Timothy Martin, Vice Presides of Sales & Business Development Q: Tell us a bit about your company and what you do for the hot tub industry. A: PDC Spas is the oldest privately held spa manufacturer in the world, and we’re looking forward to celebrating our 54th year this January. Throughout our history we’ve been a family-run company, with the second generation at the helm now ...

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Steve Kucskar, Director of Sales for BioLab Pro Dealer Division Q: Tell us a bit about your company and what you do for the hot tub industry. A: BioLab, Inc. began in 1955 as a small family business producing cleansing agents and disinfectants for the poultry industry. In 1962, the company expanded its use of chemical processes to include the BioGuard line of swimming pool and spa maintenance ...

Sony Banga, Vice President, Strong Spas Q: Tell us a bit about your company and what you do for the hot tub industry. A: Strong Spas is a unique hot tub manufacturer in the sense that we actually started out as a plastics company. Spas now account for over 90% of our business. Whilst many spa manufacturers have seen significant contractions in their sales over the past few years Strong Spas ...

Servicing Swim Spas These big units require some extra planning and some extra supplies. By Robert Stuart Swim spas are rapidly becoming commonplace in our industry and as techs we will see more of them than ever. Servicing these big beasts is similar to servicing any other spa, but there are a few tricks to make your first visit a bit more productive. In the past, swim spas were ...

Alert the Press Leverage the media to your advantage, getting free publicity. Has your retail store recently won an award? Have you been recognized for a charitable donation? Have you participated in or are planning an event? If you answered yes to any of these questions, you should write a press release to send to the local media. These short, to-the-point write-ups can help promote ...

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year Ease holiday stress by finding Christmas decorations for your retail store now. With the Christmas season less than six months away, it is time to start preparing your retail store for all of the hoopla. Obviously, this doesn’t mean decorating now, but it does mean you should start the preparations. Setting up shop for the holiday season takes time ...

Promoting Employees From Within Five Common Faux Pas (Mistakes) By Shari Roth Promoting employees from within is an effective way you can maximize the use of the talent in your organization, create employee satisfaction, be recognized as an employer of choice and save money. In order to be effective in promoting from within, there are a few things that you want to keep in mind. First, ...

Join the Fight Small business owners tend to be independent do-it-yourselfers. You take care of your business, your employees and your family, which is a lot of responsibility so it might be hard for you to throw your hat into one more arena. However, supporting an industry association (any association) can save you time and headaches down the road. Association of Pool & Spa Professionals ...

Give Your Store a Mini Face-Lift Simple, low cost ways to increase sales by improving your store inside and out. By Linda Cahan Have you ever noticed that when you move things around the selling floor people start looking at what you’re moving? It can be aggravating. Here you are, dragging product from one end of the store to the other and the pretty displays are being ignored ...

Homebuyer Credits How to profit from tax credits received by new homeowners. Over the past few years, the federal government has been urging consumers to get out there and buy a house. The incentive? A tax credit for new homebuyers. Since the timeframe for the federal credit has now expired, the state of California has announced its own plan. These credits are great for retailers, especially ...

Seven Steps to Internet Marketing Success Tips for building your store’s online presence through Internet marketing. by David Carleton As I’m sure you’ve already discovered, it now takes more than your typical newspaper ad, radio spot and weekend home show to get the sales you used to get. Why? Because the dynamics of the spa and pool market have changed dramatically. ...

Banking Buff Dan Ford, a community banker, answers some of the most frequently asked financial questions. By Megan Kendrick In the last few years, getting financing has been difficult in the hot tub industry. Some floor financing companies have pulled out, so where do you turn? Many have gone to their local bank only to find that their 30-plus-year relationship doesn’t carry the ...

Rotomold to the Rescue Over the past few years retailers have been trying to get their feet back on solid ground. Could rotomold hot tubs be the answer? By Rochelle Belsito The stormy economic climate has taken a toll on consumer markets, hot tubs included. During this time of economic downturn, consumers have tightened their budgets and reevaluated spending money on big-ticket items. ...

National Treasures In our third annual Retail Stars edition we have expanded to cover nine regions of North America. Each year we have the pleasure of featuring talented and enterprising hot tub retailers with the goal of passing on nuggets of knowledge that they have learned along the way. It is one of our favorite stories of the year and we hope that you look forward to it as well. By ...

Redemption School A company trip turns into a philanthropic adventure that means a new building for a Jamaican school. By Megan Kendrick The annual Master Spas dealer trip was a little different this year. While they still went to Jamaica to relax and have fun, the company brought along fewer people and the trip became about more than celebrating another year in business. After setting ...

Smaller Ad Budget, Better Results A variety of different advertising mediums can yield better results. by Shah Karim, Saferock Retail Several years ago there was a lot of buzz in the retail industry regarding cross media promotions that impact marketing events. During a span of two to three years, the Interactive Advertising Bureau sponsored a large study with around one dozen cases ...