Poolnologies Interview - A Business With Sustainability At Heart, 25 August 2022

SweCham had the great opportunity to interview, Mr. Mattias Nordin, Managing Director at Poolnologies Co., Ltd. Keep reading for an insightful interview on how Poolnologies manages to maintain its high standards and be an industry leader in their field.

Could you tell us more about Poolnologies? 

Poolnologies is our main company and it was established back in 2015. We represent European Brands by importing, exporting, and distributing swimming pool equipment.  We focus on providing our customers with high-end products that have been manufactured in Sweden. For us, quality is at the heart of our business practices and we emphasise sustainability. Our mission is to reduce unnecessary waste which so often accompanies swimming pools. We are based in Chonburi, Thailand yet we distribute to the entire Southeast Asia Region.  

Poolnologies currently partners with seven companies from which we import products, to then distribute and sell them. These companies are Electro engineering (UK) – photocatalytic oxidizer to ensure that all ecoli are eliminated, Pahlen (Swe), Hexagone (FR) – pool cleaning robots, Microdos (ITA), Toscano (SPA) – control devices, NatureSwim (our second company), Renolit – reinforced liner for swimming pool (feel of real stone texture), RPI – steel pan equipment for the pools.  

Could you tell us more about your company NatureSwim? 

NatureSwim is our second company. At first, we thought that having NatureSwim as a part of Poolnologies product line might be a good idea. However, it is proven that there is a more efficient way to market NatureSwim. We decided that NatureSwim will be its own company that produces its products and services, while still being part of the Poolnologies group. The company was established in 2015, the same year as Poolnologies. However countless trials and tests have been done dating back to 2005. We are the first company in our field to have gone through all the testing and certification processes to prove that our ideas would work. The longest test period lasted for 12 months and proved great success. 

Many private pools are cleaned using excessive amounts of chemicals to treat the pool water, which greatly affects the user’s health. For example, 30 minutes of being exposed to Chlorine gas will start to affect your liver, kidneys, and lungs. Eventually, after one hour of exposure, the gas will affect your brain. Most pools require a high level of maintenance, making their products costly and damaging to the environment. This is why Poolnologies and NatureSwim aim to provide customers with high-end equipment that will last for decades. Our practices use only natural water treatment processes that will not leave you with negative health impacts. We do not use chemicals during the treatment process. During times when the NatureSwim pool system is not operating, the pool water will be protected using a small amount of copper and silver Ions, which have algae-removing and bacteria-killing properties. 

What markets are you currently operating in? 

For Poolnologies, we have been assigned to distribute our partners’ products within all of Asia. NatureSwim is operating in Asia and Europe, we are aiming to expand our market into surrounding countries and regions.   

Who are your main customers? 

Our main customers are Eco-friendly resorts and hotels looking to provide their customers with sustainability and high-end products. Our products are sold at a premium price, however, these luxury hotels know that the initial cost is worth the payoff of being highly sustainable, reducing their water usage, and eventually a return on an investment will occur due to the high quality and long-lasting products. Currently, we supply high-end hotels and resorts like Zeavola, Sunplay and Soneva in the Maldives with pool equipment.

Our second biggest market is highly-educated customers, usually, professors and doctor’s who have looked at the research and know the benefits of using freshwater pools. These clients usually purchase our products for their home usage.  

The next step for us would be to start supplying commercial hotel chains and target the larger group of the private sector. It is sometimes challenging for us to compete with other Pool companies that do not emphasise using suitable products as their initial costs tend to be higher. Thus we need to educate our customers on the ranging benefits that come with using Fresh Water pool systems. 

What makes Poolnologoies unique? 

Our main selling point is the quality of our products and manufacturing. We only import products from European brands. We have also been entrusted by Pahlen, a supporter of the Swedish National Swimming Team, to represent Pahlen in Asia. Pahlen is a Swedish brand that manufactures all of its products in Sweden, making the quality high. Due to the high quality, our pool equipment would last decades with minimum maintenance. This is why our product prices are higher, but in the longer run, our customers tend to save money as the level of maintenance decreases. 

For NatureSwim the key advantage is our pool water treatment technology which creates a freshwater pool systems. The pool water will go through the process of oxidisation, which is needed to avoid bacterial build-up. The oxidation process is efficient and has been proven safe for human usage. This process will leave a residual oxidization or ORP (oxidization reduction potential) within the pool, that would equal adding 2-3 PPM of chlorine, but with the difference that our oxidization does not affect users’ health. Another important process is ionisation because oxidisation has limitations, when the oxidised residual evaporates, the water will be left unprotected. Our ionisation process will add 0.25 – 0.4 mg/L of Copper and Silver to prevent algae build-up when the pool system is not operating. The amount of copper and silver that we add is well below the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) drinkable water standard of 2 mg/L. Our systems also have an Electromagnetic Descaler which will help prevent calcium from bonding together within the pipes and the pool, NatureSwim is the only system that has this EM Descaler built-in.  

What is Poolnologies’s biggest challenge? 

Our main problem is reaching the right customer base. We are currently trying to reach a wider range of customers. The challenge we face is getting customers to realize the value that comes with paying a premium price and that there is a return on investment in the long run. We aim to continue to educate more people and raise awareness about the dangers that accompany chemical-treated pools, we hope that this will eventually shine a light on our freshwater pool systems. Another challenge is that feeling is believing as we say, once you have tried a freshwater pool you will never go back to a standard pool, the problem is that we cannot send a test pool to all customers that want to try. 

We recommend our prospective customers view the pool systems that are installed in our partners’ hotels and resorts. 

Where do you see yourself in the next few years? 

Our main goal for the near future is to work our way into the market of everyday pool users and homeowners.  On the other front of our business, which is Asia, we will continue to raise more awareness of how the low-quality built pools causes tremendous costs of maintenance and may result in serious health damage. We are hoping that in a few years, these problems would come to light so that we would be able to grow our Poolnologies business in other parts of Asia.  

We are aiming to expand NatureSwim to other countries in Asia and Europe. NatureSwim is investing a lot into R&D and next generation product development, NatureSwim has its own manufacturing and controls the products from start to finish to ensure the quality. Though there will be challenges, we are seeing positive changes in Europe as some countries are starting to ban chemical usage in public pools. In Thailand, we wish to further expand our customer base within commercial resorts and hotels. We will continue to educate people about the dangers of using chemicals to treat pool water. With the new knowledge, our aim is to penetrate the market of everyday pool owners.