Who Bought Who?

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May 11, 2007
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Texas
I have heard that either Zodiac purchased Polaris or Polaris bought Zodiac and I'm not sure which it is but I've been wondering if it's true, which products will they stop selling and which will they continue to sell?

I have several Zodiac SWGs in use now and a contractor has specified in a bid on a new pool for us to use a Polaris SWG.
Should I have any concerns about which swg he ends up using? I need to be able to buy replacement parts down the road is my main concern and I'm not clear on which company will be around... :lol:
 
Zodiac acquired Polaris a while back....Old news! The Polairis brand is a strong one and Zodiac is not about to get rid of it. However, I do not have a very high opinion of Zodiac SWGs. Not that familiar with the Polaris Autoclear units but if they share any characteristics with their Zodiac siblings I would stay away from them also.
 
The Polaris unit is the old lineage of Kreepy Klear. When they upgraded that system, they went to Autoclear. At one time, they made it where the cover was removable so that you can replace just the electrodes.

More interestingly, in 2006, Zodiac and the Carlyle Group (investor) purchased the Jandy/Laars/AirEnergy/Chlormatic/levelor/coverpools. And Jandy seems to be still the main management team of this acquisition. So far, they've managed to keep all companies as separate companies...that is, Zodiac, Polaris, Jandy brand salt systems...still.
 
These mini monopolies in the industry are just going to cause prices to rise and lower quality in the long run, IMHO. The same has already happened in the eyeglass industry with the Italian owned Luxottica group (Lenscrafters, Pearle, Sears Optical,Target Optical, Cole Vision Care, Eyemed Vison care which runs several optical insurance companies, Oakley, RayBan, Anne Klein, D & K, Vogue, Chanel, Prada, Ralph Lauren , in fact just about all the 'designer' frames, and Sunglass Hut-- just to name a few of their holdings!). If anyone has worn glasses for at least 30 years they can remember when the price of glasseas jumped around the early to mid 90's when Luxottica started aquiring just about every company out there.

I just hope Zodiac does not become the Luxottica of the pool industry but they seem to be well on the way!!!!!
 
It usually happens with privately owned companies, owners retiring and selling off, or they just cannot resist the big pile of money.

Mind you it doesn't always work out good.

For example Pentair bought Onga in Australia, and now Onga is going downhill, and i think unless they change their management teams, they will be out of business very soon.
 
waterbear said:
Zodiac acquired Polaris a while back....Old news! The Polairis brand is a strong one and Zodiac is not about to get rid of it. However, I do not have a very high opinion of Zodiac SWGs. Not that familiar with the Polaris Autoclear units but if they share any characteristics with their Zodiac siblings I would stay away from them also.
Click to expand...

Care to elaborate why you feel so strongly against the Zodiac SWGs?

I currently have 9 of these systems chlorinating 7 pools which run 24/7/365 and honestly have very little trouble with any of them aside from having to occasionally replace a cell that gets worn out. I guess if I did have a beef with them it's simply with finding replacement cells quickly.
Their parts replacement program has got to be the worlds worst as far as I can tell. I think all of their warehouses are located on a deserted island off the coast of Bora Bora somewhere.
 
basically, I don't think much of their customer support and their earlier units were not the greatest. The LM3s are not that bad but there are better units for the money, IMHO, but I do question the amount of chlorine their cells are able to generate and the pools they size them for. Seems they like to undersize the cell a bit and then recommend a Nature2 along with the SWG (Hence their DuoClear unit with a very undersized cell.)

Good marketing (scam :wink: ), however!
 
Not being argumentative, but wanted to say that my lm3-40 has been great.

I try to keep my salt around 4000, have a 26K gallon pool and ran my chlorinator, at the most, level 3 out of 6. And I had around 30 for my CYA. It has never had build up despite ph wanting to be high. It's fun to watch it work (it's clear.)

I had a question last year and called customer service and got a very vague answer. I posted the same question on here and poolsean answered it for me much more clearly. That is the only time I've contacted customer service so I can't comment anymore on that.

Of course you guys see WAY more SWGs than I do, but that is my experience.

Strannik - what are these ball shaped cells? Mine are straight - more like plates.

Kristi
 

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