JESSAMINE COUNTY, Ky. (LEX 18) — While the pandemic plagued countless industries, the pool business has thrived in the Lexington area as COVID-19 forced homeowners to stay home.
ATD Pool Care services pools in Lexington, Nicholasville, Georgetown and Paris. Their owner Jason Harman said business doubled since March.
"I realized it right away, you know, unexpectedly, because normally we start opening pools, the very end of March to the first week of April. And this year we were opening pools, I think it was March 16th and a lot of them," explained Harman. "We had a little bit of heat that came in early, and it's like once word got out that there may even be a potential of public pools not opening, the whole world started to flock in order to get in-ground residential pools or above-ground residential pools. Residential pools as a whole blew up. So, and then now with a lot of the public pools now opening late, like the pool businesses just is out of control."
Unlike so many other companies laying off employees during the pandemic, Harman has been hiring to keep up with growing business. He said, "We're gonna be hiring even more people going into next year; we've already made that part of our business plan."
Harman explained new clients are booking appointments in such large numbers as dozens of homeowners have chosen to build pools this year.
"We've had such an influx of new clientele that nobody can keep up, none of the pool companies have been able to keep up. Like builders, I spoke to a builder the other day who told me he was literally 85 pools scheduled behind at the moment. And I spoke to another pool company who said they, they're building at least 40 this year in-ground. So, you know, there's 52 weeks in a year and a lot of those weeks are frozen. So, it's going to be a really challenging, challenging time for the pool business, but in a good way."
ATD Pool Care is staying busy helping those new pool owners keep their pools safe on a weekly or bi-weekly basis. Harmon said, "What we focus on is keeping pools really pretty and clean for the clients throughout the year, like, I don't know how many clients call us and say, 'Hey, my water's green. Hey, my water's cloudy. What do I do?' And guiding them through or else performing the actions ourselves is really where we specialize because we're going to get their water really good and clear we're going to keep it that way throughout the year."
Harman admitted when the COVID-19 restrictions started, he was concerned about how his company would be affected. Still, after months of non-stop business, he looks back, grateful.
"We've been fortunate and blessed."
