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River Pools & Spas Blog
The most educational swimming pool blog in the country, providing fiberglass pool articles and videos, as well as information on inground concrete and liner pools.
So here we are, mid April, and many of you reading this are still looking at a pool in your backyard with a cover on it. This is understandable, and I’m sure you have your reasons, but I simply wanted to write this little article from the opposite perspective.
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Installation & Construction | Options and Accessories | Retaining Walls, Fence, and Landscaping
Note from Marcus: This is a guest post from one of the most prominent landscape designers in the Northern Virginia area, David Marciniak of Revolutionary Gardens.
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Don't blindly wonder if a fiberglass, concrete, or vinyl liner pool is right for you. Our educational ebook does a deep-dive comparison of the 3 types, all while noting the advantages and disadvantages of each.
Fiberglass Pool Information | Finding A Pool Contractor
For full disclosure, let me just start off this little article by saying that I’m not an economist (although these days, that might be actually lend the following words quite a bit more credibility). But what I do understand, and clearly have my finger on the pulse of, is the state of the swimming pool industry.
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Fiberglass Pool Information | Fiberglass vs Concrete vs Vinyl Liner
For the past couple of days, my business partners and I have been viewing the new 2011 products of the swimming pool industry here at the Atlantic City Pool and Spa Convention.
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Finding A Pool Contractor | Pool Design Guides
Many of you reading this right now know you’re likely getting a pool this year. Yep, you’ve finally made the decision to ‘take the plunge’ (lots of pun intended). This being said, most of you are going about this whole ‘pool buying thing’ the wrong way.
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Options and Accessories | Pool Design Guides | Pool Maintenance
OK, so it’s Christmas week and I hope everyone is loving life with family and friends. But considering Santa is on his way, and that spring is (believe it or not) just around the corner, it may be time to think about a few ‘gifts’ for your swimming pool this coming year.
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Fiberglass Pool Information | Installation & Construction
How long does it take to install a pool? Now, that depends on what type of pool we’re talking. Doing a search for “how long does it take to install an inground pool from start to finish” will likely yield some wide ranges of answers if you don’t specify which type of inground pool. A little fun fact about us (or maybe a big one): we at River Pools manufacture inground fiberglass pools, but our time in the pool industry has helped us learn tons about inground pool types far and wide. So that brings us to the main focus of today’s article and let me say it’s one of the most mistaken and sometimes misunderstood parts of having a fiberglass inground pool installed in your backyard. Though fiberglass is where our expertise lies, we’ll also briefly go over some facts for concrete (gunite) and vinyl liner pools, just so you have all your options laid out in front of you. Let’s start with the ever-familiar concrete pools. These bad boys are built from scratch in your backyard, so they can be practically any shape and size you dream of (folks dreaming about a never-before-seen pool shape – we’re talking to you). With the excavating, rebar placement, plumbing, concrete-shooting, curing, coping and plastering, installing an inground concrete pool may take three to six months on average. Vinyl liner pools, also often referred to as just “liner” pools, also offer customization options and can be appealing due to their lower upfront costs and smooth texture. Keep in mind that the more custom the design, the more money you’ll likely have to pay. This goes for concrete, as well. These pools also require excavation, along with lining with metal wall panels, plumbing, creating the pool base/floor (this is often done with vermiculite or grout) and installing the liner itself. This process can take six to eight weeks on average. I find it a little funny when I look online and I see companies with the headline ‘We will install your pool in one day!’. Actually, I’m a little bothered by these statements because the task of installing a fiberglass pool in one day is nearly impossible. Why? Well here are the different phases of an actual complete installation:
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Such was the question a customer asked me recently and so I figured that being we’d not broached this subject here on the blog, as well as the fact that November is upon us, now was the perfect time to address the idea of year-round inground swimming pools.
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In interesting industry news, Viking Pools/Latham International has purchased Blue Hawaiian pools. For those of you unfamiliar with BH, they have plants in Florida and North Carolina and have been a significant manufacturer of fiberglass swimming pools for quite a few years now. This news was confirmed to me yesterday by more than one current BH dealer and the transition appears to be happening over the coming month or so.
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Fiberglass Pool Information | Fiberglass Pool Manufacturers | Installation & Construction | Pool Design Guides
As most of you are very well aware, the entire purpose of this blog is to educate, and at the same time elevate, the fiberglass pool industry. And because the popularity of fiberglass pools has exploded throughout North America in the past 10 years, it’s critical to us, the writers of this blog, that such a growth curve continues to happen as consumers become more and more informed as to the beauties of fiberglass pool ownership.
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