Young Ones To Watch: Chris Perez, General Manager at Pool Scouts

About three years ago, Chris Perez made a good impression on Christian Pillat and Brandon Fish, two entrepreneurs who lived in his neighborhood and happened to work in the franchising industry. By going above and beyond in his contracting work for Pillat and Fish, he unknowingly opened doors for himself to a fruitful career in franchising. 

As fate would have it, after that encounter, Pillat and Fish were looking for someone to help run their Pool Scouts* franchise. Perez, at that point, had left contracting and just been laid off from a position at Delta at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. He jumped at the opportunity and never looked back. 

Now Perez is general manager of Pool Scouts’ Atlanta market, where he says business is way up. 

1851 caught up with Perez to get his advice on succeeding in the franchise industry. 

1851 Franchise: Tell us about your Pool Scouts. What sets you apart?

Chris Perez: The basic elevator speech I give our customers on the phone is we have a few things that differentiate us from our competition. From what I've noticed, our competition, specifically in Atlanta, Georgia, is not the strongest when it comes to customer service. I’m really trying to emphasize that. One thing we really value is trust. Where that comes into play with our service is our techs are always professionally trained and show up in a Pool Scouts branded van and uniform. That's really important because we’re going to be on their property. Not just for safety reasons, but for consistency and trust. 

Second, we try to over-communicate. Specifically, customers are always gonna receive a notification when the technician is on the way to their home. We over-communicate in our post-service reports, too. 

Our third value is accountability. What I've noticed in the market is that there doesn’t seem to be a lot of accountability for services customers had previously. A lot of customers say they didn’t know when their pool person came or they’re stuck in year-long contracts and they still don’t know when that person is coming. So we send out a post-service report after every service. A before-and-after picture of the pool, the water survey reports and all the pricing. 

Number four is customer satisfaction, we have a guarantee that if you’re not happy with our service we come back and do it again.

Finally, we have no binding contracts. We strive to provide good service, every service and earn your business with each visit. 

1851: How did you get into franchising?

Perez: This was an opportunity given to me from one of the partners, mostly Christian, who is the operating partner. I think he somewhat stuck his neck out for me. Same with Brandon Fish who is running the other two brands in this office. They did that based on our previous relationship we had maybe two years ago now. 

I had done some work for one of Christian’s companies on a contractor basis and through that I left an impression on him and Brandon. I was out of work after working for Delta right before COVID-19 and he was looking for someone to grow and build the brand, someone they could trust and believed in to some degree. They knew I was a hard worker from the contracting I did for them, so it was really just an awesome opportunity given to me. I’m grateful for it and doing my best. 

1851: What do you love about the industry?

Perez: I’d say Delta Airlines and subcontracting are two good examples on either side of the spectrum. Subcontracting at a really small business — the problem was there was no direction there. I was really given hardly any direction at that company. Not a lot of guidelines or coaching. That’s on one end of the spectrum.

On the other end you have Delta, which I thought was going to be my career. I was happy there. I wanted to get a few licenses and get myself to the cream of the crop in operations, but compared to franchising with Pools Scouts, it’s such a big company. They treat their employees well, but when it came down to it, you realize how big it is and you are a number and a worker to them for the most part. So it was a lot more cookie-cutter. They have their processes, but that’s on the far end of the spectrum.

Where I'm at with pool scouts now, it’s a perfect balance between structure and having a road map and at the same time there’s a lot of freedom for me to get my hands dirty and prove myself and show my creativity and work ethic. It’s not so directional like delta or so indirect like contracting.

1851: What makes someone a good fit for the franchise industry? Are there traits that are shared by the most successful franchise professionals you know?

Perez: The biggest thing is just getting things done. Whatever lands in front of you for that day or week: Get it done. There is some give there. When you have so much on your plate quality of work might drop a little bit, but just get it done. 

1851: How do you feel about the industry's response to the coronavirus crisis so far? Are there challenges or opportunities that the industry still needs to address?

Perez: There are definitely opportunities out there. It goes without saying, but people are spending more time in their homes. Even in the winter, people aren’t using their pool, but they’re looking at it. We’re getting more time and attention from customers who wouldn’t think as much about their pool. 

The demand is definitely up from COVID-19 overall. We started in August. COVID was more relevant than it is now. There haven’t been any changes we’ve really had to make in the service. If we’re gonna be interacting with customers, we’ll keep a mask on and keep our distance. Besides that, during the service itself you don’t see the customers. 

1851: What advice do you have for other young up-and-comers in the space?

Perez: I would say, get good at keeping track of things. For me, the hardest part has been my mental bandwidth has been pushed to the limit trying to keep up with some things. A few things I’ve done to help me keep up with what’s going on and tasks would be just making lists and staying organized. Take good notes, try to build a good system to look back at your notes and try to cross things off the to do list every day.