![]() ![]() "If dealers aren't selling auto covers on their pools, we let them know they're missing out on revenue, because the fabric has to be replaced every seven years. "Every year, we're trying to promote them more and help people understand them better," Shadoan says. Increased education is expanding the market, too. Coverstar even revisited its technology and assembly, resulting in a "huge rush of new product innovation and design that has really helped us make it easier to manufacture an automatic cover and even easier to install an automatic cover," Smith says. Manufacturers also are altering their products to make them more appealing to builders. "But finding people who want to work and who are reliable is a struggle, from manufacturing through installation." "I think we have put enough backup plans in place - Plans A, B, C and D - that we are not going to run into any supply issues in the next year," Smith says. Other manufacturers also turned to alternate suppliers, too, and some reported shortages of key materials like aluminum extrusions and motors to drive cover mechanisms. "But now, we're being quoted extraordinarily long lead times by certain suppliers fortunately, we keep multiple suppliers." "When we saw what was happening, we told our purchaser to just buy double or triple of everything, so we really didn't have supply chain issues," Dankel says. The pandemic did not break any major automatic pool cover manufacturers, but it did force them to make production and operational adjustments on the fly. And, you know, that kind of growth can break a company. And when you grow at that pace, you realize really quickly you don't have the capacity for the type of growth that you're going through. "It took us a while to get our supply chain up to speed, because no one expected 50% growth year over year. ![]()
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