Question:
I want to own a Haven Spa and not be forced by economics to purchase an
inferior spa? I just don't understand how spas can be so expensive.
A: I know that many people are in need of owning a spa for heath,
enjoyment and life improvement. I was in the same
boat. When I first got into the spa industry, I drove a 12
year old car, because I had a family and mortgage to support. I
bought my first portable spa with payments and it was worth every penny
in interest. It was also a very good well made spa. I
had the advantage of knowing spas. That spa never needed any
warranty service either.
When I needed extra money, I always had to borrow it and make
payments. I still do that in my business, but the end result of
borrowing money allows the business to grow.
One of the best sources for money to purchase a quality spa is in your
home. I do not recommend this for most anything else but to
expand your home, or to put in improvements. I do not
consider some (most) spas to be a “home improvement”. I do not
recommend putting money on a spa that is going to cause problems to
people who can barely afford to own a spa. Those are the people
who also cannot afford to pay to have them fixed regularly.
If you buy a cheap hot tub, you need to be mechanically inclined and
forget about any support for your purchase.
We have service customers like that. The spa had a very short
warranty, and is now in need of repairs. Normally these spas are
purchased from mass merchants. When they get the repair bill for
$500 on a new $2,000 to (now) $6000 spa is should be a “wake up call”
and
it will be a
“sign of things to come.”
I have a friend (spa service technician of 24 years) who called
me the other day. He told me that Lowes is getting some cheap
line of spas. Then he said: “I guess that
will insure job security” for him, because he is doing
warranty work for the other companies.
I have, personally, participated in warranty for 16 different spa
companies, and Haven Spas are nothing like those spas. We are
truely the least amount of warranty company in the spa business.
I mean we don't do much warranty work at all, because the spas work so
well, as they were designed to.
When you pay way too little for something, it costs you money in the
long run. On some spa brands you pay high for the orignal prices
and you pay a lot for keeping it running. In the case of poor
quality spas, it is a lot of money in the long
run. I see people dumping those spas by giving them away or they
sit in the back yard for years, before going to the dump. Nobody
is going to put $1200 into a 6 year old spa that is worth $1000 in
runnng condition. By the way, Haven Spas have the highest resale
value of any spa I have ever sold.
Typically the spa company's main line of spas is sold through
dealers. Those dealers, do not like threats from Lowes or Costco,
Target, Sears, or Walmart on their
income, so you know the Mass Merchant version spas are cheap and made
to not compete with the main line of spas.
Since I consider the latest “premium” corporate spas to be a poor to
mediocre value product, you have to realize my opinion of the
mass merchant version of those spas. Why buy something that is
built so cheap? Don’t you know what the professional spa service
people think? (and my number one question I pose to spa shoppers:
How much do you know about spas?) Don’t you know how much electricity
it costs to run a poorly insulated spa?
Enough of that.
When you realize that you need to spend some "serious" extra money to
get a better product, then you need to find the money, do a budget, and
you need to
evaluate the total costs of ownership. If you pay $6,000 for a run of
the mill spa and it breaks down in 5 years, when the warranty is over,
you can pay for just one service call, $500 on average, if a main
component is dead. If you can get 7 to 10 years on the same type
of part, isn't that a better way to go?
In the back of my book “How Spas Are Made” I give an average comparison
between the standard spas of Southern CA and a Haven spa.
Most of it has to do with cost of ownership, not just the cost of the
original purchase. You could make the interest payments on a
Haven Spa and still save a few thousand dollars of the life of the spa.
The Haven way of building and producing a product, gives you an idea of
where we come from.
I have seen plenty of spa shells that have lasted over 15 years and
what they look like. I have seen properly applied fiberglass
shells, made with acrylic that are in great shape at over 20
years. That is why we
choose the Acrylic/vinyl ester/fiberglass composite for our shells as
just one example. We also choose the best motors, I know
of. I am constantly looking for better parts, and we now have a
newer more modern motor on our SC and SE spas. This, along with
the DAIT, and our beefed up control system
will make Haven SE and SC
spas the longest lasting without the constant visits by the service
people.
There have been plenty of poorly made spa shells, and I have seen the
results and I have seen improper use of water pumps and poor filter
designs. It is rampant in the spa industry. The utter disregard
for the ANSI safety standards by the majority
of the spa industry is really bad.
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Haven Spas are my personal answer to this problem.
However, they are not cheap to purchase, but much less costly to own
over the life of the spas. If you look at the Haven line of spas
and
the prices, you will see that we do not cut the strength of the
product, we cut features, but still maintain therapy in all the
spas.
If you want real value for your hard earned money, you need a well made
spa. In my opinion, there is no other choice.
You cannot put twin 4 HP pumps and 30 jets and sell it for less
than
$6000 to consumers, unless it is low quality (junque) and has poor
service. These spas
are not made
in China or Indonesia, and the cost to produce a truly American made
spa is higher, because of the higher quality of lifestyle we are
supporting. How do these “fly by night” companies sell so cheap,
something that is made in America? You think about that.
Most manufacturing has left the US, but at least some of it is still in
the continent. Haven Spas are Made In the USA. Some subassemblies
components come from Canada and Mexico. The new SE and SC motors are
made in the US, Indiana. One of the things that keeps American
Made
products, American Made, is that no other country can build something
like this. They have tried, and the economic conditions are not
in
those countries to support such a device on any level of market.
In
order to have the level of construction in a Haven spa we have found
the only way is to reduce the cost to market the products. The
Internet has allowed us a market that has a lot less “steps” in the
economic “food chain”.
So, to answer the question, you see, that I have to educate on the
economics of owning a better product. Is it worth it to
purchase a spa
that is designed to outlast the rest, and has the lowest energy
consumption of any spa with similar equipment?
Yes, it is worth getting a “home improvement loan” on the equity in
your house, in order to own one of the best home improvements there
is. Contact any bank on this.. This interest rates are
lower and tax
deductible, because it is a home improvement. Most of us don’t have $6
to $14 K around to buy anything with, so if you are wanting something
that is worth going to the effort to make payments on, it better be
worth it. Don't you agree?
The other thing and a very important part of our business ethics is
that we respect your money. Most people work hard to make a
living
these days. The facts are that those who want a good lifestyle,
have to
work longer hours and both husband and wife have to work. It is that
way in my family.
Does a spa sales person, who knows nothing about spas, is reciting a
memorized
sales pitch, and is selling some rip off spa, like a Hoh Sprind Spa
product, respect your money?
No, they only want your money! The ethic is that they will
deceive
you into purchasing a stamped out piece of plastic, because it feeds
the corporate machine. Large corporate spas are the worst,
because of
the way they are produced and the amount of human resources that are
wasted, but still have to be paid wages. The larger they are the
more
wasted time and effort there is, because they follow the archaic
corporate design that is taught in college. Hasn't anybody
besides me
figured this out. The schools are teaching “old school” business
management in the age of world economy.
Do you have any idea how much it costs to live in southern
California? It is virtually impossible to produce a quality spa
in Southern California and pay the wages needed to buy a home.
Hoh Sprind Spas is doomed to extinction, by the nature of how and where
they run
the business.
You are going to see them in the mass merchants, "burning" all their
dealers as a last ditch effort to keep the corporate machine going.
The only thing that will save them is to spin off to small efficeintly
companies.
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