Calcium Nodules, Mentorship, and 50 Years of Pool Industry Wisdom with Jerry Wallace

What does nearly 50 years in the swimming pool industry teach you? According to Jerry Wallace, there are no shortcuts, you never stop learning, and sometimes you need to show up with a rolling suitcase full of textbooks.

Natalie Hood sits down with Jerry Wallace, president of Swim Chem and one of the 2026 Talking Pools Podcast Top Ten Pool Industry Mentors. Jerry shares how he entered the family business as a teenager, the mentors who shaped his career, and why mentoring is about leaving the industry better than you found it.

Then Jerry puts his decades of water chemistry, plaster, and expert-witness experience to work busting some persistent myths about calcium nodules. Are they caused by excessive calcium hardness? Are they simply another form of scale? Can adjusting the water chemistry stop them?

Jerry explains why calcium nodules are typically associated with voids, delamination, pinholes, or cracks beneath the plaster surface, not a pool professional’s failure to maintain the water. His message to service professionals is blunt: educate yourself, document your work, demand an explanation, and stop allowing people to steamroll you.

Jerry also discusses why manufacturers need to listen more closely to service professionals, what younger professionals bring to the industry, and the three groups every successful business must protect before looking at the profit-and-loss statement: family, employees, and customers.

And, because this is Talking Pools, Natalie settles the critically important question of whether pineapple belongs on pizza.

In This Episode

•  How Jerry entered the pool industry at age 16 
•  The mentors who helped shape his career 
•  Why mentorship is about life lessons, not merely technical knowledge 
•  How to recognize when someone is no longer coachable 
•  Why there are no shortcuts to long-term success 
•  The difference between calcium scale and calcium nodules 
•  Why high calcium hardness does not selectively create isolated nodules 
•  How voids, delamination, cracks, and pinholes contribute to nodule formation 
•  Why changing the water chemistry treats the symptom, not the underlying problem 
•  How service professionals can defend themselves against unsupported blame 
•  Why pool professionals must become experts in their trade 
•  What manufacturers misunderstand about real-world equipment retrofits 
•  Why the industry needs stronger communication between engineers and field professionals 
•  What younger generations are bringing to the pool industry 
•  The three priorities Jerry’s father used to measure a successful year 
•  Jerry’s controversial but unwavering defense of pineapple on pizza 

Jerry’s Message to Pool Professionals

Do not assume a calcium nodule is your fault simply because someone points at the water chemistry. Test the water, investigate the surface, document the evidence, ask for the actual mechanism, and make the person assigning blame show their work.

If you are going to work as a pool service professional, become an expert and stand up for yourself. Nobody else is going to do it for you.

#TalkingPoolsPodcast #PoolIndustry #PoolService #SwimmingPools #PoolChemistry #CalciumNodules #PoolPlaster #Mentorship #PoolProfessionals #WaterChemistry #PoolEducation #SwimChem #JerryWallace #NatalieHood #MythbustingWednesday

Transcript

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SPEAKER_08 0:54

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, and today we're gonna do something a little different because we're sitting down with one of the top 10 mentors in the pool industry. And honestly, being named the top 10, it's an accomplish all by itself. And these are people who aren't just successful in the industry. They're the people who take the time to turn around, help the person coming up behind them, share what they've learned, and sometimes teach those lessons the hard way. And my guest today has certainly had plenty of time to collect a few of those lessons. Jerry Wallace. He has been in the swimming pool service and repair industry since 1977. He has worked his way from entry level all the way to becoming president of SwimCem, one of the largest swimming pool service companies in Northern California, servicing more than 4,200 accounts. Jerry holds a California C53 swimming pool and D8 concrete contractor's license, and his experience covers everything from water chemistry and full pool service to equipment repair, new technology, energy efficiency, and even serving as an expert witness in swimming pool plaster cases. And this year, Swim Chem is celebrating an incredible 50 years in business. So today we're going to talk about mentorship, the people who helped shape Jerry's career, the people who he's helped along the way, what almost 50 years in the pool industry teaches you, and Jerry even came prepared to bust a few myths about calcium nodules. So, Jerry, welcome to the Talking Pools Podcast.

SPEAKER_01 2:34

Thank you. Great to be here with you.

SPEAKER_03 2:35

You know what time it is? Wednesday vibes on the Talking Pools Podcast.

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SPEAKER_08 6:35

Jerry, welcome to the Talking Pools Podcast.

SPEAKER_01 6:38

Thank you. Great to be here with you.

SPEAKER_08 6:39

Yes. So for those who are not familiar with your beautiful background, what got you interested in the pool industry?

SPEAKER_01 6:47

Family. Family tradition, I guess, as Hank Jr. said. My dad was in the swimming pool business down in uh Central California. He had a plastering business, he had a concrete decking business, and an excavation business. And he wanted to get out of construction and into something with more stable year-round income, which led him into the service business. So he started that business in 1970. And I began working the day I turned 16 officially as a young route person. Um before that I was, you know, a helper for a lot of summers. But then I started full-time running a route uh during my last years of high school and a couple years of college. Um and just loved it and stayed with it.

SPEAKER_08 7:33

I love that. I love that. You know, I when I was growing up, my dad did he worked in a lot of construction. He never transferred over to uh the aquatics industry, but now that I'm so heavily involved, he's told me a few times, he's like, Man, that's what that's the industry I should have gotten into. And I'm like, There's still time, Dad. There's still time. But I love that. Well, and congratulations on swim cam being in business for 57 years. That's certainly an accomplishment. Thank you. It's very exciting. So we're here to talk about mentors. So, first of all, congratulations for being part of the top ten. Thank you. I'm I'm flabbergasted to say that is the perfect word. So, first of all, what does it mean to be named uh one of the top ten mentors? What does it mean to you other than being flabbergasted?

SPEAKER_01 8:21

It it's incredible. I mean, there's so many names on the list this year. Uh the the top ten from last year. Um, I look at those names and and then seeing my name up there uh beside them uh was shocking. I was actually at the car wash uh the Saturday morning whenever Rudy's post showed up on LinkedIn, and uh that's how I found out that I was uh a top ten nominee. And it's like, oh my goodness, how did that happen? But it is incredibly cool to be recognized with uh with those names that everybody knows and respects for what they do.

SPEAKER_08 9:00

Yeah, I absolutely agree. So who is the first person you told?

SPEAKER_01 9:04

Uh probably a lot of people because I turned around and reposted. There you go.

SPEAKER_08 9:09

Good man, good man. So and we can't ignore the prize here. So what would receiving the championship belt mean to you? So Rudy showing up unexpectedly on your door with that belt?

SPEAKER_01 9:22

That would be hard to believe. Again, the competition, the names, being in the top ten from what I under have learned about the process, there was quite a process to get down to the top ten and and make the top ten was incredible enough, but to to to get the belt would be a pretty amazing feeling. Um and I'd probably be asking myself a lot of questions about how and why I was recognized for that. But that's for others to decide and not me.

SPEAKER_08 9:53

Well, I will say we uh the judges were part of that. The they they did the judging and we did blind judging. So there were, as you said, a lot of amazing candidates that were submitted, and um it was definitely quite the process, but congratulations again. I when I did see your name, I was I was like, go Jerry, yes. So thank you. Yes, definitely well deserved.

SPEAKER_01 10:16

So I'll take all the support I can get.

SPEAKER_08 10:18

Yes. Uh so who mentor yeah, who who mentored the mentor here? Who was yours?

SPEAKER_01 10:25

Well, for starters, of course, my father worked under him for for a lot of years through expansions and and uh you know trials and tribulations and changes in in the industry and changes in our business style and model, uh, what we were doing. So learned a tremendous amount from him. Another one is uh Phil Gilhouse, who was a uh owner former owner of General Pool Supply who reached his exit a few years back by selling to Pool Corp. And uh good for him. He's uh he's my business resource. Him and my dad were good friends, and uh him and I still will get together for a breakfast or lunch uh once a quarter or so, uh whenever we can match our schedules with his retirement and his baseball playing.

SPEAKER_02 11:14

There you go.

SPEAKER_01 11:15

So he was a a pretty big influence. And then uh also the the guys at On Balance, Kim Skinner, Q Hales, Doug Latta, we've all kind of been around each other for the last twenty five or thirty years uh doing water chemistry stuff. So we we talk a lot about uh water chemistry issues and problems and solutions and things of that nature. So they've been a big help.

SPEAKER_08 11:42

I love that. And it's I mean, you've been doing this since 1977, and so it it it sounds like as you were growing up in the industry, you had numerous mentors. And I think that's I think that's great. You shouldn't just have one, you should have it's okay to have more. And I love that you've maintained that relationship with them over the years. I think that I mean, I know I've had mentors, and you know, I've said it before, but Michelle Kavanaugh is one of my mentors, and I even through changing jobs, I've always called her up like, hey Michelle, what do you think of this? And she's like, Okay, this is what we're gonna do. I mean, it's you know, we were just talking about Michelle before we started this. And so I I really think that's that's fantastic. Um, but was there one person or one piece of advice from a mentor that really changed, I would say, the trajectory of your career? I I know it's a big Yeah, it's a big question. That is a big qu it's a hard one because you have so many.

SPEAKER_01 12:39

And we also probably uh from my dad because uh it it was a family business, you know, working underneath him for him, you know, expanding the business. And before we got to that expansion was the the very hard discussion about uh with him, um, are you sure that this is what you want to do? Because it's it's not easy. You've been here, you've seen what what my life is like, and are you ready to take this on as I start stepping back and and run with this thing and take it to the next level, whatever I felt that level was or what direction it was. So that was that was a hard question and a lot of thought and a lot of consultation with with my family and and and on also him went into deciding that yeah, we're gonna do this, we're gonna take it, we're gonna grow it and uh see where it goes.

SPEAKER_08 13:36

Yeah. Well you guys have definitely done something right, fifty-seven years. I think we did okay. I think you're doing okay. And I mean, I love that it's in Northern California, that's where I grew up. He's like, oh gosh. Great place to be. It is, it is a great place. It's very expensive now, but it's it is gorgeous.

SPEAKER_01 13:54

Well, we're kind of in that sweet spot. I'm in, you know, my home base is Sacramento, so you know, we're an hour and a half to San Francisco, which obviously isn't what it used to be, but it's still something. Um then we're an hour and a half from Tahoe. So uh got the best of all worlds right there.

SPEAKER_08 14:13

Yeah, I grew up in the Bay Area, so I haven't I moved away about 20 years ago, and I've gone back a few times and it's just nothing like what it was when I grew up. But it's still beautiful. Still very beautiful area.

SPEAKER_01 14:25

Napa's not too shabby a place to go either, so never, not at all.

SPEAKER_08 14:30

My parents still live around there, so it's it's always a great vacation. So when we're talking about mentors, you know, so you've been voted as a top mentor. So when you think about mentoring, why what does it mean to you as a mentor? I mean, why mentor?

SPEAKER_01 14:45

Well, it it kind of goes back to to my upbringing. I was uh I was an athlete, I wasn't uh an outdoorsman that fished and hunted and camped and did all that stuff. I was the proverbial jock. So so I did that. So it was always team. So always about the team and and helping out others and that led me into coaching after I got done with my playing days. Very cool. You know, I coached my kids growing up and after my kids aged out, I continued coaching. I was coaching high school girls' softball as well as 18 and under competitive softball. Um and giving back and and it was more about the life lessons through sports than the sport itself. Teaching them how to be responsible. And and the same thing goes for for in the work environment. I want to help others, I want to give back to the industry that gave so much, not just to me, but to my entire family. My my dad. Uh my brother worked in the family business for a lot of years. Um, my son works in the family business now, um, and has for 15 or 20 years. Well, I'm probably more like 25. Gosh, I'm getting older.

SPEAKER_08 15:59

You don't look a day over 30, Jerry. Come on now.

SPEAKER_01 16:02

Okay. But, you know, giving back to what gave so much to to me and my family. Leave everything that you're involved with in a better place than it was when you found it.

SPEAKER_08 16:14

Yeah, no, I couldn't agree more. And you definitely hit something there with with, you know, sports. I think there's a lot to learn, um, especially for younger kids with education, right? There's a lot of there's a lot of rules and things that they need to learn, I think, to grow in themselves personally. And I think that definitely applies as they get older, especially as you're figuring out your career pathway. I think there's a lot of things that you can learn. So I love that. I know I'm definitely gonna be getting my kids into sports. They have some life lessons to learn.

SPEAKER_01 16:45

Yeah, our kids were heavy into outside activities, sports, scouts. Um I wasn't an outdoorsman. My my son was a Boy Scout for a number of years. Keep actively involved in activities so they don't have time to get into trouble, and also keep them off their devices.

SPEAKER_08 17:04

There you go. Yep, yeah. I could not agree more. I always wondered why my mom kept me so busy every every sport, every dance class, you name it, and now I'm like, I get it, and I'm doing it to my kids. So I get it, mom. Turned into my mother, and I'm okay with that. Yeah. Is there a mentee that you're especially proud of?

SPEAKER_01 17:25

Oh gosh, this is probably the easiest question. Oh, okay. That that that you're gonna give me all day, I think. Um, because the answer is easily my son. He is so much better than me in the in the technical skills. I wasn't a great technician as far as hand skills. I mean, my dad plastered pools, my dad finished concrete, um, he could work on automobiles. Somehow or another, those things skipped over me. I I understand concrete science, I understand plaster science, I understand all of that stuff. But you know, troweling plaster, not my forte or concrete. I remember back at at one point making uh plaster coupons to do research on. And uh I w I wasn't being very successful at at troweling my coupons. My dad said That's when you knew just like buttering your bread, you know, it's easy. I I literally looked at him and said, Dad, when I butter my bread, I tear the bread too. So I just didn't have that touch. But my son has all of those skills, he has the brain power, you know, he's he's technological. He built his first computer when he was like ten years old. Okay. My you know most kids watch Saturday morning cartoons. My son watched the automotive repair shops, this old house, and anything technical that he could watch and not cartoons. Wow. So that's the way he was. He asked me to take him to Fry's and he'd buy all the supplies to build a computer, and I said, You know what you're doing? Because I don't. Yeah. Oh yeah, I do. And that was thirty years ago, because he's gonna be forty in a couple of months. So yeah, he's uh he's a very, very sharp kid. He understands the chemistry. Um, he understands everything that we do within this business, you know, the automation and all the things that that I'm terrible at, and because I'm not in the field working on it, I quit trying years ago because you you don't use it, you lose it. And so it's like, why am I going to these classes and trying to learn? You know, so I just quit and say, you go learn, you know, and he and he's really picked it up and he does a fantastic job. Well, that's awesome.

SPEAKER_08 19:51

I love that. Now let's kind of switch gears. Have you ever had a mentee where you realized I just have to I should have walked away from this one sooner? I know that's a little harsh, but it's the tr it's the truth. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:09

I mean warning signs were you always thought there was a better way. Better than what I was trying to teach him, and and this is kind of a weird dynamic because it was a a plastering contractor. And we have a uh had a great relationship with the with the company for a lot of years. Um this is second generation coming in and I'm trying to bring him up to speed, you know, with how the water chemistry works with the plaster and this, that, and the other, and he just was totally bought into the uh not a plaster problem around that isn't the fault of the water mentality. Um and that's just you know, not the right approach. Open mindedness, you know. I'm willing to learn. I know that there are problems that are caused by water chemistry, but I also know what they are and I know how they happen and how to prevent them from happening. Right. But people try to associate blame on every cool plaster problem to the water chemistry.

SPEAKER_08 21:19

Yeah, yeah. My my thing is you should forever be a student, and I think it's healthy to challenge something, but you should fully understand both sides and make sure you take the time to understand it. And it sounds like that person just was not willing to set aside their feelings and emotions and the good old the good old dog tricks, you know. So how how would you say, how do you know, you know, what are some other areas where you know when someone is just no longer coachable?

SPEAKER_01 21:48

When you have to keep telling them the same story time after time after time, it's not getting in. It's not absorbing it. Yeah. Yep. And then you know what you can try and train change your approach, but sometimes it's not the approach, it's the it's the receiver. You know, and if the receiver's not willing to receive, you know, you need to rethink if you're expending your efforts wisely.

SPEAKER_08 22:14

Yeah. Yeah, that's so true. You know, everyone learns differently, but if you're coming at if you're approaching from all these different angles and they're still not getting it, then there's only so much you can do. And again, people only wanna some people just may not want to take in that information, so it's really too bad.

SPEAKER_01 22:32

Yeah, do you want to learn because you want to learn what the real situation is? Are you learning because you wanna try and figure out a way that you can use a modicum of knowledge to CYA? Right. I think I could get away with CYA since it is a Rudy Podcast. There you go. Yeah, I think you can too.

SPEAKER_08 22:56

All right. Well, let's let's let's give you a little break. Let's switch gears and let's have a little fun. You know, you've spent decades dealing with water chemistry, and you've actually served as an expert witness in swimming pool plaster cases. So I thought this might be a fun subject that you might want to set the record on, and it's calcium nodules. And so I thought I would give you five statements and you can kind of tell me what's wrong with them with you know the typical myth busting that I like to do, if that sounds good to you. Sure, let's go for it. Let's do I'll give you a break from these mentor questions for a little bit. The first one is calcium nodules are caused by water chemistry, specifically excessive calcium hardness.

SPEAKER_01 23:40

That's absolute falsehood. It's one thing I've that I hear a lot of. As a matter of fact, in the last two weeks, I've been dealing with a a pool uh that has calcium nodules over in in the livermore area of the the East Bay area. Customer had some calcium nodules. It's a few years old replaster job. And uh the plastering contractor is blamed the calcium nodules on water chemistry specifically. You know, the calcium hardness is too high. Well, the calcium hardness is a little over 500, 510, I think is what it was whenever we tested it. Um that's just marginally high. If you go to the acceptable range, you know, if you narrow it down to the ideal range, okay, it's a little bit out farther, but still not that far if you look at you know the APSP standards that are 500 to 1,000 on calcium hardness, and they may have changed because I haven't looked lately, but but they're up there, and so that's where the plastering contractor went to. That's where the material provider went to and said that that was the cause, and that's just not the cause. The contractor suggested that they drain half the pool and do that, and that will probably prevent any future growths. And in the meantime, they sent a diver in to sand off the 18 or 20 nodules that were already in place. So they did that, and the consumer drained the pool halfway, and in our conversations with him, we had conveyed what our thoughts were, uh, which that it's very likely that where you found those nodules that they sanded off, sanded off, you would probably find a hollow spot behind them. So when the pool level got down, most of them were ironically on the wall in this particular case. Okay. He took either a screwdriver or uh or a small hammer and was tapping around those areas and found that boy, there were hollows in uh in a lot of those spots where he was previously had had nodules. So he called me and I said, Well, get your wife out there and get your camera going and and uh videotape your knocking, tapping on the wall, so you know the audio will pick up that there's a hollowness there compared to where the solid structure is. So they did that, and lo and behold, this morning the plastering contractor, supervisor, manager, whatever was out there, and he was shown the video and uh where they previously said it was the water chemistry, now with all the voids exposed, decided that they would re-plaster the pool in full at no charge to the customer. So eating is work with the probably wasn't the water chemistry.

SPEAKER_08 26:37

Yeah. So why do you think calcium hardness has why does you think why do you think it continues to take so much of the blame?

SPEAKER_01 26:44

Well, I guess it depends on how they're explaining it, because one of the myths is that it's not just the calcium hardness, but it's it's aggressive water. Right. Something that's been espoused as well. So is it aggressive water or is it high calcium? Because those are usually opposite ends of the spectrum. And and why is it the scapegoat? I I guess, I'm supposing, I don't know, because nobody's ever been able to explain it to me of what the actual mechanism is. They just say it's it's the calcium hardness. I guess it's because a calcium nodule is just that, it's a calcium product. And so they say it has to be affiliated or attached to you know the calcium hardness in the water, which um is that that's not correct. Interesting.

SPEAKER_08 27:34

Okay. Well, here's another one, and it's calcium nodules and calcium scale are basically the same thing. But what's the difference?

SPEAKER_01 27:42

If you get down to the nuts and bolts, chemistry of the composition of the nodule or the composition of the scale, they're very similar if not identical. Okay. But the issue is how did they get there? What was the mechanism to make them appear and how they appear? Now, back to your prior question about calcium hardness and and calcium scale. Okay. When the calcium hardness gets too high and other factors are aligned with that being too high, causing the calcium to precipitate out of the water, you get calcium scale kind of uniformly over the pool. But you don't get it to s pick a spot like a nodule is and form right there because the water was out of balance. Our water's not smart water, it's it's just not intelligent. I love that. I'm gonna attach right here and one inch away, I'm not gonna attach there. And the rest of the pool I'm not gonna attach. Yeah, it's not a good one. You've got you've got 18 or 20 square inches if you had 18 or 20 nodules, 18 or 20 square inches of of nodule calcium material on how many square inches of pool surface, and the water's smart enough to pick out those specific areas, nah, there's there's something much greater going on than the water chemistry's not balanced properly.

SPEAKER_08 29:19

Yeah, I agree. I love that smart smart water. I'm gonna use that. So for us from a service professional's perspective, what should they look for before before assuming it's scale?

SPEAKER_01 29:31

Well, obviously testing the water is important. Okay, but usually if you investigate far enough, uh this is where it gets tricky. If you investigate far enough into calcium nodules, you will usually find either a pinhole or a microcrack or something that the the nodule is attached to or growing out of. Okay that's tough to do from the top of the pool. Now, you can swim down there, you know, with some goggles on and maybe a magnifier and and and get a better look and and see some craze cracking, but it but it's not an easy thing to do. And usually, you know, behind that, just a craze crack is not going to produce a nodule. Okay, a pinhole by itself is not going to produce a nodule. Nodules are usually produced the vast majority of the time because there's a void underneath that craze crack or pinhole. Okay, so that means a delamination between the the top coat of plaster, the substrate, either the prior layer of plaster, or if they chipped it all the way down to gunnite, to the gunnite, there's been a separation of the new surface from the old surface. Okay, and what happens is you have when you when you re-plaster a pool or a new pool, oftentimes you get a lot of what's termed plaster dust. And that's because of a chemical reaction of the water, fresh water reacting with the fresh plaster and all of the nutrients and ingredients that are in there, okay, and that produces plaster dust. A nodule is created when you have a void behind that fresh plaster and a pathway for water to get into that void. Okay. When that happens and you get water back there, then the water can react with the backside of that plaster. Even if it's a few years old, it's pretty much freshly fresh plaster that's not reacted with water like what on the outside surface of the pool has. Right. So water gets in that void and starts reacting with the plaster, and uh, the same chemical reactions take place that created plaster dust. I'm trying to make this fairly simple here. I appreciate it. But you get those things happening, and so you get this small cavity of water back there that becomes full of a lot of calcium material, calcium hydroxide material that's been drawn out of the plaster from the backside. Okay? And then it pushes through the crack or the pinhole into the main body of water of the pool, and the main body of the water of po in the pool consists mainly of bicarbonate alkalinity. Okay, so now you've got hydroxide alkalinity reacting with the bicarbonate alkalinity, and it turns it into carbonate, okay? And the calcium carbonate falls out of solution right there at the point where it's escaping from the boy. And it usually creates what looks like a little volcano, or in the case of a crack, it may be a little elongated, like uh I think our old friend Brad Garrett used to call them wormers. Yes, uh, where a calcium nodule grew along a craze crack. So it can take a couple different shapes there. Um, but that's the reaction of that, you know, hydroxide reacting with the bicarbonate, carbonizing, carbonating, and attaching to the to the surface there. Okay. Well, I appreciate that explanation. I know I've definitely learned something. And that's how you get them in those small localized locations and not throughout the entire surface of the pool. That makes sense.

SPEAKER_08 33:46

That makes a lot of sense. And, you know, I feel like the the service guys and gals are the first to be blamed. And so, you know, if calcium nodules appear, you know, there's another myth out there that someone must have improperly maintained the pool water. But we're, you know, we talk about that. We've talked about it a few times, but you know, why does water chemistry always seem to be such the easy culprit when there's a plaster problem?

SPEAKER_01 34:12

We're getting into opinion here now.

SPEAKER_08 34:14

A little bit, yes. Yes, that that's what we do here. We do do throw some opinions. So how about for your expert witness experience?

SPEAKER_01 34:22

Sure. I would say if I'm the service guy, uh I I always, you know, my dad was from Missouri, which means show me. Don't tell me, show me. It's like in in the case I just mentioned earlier in Livermore. You know, they told me, but they didn't show me.

unknown 34:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 34:38

You know, show me how. Explain to me the chemistry. You know, nobody ever does that. And the the service guys are usually smaller operators than a plastering contractor. Very true. Um and the plastering contractor is perceived to be the expert on their product, as they should be, but they are not the expert on the water. True. Um, that's where the service guy should be. That's the approach and the perspective that I take. You know, you got to do better than that. If a customer calls our company and tries to say the plastering contractor said this, I'm like, okay, that's fine. You call them back and tell me what day and what time they can be there with you, and I will be there, or somebody from my company will be there because now I have trained some of my staff to be able to deal with these things. So I don't have to run around all over the place anymore because they have to be able to deal with things as well. But they stand up for yourself. Yes. You know, I won't I won't go out and look at those unless the homeowner can get the party that's accusing me of being at fault to be in the backyard with me. And they want to show up. I show up with a small carry-on bag roller suitcase full of information. Yeah.

SPEAKER_08 36:03

No, I think that's so smart because I think that they're so quickly blamed for just about everything, but I I love your approach.

SPEAKER_01 36:11

They might show up with uh with a clipboard and and maybe a pamphlet or something. Yeah. I've got uh I've got textbooks from the American concrete industry from the Portland Cement Association. You don't play around. Look at that. I love that. If I roll it out there and it's like, okay, do we want to go? So, you know, most of the time I don't have to go poolside. We, our company doesn't have to go poolside very often anymore because they know what they're going up against. Yeah. And so it's like, well, we can fight this. Or Jerry's Jerry's pretty strong. Jerry's pretty strong. Um, and and the company that that we dealt with that decided to replaster today is a company that's a pretty strong company, and they have a general company policy, but they knew who they were up against and what we had told the consumer, and prep the consumer to have the discussion with the with the uh contractor and go from there. But the thing that I I want these guys to understand is man, you gotta stand up for yourselves because nobody else is gonna do it. You know, yeah. Don't get steamrolled um just because you're afraid of the plastering contractor and you think they have more resources, and you go to OnBalance's website, poolhelp.com. They've got all kinds of literature on there about lots of problems, not just calcium nodules. But they've got a very nice little display of how calcium nodules will are formed, you know, what it takes to form them and how the whole process works. Yeah. Stand up for yourself, guys.

SPEAKER_08 37:56

Yeah, agreed. And use those resources. And if you don't know where to go for those resources, reach out. I mean, I see across the industry and social media, people will ask, they'll they'll you know, copy and paste or screenshot, hey, this is what the customer said, how should I approach this? But you know, there's so many resources out there, and like you said, don't let them don't let the other guys bully you. Absolutely. And they're gonna continue to bully until they're put back in their place. So, you know, stand up for yourself and learn how to say no. And if you have to show up with the roly, show up with the roly, you know.

SPEAKER_01 38:29

It's okay. The service industry has always been looked at as the redheaded stepchild, so to speak. We're the lowest common denominator, you know, in the math equation, and and we shouldn't be. You know, if you're if you're an expert, if you're in the pool service industry, you need to be an expert. Yeah. You need to learn, become educated, use the resources, and stand up for yourself.

SPEAKER_08 38:56

Yeah. Well, you know, there's so many people out there that don't even know this is a this is a thing. People will ask me what I do for work, and I'll start to explain, and they're like, oh, that's a thing. I'm like, yeah, it's a thing. There's a whole industry that you're not aware of. So I I completely agree. You you should be an expert. It's a I I love that. You know, another one, uh, going back to the myths, is that lowering the calcium hardness or adjusting the water chemistry will stop calcium nodules from forming. But are we really fixing the problem or just trying to treat what we're seeing?

SPEAKER_01 39:30

That that's uh a coping mechanism, as you as you say. And I'm not sure how well it's gonna work because, like I said before, it's the water getting through that pinhole or craze crack into the void, right? Creating its own little water chemistry atmosphere that you can't control, the service person can't control. And so as long as the water can get into that void, those reactions are going to take place, and nodules will appear until such time as that pathway into the void is sealed off. Now, it may take only one time where that is that material is coming out, maybe it's just a small pinhole, and enough of the of the nodule fills the the pinhole up so no more water can get in or out into that void. That may solve the problem. You may have to, you may get it, may come back, and you may have to sand it off, and then it may come back again. It may come back three or four times until either the the the pinhole or the pathway is plugged, or the plaster on the back side of that void has all been reacted with, and there's no more fresh plaster effect, just like your plaster dust quits occurring, you know, it would quit occurring in that void as well eventually.

SPEAKER_02 41:06

Right.

SPEAKER_01 41:07

So that you know, that's that's treating no matter how you slice it, it's all treating the symptom. Once you get a calcium nodule, you're treating the symptom, not the problem. The problem is there's a void there. Right. Okay, and the solution to that is replastering the pool if there's enough voids there to require the entire pool to be replastered. Or draining, and if there's just one or two, you can drain, you know, knock out the void and and patch the plaster, but then you're gonna have a patched plaster that's not gonna be uniform and look pretty. Yeah, that's true.

SPEAKER_08 41:47

Well, I I mean, you know, there's an there's a follow-up myth to this, but it doesn't even really make sense to even ask. I mean, maintaining balanced water, I mean, we've kind of already touched on that. But I guess with this, if there was one thing you could get every pool professional to stop believing about calcium nodules after listening to this episode, what would it be?

SPEAKER_01 42:11

That it's your fault, not your fault. Okay. Sometimes it's nobody's fault. Sometimes it's the contractor's fault if they didn't have great work practices that contributed to the delamination. But sometimes stuff happens. Sometimes you can have a delamination that wasn't because of a poor work practice or or anything of that nature. Okay, but one thing's for certain it's not the service guy's fault that there's a calcium nodule or nodules in the pool. I agree. Stand up for yourselves.

SPEAKER_08 42:50

Yes, say it again for the people in the back. And there you go. Say it, Jerry. I love that. All right. Well, let's bring it back to mentorship because you've been doing this for almost 50 years, and you know, you've had the opportunity to watch multiple generations come into this industry. So, what's something you wish your younger self had listened to when a mentor told you to do something? Was it you know, was it something that you eventually had to learn this way? What what kind of what comes to mind?

SPEAKER_01 43:23

Book education is always a good thing. I did two years of junior college, and I did two years of junior college taking business classes because I had to take classes while I played sports in junior college. Let's be honest. I knew I was going to be in the family business, but I didn't take heed to the advice of really getting, you know, an education, and it can be business because you know, I'm not the world's greatest businessman. I've been pretty good, but I rely upon a lot of other people too. It could be chemistry. My dad took chemistry classes, probably in his 50s, he was taking chemistry classes at the junior college. So never stop learning. And college learning is good learning. May not always be practical to what we do, but I I wish I had done more of that.

SPEAKER_08 44:18

Yeah, I agree. And I always say, forever student, when you it the day you stop learning is when you're in trouble. Well, I never stopped learning. I just quit going to school. You know what? I I went and got my degree, and my husband will joke with me. He's like, Do you do you want to go back for your master's? I'm like, Well, I'm kind of busy doing this right now. And he's like, But I agree, you should you should never stop learning. So, what's one mistake that you see uh young people when they're entering a pool industry and they tend to kind of make over and over again?

SPEAKER_01 44:49

Don't think that there are shortcuts, and don't think you know. No more than the old hands do. Okay? We're old hands because we've done it. We know what works, we doesn't we know what doesn't work. We have a a couple signs up, one in our shop and one in the hallway in the office that said, There are no shortcuts in this business, in this company. You can't short your shortcut your way to success. Okay? Hard work, learning, listening to others, asking questions. You go ask challenging questions. I love it when I get challenged. I really love being challenged. That's the fun. That's the fun of mentoring.

SPEAKER_08 45:41

Mm-hmm. Yeah. No, I I love that. I'm gonna I'm gonna keep that one in mind for the future. So on the flip side, what do you think the generation, the younger generation, is doing better than what we did when we came into the industry?

SPEAKER_01 45:54

Oh, I've been talking to quite a few people, and and what they're bringing, bringing technologically to the industry is amazing. But seeing the the old hand that I am, I'm a little bit slow to change, and and I need a little bit more of the show me, don't tell me, show me type of deal. And you know, we're a big company, like you said, over 4,200 pools. So it has to be something that won't just work for the for the for the one polar guy or the two or three polar guy. This has to work for a 4200 pool operation that's repeatable, reliable, and kind of bulletproof.

SPEAKER_08 46:39

Yeah. Yeah. What's the what would you say the greatest thing about the pool industry is? The greatest thing about the pool industry is the greatest thing, yes.

SPEAKER_01 46:49

Well, see, now I I thought you couldn't give me an easier question than who my favorite mentee was. But the greatest thing about the pool industry is easily the people. Easily the people. You know, the people I've met at all different levels is amazing. Yourself, Rudy, just two simple examples. But I have people I've met through trade associations. You know, I'm in Northern California. I have a good friend that uh had his business in Florida, and he was fortunate enough to sell his business and retire earlier and younger than me, and we're still great friends, you know, the on-balance guys, Kim Skinner's a good example. I mean, our company started out with an affiliation with uh Kim's father's company and uh ended up going our separate ways, and we had some some rough patches in our relationship, you know, in the 80s. Uh, but we came back together and you know, rekindled a uh a camaraderie and a friendship, and you know, uh the Phil Gillhouses of the world, and a couple names I didn't mention as as mentors. One was uh Don Aston, who owned uh Tim Quip, and he started along with Phil Gillhouse Foundation for Pool Spa Industry Education here in the Sacramento area, worked with him on educational things for years. Uh, he was a great guy and a great influence. Don Burns, um the godfather of the California pool industry legislative efforts, a fantastic friend. And you know, when he finally retired and was replaced by by John Norwood, you know, John Norwood's another great example. You know, here I am, a simple pool guy that doesn't even have a two-year college degree, and I'm associating with you know lobbyists in the pool industry, you know, people from APSP, um, you know, on the board back there, and you know, big wigs that uh you know major international companies, you know.

SPEAKER_08 49:04

That's what the industry is. It's a family. It's it's a family. You know, you you make friends all over and it's become this family. That's how I look at it. And it's kind of what you're describing. Oh, yeah. You you make some some of the the closest friends I have I've met in the pool industry. Oh, totally agree. Totally agree. So now I'm gonna get us into a bit of trouble here. What do you think the pool industry is currently doing wrong?

SPEAKER_01 49:31

Yeah, you you're throwing me softballs here. I am for me it's it's a simple one. And it's it's at the manufacturer level. I don't think that they're listening in particular to the service industry enough. If at all. At the lower echelons of the manufacturing industry, there's a pretty good connectivity, you know, in a in a lot of ways, you know, with the reps, uh the individual sales reps, maybe even the the regional sales reps. But somehow it's it it gets lost getting up to to the top levels. I mean, the advances in pump technology, it's it's wonderful stuff, but it it seems like so much of what is being manufactured these days is focused in particular on new construction and not for you know retrofitting into the 20 or 25-year-old pool that we now have to put a variable speed pump into where we before had a single speed, you know, monster of a pump, and pads are not like they are in Bel Air, California, of multimillionaire status. You know, we're lucky if we have a three by four or three by five foot pad, and we've got this new pump with a footprint that's one and a half times the footprint of the old pump. How am I gonna put that into an existing pad? There's just not the room to do so.

SPEAKER_08 51:11

Yeah, yeah. So you feel like the the manufacturers just aren't listening to voice or reason.

SPEAKER_01 51:18

I I I I don't know if they're even being offered the voice. I I I I don't know that the mechanisms are there to communicate down to our level. And I have brought this up to a manufacturer's rep that's up there in uh up there in standing, shall we say the major manufacturers that they need to put together uh a group across the country. It can't just be one group, it has to be uh a group that includes Florida and Texas and California, you know, and in the Northeast and whatnot and Arizona. Either one big panel or you have to have multiple panels that are able to have the conversations with the engineers that are making these decisions.

SPEAKER_08 52:08

Yeah, no, I I completely agree. I mean, I think it's it's healthy to have those discussions, and I think it would be appropriate too, because that's uh you know, I've seen some some things hit the market, like, what is that?

SPEAKER_01 52:20

Wait what you doing? No doubt about that.

SPEAKER_08 52:24

Yeah. Well, after almost 50 years, you know, in this industry, are you used to looking for mentors yourself? And I I guess do you who do you go to when you need advice?

SPEAKER_01 52:37

Never stop learning. Like you said, uh I think we both said it at various points before. I don't go learning at school anymore necessarily, but but I seek out advice and question those around me whose whose opinions I respect, you know. I still, like I said, I I meet with Phil Gellhouse, you know, a few times a year. I talk with uh Q and Kim um quite often about chemistry problems or plaster problems, whatnot. I talk with a few, okay, a couple plastering contractors. I'm not sure what my uh welcomeness is with the plasters council these days. I I did my time there and I think I may have worn out my welcome. Those challenging questions aren't always appreciated. Yeah, but uh I still do, you know, ask ask of those, you know. I'll go to John Norwood, you know, if if I think there's something that he can help me with from a regulatory standpoint in in the state of California. And I and I also, you know, bring things to his attention that I think he should be aware of and try and get him aware before maybe he finds out through other means. Yeah.

SPEAKER_08 53:52

No, it's good to have those healthy relationships. They're not always I I can get that. I understand what you're saying. Sometimes my welcome can be a little more now, but I do try and stay in contact. I get it. Okay, so we have to get serious again for just a moment, but I need to know something extremely important. What is your favorite pizza topping? I know.

SPEAKER_01 54:12

I know. Have I have I gone against the grain enough today? Or do I need to go against the grain one more time? I mean, you wanted a challenging You like being challenged. This is it's a famous pizza question, you know. Does pineapple belong on pizza or not? I'm a yes guy. Give me Canadian bacon and and pineapple and olive, and you get the sweet and savory, and oh my goodness. The cheese I'm good to go.

SPEAKER_08 54:42

I just like pizza. I I have to admit, I'll I'll do these big swims. Some days I have really long swims, and some days I have short swims. And I will say one of my favorite parts is the the carb loading the night before. And I have to say, my husband's like, let's go.

SPEAKER_01 54:57

Well, I'll tell you, I I really honestly would have to say I agree. I haven't met a pizza that I dislike, you know, but uh but you know, Canadian bacon and pineapple and olive, and yeah, I'm right there with the whole Hawaiian thing.

SPEAKER_08 55:11

Getting hungry just talking about it. Let's go. Let's do it, let's get some pizza. Pizza's on me. So now there I have one final question, and I I'm gonna ask all of our top nominees this, and there's absolutely there's absolutely no professional reason reason for me to ask this, but have you ever checked yourself out in a mirror listening to Taylor Swift and imagined you had a superpower?

SPEAKER_01 55:33

God, what's Rudy getting you into? The answer to that is no. Oh. I'm I'm way too old for that, and I am uh you know, I I do like uh Taylor Swift's oldest era. Okay, but uh her newest eras, you know, I'm not so much uh into that. My granddaughter is. Oh, yeah. And so when I'm transporting her around, I have to put on the Taylor Swift channel on Pandora. And uh then I hear some of the language, and I'm like, she really said that. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_08 56:13

No, yeah. My my kids will say, We want to listen to the mermaid, and that's her her newest one. I'm like, Mermaid, what's the mer? And so my husband now has mermaid, aka Taylor Swift in his his audio track for the kids, and and it's funny because now he knows Taylor Swift. So I do appreciate the honesty. Because I was like, come on, let's let's I don't know if I'm not I'm gonna believe you if you don't say it.

SPEAKER_01 56:35

But I will admit, whenever we were in Nashville a couple years ago um at the museum, they had a little tour bus mock-up of Taylor Swift with her pictures. So for my granddaughter, my wife took a picture of me with uh the picture of Taylor Swift on our tour bus. So good man.

SPEAKER_08 56:54

For the kids. For the kids. For the kids, good man. Well, before I go, I want to leave you with one final question. You know, you've again you spent 50 years building a career in this industry and you've built a company celebrating 57 years, and along the way, you've had the opportunity to teach and mentor a lot of people. So when all of this is eventually said and done, you know, what do you hope the people you've mentored say that they've learned from Jerry Wallace?

SPEAKER_01 57:24

What I hope they've learned is, you know, that this is a very good industry and you need to treat it with respect, treat the people with respect, your employees and customers with respect. You know, we had, you know, when my dad started this business, you know, at the end of the year you always look at your profit and loss statement. And and before we ever did that, it was always uh did we take care of the family, did we take care of the employees, and did we take care of the customers? And if you could answer yes to all three of those things, he would say, Then we had a good year. And then he'd say, Now let's look at the PL.

SPEAKER_02 58:07

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 58:07

And if we look at the PL and there was any profit whatsoever, he said, We had a really good year. If there wasn't any profit, he'd say, Okay, we took care of the big three. Now we need to take care of getting something to the bottom line, okay, without affecting negatively the big three. So keep those things in mind. Without your customers and employees, you know, your business is nothing.

SPEAKER_08 58:35

Yeah. Um learn it's okay to say no.

SPEAKER_01 58:38

It is definitely okay to say no.

SPEAKER_08 58:40

Mm-hmm. Well, Jerry, congratulations again on being named one of the top 10 mentors of the pool industry. And congratulations to you and the entire swim cam on 57 years again. And thank you for taking the time to hang out with me today. I wish we were we lived closer. We I'd say let's definitely go get some pizza, my man. Like I'm hungry.

SPEAKER_01 59:00

Well, for sure. Next time you if you visit the Bay Area, give me a call.

SPEAKER_08 59:04

I'll meet you. Absolutely. Well, and to everyone listening, thank you for joining us again on another Talking Pools podcast. And until next time, keep learning, keep teaching, and don't forget to turn around every once in a while and help the person coming up behind you. Until next time, guys, see ya.