New product makes salt chlorine generators operate easier
As consumers become more accustomed to saltwater swimming pools, they have begun to ask about using salt to generate chlorine in spas as well. Kevin Vlietstra, technical director for Haviland Pool & Spa, isn’t surprised.
“We looked at the pool market [with] your traditional chlorine introduction, and then eventually, salt chlorine generators started being introduced to the market,” Vlietstra says. “And that adoption rate just kept on increasing. We felt that eventually, it would start to appear in the spa market.”
Vlietstra’s team predicted the spa industry would start using salt chlorine generators more, and when that happened, everyone would “need salt to get those generators to operate and do their thing,” Vlietstra says.
He shared his idea with John Bokor, the director of sales at Haviland. From there, the Haviland team began creating a salt product that would not only be a commodity for portable hot tubs but also provide value. Thus, SpaPure Salt was born.
“Instead of having dealers sell 40-pound [pool salt] bags, where a homeowner would only need a small portion of that, [we wanted to provide a product that would] also give retailers something to talk about,” Vlietstra says. “[SpaPure Salt] gives them an opportunity to get some margin with the right size container.”
Making this product was not an overnight process. It took careful planning and an understanding of how salt would interact with portable spa machinery.
“Salt in any environment is corrosive by nature,” Bokor explains. “To add it into a small body of water, we want to make sure that we protect as much of the equipment as we possibly can.”
This product is going to prevent the two most known issues with generating your own chlorine. [It] will eliminate the increase in pH … and greatly help inhibit scale formation.”
Kevin Vlietstra, Haviland Pool & Spa
To protect spas, the SpaPure Salt adds softening agents to the water, reduces pH levels and has chelating properties to fight corrosion and scaling. Bokor recommends selling the product with SpaPure EZ Enzyme + PhosAway. “The two products complement each other,” he says. “Inherently with salt, if there are phosphates in the water you can cause some other damage to the chlorine generator cell. So the reduction of phosphates is pretty important when using salts in a hot tub.”
One retailer — Josh Arnold, the chief operating officer of Southern Pools and Spas in Virginia — says the product is an affordable and easy-to-handle solution to many spa owners’ problems.
“Most saltwater spa customers run into the problem of the salt not dissolving quickly in the water, which allows it to sit on the bottom of the spa and create a rough feel to the acrylic,” Arnold says. “Not with this product.” He’s also a fan of the refreshing scent and convenient packaging.
“This product is going to prevent the two most known issues with generating your own chlorine,” Vlietstra says. “[It] will eliminate the increase in pH … and greatly help inhibit scale formation. We believe that the added benefit of these is going to help create good water quality and customer satisfaction.”