Karen and Dave Dennison had been retired for two years when they started to get the business itch again. The couple previously owned and operated several other businesses, and as their children began to graduate and leave home, they wanted to try their hand at something new: selling Beachcomber Hot Tubs. So in 1997, they purchased Tropical Pool & Spa, which had been serving Prince George and the surrounding areas for 20 years.
Ten years prior to buying the business, Dave had bought a Beachcomber hot tub while Karen was away on a business trip. The $5,000 purchase didn’t make much sense to Karen at first, but it grew on her.
“After I got in and saw how my family enjoyed it, I didn’t begrudge it at all,” Karen Dennison says. “So when this [business] came up, we knew that it was a quality product and we knew that we totally had enjoyed ours, so it would be a fun business.”
Within five years of purchasing Tropical Pool & Spa, the Dennisons had outgrown the location and inventory space.
“The building we were in really wasn’t designed well for a hot tub store,” Karen says. The hot tubs ended up being stored in the building’s basement as well as in the yard at their home. “You’d get ready to deliver a hot tub and then you wouldn’t know whether it was in [the store] basement or at your house because everything was so jammed.”
So, in 2002 they purchased a new building and brought on a partner, Verdine Mojolsness, who brought expertise to their service department. Karen says people might think they are over-inventoried, but for the volume the store does and its remote location, she’s glad they have the space to keep as much as they do on hand.
“Prince George is a really tough market because we are 500 miles from anything,” Dennison says. “We are such a long distance inland that shipping is really expensive. So there is no point in shipping one of anything up here; it might as well be a truckload.”
But being remote doesn’t just impact the freight costs for the store, it was also affecting customers who sometimes came from more than 150 miles away to buy a hot tub. So they found an innovative solution.
“We felt really strongly that there was no point in selling hot tubs to people so far away if they couldn’t have products to keep them properly,” Dennison says. So the company set up a network of eight satellite stores to sell after-market products like chemicals to its customers.
“So we wholesale products to those stores. Some of them do water testing for the customers, and for the most part [customers] are able to buy everything they need for their hot tub at their local suppliers.”
While it’s not as profitable as it would be to sell the chemicals from their main location, it’s advantageous for their customers. “We would rather our customers have the convenience of being able to get stuff in their town,” Dennison says.
With numerous product lines, including building in-ground pools, and such a large territory to cover, how does the store possibly balance it all? Dennison says it’s not easy, but they’ve found systems that work for them. They keep their dedicated service and building crew separate from the sales floor staff, allowing both teams to focus on what they do best. Another advantage is having a close-knit group of employees, including several family members. In fact, all three of the Dennison’s children have worked in the store in some capacity, and their daughter, Deanna, and her husband, Derek Devlin, bought Karen’s shares and are now part-owners.
“It’s pretty tough to drag your kids through your business, because it may not necessarily be their dream,” Dennison says. “But when I think about what Deanna has brought to the business, it is a tremendous amount of energy. What really makes me feel proud is the fact that our business has done so well that we can not only afford to feed our families well and do all the things we need to do with our families, but we can also give back to our community.”