You've put years and years into building up your pool and spa business. It entailed long hours and inconveniently timed emergency calls that ate into evenings and weekends. The sacrifices were significant but so were the rewards. You built up a customer base that values and trusts you, and there are several employees on the payroll who appreciate the investment you put into them and their work.
The time has finally come when you can think about retiring. The looming question is: What do you do with this company you’ve nurtured? For many proprietors in the pool and spa business, the hope is that their mom-and-pop shop will be passed down to the kids. They’re surely the ones who are most likely to carry the company forward with the same pride, work ethic, and sense of responsibility that defined your tenure.
Are there strategies you can follow to help ensure that your business is one that your kids want to be a part of and eventually take over? The unique journeys of three different multigenerational pool and spa companies might hold some clues.
Tim Tarricone (Rich's son, now a pool service pro) cleaning his grandfather's pool. It's never too early to start learning the pool business.
KEEPING IT IN THE FAMILY
It was a commitment to family that prompted Rich Tarricone to start running a pool and spa business in the first place.
When Rich was in high school, his brother Drew started a pool business in Southwest Florida. It made sense for Rich to sign on to help. When the Tarricone boys were younger, their parents owned a resort in Lake George, N.Y., so Rich got very used to pitching in on whatever needed attention among the 20 units on site.
After college and some unsatisfying stints in corporate America, Rich went back home to Florida and started working for his brother while he tried to figure out what to do next.
Then, Drew died suddenly, leaving behind a wife and a young child. In part to help ensure they were provided for, Rich took over the business. Rich’s sister-in-law eventually sold the business, but he was now locked in with the pool and spa industry. He worked in different capacities across the field before starting Aquatic Pool Systems, a company in Tampa where he serves as owner and president to this day.
With his own experience transferring the family company in mind, Rich is now bringing his son Tim into the fold.
When Tim expressed interest in entering the pool and spa industry, Rich’s first move was to get him a job with someone else.
“My real thing was I wanted him to be yelled at, I wanted him to be patted on the back,” Rich explains. “I wanted him to get the social experience of having a real job and making friends at work and know what it’s like to build relationships with some people.” Rich used some connections to help Tim get a spot with a company that takes on bigger jobs than are typical for Aquatic Pool Systems. The short stint stretched to four years, and Tim developed a useful sense that there were different ways to approach the different tasks that come up in the field.
Although Rich didn’t specifically guide his son into joining the business, he has thought about the different things he did that led Tim to see the pool and spa business as a viable career.
For starters, Rich suggests getting the kids involved at a young age. That approach can entail time in the office or on jobsites, and it extends to bringing them along to state meetings and conferences.
It’s also important to be a role model. Rich says your children should see that you take pride in the work that you do, and you approach employees, customers, and the job itself with respect.
A PLACE FOR EVERYONE
“One, two, three, four, five, five family members,” tallies Chuck Grove, president of Horizon Pool & Patio, when asked about relatives who are also coworkers and employees. “Actually six, including my wife, who’s also involved to some extent.”
Chuck and his wife, Linda, started the company in Florida’s Palm Beach County back in 1985. The business grew quickly, opening its first retail store within six months. These days, Horizon Pools services approximately 800 pools in the area and lately, picked up a steady stream of pool renovation jobs.
The Groves didn’t necessarily position succeeding generations to come into the business. The family presence largely happened as a matter of course. Afterschool jobs turned into burgeoning careers.
There were also instances when it became clear that the best choice for a role could be found right there on the family tree. For example, Chuck’s daughter Jennifer Kenbeek left the fold for a few years to work in finance. She returned to help when the business’s longtime bookkeeper retired. Jennifer has been there ever since and is now vice president and CFO.
With so many family members on the Horizon Pools roster, they’re able to make changes to suit individual strengths
“Jordan and Jesse, the two grandsons, both started out working in the store as teenagers,” Jennifer notes. “They both started cleaning pools after they were in the store, and then Jesse started doing some repairs. It just naturally flowed with Jesse going into the repair department. And Jordan is now the manager of the service department.”
That deliberate progression from store to field work to management is central to the process of integrating family members into the business. Someone who tries to jump into a leadership role without a firsthand understanding of the wide variety of tasks that go into a thriving pool and spa business is bound to struggle. Chuck’s children and grandchildren filled chlorine jugs, bagged chemicals, cleaned pools, and took on just about every other smaller job on their way up the ladder, just like any other employee.
That sense that everyone, blood relation or not, is treated equally is another contributing factor to the strength of the Horizon Pools team.
“We have a couple of key employees who are not family members,” says Jennifer. “Our general manager has been with the company a year more than I have. The boys, my nephew and my son report to him. And so, you know, there’s checks and balances. We try to do everything very fairly, and we consider him family. We consider pretty much everyone in the business family.”
Jordon Grove (currently Horizon service manager) at 18 months — already in pool pro uniform!
AN UNEXPECTED OFFER
Chantel Dooley had just completed her doctorate in philosophy when her father delivered some surprising news: He was ready to retire from day-to-day oversight of Dazzle Pools, the Phoenix-area business he’d grown from a 20-pool route he’d purchased around 20 years earlier. The question that followed was an even bigger shock. Did she want to run the company?
“I had just earned this very expensive piece of paper,” Chantel remembers. “And I thought, ‘I’m going to go from this Ph.D and people calling me doctor down to answering the phone and talking about, you know, swimming pool algae.’ Like, what?”
It’s not as if the pool and spa field was new to her. Working for her dad’s company was her afterschool and summer job, and she’d picked up work cleaning pools during her college years. Still, this obviously wasn’t the outcome she imagined for herself when she embarked on her advanced degree.
She realized that letting the business go felt like setting aside her family legacy. There were other weightier considerations, too.
“Another piece that’s really important to me is that my parents have grown this business to where it’s not just providing an income for us,” Chantel says. “We’re providing an income for every single person that we employ. And we’re putting roofs over their heads and food on their tables and clothes on their backs. That’s not something I take lightly.”
Chantel initially said she’d give it one year and reassess. Three years after that deadline, she’s fully committed to the job.
Officially, Chantel is the chief of operations for Dazzle Pools. For now, her parents remain the owners. That connection also means that her father — and his decades of experience — is an invaluable resource.
Much as Chantel looks to her father, she also understands the importance of setting her own course. Importantly, her father is keenly aware that his suggestions will be heard and considered, but Chantel is now the decision-maker. The transition has been gradual and organic.
And Chantel has no regrets about her unexpected career path.
“It’s a great, great job,” Chantel says. “It’s been a great job for all the different seasons of my life. And I really enjoy the challenge of taking something that my parents have worked so hard to grow and nurture and provide for not only themselves, but for other families. I get to take that and sustain it and hopefully, God willing, grow it.”
This article first appeared in the February 2026 issue of AQUA Magazine — the top resource for retailers, builders and service pros in the pool and spa industry. Subscriptions to the print magazine are free to all industry professionals. Click here to subscribe.
