AI, Automation, and the Future of the Pool Industry with Special Guest Fred Ross

AI, Automation, and the Future of the Pool Industry

With Special Guest Fred Ross

What happens when a pool industry veteran with roots in Silicon Valley, data centers, transportation logistics, and large-scale commercial pool operations sits down to talk about artificial intelligence?

You get one of the most eye-opening conversations we’ve ever had on Myth Busting Wednesdays. 

This week, host Natalie Hood sits down with Fred Ross — former tech executive, entrepreneur, commercial pool operator, and industry innovator — to discuss the rapidly approaching collision between AI technology and the swimming pool industry.

Fred shares his incredible journey from the transportation world into Silicon Valley tech, eventually building one of the largest independent commercial pool operations on the West Coast with 50 employees and over $5 million in annual revenue. Along the way, he witnessed firsthand the industry’s resistance to technology, standardized processes, and scalable training systems. 

Together, Natalie and Fred tackle some uncomfortable but necessary questions:

•  Is AI about to radically change hiring in the pool industry? 
•  Can artificial intelligence actually identify better employees than humans? 
•  Will digital AI agents eventually replace customer service staff? 
•  Are robotic pool technicians closer than we think? 
•  What happens to one-pole-and-a-truck companies when smarter competitors begin embracing automation? 
•  Will future pool companies be built around technology rather than chemistry knowledge alone? 

The conversation dives deep into the realities of AI agents, automated recruiting, intelligent training systems, robotic cleaners, smart equipment, and the growing divide between companies willing to evolve and those still operating like it’s 1960. 

Fred explains why the real bottleneck in the pool industry isn’t chemistry — it’s business operations, hiring, training, communication, and scalability. He also breaks down how AI can dramatically reduce administrative burdens while helping companies improve customer communication, employee training, and operational consistency. 

Meanwhile, Natalie brings the conversation back to the human side:

•  customer service 
•  education 
•  mentorship 
•  workforce development 
•  professional standards 
•  and the fear many people feel watching technology evolve this quickly 

This episode balances excitement, concern, humor, and realism as the two discuss where the industry may be heading over the next decade.

Whether you’re excited about AI…
 terrified of it…
 or somewhere in between…

this conversation will absolutely make you think.

Because the future of the pool industry may not belong to the company with the biggest route anymore…

It may belong to the company that learns fastest.

🎧 Listen now on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube, and everywhere podcasts are streamed.

#SwimmingPool #PoolIndustry #ArtificialIntelligence #PoolService #AI #CommercialPools #PoolPros #MythBustingWednesdays

Transcript

SPEAKER_06 0:01

Welcome back to the Talking Pools Podcast, your go-to source for everything wet, wild, and wonderfully misunderstood in the pool world. I'm Natalie Hood, Director of Education and Events for The Grit Game. And today we're diving into a conversation that blends the old school grit with the new school intelligence. Artificial intelligence, that is. And my guest today is someone who has lived multiple professional lives and succeeded in every single one of them. Fred Ross. He's, you know, he started out dominating the transportation industry, then pivoted into tech, where he rose to VP of sales in Sacramento. He earned his MBA at, what was it, 50 years old, when most people are slowing down. And then he jumped headfirst into the pool industry and built something massive. He went from cleaning about 100 pools on his own to hiring employees to transitioning fully into the commercial service to holding down a contractor's license for building and remodeling and ultimately scaling to 50 employees and 5 million in annual revenue. So his company became the largest independent pool service operation on the West Coast. And so Fred has seen the best and worst of this industry, including the good old boy training culture that's frustrated him and many of us as techs. And he has spent years for pushing for higher standards. And he even served as a technical advisor for the CMAC. And so today we are talking about something that he has strong opinions about, and that is AI. And if it, excuse me, my voice. And that is where it helps, where it hurts, and where the pool industry is wildly unprepared for what's coming. So, Fred, with your background in transportation, technology, business leadership, and large-scale pool uh commercial operations, you've seen more evolution than more people have. And so, kind of let's start there. How did you kind of give us a background of your history and kind of how you got into the industry a little bit more in depth?

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SPEAKER_06 3:51

So, Fred, give us a background of your history and how you got into the industry. Sure.

SPEAKER_01 3:56

So keep in mind when I got into the uh computer industry, it was uh when I discovered the Apple Macintosh and bought one for about 5,000 bucks back in the early 80s and got the bug and uh rode that wave for a long time. Like I said, general manager for a couple of tech firms, and then it was a director at Ingram Micro. They're about 40 billion in sales, global operation, lived on airplanes, got recruited to go up to Sacramento for a data center startup. Of course, data centers are the hot thing in the news right now, but uh this was back around the year 2000, and we were already building data centers for Google and eBay back then. So I got a big exposure to tech in Silicon Valley at that time and the venture capitalists and uh Sand Hill and the whole nine yards. So, like you said, I I've seen a lot of technology. So when I got into the pool industry, one of the first things I I thought I had noticed was, boy, is it 1960 or is it you know the year 2000? I mean, I just couldn't believe the lack of technology that anybody was using in the industry and the lack of processes. So it's kind of funny how I ended in the pool business. If I had the money, I probably would have bought mini storage or uh, you know, some other business, but I didn't have that. Oh, yeah. But I did a big survey. It actually, I talk about it in my book called The Big Pivot Big Pivot. I go through the whole process that I went through on ultimately narrowing down on why I picked the pool industry out of all kinds of different small business opportunities. But anyway, then I just I jumped in with two feet. I'm a big believer in the UPS model, which is everyone, including the CEO, starts working the crappiest shift they have, which is the graveyard shift from 11 o'clock at night to seven in the morning. So you go to work for UPS, you have to start at that shift. I don't care if you got a PhD, that's where they start you because they want you to learn the business from ground up.

SPEAKER_08 5:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:57

So I got a truck, bought a few pools from a pool broker, and uh started off, started off about 30 pools I bought, and then just grew it through word of mouth and doing a good job. And uh being the only pool guy on the street after the Santa Ana winds blew in Southern California, and they were all hiding at home, and I was out there cleaning pools.

SPEAKER_07 6:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:17

And so grew it to that. And then one day a friend of friend of ours in our Bible study group says, I've got this commercial pool service company, and one of our techs left a valve on and drained an Olympic pool over the 4th of July weekend, and I give up. You want it? So we got on the commercial pool business and very quickly realized commercial pools are a completely different business and different thing than residential. So we ended up selling off all of our residential accounts. I think we had two or three hundred at that point in time, and uh just focused it in on the on the commercial. So, anyway, that's a little bit of my background. Well what's fascinating all the time, the whole time I've been in the industry, I was fascinated by the fact, and this is not just true for the pool industry, but I've talked to air conditioning guys and plumbers and electricians and everything else, so many guys that never go beyond one pole in a truck, and they're happy. Yeah, that's great. You only go belong one pole in a truck. There's about 125,000 pool service businesses in the comp in the country, according to IBIS, and 60% of those are one guy in a truck. Yeah. Okay, 60%. 35% have one or two employees. So already we're down to 95% of the pool service companies have two or less employees.

SPEAKER_05 7:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:34

So how many have two to thirty? That's another two for two or three percent. So if you get to somebody who's got 40 or more employees, you're talking about the top one percent, especially if they're independently owned.

SPEAKER_00 7:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:46

It's probably less than one percent. And because in some of those numbers are some of the national, you know, pool works and some of the national franchises get rolled in those numbers and kind of skew the averages. So why is that? Why is that? Well, the number one thing you hear from guys and they go to I don't have time to recruit and train, and those idiots that I hired, they don't do it the way I want it done. That's all on the trainer, not the employee.

SPEAKER_08 8:16

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 8:16

So you can throw all these tools and you can make everything go really, really faster by by throwing artificial intelligence at it. But if you don't start with the right framework of knowing what you need to know, you're just spinning your wheels. So these tools are fantastic, and they're not gonna go away and they're gonna get better and better and better. And there's already some fantastic ones out there.

SPEAKER_05 8:38

There are, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:39

There are. But you gotta start with what am I looking for?

SPEAKER_06 8:44

Correct. You have to ask the right questions too.

SPEAKER_01 8:47

You have to ask the right questions. Yes. Well, well, what skills am I looking for? What attitude am I looking for? What background am I looking for? And the I big mistake that a lot of guys make in the in in blue-collar trades in general is well, I want to go steal a guy from the other guy. I heard Joey over there at XYZ pool service, he's a great pool tech. I'm gonna steal him.

SPEAKER_05 9:08

Yeah, that's great.

SPEAKER_01 9:10

Because then somebody's gonna steal him from you.

SPEAKER_05 9:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:12

And what you may end up with is a a whole bunch of mercenaries that just go wherever the next guy's throwing money at.

SPEAKER_05 9:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:19

And then is that really what you want? Is that the culture that you're trying to build in your in your in your business?

SPEAKER_05 9:25

Right.

SPEAKER_01 9:26

So you have to really think long and hard about how you're gonna do that. And of course, training them is uh if you start with this somebody that's got the right attitude and the right work ethic, correct, shows up on time, is dependable, can fog a mirror, as we used to say. Yes. So that's an investment. And then then, well, I'm gonna put all this time and effort and training this guy, and then he's gonna quit in 90 days after I turn him into a the world's greatest pool guy. And well, that's that's that's a risk in business you have to take. So you have to create the environment in your business that says that's gonna keep them around and give them a career path or give them a reason to stick around there, right?

SPEAKER_05 10:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:08

And so these artificial intelligence tools are just incredible. And I sure wish we would have had them, you know, back when I was running the business because we spent so much time on this. So I mean, just stop and think about the the the very first one here. You go, Well, we gotta go find them. Where are we gonna find these people?

SPEAKER_05 10:28

Yeah. Are you looking?

SPEAKER_01 10:30

Yeah, I mean, where where is this target employee? Now that you've defined them. When I was going to Saddleback Church, Pastor Rick Warren, he built one of the biggest churches in America, said he called it Saddleback Sam. And we had this picture of a of a you know, imaginary person, but where they lived, how much money they made, what kind of job they have, how many kids they have, their background was. He had all these things about him, and he knew exactly who he wanted to bring into his church, okay? He called it the unchurch. People got bored, the music was terrible, whatever you that's what he went after. He knew exactly what he was going after. So same thing is true here with the candidates.

SPEAKER_05 11:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:11

And so where are they? So you've defined this person.

SPEAKER_05 11:15

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 11:15

And now where are you gonna find them? Is it somebody that's at a junior college? Is it somebody working at McDonald's? Is it somebody working at a construction company? Where is this person right now? If they if they're completely been unemployed, you'd be like, hmm, why are they completely unemployed in this economy? Everybody that wants a job could get a job, right? So you got to think about where are they, and then that brings back to in focus, well, which tool are you gonna use?

unknown 11:43

Right.

SPEAKER_01 11:43

You're gonna use Indeed, you're gonna do ZipRecruiter, right? Uh you're gonna use we used to call Monster or Career Board back in the day.

SPEAKER_06 11:50

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:51

Remember those? Okay. And there's always been all kinds of.

SPEAKER_06 11:54

There's all and there always will be, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:56

And there always will be, and there's more all the time. And that doesn't even include the the young folks that seem to live on Instagram and social media, and how are you gonna reach them?

SPEAKER_06 12:07

I will tell you, I mean, I'm I am part of that younger generation, and there are some there there are always new, you know, apps, apps coming out, and I'm at the point now where some of them, I'm like, I'm not even gonna download them because I just don't frankly have the time. I was heavily into the TikTok era. I but I'll say the last couple months, there's just so much on TikTok that I just I'm TikToked out. TikToked out, and it's the same stuff over and over again. And I and I've talked about this before with some of um with a few guests back, was that the stuff that people are selling on TikTok, the information that they're they're you know, they're influencers and they're selling these products, but the information that they're delivering is so inaccurate that I'm like, I just don't want to listen to you anymore. My brain is fried and I'm at work all day. I'm doing and I have to be extremely I have to pay attention, and then my kids come home, my husband's working, I'm mom, I'm business lady. And so by the time I'm scrolling, I I don't have time to decipher if what you're telling me is true or not. I mean, you gotta do it anyways, but so much of the stuff that they're selling is such lumbo jumbo that I'm TikTok's out.

SPEAKER_01 13:20

Absolutely. So what the AI will do is it goes, it's it's this is a hard one for people to wrap their heads around because ChatGPT is not AI. Groc, I thought it's just a little tiny bit. This this these are just the little tiny kernels of it. Real stuff that's happening now with with Claude and uh Anthropic and some of the real leaders on this is this is hard to want to wrap your round your head around, but it's like from the movie The Matrix. Yeah, these are agents, these are live, digital people. Just think about that for a minute. Yeah, this is like the the the the lead character in in the matrix. When he's in the matrix, and he's nothing, it's just a completely digital world run by the computers, okay? And the agents are at the getting so remember that. So this is this is a person. So that's how intelligent these in these agents are today, and they're only going to get smarter and smarter and smarter. Because the one thing about artificial intelligence is it it constantly learns by mistakes, and here's the real mind blower. They all talk to each other.

SPEAKER_05 14:38

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 14:38

So an agent in China that learned something shares that all over the globe with an agent in Silicon Valley and an agent in Oklahoma and an agent in New York and all over the place. And so that's why these guys talk about the learning curve on this stuff being this hockey stick of how fast this stuff learns.

SPEAKER_05 14:56

Well, it learns like that.

SPEAKER_01 14:58

It learns like that, and it's just going to accelerate. So that's why I said that if you're not on board with this stuff, if you're not learning how to use AI in your business, you are going to be left behind and you're going to be out of business because your competitor learns how to use this stuff is going to smoke you.

SPEAKER_06 15:14

Well, absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 15:15

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_06 15:16

I will tell you, and I've said it before, I changed uh jobs the last year and a half now or so, and I did not use AI in my previous job. It was slowly introduced to me. Now where I'm currently at with the grit game, uh they Lacey Davis absolutely love her. She really showed me AI and really trained me on how to use it. And I absolutely love it. Now, do I heavily rely on it for my day-to-day job? No. No, I haven't well, not yet, but I have a brain for that. I I have a brain, and I'm just very happy I got my degree before AI came out. But I will say it is very useful and it does save me time. There was something that she was doing that was taking her about six hours, and I think now it's only taking her an hour to do. You know, there are ways that you can definitely save time, but you have to learn, you have to train AI the way you have to train yourself on how to use it. So I think AI is definitely beneficial. If you're not using it, you need to learn how to use it because it's not going anywhere, but you have to be careful as well because it doesn't always get it right. It's still learning, it learns quickly, but it's still learning.

SPEAKER_01 16:30

Just like an employee is never gonna get it right.

SPEAKER_06 16:32

Correct. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:33

So I mean, you can have the best recruiter in the world and tell them what people you're looking for and the best interviewers, but they're gonna still make mistakes too. I mean, you know, it's all that's just human nature. So exactly. But what's what's what's incredible is you know, there already are agents that you you you call up, like I gave you the example. I called an air conditioning company the other day because my air conditioner went out, and I could not tell that I was not talking to a human.

SPEAKER_06 17:00

You were telling me that when we were on the phone, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 17:02

This this agent, this she she called herself an artificial digital agent. Was so good I could not tell that it was a computer versus a human. I mean, it paused, it said, hmm, well, let me think about that. Just a minute, let me go check with the boss. I mean, it was it was like everything that a normal you would expect a receptionist or someone in customer service to say. Uh I I I was blown away. I had to finally ask, is Am I talking to a person? She says, No.

SPEAKER_05 17:31

That's right. What was the response?

SPEAKER_01 17:35

She said, No, I'm an artificial digital agent. And so I thought, my. So then we talked about, we chatted about my number one, my number one pet pee right now is being on the board of a couple of HOAs and just, you know, owning a home and being retired as contractors that don't answer their phone and don't return their calls. Yes. So you know, it's the same thing, and whether you're recruiting or trying to get business or whatever.

SPEAKER_05 17:58

Right.

SPEAKER_01 17:59

These this technology, it it just it does, it can do all that for you.

SPEAKER_05 18:05

Right.

SPEAKER_01 18:06

You can be out running your operation and you've got this digital person qualifying candidates, setting up interviews, arranging for in-person interview dates, doing all that stuff that you don't have to spend any time on. And all you have to do is, you know, meet them at 10 o'clock on a Tuesday and do the final interview and decide if you want to hire them or not.

SPEAKER_06 18:27

Well, that gets into our, I was gonna say that kind of gets into one of the myths I wanted to talk about, our first one. And it's, you know, AI, it's claiming that it can find hidden talent. Do you believe that? And it sounds like you believe that to be real.

SPEAKER_01 18:40

Absolutely. Because what it will do is the the algorithms will go out and search. So when you say hidden talent, so most people think about, well, let me go scan through a whole gazillion resumes on LinkedIn and Indeed and zip and all these things and see if I could find a candidate. Right. Well, that means they're looking for a job. That means they're actually on there.

SPEAKER_06 18:59

Right.

SPEAKER_01 19:00

What about the people that aren't?

SPEAKER_06 19:02

Correct. Because I I've I never really went on there. Mine was all word of mouth. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:07

So what what the AI can do is look on on Reddit and other boards and saw their social media posts and say, here's a guy, he posts a lot, and he's the manager of XYZ Pooh Company down the street. And oh, maybe he's not happy. Well, let's reach out to him and see. Maybe we can recruit him as our as our next manager.

SPEAKER_06 19:26

I mean you're saying AI's doing that.

SPEAKER_01 19:30

AI can do that. Yeah, go even further. Anything that's on the web. Let's say you wrote a paper, you wrote a book, you wrote an article, you published a podcast, it can find you.

SPEAKER_06 19:41

Yeah, that part I know. Yeah, that I know. Because I know I've done a lot of research. I actually I'll say when I'm when I'm doing research and I'm trying to, or if I'm looking for testimonials, or quite frankly, if if I just can't remember what I read last, I go through, I go to AI first versus the general just web, because the web brings back things that I'm not looking for versus AI, it gives me directly just about 99% of the time what I'm looking for, and it remembers what I was searching for last.

SPEAKER_01 20:14

Exactly. But remember, ChatGPT, Crock, and all those, that's those are the babies.

SPEAKER_06 20:20

Very much babies, yes. That's what I started with. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 20:23

Yeah. I've talked what I'm talking about is the whole next generation. And these are remember, this is like your own little 24-7 person. It's a digital person, a digital agent. And they're gonna go do all this stuff for you. That that's what's hard for people to wrap their heads around. They they're getting used, they're getting a little tiny taste of it with Chat GPT, but it's I'm telling you, that is nothing compared to what's coming.

SPEAKER_06 20:50

See, I have not I have not played around with the agent part too much.

SPEAKER_01 20:53

Okay, yes.

SPEAKER_06 20:54

That one I haven't played with.

SPEAKER_01 20:56

So research that you're gonna be blown away what's going on there with the with the agents. Okay. I mean, they are there are already examples of companies being built using artificial agents that are worth a billion dollars and have no employees.

SPEAKER_06 21:11

Wow, really?

SPEAKER_01 21:12

Yes.

SPEAKER_06 21:13

Okay. I'm gonna I'm gonna have to look into that.

SPEAKER_01 21:15

You gotta look into it.

SPEAKER_06 21:16

I'm gonna have to look into that. I I did not I I knew there were AI agents, but I was not aware of that.

SPEAKER_01 21:22

Yes. Okay, so mind-blowing.

SPEAKER_06 21:25

That is absolutely well, I mean, I'm not surprised, but it is a little mind-blowing. So then do you think would you say that AI screening is more accurate than a human's?

SPEAKER_01 21:35

It can be over time. You again, all this stuff's gotta be trained just like your your screening tools, whether you do it manually or I I I how many times you've done it, I've hired I've literally hired thousands of people.

SPEAKER_05 21:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:52

And you still make mistakes. We have human biases.

SPEAKER_06 21:55

That's true. That is very true. I tend I mean, I've done a a lot of hiring in my days. And I would typically always start with the same questions pending what the job was, but I would always kind of, you know, go around the questions pending on the conversation.

SPEAKER_01 22:10

Exactly. So, and you still can do that. People are still making the final hiring decision here. Right. These tools are just to help you eliminate from, you know, 20 possible candidates down to one or two, and then you make your choice.

SPEAKER_06 22:24

And the the other thing, too, that I would be concerned of is I mean, granted, someone can look great on paper and then you high, and that that was one of my biggest frustrations is someone's great on paper and you bring them in, you interview them, and they know nothing. Or great interview, great on paper, you bring them in within a day or so, you're just like, What did I do? And it's like out. Or you have to go through the steps to get them out. That is the worst. And I've had to do it a few times, and it's not fun. I don't miss that.

SPEAKER_01 22:54

Yeah. There's there's an old mantra. It's called Hire Hard and Manage Easy. Hire hard manage easy. Yeah, take your time up front, and you get a whole team of people that don't need a lot of you'd be putting your feet up on your desk and kicking back and going, This is great. I could have a thousand people because you when you hire right, you don't have to micromanage people all day.

SPEAKER_06 23:16

That is true. Yeah. I will say my first couple hires, I I learned very quickly. I will tell you that. Very, very quickly. Well, let's move on to a different one. And I I definitely have opinions about this one. And it's that chatbots improve candidate candidate experience. What do you think about that?

SPEAKER_01 23:34

Chatbots. Well, depends again, it depends on how they're used. Um it comes back to the responsiveness thing. I mean, think about this from an applicant or or, you know, an employee's perspective. I can't tell you how many times when I was in the job market looking for a job when you'd send a resume up to somebody or call them up or knock on the door or go in or fill out a job application, and nothing. They ghosted you, they didn't call you back, they didn't tell you what's going on, they didn't tell you if they filled the position or not. Nothing.

SPEAKER_06 24:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 24:04

Is it that frustrating?

SPEAKER_06 24:05

It's extremely frustrating. Or they do call you back and nothing. Nothing. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. And then, or I know a a friend of mine, she's she's absolutely brilliant. I love her dearly. And she is she has so much education. But now I'm starting to think that she's too overly qualified because she'll go to all these different interviews and she's like, she'll go to the first, the second, and the third interview, but and it just kind of drops off. And I'm like, girl, I think you're just too overqualified at this point. I I don't know. I mean, I've worked with her, she's fantastic, but back to your point, yeah. I mean, I've I've definitely submitted resumes in the past and crickets, and I'm like, okay. Thanks for your time.

SPEAKER_01 24:48

So can a chat GPT or can an agent help with that, help you improve your timeliness and your communications? Yes.

SPEAKER_05 24:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:00

Yeah. Again, at each little step in the process, you gotta be it's like my my wife used to call it, she's like, man, you are just good at this. I I call it eating an elephant one bite at a time.

SPEAKER_06 25:10

But I mean, true. But I I have to say, I would almost think that chatbots I I find them to be helpful on some websites, but I also think it depends on what that website has set up for that chatbot to do, right? You know, what they're gonna allow it to do. Because I'll say with you have some websites that absolutely want to have no human interaction with you. That's how they've designed it. They've they've said, oh, well, we're gonna set up our website to where all of the answers are here. Well, there's some people, like my husband, who doesn't want to doesn't want to send you an email. He doesn't want to talk to you via text. He wants to call you, he wants an actual human. And then you have me who I'm okay, I'm okay to send you a text or send you an email. That's fine because I'm just so busy. But I'll tell you, some of those chat boxes, they're not helpful at all. They give me the different options to choose. Okay, great, but my situation is different than what you're offering me. So I can see in some ways, yes, they're helpful, but I'll say more so than not, I'll look at those boxes and if I see that pop up, I'll just pick up the number and call.

SPEAKER_01 26:18

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_06 26:18

But that's my experience.

SPEAKER_01 26:21

Yeah, I would agree with you. No, it's like different people are going to have different reactions to it. The more and more people get used to it. Yeah, and again, it depends on how what you're using the chatbot for and what the purpose is. Is it is it like a call director, uh, you know, for for sales press one, for service press two, you know. So some chatbots are just really doing the same thing a receptionist would do only with text messages or chatting online with somebody, right? They're just directing you to the right person or whatever. Other ones are are are a little more advanced and set up to do some more screening. Right. Right. And then and you know, they can they can have the candidate ask a few basic questions before it even goes to the next one.

SPEAKER_06 27:02

Which I which I get, which makes sense.

SPEAKER_01 27:03

Before the next thing. You know, do you enjoy uh working outside when it's uh a hundred degrees and uh you know, you know, or just some some some day-to-day things you might run into and and the lobster by the end of the day? Yeah. Do you enjoy walking around with soggy feet all day? Yes. But there's a few little things you could do that might weed out a few people that are like, you know, no, no, no, no. I you know, I'm looking for a desk job, you know.

SPEAKER_06 27:31

Right, yes, that is true. I I will say it's oh, it's a commercial. I I can't remember what commercial it is, but it's but I don't oh, I can't remember what company, but I every time I see it, I always giggle because there's all these people coming in, and I think it's like a gas station clerk, and she's been in the nice AC all day, and everyone that's been coming in, it's like, oh, it must be nice being the AC all day, right? And they're I think they're like construction workers, you know what I'm talking about. That's what that's immediately like kind of what comes to mind. Probably like the most appropriate commercial to talk about, but it's is what comes to mind. Very that's it. Yeah, you know, but the other part of that too is you know, I definitely think that chatbots are helpful. You know, it it can kind of help it can push people to where what department they need to go to. But the one, another area of this industry that I think is lacking is customer service. And so my fear with chat boxes and also with AI. Now, granted, I use AI, but is that AI might take over a lot of the customer service experience. And with so many not having that and there not being that much education out there on customer service experience in this industry, uh that's a major concern for me.

SPEAKER_01 28:43

Oh, it's going to completely take it over.

SPEAKER_06 28:45

It will. Yeah. 100%.

SPEAKER_01 28:47

I'm gonna completely take over customer service. Absolutely. I mean, why could I mean the customer service people we went through, but you know, why spend it's a hard job a year for a customer service person that frustrates you when you can replace them with uh, you know, artificial agent for pennies a day. It's gonna happen. It's just it it is. So we're in the very early stages of this. We've got a long way to go on this. Just like, you know, the first self-driving cars, and look how far that's come.

SPEAKER_06 29:19

I s I still you still can't get me in one. You can't I've seen them. I've seen them, but you can't get me in one. I'm not I'm not getting in one. It's still it's no. I won't get on a boat and I won't get in a car. No, like that. No. Well, what about uh anyway?

SPEAKER_08 29:35

Go ahead.

SPEAKER_06 29:35

Yeah, so we're talking about AI. Another one is AI can evaluate facial expressions and tone objectively. What do you think about that?

SPEAKER_01 29:45

I think that's a ways off yet.

SPEAKER_06 29:46

Yeah. What about with the AI agent? So what you but let's go back to the AI agent.

SPEAKER_01 29:51

We'll get there quickly.

SPEAKER_06 29:52

You think so? So I I haven't played I haven't played around with that too much. So are they just to the interviewing stage, or are they just more of like the back back end uh research stage? Both. Okay, so let's talk about the interview.

SPEAKER_01 30:07

Are they very very soon you're not gonna know if you're talking to me or you're talking to an agent that just looks like me. They're already they're the the AI is getting so advanced already that people are having a hard time differentiating between what's real and what's not real.

SPEAKER_06 30:24

And it Yeah, I well, I will say I so Eric Knight with Watershape, he did um a podcast and it was recorded. It was just audio, and he shared it with me, and uh, he's one of our partners, and he uh he had me listen to it, and I think it was about 30, 40 minutes long. And for most of it, I was like, Yeah, this sounds like him. And then I think it was like the last minute or so, he said, This was not me, this was AI. And I was like, Really? And he goes, Yeah, that wasn't me, that was AI. And I think he actually released the episode and said that was AI. And I was like, would you use to do that? Because that would save me a hell of a lot of time when I'm doing, you know, educational content. Because right now, I I mean, I use my AI voice on occasion, but it's it's I'm still training on how I like to hear it. But I, you know, I'll I've seen a lot, I tend to pay attention a lot more, but I'll I'll see commercials and I can definitely tell they're AI and I'm like, I don't know about that, but I don't know. I don't know if I could believe if I was talking to someone if I couldn't tell they were AI or not. It'd have to be pretty good.

SPEAKER_01 31:32

I don't believe it, but it's it's it's going to be, yeah. Is it there now? No, but it's going to be.

SPEAKER_06 31:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 31:40

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_06 31:42

I'm I'm I'm gonna have to look more into this AI agent.

SPEAKER_01 31:45

Yeah, you look into that. It's gonna be a real eye-opener for you. So who who who first introduced it to me was this is a funny story. So Okay. The guy that wrote this textbook. A new int entrepreneurial dynamic. Okay.

SPEAKER_06 32:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 32:03

Greg Autry. Okay. So Greg used to work for me, then he got his PhD, then he became a professor at USC in Southern California. Then he had an entrepreneurial department. So he was a professor of entrepreneurship at USC. He used to have me come out there and talk to his students all the time. And they wouldn't believe me either. I'd say, you know, every one of you smart guys in this room here, I think you're gonna be the next uh, I don't know what, Steve Jobs, uh Wozniak. Pick, pick, pick your billionaire, right? Yeah, Elon Musk, whatever, pick your billionaire. I have a billion. Yeah. And I said, but you know, if you guys went over here, if you guys took that drive and ambition and smarts and went over here into the trades business and started a heating and air conditioning company or electricity company or something, you'd own it. You'd dominate it. You you'd be the king of the hill. Because you'd be the smartest guy in the room. You go over here to these tech companies, you're just one of the 10,000 smartest guys in the planet. So they are starting to wake up to this. Now I was preaching this to this choir 10 years ago, and you can see lately, it's very interesting to see the swing. Everybody's all of a sudden talking about blue collar and trades and get your kids into the trades, forget college.

SPEAKER_05 33:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 33:28

It's true.

SPEAKER_05 33:29

That is true. So, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 33:31

Not only is AI coming for the 95% of guys that have one or two employees, a whole swarm of pretty smart people are going to be getting into this industry.

SPEAKER_06 33:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 33:46

Well, and I think And they're going to be using these tools because they're growing up on these tools. They don't know anything about running a pool. Yeah. Yeah, that's how long does it take you to learn that if you're pretty quick? True. You can learn that pretty quick. The hard part of the pool business is the pool business, is the business side. Yeah, that's true. Hiring employees and training them and keeping them around and and you know, growing them and giving them new skills. No, you're right.

SPEAKER_06 34:16

No, you're right. I mean, just just in the last 10 years, things have changed so much. So, I mean, 10 years down the line when my kids are what, gosh, high school. I'm not ready for that clearly. I can only imagine where we're gonna be with AI and technology just in general and where the pool business is. I mean, I'm already kind of scared where the pool bit the pool industry is gonna be in 10 years education-wise, but AI. I mean, I think it was there was a post on uh I think Rudy had posted something on social media, and I think that's how kind of how you and I started talking. You were saying that you were you you were suspecting that you were they were gonna have like AI robots uh cleaning pools. I think so.

SPEAKER_01 34:58

No, absolutely. Oh, I'm not arguing.

SPEAKER_06 35:00

Oh, I'm not arguing. I just it's it's that'll be the day. That'll be the day. I mean, well, I mean, they do have a lot of robots now in restaurants in the back.

SPEAKER_01 35:11

So the robot will roll up and they're self-driving robo taxi and they'll be out and they'll you know, humanoid style robot, and they'll go around there and they'll do everything that a human can do. Absolutely. There's no doubt about it.

SPEAKER_06 35:24

I'd like a robot in my backyard, but I get it.

SPEAKER_01 35:26

I mean I mean, people are gonna have robots in their home.

SPEAKER_06 35:29

I don't think I want a robot in my home, but that's I know.

SPEAKER_01 35:32

This is the funniest conversation. Yeah. Because this this is where being an old guy like me kind of comes in handy. I remember we had the same conversation back in the 80s. This was hilarious. Why in the world would I ever want a laptop computer in my house? And now you have I never bought a computer one of those things for. And look where they are now. That's true. So remember, Steve Jobs Jobs' vision was a Macintosh in everybody's house. Okay. Musk's vision is an optimist in everybody's house.

SPEAKER_05 36:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 36:05

I think he's gonna get there. I really do.

SPEAKER_05 36:08

Might. Yeah, you're right.

SPEAKER_01 36:09

So you got a rot robot in your house working 24-7. What do you need that? What do you need the pool guy for?

SPEAKER_06 36:15

Well, shoot, if there's if a robot's coming in my house, I'm gonna tell you right now they're doing the laundry first thing because I cannot stand holding laundry.

SPEAKER_01 36:23

Laundry, cooking, cleaning.

SPEAKER_06 36:24

Hey, you're right. You know what? You're absolutely right. They can do the laundry, they can do the cooking, they can do the cat's litter box. You know, I'm I'm starting to warm up to this idea. You gotta you're on to something.

SPEAKER_01 36:34

Okay. They can do a lot of things. No, seriously. So then you gotta think, well, well, gee, what's gonna happen to the industry? That's a good question.

SPEAKER_06 36:44

No, that's true. I mean, you know, I mean, so let's kind of jump around a little bit. So what if so you with all of this, you know, talking about robots, do you think that maybe in the future we're gonna see fully automated hiring?

SPEAKER_01 36:57

Yes.

SPEAKER_06 36:57

You think so?

SPEAKER_01 36:58

When when would you I think it'll be fully automated up to the final point, sign it on the dotted line and say, come to work tomorrow. That'll still be done by by you know the humans, the owners of the companies and so forth, the humans, yeah. That's 2D little humans, yeah. But I think most of the process, like right now, the these are gonna get so good. We could have this Zoom interview right now, you wouldn't know you're talking to an agent or a person. That's where it's going.

SPEAKER_05 37:25

I can see that happening.

SPEAKER_01 37:26

I I can see that happening. Yeah. And because you'll make a clone of yourself. It might even look and sound and talk like you, like you had your experience with your with your friend. Yeah. So I mean, this this is this is this this is disruptive and shatters a lot of preconception and notions about a lot of things. Uh, you know, I've been preaching this, I've been preaching this one since since again, since I'd say early 2000. I got in the industry and I thought all these all these pool guys would say, oh man, don't sell your customer a robotic cleaner. So many now. Cleaner or Polaris or whatever, they they won't need you anymore.

SPEAKER_06 38:04

Well, now look at them. You go to the you go to the show, you go to all those shows, and there's so many robotic cleaners. Oh my gosh. The last show season, I mean, every single aisle it was just robot, robot, robot, robot, robot. I was like, fool.

SPEAKER_01 38:19

If your only value add to your service customer is netting and vacuuming, your your value is very little. And it's funny because you think about the time spent. We used to we used to do we used to clock this like UPS does. We'd follow our guys around, and we would actually run the stopwatch and say how many minutes it takes to do each task. Really? This is part of our training program because we'd see guys and they're like, what do you mean? What are you running back and forth to your truck 15 times for when you're at this pool? No, bring all your stuff pool side, do your thing, and get out. I could do I could do a pool first class job in 10 minutes. That's good now. Super fast. That's good, yeah. So if you're a pool technician and not a pool cleaner, you're going in there, you're checking to make sure everything works. You're checking to make sure that the work equipment's working right, right? Right. And checking the water chemistry. You're not you're not spending your time cleaning tile and vacuuming and netting and jetting and so you're saying having the that's low value add. Yeah. Low value.

SPEAKER_06 39:30

That's true. So having the AI robot come in and do this and then they can come in and clean and well, and then I mean again.

SPEAKER_01 39:38

Well, even right now, even with just these these these robotic cleaners that the you know homeowner drops in the pool or somebody drops in the pool and goes around and cleans, right?

SPEAKER_05 39:46

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 39:47

So what's a tech really need to do when he comes?

SPEAKER_05 39:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 39:52

Everything else on his list.

SPEAKER_05 39:54

Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's true.

SPEAKER_01 39:55

But not that. And that's the one thing that took the most time.

SPEAKER_05 39:58

Yeah, I remember doing that.

SPEAKER_01 39:59

You look at 40, 40 minutes service stop, 20 minutes was spent vacuuming.

SPEAKER_06 40:04

Yeah, I I remember that was one of my chores when I was younger, was cleaning the pool. And I don't miss it.

SPEAKER_01 40:10

I don't miss getting the hose out, up, priming it up.

SPEAKER_06 40:15

I don't miss that. We had like the long cord to vacuum, and yeah, I don't miss that. Yep. And that was in the two early 2000s. Yeah, don't miss that at all.

SPEAKER_01 40:23

Exactly. So that that's same, that's just uh that's just a little glimmer into what's coming in on that, and then uh then you take it to the next step with the equipment. And then so a lot of pool people are are scared to death of what's happening with automation in their pool equipment. And they go, well, they're gonna need me anymore. This stuff's getting so smart, and it's connected to the home, the smart home systems. And the homeowner can program the thing and turn things on and off.

SPEAKER_06 40:53

Mm-hmm. There's a lot of that out there right now.

SPEAKER_01 40:55

There's a lot of that.

SPEAKER_06 40:56

Yeah, they can go in and they can they can log in how big the pool is, and just they can get updates hourly. And if they're you know gonna be having people over, they can change the flow. And yeah, there's a lot of that right now.

SPEAKER_01 41:08

Exactly. So some full people will fully embrace that and say, I'm going to be the guy in my market. It's the go-to guy for that stuff, and other people are gonna be scared of it and walk away. Yeah, you know, fast forward five years, which one's gonna still be thriving and which one's not?

SPEAKER_06 41:28

True.

SPEAKER_01 41:30

Okay.

SPEAKER_06 41:31

Yeah. And that I mean, that's the other thing too, is there is a high turnover in this industry.

SPEAKER_01 41:37

Very high.

SPEAKER_06 41:38

Very high. Yeah. I mean, I'll I'll say, you know, there's a joke, is um, you know, once you get sucked in, you're sucked into this industry. But at the same time, if you can't hack it in this industry, you definitely get out.

SPEAKER_08 41:50

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_06 41:51

You know, and so, um, and going kind of back to education, you know, I there's, you know, we were talking about it earlier, and it was, well, I'm I I don't want to, you know, with training, I I don't want to spend all this money and do professional development for my guys or gals because they're just gonna get all this this education and quit and go somewhere else. Well, yes, that is possibility. But also I feel like if you're not putting that professional development back into your team, why would they want to stay with you? And yeah, you're gonna have people that like, oh yeah, you know, my boss sent me here, and I just gotta pass this exam or come on, man, or gal, just help me pass this exam. But really, I mean, the good ones will find the true balance in that and maybe stay in the industry, right? But, you know, talking about uh, you know, AI, we we talk about training programs, and I do see that AI is useful, not not necessarily chat GPT, um, but there are some other programs out there. But let's talk about training programs. And one is AI can create complete training programs without human oversight. Uh no. Okay, good. I'm so glad you said no. No, not on that one.

SPEAKER_01 43:05

No, absolutely.

SPEAKER_06 43:06

I was gonna argue with you on that.

SPEAKER_01 43:09

No, no, no, no, no, no. No, you're you're gonna have to develop the training program. What what the AI could do. So let me give you an example. We used to make, you know, my service manager would say, Oh, Fred likes to tell him to tie your shoe case, tie your shoelace method, because once you learn how to tie your shoelaces, you don't even think about it, right? You just tie your shoelaces. Right. It becomes unconscious, it's like muscle memory. Yeah. So we would we would teach our we would teach all of our pool techs so that everything they did throughout the day didn't have to think about it. If you did everything exactly the same way, your day was nice and smooth, right? Things were good.

SPEAKER_08 43:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 43:41

So we would put training videos together. So we'd follow around our top guys, we called top guns, and we'd take a video of them doing their routine, their whole thing. This is how they went and serviced the pool. Okay. And then we'd show that, and then we'd we put it on the internet so that they could pull it up at home. Or at their lunch break or whenever they they wanted, but it was too slow. You know, they don't have a time when they're on their route to go to the truck and sit down and pull up on the internet and watch some five-minute video. You know, they want an answer now.

SPEAKER_05 44:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 44:13

Hey, my pump on prime. I'm stuck here. What do I do? And they want an answer now.

SPEAKER_05 44:19

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 44:20

Right. So what are they going to do? Well, they're going to call the service manager or the route supervisor or whatever and say, what do I do? Okay. So that's the kind of stuff that you can automate with AI and says, oh, we'll do this, this, this, and this before you call the service manager.

unknown 44:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 44:35

And then that means that you you can have your route supervisor or service manager, which is pure overhead, can have a lot more people that he's mentoring in. Right. So maybe for whatever you want, one of every five, you can have a service manager for every 10 or 15 or 20 guys.

SPEAKER_06 44:50

Yeah.

unknown 44:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 44:51

And that was something that you and I were talking about, is that we've we've utilized AI here at our company is, you know, when we start to work with a new partner, you know, we have different channels for different partners and manufacturers that we work with. And essentially we'll uh create a private channel for our internal team, of course, and we'll train the uh you know AI app that we're using. And so if the team's out there and they have a question that stumps them, they can actually go into that AI channel, ask it, and it spits back out the correct information. And so that's been extremely great example. Yeah, it's and it's it's helped me quite a bit, especially when I first got onboarded, because you know, I was in a very different part. There's so many different parts of this industry. And I had never been on necessarily the manufacturer's sales side, and I absolutely love it. Um, and I'm excited to dive a little bit more into it soon. But I really found it extremely helpful. And then we've taken it, uh, Johnny and Lacey took it a step further, and now they're creating free education on the products for the manufacturers. And it's like, hey, you don't know how this product works, and you're can you know you don't necessarily want to commit to it just yet. Well, here, here's a free educational course on the product. It it trains you and teaches you about the product, how to use the product. And so, hey, you don't have to fully commit, but if you're curious, this is what it's about. I mean, that's pretty cool.

SPEAKER_01 46:12

That's very cool.

SPEAKER_06 46:14

It's very cool, and there's no one else out there doing it.

SPEAKER_08 46:16

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_06 46:17

No one else out there doing it. And that was not created by AI. I'm very proud to say that. But very proud to say that. But, you know, you're right. There are, I have, I will say, I have seen some other companies out there, I'm not going to name names, but I've seen some companies out there that have put out some courses and they're just completely AI. And I'm like, oh, okay. And not at first not knowing they were AI, and I went through them. Um, of course, under a different name. And I went through them and I went, they forgot to delete the little chat GBT note on the bottom. And so I, you know, I do think that, again, back to our original conversation, I do think that AI is valuable and, you know, help assisting you with research and or maybe help cleaning something up that you've put together. But I definitely still think you need to use your noggin and research and um, you know, connect with your buddies or gals in the industry. But I kind of want to go back. We don't have it on we don't have it on our list.

SPEAKER_01 47:13

No question. And I'm not advocating for all that. I'm just saying if you're in this industry, in any industry, you're if you're in a blue-collar, any any trade, you need to be aware of this and keep an eye on it. I'm not saying if you don't go do this tomorrow, you're gonna be out of business, but you need to be aware of what's happening and how fast it's happening and the possible ramifications to your business and and keep a close eye on it. And when you see something, oh, hey, here is something that I could do today or tomorrow that's gonna really gonna help my business, jump on it. That's all I'm saying.

SPEAKER_06 47:47

No, I I absolutely agree. I mean, uh there are a lot of apps that are AI that are free too. And so I'll say my dad was asking me a question. He was asking he wanted to better his golf stroke. And uh he actually does have a uh a golf trainer and he's been golfing for 40, 50 plus years. That was what I was telling you earlier before we got on the call. You know, I was talking to him and he had to go to the office, aka had to go hit a bucket of golf balls, someone has to do it. And um, but when I saw him last, he said, you know, can you can you kind of show me how to use AI? And I said, Well, yeah, sure. What do you want to, what do you want to know? And I brought up chat in that instance and I said, because well, I just kind of want to know how to use it. And I said, Okay, well, you know, this is the account, this is my account. And I said, you know, it'll save, it'll save your searches. Um I said, but let's let's make it fun and interesting for you. Because that's how I liked, that's how I learned. If I'm not interested in one ear out the other, and I said, I asked Chat, I said, create me a course on for beginners on how to golf. And it spat a course out within seconds, and I typed in a few more, you know, requirements, and boom, I had like an eight-lesson course. And my dad was like, This is really cool. And I said, Okay, yeah, I know it's pretty cool, isn't it? And he goes, Well, let me look at this thing. And he started going through and he goes, Well, it's missing this. Really, that's actually really good. I'll have to use that. But it's missing this and kind of missing that. And I was like, feeling like an expert, don't you, Dad? He goes, Yeah, I could write this course, I could add on to it, maybe I could sell it. And I said, Well, yeah, you could. That's what a lot of people do. And so, um, kind of back to what you're saying, it's you know, you definitely can't be afraid of it. It's here, but um, you know, you kind of got to stare it in the face or you might be out of business.

SPEAKER_01 49:35

That's that's my recommendation that, yeah, that that's my summation of all this for folks. Yeah. And yeah, I mean, just look around and pick up the newspaper every day. I mean, you think, why in the world are people pouring trillions of dollars into all these data centers all over the country? Some of them are extremely controversial about the amount of water they use, electricity, everything else. Yeah, but there's these companies, these people, isn't that stupid? Why do you think they're investing trillions in these? Because they they see what's going to happen with this. And so there's I saw that early on. Oh there's no doubt.

SPEAKER_06 50:12

So well, when you find that robot that's ready to do my laundry and cooking in a litter box, you let me know you have my number. Because I'm about tired. That's normally what I do on Sundays.

SPEAKER_01 50:22

Well, they're testing them right now. Right now, they're they're they're testing them in the hotels so they can go make all the beds and do the laundry and everything else. So just just imagine what that would save a hotel owner if he just had robots going.

SPEAKER_06 50:34

I can't even imagine. My gosh. I mean, I I hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 50:42

They don't they don't they don't need 401ks, they don't need health plans, they didn't go on vacation.

SPEAKER_06 50:47

It makes me feel sad though for all those workers. They're gonna be out of jobs.

SPEAKER_01 50:51

That's there's going to be a lot of that. So you're gonna have to reinvent yourself. When I first got out of school a long time ago, they told us, well, you know, back in the day in our grandparents' day, they could do the same career for their whole life, right? They could go work at General Motors in the auto factory for 40 years or whatever. You know, you you could you could you could be an accountant your whole career or whatever.

SPEAKER_08 51:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 51:15

And then it was when I by the time I got there, the time I graduated from college in the in the 80s, it was, nah, you better plan on changing, completely changing career two or three times, which is exactly what happened to me. You were successful, very successful in my bet. But over from transportation to computers to the pool industry. So three completely different industries. Very different. Completely different.

SPEAKER_06 51:39

I've just stuck, I've I've I'll have to say I've stuck with pool industry. I I tried my I tried a little bit at bodybuilding, I tried, but I couldn't really make it a career. You know, those darn kids. No, I'm kidding. But I mean, no, you're absolutely right. I I will say there was a time when I thought, well, am I gonna get out of the pool industry? Am I gonna stay in it? I'm gonna stay in it. Can't get rid of me that quickly. But no, you're right. I mean, my husband, he's um a couple more years and he'll be out of the military. And he's like, I he's got options. He has quite a few options, but he's like, I don't even know where to begin.

SPEAKER_08 52:12

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_06 52:13

So it's definitely scary. It it's it's very scary, definitely for my kids. I'm like, well, then we gotta wait till you guys have to figure it out, but it's interesting.

SPEAKER_01 52:22

It is. So what skills, you know, what are the what are those key skills? When you go back to the interviewing and hiring question here is Yeah, what skills are you going to be looking for in those employees as we embrace more and more of this? We get more and more of this technology in our daily lives. You can see that the skill set's going to change rapidly.

SPEAKER_06 52:43

Yeah. Well, Fred, I have to say this has been an incredible conversation. You've definitely opened my eyes and changed my mind about maybe having a an iRobot in my house. You hear that, Saban? We're getting a we're getting a an Amazon. Optimus. Yes. Yes, we're getting we're gonna get someone in our house. Is there anything before we end this that you want to live leave our live that you want to leave our listeners with about AI?

SPEAKER_01 53:11

Um, I don't know about any more than we've already covered. Just to kind of sum up, like I said before, is just be aware of it. Keep an eye on it. Don't don't just think, oh, I don't need this stuff. I'm in the pool business, this will never affect me, because it's going to. And no, you don't need to run out tomorrow and implement all these things. But you you need to be aware. And if you're even if you're just one guy in a truck, you need to be thinking about, well, what's the absolute basic thing I can do that might help me just manage my communications with my customers? You know, take some of those phone calls. In other words, than trying to answer the phone while you're doing pools and and get back and take care of customers and and answers Mrs. Jones and whatever. Even if it just took that off your plate, look look, imagine what a better job you could be doing if you weren't distracted by your phone all day. Okay, agreed. Just a simple example.

SPEAKER_06 54:08

I can't agree more. I absolutely agree. So for those listening, as you know, as he said it, AI isn't going away, but you know, neither is human judgment or human experience or accountability. So it's it's really AI, it it's going to be with people and who know what they're doing. So again, Fred, thank you for joining us and to our listeners. Yes, thank you. Stay curious, stay skeptical, and stay committed to doing things the right way, not just the fast way. Until next time, guys. Bye.

SPEAKER_01 54:38

Bye.