's mainly what I use we've been good we we've tried to
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um you know and Through the Years and and uh going back in haasa's history
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um they've they've tried to delve into Specialty Chemicals uh and so forth and
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and there was a sort of I guess you could call it a Hasa specialty chemical
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line that was developed a lot of people don't even really know about it uh because it was something almost really
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that was more created uh so that you could pack out a a trailer
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um you know so you weren't shipping half a trailer of just liquid but you could pack it out with some other things and
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it you know you got a little bit of something out of it or whatever uh but we really that was not what we were good
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at um but you know um there's certain Specialty Chemicals
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like enzymes I think enzymes are are good um certain types of clarifiers and and
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um you know my history and the pool business goes to I I had 24 years of my
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life was at cclear uh they made kaidasan clarifier which I'm going to just say is
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probably the best form of a clarifier you could use in a pool for many reasons and I'm not biased but I believe that so
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um you know and and that's something uh that was in the Orinda line
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um you know and actually their supplier was the original kind of sound supplier so it's uh it's a good product so I
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think that there was you know Orinda has has really come a long way in building themselves as a brand
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um and despite what anybody thinks about uh the chemistry or or that philosophy I
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don't think you could argue that you know they've got good solid products they've got a good solid line they've
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certainly built that brand and built their name uh over the years to where
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um they have an incredible following um of cool text and Pool Pros and Commercial users
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um of that product so I would say that is initially what drove
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us to and you know I mean let's be transparent and honest I mean
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we acquired Orinda but I'm we were looking at other companies obviously too
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um but Orinda seemed to be the one that we really felt from the standpoint of branding
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um you mentioned NSF I mean okay let's talk NSF they have that NSF you know on
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all their products and uh they built a good quality product the other thing too I'll say is I think that
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um they do a really good job of communicating um to the pro and again whether we agree
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with maybe the philosophy or the education of what they're teaching uh they're doing a very good job and they
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they they have huge response um from that standpoint which we don't
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do well at Hassan uh we really don't don't do that well and so use the app
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pretty much daily so yeah yeah yes um and so that was a big part of I think
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kind of on the benefit side that that drove us to that obviously so now let's
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talk about um the education and the chemistry and
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I think what you said Rudy about you know Assa is a little more I guess I
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hate use in the word old school but that's what people say um because I share the same belief
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system that I have that yes tried and true and here comes this just let the pH
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do its own thing right where are we at right right well
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um so first of all uh uh the biggest concern I had going into
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this um with uh some of the uh philosophy of
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Orinda and so forth and of course um you know Orinda has and they've done
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it well um but it's it's uh LSi and it's LSI first range chemistry
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second and they've developed a lot of things behind that and a lot of technique behind that and some of it I
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think is beneficial and and good um where the the only place where I had
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a problem was that if you're going to say okay LSI first range chemistry
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second and if you were going to take your LSI and say Okay um
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I've got my LSI lined up but let's just say that
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in getting your LSI lined up your pH happens to be eight
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um or your total alkalinity is you know 60 or something or or below in
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other words you're you're not in standards but your LSI is lining up which is
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possible you could do that um and then to instruct or say you know
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yeah so as long as your LSI lines up but your Chemistry or or one of your values
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is off as far as standards go well that's okay don't worry about it um and so that's where I had concerns
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and I don't know how much that was really happening and I don't I don't even want to speak to that but I do want
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to say that that was a concern so my main concern and it's because I'm a person who serves on the phta
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recreational water air quality committee and I'm also by the way on the standards
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Review Committee so I'm reviewing phda standards and and we're going through every publication
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because we merged with nspf so now there's a bunch of other you know stuff we have to get on the same page there
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from that standpoint um and I've taught basic water chemistry
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uh basically along the same lines as Bob Lowry teaching basic water chemistry and
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it was always according to range chemistry and it was always according to standards
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um and we could go off way more on that on just liability and everything else but let's just keep it at standards uh
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and you asked about okay so what are we going to do are we going to let them go with the way they go and are we going to keep going we're going and I'm going to
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say yeah right now we are okay um but
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but with the caveat that you know um we're going to teach standards on
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either side so uh we're going to be really careful about saying you know
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they if your LSI is good but your pH is eight well okay the max is seven eight so we're gonna work with that um and we
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don't we don't want to get you know uh anything kind of going off on on that from that standpoint the
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other thing that I will say is um and we've had a lot of conversations
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on this um I I don't think that we're all that
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different in a sense and here's why I'll tell you why um you know uh I'm teaching the pcti the
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Bob Lowry course I was going to bring that up yeah um and we teach range chemistry and that
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and I've taught range chemistry and all anything I've taught in all my teaching for for
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30 years um and really if you think about that
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and I know for sure in what I teach with Bob Lowry that's all operational chemistry
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it's basically uh this is for you have a pool that's up it's
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running it's in temperatures that are swimmable you know so the 75 to you know
24:28
whatever 85 90 degrees it's it's being maintained it's being treated on a
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weekly you know twice weekly whatever basis and this is a system that's
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designed to maintain and control that pool um and I think anybody could agree with
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that uh and what when we talked about what orinda's doing with the LSI and if
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you look at the Orinda Academy some of these things whatever A lot of it has to
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do with startup a lot of it has to do with starting up a pool a lot of it is based on they talk a
25:04
lot about temperature and a lot about what your calcium is going to do at certain temperatures and
25:09
that gets into kind of winterizing what the pool is going to do over the year and then you're going to be starting it
25:15
back up and those kinds of things and I and again I'm going to say and I've looked at a lot of their material uh and
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I feel like from that standpoint they have some good points to offer and so
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what we've talked about is I said look what what I teach I'm teaching
25:32
operational chemistry you guys what you're teaching you're teaching kind of more
25:37
with winterizing and starting up from the spring and temperatures of the water
25:43
and where that's going and and making sure the LSI is Good from that standpoint and so I think that's more of
25:50
the differences than anything else and there's some other things like this about the cya and the you know the
25:57
Henry's law and the pH rough and stuff but again we're addressing those we're addressing those so okay I have a list
26:04
of reasons I don't like the pH higher I've discussed them before so I'm not going to go through the gamut now that's
26:10
something this is about right it's not what this is about but we can compare notes afterwards but well when I use the
26:16
app I start with the ph and I put it you know because on the left side you no I'm interrupting you
26:21
[Music] I'm interrupting you on the left side on
26:27
the left side on the left side you have what's your chemistry is and then on the right side you input you know what you
26:34
want it to be sure and then that's where I start so I always will start with putting it at 7.4 because I'm with you
26:42
guys like I don't like you know I try to keep it at 7.4 it's never usually that
26:48
when I show up to the pool and then I gotta fix that but you know I that's where I start I'll do 7.4 7.6 and then
26:56
I'll go through the rest of the numbers in the app to get a balanced LSI and then get to where I feel like the
27:02
chlorine is going to be effective and all these other things so well Rudy you're a CPO instructor I'm a
27:07
CPO instructor uh and you know I we teach LSI and the CPO and I and and I
27:14
just know one of the big things when I teach the LSI and the CPO and there's adjustments usually the first adjustment
27:21
is always pH correct um overall um so uh
27:26
yeah so Andrea that's that's a good thing I I agree I have everybody bring
27:31
everything to the ideal range total alkalinity calcium hardness pH and
27:36
it usually gets you there Rudy and Andrea will be right back with
27:42
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download on Google Play and the App Store you mentioned teaching Bob Lowry's class
29:42
yes can you go a little bit deeper into that for us because he was a friend of mine he was a
29:48
friend of yours he was my mentor for many many years but there is this class that he has and sadly Bob's has passed
29:54
but you guys you're teaching it you're rolling out forward with that I know you taught it with them but you're continuing to do so share yeah
30:03
um well so uh same here I mean uh I met Bob like you know I don't know probably
30:10
almost I hate to say 40 years ago that sounds really terrible um but it probably was and uh you know
30:17
when I met Bob uh you know I was a I was a pool guy I was a lost pool guy didn't
30:23
know what the hell I was doing and it was really hard to get a lot of information back then
30:29
um you know unless somebody at the counter or you had somebody that was gonna you know uh and usually it was manufacturer's reps and you didn't
30:36
always know if that was correct so um but I met Bob and I walked into a
30:42
class took a class of his basic water chemistry at the Western Pool and Spa show uh which at the time was in
30:48
Pasadena California so that's how far back that goes um and uh yeah so uh after that it was
30:57
like 35 plus years of Friendship with him and uh just learning from him and
31:03
that helped me tremendously uh in my uh career
31:09
um so Bob uh you know I think everybody kind of knows the legend of Bob and the pool industry
31:15
and so forth but I want to say about 10 years ago um and he met up with a guy named Greg
31:21
Garrett who also sadly has passed away um and Greg uh taught primarily startup
31:29
uh another another industry great for sure yes yes uh for NPC National
31:36
clusters Council so the two of them got together and they just they formed a friendship as well they started talking
31:42
and in there talking they were they were pretty much uh I guess downtrodden that
31:47
there didn't really you had CPO and CPO was primarily for a commercial
31:52
operators or commercial operators and Aquatic Facility operators that kind of thing but they kind of felt like CPO and
32:00
most Pool Guys gals that were even doing residential were encouraged you know
32:06
take the CPO take the CPO but in a lot of cases for somebody who's just doing residential polls CPO is Way Beyond
32:14
them or even even material that they even needed to have and Bob and Greg
32:21
both uh they talked a lot about this and they like they they came to this conclusion like you know there's really
32:26
not anything that's specifically for a residential sort of backyard pool Pro
32:34
with an operational pool who needs to know and have the best way to maintain
32:39
and operate that water chemistry so that uh the the pool is is consistent
32:45
weakened and weak out um they're they're able to use less chemicals uh you know they're they're
32:52
able to maybe uh saving their costs and so forth um and just really have a really simple
33:00
uh strategic way to keep those pools good
33:06
weekend and week out and and there's not anything that really hones in on that
33:12
and of course you know Bob's background with just basic water chemistry and with Pool Pros and and Bob really had an
33:19
affinity for the backyard pool Pro I mean hell the guy went to work for almost three months for a pool company
33:26
uh for no charge so don't pay me I just want to ride along with your guys and I want to see what they're dealing with
33:32
day in and day out you know um and that's the kind of guy that that he was and so they developed
33:39
um Bob and Greg together they developed what was known as the pool chemistry training institute that was in 2018
33:47
. um Bob developed a book around that it's a 258-page book called uh pool chemistry
33:53
for residential polls uh he also just before that had written a small little 26-page book which is called who chemist
34:01
uh hook chemistry for service pros which is sort of the synopsis of the big
34:06
book um and they launched that uh with the idea that this is going to be a one day course like six seven hour course uh and
34:15
we're going to give an exam just like they do in CPO um of what you've learned and you pass
34:20
the exam and you get a certificate you get a patch um you know we provide you with ongoing
34:27
information and education and so forth through Tech sheets and things like that
34:32
um and so they launched that in 2018 they started going out teaching it live uh they were doing it at trade shows
34:39
things were going along well um but you know uh uh Bob had a uh a health issue even at
34:47
that time he was diagnosed with a what was called a fatal lung disease
34:53
uh at the time he was diagnosed which I think was like 2016 maybe something like that
35:01
um they told him basically he had two years if that
35:06
um and so every day was just what it was every day was a gift
35:12
um and uh and he knew that but I mean man you know the dude was a Green Beret so he was tough as hell you know and he
35:19
didn't let like that stop him so he kept going and uh was teaching these classes but you know he realized what
35:25
was going on and he had his wife Sylvia who's just a beautiful person and um you know him and I started talking
35:32
more and more and I loved the course I attended the course I went through it I thought well this is great you know it wasn't perfect it had some things where
35:38
it needed Improvement and I talked and shared that with Bob um and as we talked more and more you
35:46
know he began to say you know I'm obviously he knew I'm not going to be here forever uh I have a wife I'm
35:52
concerned about and uh you know I'm looking at probably selling this off at some point
35:58
so when he said that uh and I was with Hossa and I think I had just gotten hired with Hossa only about a year or so
36:04
in uh and uh you know I said I mean I went to the folks at Hossa and said look
36:10
if you want a great education program this is it um so let's work out and and we did uh
36:16
so we worked out a deal and it's interesting that kind of right in the time that all that was happening
36:23
uh as it turns out sadly uh Greg Garrett died very suddenly
36:29
um and Greg Garrett was the U.S office of pool chemistry training institute uh he was pretty much all the
36:35
administration and so forth of that at that time because Bob was in Peru uh he lived his wife was Peruvian and he
36:42
lived in Peru uh well so when Greg passed that all went away uh that just
36:48
it was gone and uh so Bob was pretty much left just to
36:54
himself and trying to operate this thing from Peru and keep it going and
36:59
um so that's when Hossa got involved and we partnered with him really is what we
37:04
did in the beginning you know everybody thinks we just kind of you know took it from him or bought it from him you know
37:11
to make money and all that and that's totally not true that I've not heard yeah some people say that
37:18
um and uh it's wrong uh because that's not what we did whatsoever at all and in
37:23
fact the deal and the partnership was really uh more so for us to keep it going to
37:29
keep his legacy going um and to be able to um uh after Bob
37:35
passed uh to uh make sure that uh Sylvia had um some income coming in from you
37:43
know what we the deals that we worked out with Bob so uh that's kind of been the way it's gone so I've taken it from
37:49
there and um it's it's been a bit of a struggle uh
37:55
you know because there's a lot to it um but uh we're keeping it going
38:01
um and we have some plans to actually um
38:06
make it more virtual make it more accessible even than it is now to a broader
38:12
number of wool pros and pool techs because we realize that a number one uh not everybody can get to
38:20
a live destination or not everybody's not at trade shows um we do online courses
38:26
um but sometimes not everybody can take a Saturday off or whatever
38:32
um so what we're uh looking at moving ahead is making it available as kind of a a virtual course as well that so
38:40
somebody could like with CPO like the fusion uh course with CPO so that's kind
38:46
of the next phase that we're uh going towards and uh but I will say um it's
38:52
been very successful we've had great classes we've had some great online classes uh I think since since Bob has
38:59
passed um we've had about almost 300 uh
39:06
texts that have gone through and gotten certified when Bob's first came out with that program he had talked to me about
39:13
teaching the course of course yeah send me over the slides to look at and unfortunately between afo CPO and then
39:20
some other things I had going on I just didn't have room in my schedule for it but I did look through it and looked to
39:26
be a great program let me ask you this because it kind of ties in you so you picked up that asset did you pick up all
39:33
of the Bob Lowry assets um no not not not all
39:39
um we uh basically what we mainly picked up was all pcti
39:44
assets the Publications the slides the course the uh the name the um you know
39:52
all the certificates and patches and all the artwork and all those things um copyrights and all that
39:58
um along with that we did get uh because Bob wrote um well several ipsa manuals that's where I
40:06
was heading um and um so we do have uh copyrights to uh basic training
40:15
chemical Manual of ipsa the intermediate manual the Spanish versions of those
40:22
um he also had a um a book which was a handbook on chlorination
40:28
um which was yeah that was published earlier book uh it's a great book and we
40:33
we have the um the copyrights to that Bob had a skill in taking extremely
40:40
complex information and making it very easy for anyone to understand and that
40:47
yeah that is not something that everybody has no and that's that was his
40:53
gift and uh and that was his and I'll say that was his passion also I think he
40:59
realized that was his gift I think he related to it I think he related to just you know the um Grassroots
41:08
tax you know and that's who he loved to interact with and he loved being able to
41:15
kind of take complicated chemistry and and and figuring out ways that he could
41:20
make that uh usable um you know not just to get up and and
41:25
for people to go wow this guy's smart but to be able to they could sit in a class and then they could go the next
41:31
day and they could put into practice what Bob had taught them and it would work and that I think he had a passion for
41:38
that that's really what he wanted to see happen and I think that's in pcti um the cool chemistry training yeah
41:45
so Andrea and I have this theory that every saltwater pool should have
41:52
automation on it for feeding acid so can this yes can
41:57
this thing feed acid see because you have this product you
42:03
have this product it's called a liquidator I have the Barbie Dream House size that's what I add here yeah so yeah
42:10
that's the um and that's actually we the we had an older version which we called the Liquidator uh that that version that
42:16
you have that newer one is we call that tahasa liquid feeder uh acronym is the
42:22
HLF because we think that's it does say that on it if I actually turned it around in red before I opened my mouse
42:27
the HLM oh and so I'm gonna tell you real briefly about the idea that's
42:33
behind that is that product there uh it's not real sophisticated and it
42:40
wasn't designed to be all that sophisticated it really was designed to be a
42:47
um liquid version of a tab
42:52
um an inline tab theater uh and if you were to look at the video or read the directions on installation
42:59
you would see that it's basically like installing a tab feeder there's no
43:05
electricity anything like that involved with that unit it works uh completely
43:10
off the Hydraulics of the system um so it's got a um uh you know the the
43:17
end part of that which is gonna which comes off of the return um and then the outflow goes to the
43:24
suction side um just like a tab feeder and I have a dial where I'm controlling the water and
43:30
you've got a little simple flow control um and so it's got water in it from the
43:36
pool system and then you add liquid to that uh and then those mix uh in you
43:43
know in the unit itself and it's slowly you know depending on how you put that flow or whatever it goes out uh and
43:50
feeds liquid kind of on a as need basis um and and that was the idea behind that
43:57
it wasn't to try to make something really automated or sophisticated it was more so you know
44:04
because because the biggest thing you're going to find in Andrea you know maybe you deal with this because you said you
44:10
do liquid and you're in Florida so I don't know if you use Jerry jugs that you fill up from the big gasket I do
44:16
container yeah uh but I mean I think you would say or kind of know that it's a
44:21
it's a little bit of a um uh let's say labor intensive to haul liquid into
44:27
somebody's backyard all the time when you have to put it in it's not that simple of a thing or it's not like you
44:33
know bringing tabs in and throwing them into a feeder it's a little more and and I know where I did pools in Southern Cal
44:38
you know we didn't have the Jerry jugs and all that we had the hosta cases with the gallons in them uh and uh you know
44:46
the other thing is uh with you know is liquid gonna make it through the week this kind of thing you know well maybe
44:52
we need to leave some behind um and so there was all those kinds of things where it's a little bit
44:58
um you know clunky uh let's just use that word and so we were trying to make it less clunky uh by saying no well hey
45:05
here's a a little unit you can install and it takes 20 minutes to install it
45:11
doesn't use any electricity it works like a liquid tab feeder and you can have liquid feeding in there on a daily
45:17
basis if need be so now you're not having to haul it around so much you're not having to leave it and depend on
45:23
customer to put a gallon in on Wednesday you know or whatever so that was the thought behind that you know it wasn't a
45:30
lot of real engineering overall well so I'm actually really interested that in that hold on I have a couple of
45:36
questions no because I'm thinking in my head cold
45:42
like is there uh you said there's no electricity or anything so does it just continuously so it only works it only
45:48
works with the system when the system's on uh so it's working off of the Hydraulics of that system okay yeah so
45:55
you're drawing um into the you're drawing water into the unit from the return line either
46:01
ahead or behind the filter on there and but you you hook it into there just like you would like a tab feeder you know
46:07
where you'll drill and tap you know and you've got a little fitting that goes into that and then tubing comes off of
46:12
that um and then there's tubing that comes out of it and it'll typically go in
46:18
front of the pump or or we have it set up if you want you can actually put it into the pump if you want
46:25
um so before before anybody freaks out about that about oh going into the pump it's diluted it's diluted chemical and
46:33
usually or typically at the dosing that we have set up for
46:39
um it's about three to five PPM going in to the front of the pump of chlorine that's diluted with water so Norm so
46:46
it's like normal pool water it's like normal pool water and I mean yeah you consider if you shock a pool
46:52
you can have 10 to 20 PPM in the pool that's going in and then but but that's
46:57
diluted that's diluted so that's where you have to kind of sometimes people go oh you know you're putting chemical in
47:04
to no we're not we're putting basically pool water pool treated water into the
47:10
phone so it's funny that you bring that up because um one of my last pools today and I did
47:15
this to myself and I wanted to kick myself in my own butt I because I forgot I was going to do this so this morning
47:20
part of the reason I got up so early I went to this big big pool that I have already and I have talked about 175
47:27
000 gallons and it's set up like a commercial pool so it's got a vac DE filter and it's got chlorine tanks
47:35
um well it's got chemical tanks excuse me and Stenner pumps so I actually just had to go lug like
47:43
six to eight jugs and the Jerry jugs where I am they're two and a half gallon
47:48
so I had to park you know my truck and then walk all the way I don't even know how far it was it felt like a mile you
47:55
know walk the drugs back to the tank fill it up but this seems like it would
48:01
well yes for that pool I'm not sure um I don't
48:06
know that it's a big pool I don't think it would be the best candidate for this this is really designed for I would say
48:12
maximum 60 000 gallon pool okay um and really you're kind of just basic
48:19
backyard pool I mean that pool you're describing to me if it was going to be on liquid I'd say it might be worth it
48:25
to just you know have a controller and uh you know um like peristaltic pump
48:31
going into a dress yeah that's that's what I have right now on there and the chlorine's just going and it wouldn't
48:36
replace that in any way shape or form it's more for your kind of just average backyard pool
48:42
um and you don't want to be using tabs uh right and you definitely want to use Liquid but you want a way to you know
48:48
not have to be sort of hauling it back and forth or thinking well is it going to make it through the week what I put in uh and you don't want to depend on
48:54
the customer to put that sort of middle of the week dose in in the in there
49:01
I like the concept I like it yeah well I'd be more than happy to get you one to
49:06
try so oh cool I don't know why you don't get deliveries get just
49:12
liquid delivered to that pool um at 175 000 gallons you're down in
49:19
South Florida you're going to go through liquid I just don't see why what do you
49:25
mean like like have the jugs dropped off or do you mean have a truck come out
49:32
um like a bulk or a mini bulk yeah kind of thing yeah I don't know I'm I'm it's on an
49:40
island so I don't know they don't like trucks on the island it's it's Jupiter Island I don't know I mean it's I'm not
49:47
saying no I don't know yeah can we put muriatic acid in this no no just bleach
49:54
okay liquid only sodium hypochlorite got it um done yeah so
50:01
perfect now you guys I there's so much to talk about
50:06
Terry you guys supplied Jamie Foxx with chlorine jugs so he could go out and
50:12
kill vampires how the hell is that that's awesome yeah so I that's a that's a really interesting story because and
50:19
and again I only had been with hosta maybe a year when that first um and so I get a call transferred from
50:25
the main office and they're like you know hey uh there's this guy that wants to get a bunch of empty cases from us but like we don't know what's going on
50:31
so can you call so I call this guy you know and uh he you know he says yeah I'm uh I work for a props Department in
50:39
Hollywood so that's what he starts off with you know and he says um and uh we
50:44
want to know if we can get like empty bottles those yellow you know with the white and then those orange ones that
50:50
have the red like those whatever those are we need to get a bunch of those and can you send them to this address in
50:55
Georgia blah blah blah you know so you know I mean you got to be concerned about everything these days you can't really trust anybody you don't
51:01
know what the hell is going on so I'm like I'm like well well yeah what do you want those for you know and he goes oh
51:07
we're going to use them in a movie you know so I go okay well but then I start thinking well what kind of movie
51:14
because you know we don't want hassa you know I mean we don't want to be in
51:21
any kind of uh no porn bad yeah and there's there's Hossa in the background
51:27
right you know that wouldn't send a good message you know so I'm like you know look I need to ask you a little more
51:32
like before I can do this you know so then they get the guy broken he goes look I I work with Netflix
51:38
uh and their prop department and he goes we're doing a movie right now and they're doing a movie about a guy who's
51:43
a pool guy but he's also a Vampire Killer okay so then I went I was like all right
51:51
I'm liking this so I said tell me more you know and he's like well yeah so and
51:57
and uh so so that the really funny and interesting thing was is he said well you know
52:02
because they were in Southern Cal doing some of it and then they did filming in Georgia they were all around but but
52:07
they but the the main director of this movie was in
52:12
Southern Cal and they got this truck the truck that you see in the movie which is really a cool truck and they had the truck all
52:19
decked out with pool service stuff you know the pole the vacuum buckets of tabs
52:24
and you know everything it's all decked out and so they they bring it to the director and the director goes
52:31
hey where's those yellow and like red cases
52:38
those plastic things that I see in all those Pool Service guys like my pool service guy has them in his truck where
52:44
are those those need to be in there it doesn't look like a real pool truck if those aren't in there
52:49
so I thought that was kind of cool that's funny oh that we're we're kind of that iconic at least yeah so you knew
52:56
about you knew about the movie way ahead of time obviously yeah
53:01
did you ask for a screening a pre and I did offer I said hey look uh I'm a pool
53:07
guy if you guys need somebody to give you technical advice on site uh I'm more
53:13
than willing to do that you know and they kind of said yeah no we don't really need any help so last year
53:18
speaking of California last year something came to legislation that came
53:25
up about uh trichlore tax yeah a tax on stabilized chlorine
53:32
tablets in order to gain money for training to be used to educate the
53:38
public on the challenges of using triclore and we This
53:45
was later discovered that and correct me if I'm wrong that Haso was supporting this in some
53:54
way what's what's going on this has also been lovingly called the Hasa tax so
54:00
help me out here with this it was actually uh
54:05
in the mind of a uh a Senator Senator Ben Allen I believe um who happens to live in the same
54:13
district where um our CEO lives so it's
54:18
yeah I mean you know if you look at haasa's web page and you look at kind of how we promote ourselves one of the
54:23
things we promote is about the environment and we're really big on the environment and our uh our deposit model
54:29
with you know the house of Santa Clara and the plastic cases and the plastic bottles that get returned and then put
54:36
back um you know we really are proud to say that that saves a lot going into the
54:42
environment saves tons of plastic from going into the environment or into the oceans and um our CEO is really a big
54:48
advocate for the environment overall in a lot of ways um and at the time that this came into
54:55
fruition you got to understand California was in a major drought
55:01
um major and there were a lot of restrictions going into place and things like that
55:06
um and also the same time we're beginning to learn more and more more about
55:12
cyanic acid uh the effects of cyanuric acid and you
55:17
know the um really primarily if you look at uh phta documents if you look at the
55:26
whack you look at Health departments anything what do they say about if you exceed the you know now it's um I think
55:33
with with the uh model aquatic health code it's 90 now I believe but uh phda
55:40
it's still 100 in state of California it's a maximum of a hundred and so we
55:45
pull a lot of those papers and they're saying you know if you exceed this uh you know you need to drain some or all
55:53
of the pool and all of the recommendations now are 30 to 50.
55:58
um so a lot of the stuff that's being brought to light on the how that affects disinfection uh and so forth that have
56:06
come to light and um from our I would say kind of upper
56:14
management and Leadership at Hossa um and being in California and seeing
56:19
something to wear you have consumers who are using uh
56:24
tri-color tablets or dichlor for that matter and there is nothing on the labels of those products to tell them uh
56:33
that they are um maybe unknowingly uh contributing
56:39
cyanuric acid levels to increase their pull to a place where it might be
56:44
required for them to drain the pool unnecessarily so that was kind of the
56:51
impetus of this thing going forward and at the time I think it was also felt uh
56:57
by you know certain people or or some in the
57:03
leadership that the industry wasn't really addressing this uh you know
57:09
completely uh in that way or that the consumer wasn't really getting informed uh as to what they were really doing if
57:16
they are going in and buying tricolor tabs and using them week in and week out but you can see see how and of course
57:22
this was this and and just to clarify this was only on
57:29
tabs that were purchased retail not wholesale correct is the wording okay so
57:34
one there's a fear that once you open the door to that of course then
57:40
the tax on Commercial purchases wholesale purchases isn't far behind also you can see how the big liquid
57:48
chlorine manufacturer supporting this tax increase on trichlore tablets
57:56
with money going to somebody to train the people and of course you know that I
58:02
have no idea who was going to do the training on the education of it but people did suspect that it was going to come back to Hasa and that Hossa was
58:09
going to do that training and that this whole thing seemed extremely self-serving
58:16
yeah well I can tell you that that was not the intention of it at all
58:22
um the intention more so was um uh basically uh
58:29
uh between the bill that came from Senator Ben Allen and Hoss's involvement
58:35
with that was strictly from the standpoint at that point of water conservation
58:43
um and consumers being unaware of a certain product that they were using that could lead to
58:49
um you know uh the unintended uh draining of pools or maybe where they
58:57
wouldn't normally need to be drained as quickly or as often they may need to be drained more often and that would be a
59:03
water waster at the time um I can tell you also that you know there still was that intent in
59:11
I guess the background of a way this was kind of sort of designed to be a little
59:17
bit of a wake-up call to the industry and um and and it was and it is and so I'll
59:25
tell you just to bring you up to present date on it uh first of all the bill is the bill is on hold
59:33
um it's it it's been placed on a one-year hold before it's gonna even do
59:38
anything if we're you know it does anything at all at that point um and the reason for that is that
59:45
um you know we reached out and the industry reached back uh to us
59:51
um and we had cpsa who contacted us um you know California Pool Spa
59:59
Association obviously and they're you know everyone was made aware of this you know ahead of time we didn't try to hide
1:00:04
anything you know we went to everybody and said hey this is this is this here's this bill and we're supporting it
1:00:12
um and one of the reasons we're supporting is because we feel like the industry has to kind of Step Up
1:00:17
and do a better job communicating particularly to the users you know and and when I say users I don't mean pool
1:00:23
guys because pool guys should know we hope you know but the end users which
1:00:29
would be the consumer whether it's a consumer who's having a pool Pro take care of their pool who is using tricolor
1:00:35
tablets and at some point it's going to come up to them go oh by the way uh I tested your cya and it's over 100 so I'm
1:00:41
gonna have to drain some of your pool okay well why well because I use trichlor tablets okay well those are
1:00:47
chlorine tablets what does that mean well they put cya okay I don't know any of this and the labels don't tell me and so then
1:00:54
if I'm a do-it-yourselfer pool consumer in California and I go into the
1:01:00
store and I buy TriCore tabs and I look at the label there's nothing on that label that tells me this is going to
1:01:05
contribute cyanuric acid and and tells me uh the levels and the maximums anything about that so I can be totally
1:01:12
unaware and somebody could come test my pool and say oh you need to drain your pool because it's over this or whatever so that was the idea behind it and then
1:01:19
what happened as a result of that is we had meetings with cpsa we had meetings with phta
1:01:25
uh and the decision came up that uh there is a committee that's being put together uh it's kind of being driven by
1:01:32
CPS a and phda both um which is going to put information
1:01:38
together and the idea is for this to be information that's going to go directly to Consumers to educate them on
1:01:45
um the byproduct of trichlor and dichlor which is cya but also educate them on
1:01:51
other forms of chlorine and byproducts from other forms of chlorine and being aware of total dissolved solids and
1:01:58
overall things that are going to lead to increase uh and a need for dry raining I would like to hear a poem about sodium
1:02:05
hypochlorite oh well that's that's putting me on the spot okay but I could say you know
1:02:13
chlorine chlorine uh elementally it's green um it'll make your pool look Serene so
1:02:19
there you go beautiful thank you um I like it but uh I don't know I read
1:02:27
his first book there are no poems about chlorine that I recall
1:02:32
yeah I try and get away from that when I'm writing poetry is to kind of uh take me away from my normal kind of job now I
1:02:40
gotcha give me some peace and release I guess yeah for sure and not looking at pools all day long and you know you need
1:02:47
something else to look at so I gotcha that is when is that date for the second
1:02:52
one what do you have in mind uh you know uh it's uh hopefully gonna be soon
1:02:57
um it's unfortunately I have a day job so and as you know I mean man you've written books and and did that which I
1:03:04
applaud you greatly for even being able to to do that
1:03:09
um it's some because it's hard about the time it's really hard um I I have the material and I'm kind of ready to do it
1:03:16
it's just like yeah it's a matter of putting the time into it and kind of getting a covered design and and gone
1:03:22
but it's it should be soon um that first one I did uh I really did
1:03:27
it on the Fly I was like sitting home one day and going through Amazon and Amazon and publisher and I'm like oh hey
1:03:33
I'm gonna publish a book and and uh you know and I had all these poems and uh so
1:03:39
I was just like okay I'm start throwing it in there and I did it and put it out I think I was off on vacation for a
1:03:45
couple weeks and and I did it and I had no idea I even kind of what what it
1:03:50
would do or whatever um and uh then you know I don't know the industry kind of picked up on it now
1:03:56
some people you know started promoting it um I'm certainly gonna do rich we're gonna do now tell everybody his name in
1:04:03
the book yeah I was just gonna say tell her the name uh so the one that I have now that's on Amazon is called out from
1:04:09
the dark house out from the dark house Terry Arco amazon.com yeah if you want to see
1:04:17
what's inside his mind yeah it's uh it's a good book I have it
1:04:22
I have a copy like I said I am waiting the second one so I appreciate look forward to that yeah
1:04:28
well I guess that's it so thanks for listening to our show and um you know thanks for listening to all
1:04:36
of our other shows and you can find us on social email us at talkingpools gmail.com let us know how we're doing uh
1:04:44
if you have questions let us know and I think that's pretty much it listen to all the other shows I think I said that
1:04:50
but Terry Arco thank you for coming on with us we greatly appreciate you we we
1:04:55
tossed out some hard questions I it's just the name of the game but definitely
1:05:00
a pleasure having you on pleasure to be here yeah I appreciate it look forward
1:05:06
to seeing you guys uh at the shows absolutely I'm gonna try to everybody thank you
1:05:12
for tuning in I'm not saying anything else bye be good
1:05:17
go ahead and say it what's your problem be safe
1:05:25
bye



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