Eric Knight Joins Pool Brain

Natalie Hood welcomes Eric Knight back to the Talking Pools Podcast to discuss his move from Watershape University to Pool Brain—and what this new role could mean for pool service professionals.

Eric explains how a conversation that began in 2022 eventually developed into an opportunity to combine the work he does best: water chemistry, education, technology, and solving real-world problems for technicians in the field. He also clears up the speculation surrounding his departure from Watershape University. There was no drama, no burned bridge, and no scandal—just an honest recognition of his strengths and an opportunity that better fits how his brain works.

The conversation then turns toward the future of the pool industry. Eric explains why artificial intelligence is unlikely to replace pool technicians, but will increasingly help them make better decisions, optimize routes, train employees, standardize service, and operate more profitable businesses.

Eric also offers an early look at Pool Brain’s vision for automated chemical dosing, guided technician workflows, and “point-of-need education”—giving technicians the information they need while they are standing in front of the pool, instead of making them wait for the next class or trade show.

In This Episode

• Why Eric Knight joined Pool Brain
• How his relationship with Pool Brain began in 2022
• The truth about his departure from Watershape University
• Why recognizing your weaknesses is an important leadership skill
• What Eric is most proud of accomplishing at Watershape
• Why traditional industry education is becoming cost-prohibitive
• How AI will assist pool professionals without replacing field technicians
• Why more displaced white-collar workers are entering the trades
• The story behind the Orenda Calculator and Chemiculator
• How technology can eliminate dangerous chemical-dosing shortcuts
• What automated water-chemistry dosing could mean for service companies
• How guided workflows can improve training, safety, and accountability
• Why technicians need education at the exact moment a problem occurs

This is Part One of Natalie Hood’s conversation with Eric Knight. Tune in next Wednesday for Part Two as they continue discussing his new role at Pool Brain and the technology being developed to support the next generation of pool professionals.

Transcript

SPEAKER_08 0:54

Before we get into today's episode, I want to take a moment to recognize the incredible company for supporting my defense. Open water supply children. I'd like to thank the girls, the official sponsor of the campaign. Thank you both for believing this helping making this possible. I'd also like to give a very special shout-out. Thank you for talking to the podcast for supporting not only the supply but for also providing an incredible platform. I'd also like to thank you for coming on board as a sponsor. It's greatly appreciated. Thank you for believing for being a part of this journey. I also want to say a part of thank you to everyone who has already visited the public donation for the contribution. September 20th. And if your company would like to become a sponsor, or if you have any questions about the campaign, you can reach out to me directly.com. You can also visit my Facebook or Instagram pages to learn more about the fundraiser. Sponsoring or donating isn't possible. Every dollar helps. Every share makes a difference. And together we can help ensure more children have the opportunity to learn this life-saving skill. Now let's jump into today's episode.

SPEAKER_04 3:13

The 2026 Top Ten Mentors, Jeff Hamp, Chris Kavanaugh, Tim McDowell, Lacey Davis, Jerry Wallace, John Poma, Greg Beard, Terry Tamanin, Peter Wiederman.

SPEAKER_01 3:27

Congratulations to the 2026 Talking Pools Podcast Top 10 Pool Industry Mentors. Your willingness to teach, mentor, encourage, and elevate others has made a lasting impact on the swimming pool industry. These honorees were selected by the hosts of the Talking Pools Podcast in recognition of the difference they have made in the lives and careers of pool professionals. The sponsors of the 2026 Talking Pools Podcast pool industry mentor recognition are Blu-ray XL United Chemical, Lamotte Company, Revved Up Apparel, and Aqua Comfort Water Group.

SPEAKER_08 4:03

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 gonna have a fun one because I have someone joining me who really does not need much of an introduction in this industry, Eric Knight. And he has spent years combining education, water chemistry, technology, and probably a healthy amount of challenging the way we have always done things.

SPEAKER_03 4:49

Thank you. Thanks for having me. This is the second time I've been on the show.

SPEAKER_08 4:52

Yes, second time. You were on here just a couple months ago, I think.

SPEAKER_03 4:55

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_08 4:56

Yeah. So before we get into all the serious stuff, I have to ask, how does it feel to finally have the news out in the industry that you're with Pool Brain?

SPEAKER_03 5:05

Well, uh it's uh it's good. It's good. I I have been uh allowed, thanks to Adam and the team at Pool Brain, I've been allowed to off-board over the summer, which has been really nice of them and it's been really good for Watershape. And I've made it a point in my career to not burn any bridges. I'm there's no hard feelings whatsoever. I think it's gonna be a win-win long-term for both groups. So yeah, I was as I was transitioning out, finishing certain classes, building that service track, and then onboarding. And most of what I've done in the summer is learn pool brain by being onboard by their, I gotta be honest, amazing support team. I really wish we had a team like that when I was at Arenda, because we had so many calls and we were fielding them. But now that I'm seeing the value of that, I'm very impressed. But to be honest with you, it has been delightful being under the radar because nobody was calling me with questions about anything. You know, it was it was just watershaped stuff, and and that was great. And so I feel like I've hit the ground running, ready to go, and I'm really excited for it this fall and this upcoming show season.

SPEAKER_08 6:09

Yeah, and it's gonna be a fun one. So take me back a little bit. How did the conversation even start with Pool Brain?

SPEAKER_03 6:16

Okay. Well, I just recorded, I think it's episode 196 on the Rule Your Pool podcast that rolled out the same time this press release. And for the record, I did not want a press release. I don't think that's necessary for simply changing a job, but uh I was overruled. It wasn't my call. But um the main conversation started, I think, in 21 or 22. It was actually right after COVID. So 2022, when I first starting to work with Adam about integrating the arenda calculator into Pool Brain. Now, at that time, PoolBrain was this kind of a startup, really. I mean, it it had some customers, but it wasn't what it is today. And he said we sat down at the international show and he basically laid out his vision for what he wanted his software to do. And I remember thinking this guy is making some bold, like audacious goals, which I love. I love boldness. I think it's gonna be great for the industry. But it was kind of healthy skepticism of like if he can pull it off, you know? And he was saying some things, like automating things to the point of being able to onboard people within a day or two instead of several weeks, and thinking, man, that would be so good for the industry. But how do you onboard that much knowledge? And at that time, of course, I was teaching chemistry at every show at companies all the time. I was a uh quite frequent flyer. And I was thinking, are he is he gonna make what I do obsolete?

SPEAKER_08 7:38

Right.

SPEAKER_03 7:38

And but but then in the back of my mind, I was like, no, I don't think it's gonna make it obsolete, but I think it's gonna just change and transform. And then fast forward with inflation and everything, travel costs are absurd. And so less and less people are visiting trade shows every year. They're starting to come maybe every other year or every third year. That's what I've started to notice. Obviously, it's not everybody, but it's becoming cost prohibitive. That's the truth. It's becoming cost prohibitive to get education. And even if you do go to a trade show, you can only be in one classroom at a time. And there's a lot of classes simultaneously going on. Uh so that's when it started, 2022. But the the employment offer, actually, um that was not until I want to say April, maybe. He just called me up out of the blue. I did not reach out to him. He called me up and repeated the same exact vision and said, I need someone to build it. We're ready to do this. And we started talking about how to tie in higher education, which of course is what I was doing at Watershape, and bring that into the future in a way that WaterShape alone is not going to be capable of doing because it's not a software company. And I thought, oh, this this like this kind of gets me back to the deep work that we did at Arenda when I was building the calculator and the app when you have like a really complex problem set and it's not just busy work all the time. And I and I thought, man, this is a big challenge. What he's trying to do. And I can't discuss that on this show, but it'll roll out over the next couple of years. I'm up for the challenge, you know, in an era of AI with these tools, suddenly you put that kind of power in some amateur's hands like my own, and suddenly like it's a force multiplier. We can actually do a lot more. And uh he's got a very clear picture and and sold me on that vision.

SPEAKER_08 9:25

Yeah. No, I think what Pool Brain is doing is amazing. I mean, I know there's a lot of people out there that they're a little nervous that they think that maybe their job is maybe their job might be replaced by AI. You know what time it is?

SPEAKER_05 9:39

Wednesday vibes on the talking pools porta.

SPEAKER_02 11:44

The future of our industry is shaped by those willing to invest in it. The following companies have stepped forward to support education, leadership, and mentorship across the swimming pool industry. These are the sponsors of the 2026 Talking Pools Podcast Mentor Award, Title Sponsor, Blu-ray, XL, Title Sponsor, United Chemical, Gold Sponsor, Lamotte Chemical, Silver Sponsor, Revved Up Apparel, Supporting Sponsor, Aqua Comfort Water Group. Thank you for helping us recognize and celebrate the mentors who continue to shape the future of the swimming pool industry, and God bless the pool pro.

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SPEAKER_08 13:36

I know there's a lot of people out there that they're a little nervous that they think that maybe their job is maybe their job might be replaced by AI, but actually the tools that PoolBrain's bringing out is gonna further assist them in their daily job, right?

SPEAKER_03 13:50

You mean pool pros?

SPEAKER_08 13:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 13:52

Oh yeah. No, I don't think pool pros are really at risk of being displaced by AI in the short term. I I did an episode that was completely done by AI.

SPEAKER_08 14:00

Yeah, I remember. It was cool. You sent it to me, and I was like, dude, that was AI. Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_03 14:05

It's scary what it can do, but you're not gonna see AI netting a pool and cleaning out a strainer basket and replacing a pump and all that stuff. So those skills are still necessary, but it's going to augment the thinking part of it. It's gonna augment the optimization of a route and how well a business performs and how well it markets itself locally and all these things. So AI is gonna help pool service businesses. What is happening, to your point, is you're starting to see this influx of people from knowledge work positions, law firms, design firms, basically white-collar jobs that you know, IT and whatever these other jobs are, that IT, I'm sorry, that AI is just wiping out their entire divisions, and now they need work. And so they're coming into the trades because they're thinking, all right, well, I don't want to go to another thing that's gonna get displaced by AI. And I've met quite a few of these people that are now students at Watershape, and you know, you could be bitter or you can be better. And they made good choices to come to a place that's not likely to get automated very quickly, and that is the trades. They came to the pool business. So they and they're smart and they're here, they're hungry, they're learning, and they're already doing great things.

SPEAKER_08 15:13

Yeah. No, you're absolutely right. I mean, again, if you had told me five, ten years ago that AI was gonna be this impactful in the industry, I wouldn't have believed you. And I was not heavily using AI five years ago, but now I've embraced it and it is helpful in certain areas. It's not good for everything, but you do need to embrace it because it's here and it's gonna it's not going anywhere.

SPEAKER_03 15:35

Aaron Powell Yeah, it's it's not going anywhere. It that's absolutely true. Scary, but true.

SPEAKER_08 15:41

It is it it is definitely scary. But so kind of going back to Water Shape, when you look back at Watershape, what would you say is something that you are most proud of?

SPEAKER_03 15:51

The team. That's an easy one. The team was incredible, and everybody had skill sets of what they needed to do and what was built in such a short amount of time. It's now going into it, there wasn't actually a lot of systems and processes in place. There was a lot of really high-quality instructors, very good presenters, good information, but it needed to be structured in such a way that the books matched the presentations better and that you know customers could get their transcripts, for instance, or you know, their badges for these certifications. And all those systems had to be built basically from scratch. And it happened largely thanks to Brett, who's the developer there, who learned he is. He learned a new system from zero when I came in, and now he's like extremely proficient in it, and now it's working very well. And of course, there's going to be ups and downs, but it's just a huge workload. Michelle, as the student sponsor, and instructor liaison is incredible. You have Marjorie there who is not well, she started as like marketing and graphics, but she's basically filled in every other role. Sloan, super well organized. Julie is managing on the business side. You have Eric doing the magazine, the other Eric, Eric Herman doing uh the Water Shapes magazine. And then you have ownership and you have all these instructors that are getting involved as well. And so the team basically it w it was not a huge team, but the results were multiples of the inputs that we put into it. And like pulling off the education vacation, which had never been done, and you were there, and and that would had over 200 attendees, which was great, for having something that had never been done outside of a trade show before. So I'm very happy about that. I'm proud of what the team accomplished.

SPEAKER_08 17:34

Yeah. And I would say too, uh the one thing that I I I felt when I was there that you don't always find, and it's not very common these days, is I felt uh a family. I felt like it was family, right? You guys were a group, you were a team. And you know, they you know, when you talk when you think of watersheep, you think of a wolf pack. But that that's the sense that I get. And even now to this day, it it's a family, you're a team and you're a group.

SPEAKER_03 17:56

Yeah, um, that's true. The cool thing about Watershape that attracted me to them. When I first met them, of course, I was still with Arenda. I just wanted to teach chemistry. I was involved. I was actually pulled into the plaster class to teach the startup and the water and cement chemistry portions. And when I saw how those classes were taught, whoa, th this I thought I was teaching good classes. This is like a totally different echelon of education. Like they go so deep in these classes. I'm used to like seminars, you know? And when I saw that 16-hour class, my goodness, how does anybody teach that much? But what you realize when you teach eight, sixteen, twenty-four-hour classes, you almost run out of time in some cases. There's there is a lot to it. And what really makes Water Shape special is you have this brain trust really of the masters, the best who have ever done it in some cases, coming together, and they don't have to do this. They choose to do it. They sh they choose to share their knowledge. It's um it's an amazing thing. It's a great way to shortcut, I would say, knowledge, but not experience. You have to earn wisdom and experience, but the knowledge can kind of like keep you from straying and making the same bad mistakes that these really good instructors can warn you against, and it could keep you out of trouble. So I was very impressed with that. And in speaking with the students, it's pretty much unanimous when they take like construction 2111 or the plaster class or something like that. They're all just blown away. Like I had no idea about you know half of this I had never heard of, or or sometimes more. So it was very special in that regard. But what I said in my own podcast, and I'll say it again here, owing that mission, I'm all about. I'm still team woo for sure. But running the business of that is a very different skill set than I have. I don't have those skills. And that's why I made the decision, I need to get out of the way. It's I want Watershape to succeed. I was in the way. I didn't have the skills to do what they need. I don't have accounting skills. I I'm not an operations person. And so stepping out of the way, I believe, is best for the business. And you know, that that takes some self-reflection for sure, but I make no bones about it. I know where I'm weak, and that is definitely where I'm weak. So I think we did a lot of great things there, and I hope that they continue, and I think they will. But as far as I know, I've left the place a lot better than I found it, at least I hope so. And you know, you'd have to ask them, but I think I did. And uh we're still in regular communication, so everything's good.

SPEAKER_08 20:16

Yeah, and you know, I I would absolutely agree. I've definitely sh seen a change in watershape, and I think you're a a a big reason of that. And you know, one thing that I really appreciated in the announcement was how supportive everyone at Woo was with the move. And you know, even Bill, he described it as a a great next step for the both of you. And I I think it's important because people hear leaving and they immediately assume like, oh, there has to be some dramatic story.

SPEAKER_03 20:42

There is not. There is no drama. I know people want that, but that's actually not at all.

SPEAKER_08 20:47

Yeah. They're always like, What's the tea spill? But sometimes it's just an opportunity is simply just it's just the right ne it's the right next step, right?

SPEAKER_03 20:55

It's just w it's sometimes there's an opportunity that's a win-win. I was holding back the company and I recognized that several months before I made the change. And I I just needed I needed to figure out how to best do that. And I think a lot of people that listen to this podcast either own their pool service business or maybe a construction company. You feel that too. Like sometimes you have to recognize where you're weak. In most cases, what I'm learning, most business owners do not have uh finance forecasting skills, for instance. And you can outsource that or you have to hire it in. That's one of the first things that gets delegated is your accounting. And nobody can be great at everything. It's just not possible. And unfortunately, I just don't have those skills. And I thought the job was a little bit different. I thought it was more attuned to what I really like doing and and am capable of, but it isn't, and that's fine. And I have to make the right choice, and I did. But there's there's no bad blood. I'm still texting with ownership and and we're still on good great terms, and we're still gonna be having classes at shows and everything's good.

SPEAKER_08 21:55

Yeah. And and I I I just have to say I I think that's awesome of you. I mean, again, I think with the time that you spent at WU, I can see a massive difference. Like you said, there's no ill feelings, you're still in communication with Bill and Dave and the other instructors. And again, it's just it's what people think. They're like, oh hey, what's the tea? What what's he doing over here?

unknown 22:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 22:17

I've been getting a lot of those questions too.

SPEAKER_08 22:19

Yeah. I mean, I got the same questions after I left the last company I was with for over a decade. They're like, spill the tea. There's no tea. I just it was time to move on.

SPEAKER_03 22:28

It is companies change. That's true. And to that end, I when I left Hasa and Arenda, I mean, I gave uh what was it, ten weeks notice, not two. I finished trade show season. Like I don't want to burn a bridge. I want to leave the place good. I don't want to screw anybody over. I love my team. I still talk to my team. By their grace, they keep me in their funny text message group, so that's really nice. They don't have to do that, but they do. For some reason. But I feel the same way about Watershape. It's still a great team and I still want to contribute how I can. But I also have a baby at home. And I need to have time in the day to be with my child because she's only going to be this young once. And I was working, no joke, 12, 13 hour days, several days a week, trying to do there was just so much to do that I wasn't good at, so I couldn't get it done in an efficient manner. And it wore deep it wore me down, to be honest with you. It wore me down because I was frustrated, because I didn't have the skills. So I was I wasn't just working a lot. I was working on things that I'm not good at doing. Right. And just in the past couple of weeks of really getting into the work at Pool Brain, it fits right into my encodings. Like it's uh it's so aligned with how my brain works that I've been able to produce an amazing amount of work that you'll see over the next year already. Yeah, we've laid a foundation that's that's really, really good. So I'm enjoying it very much.

SPEAKER_08 23:49

Aaron Powell And you know, that's better for the industry too. And it's it's better for you overall because that means you're excited and you're clear-headed, right? I mean, no one's happy when they're they're miserable.

SPEAKER_03 23:59

Oh, I didn't say I was miserable. I'm I I said I said I was weak in the yeah, yeah, I was weak in the position. Yeah, but I was not miserable. I was just like, I'm letting myself down. Like, what am I doing wrong? I don't get this. So that's what it is.

SPEAKER_08 24:12

Yeah. And I I'm maybe it was it that was not that was a horrible word to use. That internal battle where you're trying to do something and you just don't have the all the tools.

SPEAKER_03 24:21

You were a swimmer. This would be like me trying to swim the 200 butterfly over and over again on repeats. I was not a butterfly.

SPEAKER_08 24:30

I was not a butterfly, I was breaststroke. I actually tried butterfly the other day.

unknown 24:34

Nope.

SPEAKER_03 24:34

What a mistake. But like, can I do it? Yeah. But it's ugly, it's painful, I'm injury prone, like it's it's not fast, it's exhausting. And then, you know, some teammates can't do breaststroke. So like you gotta know where you're good at and and uh I'm not good at a lot of things, but I like to focus on the few things that I am and and hopefully that adds value to people.

SPEAKER_08 24:54

Yeah, yeah. Oh yeah. It's funny that you said butterfly. I actually, out of curiosity, at the end of my workout this morning, I was like, I'm gonna try butterfly. I got one stroke in and I was like, we're done here. We're done here. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 25:06

Yeah. No, I made that decision 12 years ago and I haven't looked back, so that's good.

SPEAKER_08 25:10

Yeah, yeah. We won't be doing that again. We'll stick to what I know.

SPEAKER_03 25:13

Smart, smart, smart. Keep your shoulders intact. I like that.

SPEAKER_08 25:16

Yes, it yeah, right. So, you know, one thing I've noticed, you have this habit of getting involved in things where education and technology start running into each other, right? So you helped develop the Arenda calendar calculator. Jeez, calendar, swimmerhead. All right. Uh oh. You know, you created the educational content and the rule your pull podcast, and then you went to Watershape University, and now your your actual title has the words education technology in it. So have you basically been working toward this job without realizing it?

SPEAKER_03 25:48

That's a deep question. Um I've never cared about titles. I I still don't. I did not pick the title, but I think it does describe what Adam has hired me to do. And yeah, I think I think both of those fit the encoding. So basically, I I'm not a developer. I designing the arenda calculator and architecting it is a different skill than writing code. What I learned to do is listen to customers and find out what's hurting them. What is the gap, what's wrong, what do they, what do they need, what's missing. And then I look at all those options out there and say, well, what are they missing? And so the arenda calculator was not my idea. That was Harold's idea. And it was his money, it was his personal money that funded that in the early days because Arena was very small at the time. And I had just come from an app startup, but I wasn't developing, I but I was learning how to structure an app and things. And so he said there needs to be a good calculator, and it'll be really cool if we can somehow tie that in with the LSI. And I didn't know what the LSI was. I didn't even know how to use a test kit at the time. I was learning, but I, you know, I didn't know. And what had never been done, there was an LSI calculator. I think there was a few of them out there. And there were certainly websites that had it, like Lentech was one of the best ones out there. But at that time, nobody was tying that in with chemical dosing at the same time. And so we actually I spent a lot of time trying to hash this out of my brain. How can we do both? Because you know you only have so much pixels on a screen. So you have limited finite space and you don't want to have to scroll on an app. And then it became very clear LSI is a real-time reading vertically. Chemical dosing is going to be horizontal. This to this yields whatever the difference is. And that same logic went into the chemiculator, which is in the menu. If you go to other calculators, that was like, believe it or not, that was a bigger project than the Arenda calculator. A lot of people don't even know it's there. But that chemiculator is incredibly powerful because it does the math backwards that says, all right, instead of starting at this part per million to a desired part per million, it allows a pro to answer the question well, I have this gallon of liquid chlorine. What is that going to do to this pool that is 8,700 gallons or whatever? Or I have this bag of shock, what is that gonna do to my pool if I put it all in? And so you can actually just put in a quantity of a certain product with at its percentage, like liquid, you would it has a toggle for like 12.5%, and then you put in the quantity, and then it'll tell you the parts per million change. So it just does the math backwards. But that's actually, for the people that know about it and listeners now you know about it, the chemiculator in the the uh main menu of the Arenda app, they use that all the time because that's like a quick way to know, hey, I need to shock the pool. Can I round up? Is it gonna be too high? That kind of thing. Or better yet, I've got a 50-pound bag of calcium chloride and it's winterization time. How much calcium is this gonna put in my pool? And you can find out just like that. And so yeah, that that same kind of logic applies. So what that problem was that the render calculator solved is nobody has time to do the math. Like you can do you can do uh dosing charts and those are great. However, realistically, this is a tough business, and you can't be spending excess minutes in the backyard just trying to crunch numbers in your head. And as a result of that, the industry developed a lot of shortcut habits, and a lot of them are fine, but a lot of them were not. They were overdosing acid. And this is this is one of the more controversial things that that I said. I kept still do it today. Measure and dilute your acid, people. And it's not me trying to criticize you, it's me understanding what that's actually doing. When you overdose or you don't dilute your acid enough, it goes to the bottom, it could etch a cement surface, it could cause a vinyl liner to weaken and eventually wrinkle, lose pigment, all these things, they're consequences. We're trying to look out for you that a lot of pros just developed habits because they have to get to the next pool. So what the calculator does is it just like shortcuts that. And then fast forward, pool brain and other softwares took that calculator on a licensing agreement with Arenda when we were there. That's how I met Adam. And they allowed you to save results. They allowed you to save chemical history, they allowed you to put it into an account so you could actually forecast things. I mean, they took it to a much higher level than we could ever do. And that's one of the things I'm looking back, I'm really most proud of impacting the industry in that regard because that tool is now the basis of chemistry dosing, and it's extremely accurate, and I'm really happy about that.

SPEAKER_08 30:21

And I will I have to say, buddy, you are damn good at doing that because I would not be able to do something like that.

SPEAKER_03 30:27

I appreciate it. But but again, it it's not me. There's a team around it. We come up with concepts, and then it's really just figuring out how to use how a user would use it. And then, you know, I didn't do the formulas. You know, we we have outsourced consultants for that. Right. But the user experience is really what I'm doing.

SPEAKER_08 30:43

Aaron Powell Yeah. No, and I I think that's amazing. And I think what you're gonna be doing at PullBrain is so exciting. And it kind of brings me back to the announcement, right? Because they mentioned three things and they stood out at me. And it was automated water, chemistry dosing, guided training workflows, and then it pointed out uh uh point out of need education. Point of need, yeah. Point thank you, point of need education. And so what does that look like? And I know you can't say too much, but what does that look like for the technician in the field, right?

SPEAKER_03 31:16

Don't worry, Adam, because Adam told me don't promise any deliverables, don't promise any dates, because we don't know. There's always testing and you know control suitable. No, I trust me, Adam, I know. Uh so all right. What was the first thing? You you had the three things.

SPEAKER_08 31:29

You had um uh automated automated water chemistry dosing.

SPEAKER_03 31:34

And then the second one was workflows, and the last one was point of need. Okay, so let me start with the last one first.

SPEAKER_05 31:39

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 31:39

Um the point of need is basically right here, right now, you need to know something. You can't wait till the next trade show. You can read help centers, you can do all that stuff, but like right now, at this point, you need something. How do you access that information very, very quickly? That's all I'm gonna say about that.

SPEAKER_08 31:58

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 31:59

Um it is not built yet. It's a much bigger project than it sounds, but that is a cogent way of of explaining that.

SPEAKER_08 32:05

I will take that.

SPEAKER_03 32:05

Um, in terms of automating chemistry, so if you know, let's say the brain of pool brain, right? It is a day, it's uh ultimately it's a database. If you know the information about a pool, like the gallonage, the surface type, and a few other things, then with the power of computing, you can set parameters at an administrator's level, meaning a service manager or a business owner can say, hey, in my business, we run pools this way. And at its very basic level, what it does is it tells you however you test the water, you put that in, whatever you are, it will tell you in order how to get to the desired things that your company wants you to do. And it does it does this automatically. So that way the service tech doesn't need to figure out where to aim. Because in the arena calculator, you have to decide where to aim, right? Like you have to have a lot of intuition to understand where to even aim these dials. Uh, because it's not it's not very simple if you've never done it before. Whereas this is the service tech who may not understand chemistry yet, immediately is told exactly where to aim and and how much to get there. This is helpful. Extremely helpful.

SPEAKER_08 33:16

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 33:17

Yeah. And so that's basically what that is. And that guided workflow is just one piece of a bigger thing. For instance, if you have to close the gate behind you, um, I've I've been doing a bunch of demos with this. Pool Brain requires you, or your company owner, the administrator who's handling the dashboard of Pool Brain, can require a photo showing that you closed the gate before you can move on, right? And so it walks you through every step of the service visit. Clean the net, take a picture, or not the net, the skimmer basket, take a picture showing that you emptied the skimmer basket, right? And you don't always have to have the the company decides how much photos you require, and they decide every step.

SPEAKER_08 33:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 33:55

But yeah, but that's a guided workflow for somebody who doesn't have experience. What order should they do things in? So it'll say, test these parameters today, input them here, and then add these chemicals this way. And that's only gonna get better. And so to follow on with that is the education to show demonstrated how it's done, uh, whether that's videos or images or graphics or we don't know yet. I haven't built it yet. But we want to make sure that pros are given all the tools to do the right things in the right order. And that's what a guided workflow is. And Pool Brain already has that. We're just gonna make the chemistry a lot more intuitive and a lot more forecasting, so to speak.

SPEAKER_08 34:30

And that's brilliant because that's one thing. And you and I've talked about this before. I mean, long before this conversation, but that is one thing this industry is truly missing, and it's customer service and support for the pool pro, right? There's there's just, I think there's such a gap of education. They go out and they get a certificate and they're like, all right, I'm prepared. But actually, there is so much more education that they need to get to better understand how to properly run a route.

SPEAKER_03 34:58

Tune in next Wednesday for part two of this episode with Eric Knight of Pool Brain and learn more about his role at this Pool Service software giant.