What Four Decades of Serving Waterparks Teaches You About Listening to Customers

Tim Samson (00:00)
Three family members, three perspectives on the industry they've watched grow up. Paula, George, and Haley, welcome to Signal. We're so excited to have you today.

Haley Conrad (00:21)
Thank you.

George Panton (00:22)
Thanks for having us.

Tim Samson (00:24)
Paula, we've run in the same circle for years, within IAAPA. I know, right? That's usually trouble. Yeah, I remember some of the first times I met you with Denise and George from Morey's, but I don't know if I've ever actually heard the full origin story. What I know is that you were into fashion before. What made you walk away from that and walk into this crazy industry and all of the all of the hooligans in the water park side?

Paula Panton (01:06)
Wonderful hooligans, we love what made me do that? Well it was the late eighties. The economy was kinda bad and fashion business was a different business to be in at that time. But We were selling some of the water park gift shops, our fashion bathing suits. They were junior bathing suits called Sea Oats. And we sold separate tops and bottoms, which was a new idea in the retail shop. And so we were at a Surf Expo one year, I think it was about 1987, and one of the guys that operated at Wet and Wild came by and said, Hey, is it possible that you can make us bathing suits for lifeguards that won't be see-through, won't be too sexy, something that'll hold up in the environment? Environment which was a really tough environment as we've all learned. And so we said, sure, we'll give it a try and so we did. And we had to research fabrics 'cause they had to be different from fashion fabrics and they had to last longer. And so we did the research. We had some patterns made specifically for women first. And made them for Wet and Wild the first season and they were a hit. They loved and. We didn't have to make any changes. But we had to make a men's suit. So then we that wasn't really our niche at the time, so we had to give that a couple of shots and actually believe it or not, the men's was more difficult than the women's but we finally made it happen and got what the industry needed. So.

Tim Samson (02:34)
That's kinda that's kinda the complete opposite of fashion. Like don't make it sexy, don't use the right materials. Yeah, that's really interesting.

John Pendergrast (02:42)
And that the men were more in trouble than the women's suit, that doesn't surprise me either. Yeah.

Paula Panton (02:48)
I was kinda surprised by it, but we finally worked it out.

John Pendergrast (02:52)
Yeah. Yeah. I have two twenty somethings. And yeah, I can see that being and of course one my youngest is a lifeguard himself. So and he would say the same thing. He's like, No, it has to be the right thing and the right, you know, you know, the right cut and all these other kinds of things. So yeah. That's cool. Yeah.

Paula Panton (03:13)
He's right, it does. It needs work.

John Pendergrast (03:17)
Now it's really cool. I mean that's a huge pivot. And to go from that into water parks, and I mean water parks have grown kind of exponentially over the last 20 years as well. Did you go into that going, you know, this is gonna be a nice kind of hobby or a nice kind of like Not an easy job, I don't know if there's such a thing as an easy job, but you know a simple lifestyle kind of thing and then didn't realize that you were gonna end up with this kind of mega empire of all these different people that you were serving.

Paula Panton (03:51)
Gosh, I don't I don't know if I went into it thinking any of that. I went into it thinking here's somebody who needs something and we're gonna try to help make for And then it just worked. And honestly, I stepped away from the fashion business when George was ten months old. I was pushing him around in a warehouse, pulling what we call off-price orders in fashion, which means you give your bathing suits away at the end of the season. And I'm just like, this is stupid. I'm out of here. And I pushed him. Out the door, I said to my husband, I'll see you later. I'm going home. I hate the fashion business and I'm starting a new company. And he went, You can't do that. And I said, yeah, that's what I'm doing. And I mean I pushed George out the door and off we went. And we started the business in my house, our house. And did I expect it to become what it became? No, but it happened very rapidly. There was a need. You know, everything's timing. There was a need and we were there to meet it. So.

John Pendergrast (04:43)
Yeah. Yeah, you hit the perfect timing. Yeah. Yeah, it's really cool. It's amazing. It's like you just hit that exact moment in the market where everyone's like, We need this and you were the person to do it. I love how you your husband said you can't do that. Is that a kind of a common theme in life? People tell you can't do things so naturally you just go and do them? I'm looking at your kids to answer this question.

Haley Conrad (05:10)
There's a distinct possibility there.

John Pendergrast (05:13)
Yeah. George, you're very quiet. Is this diplomacy at work?

George Panton (05:18)
Well, I think we're in the stage of the conversation where it's really Paula's story, so I want to give her the chance to say it. I personally don't remember being in the pram at ten months and her switching the business, but I have heard the story many times. So yeah, I'd say keep going, Paula. Tell them the rest of the story.

Paula Panton (05:40)
Well, I literally I gotta tell you this, literally used the baby pram to put the orders in, to put the bathing suits in. So he's laying in there in the bathing suits. Usually you push a r a you know, a rolling cart around, put the bathing suits. But the kids were especially Georgie, 'cause he was the youngest, were always at the office whenever they needed to be and especially him. He grew up in the office literally. So but yeah, it was being in the right place at the right time and it was the right industry for me and the right people for me. So I said in the fashion business in the late eighties we went from net thirty to net never and I was gonna write. A book and then getting involved in this industry I was like these people are awesome they pay their bills they appreciate us and they order the same thing every year so it's great. Exactly.

John Pendergrast (06:25)
Yeah. Yeah, it's amazing. Repeat customers, the whole deal. Yeah. It's funny. I just as we were kind of kicking this off, we did this sound check for those of you who are watching this or listening to this body. We did a sound check and George jumped in and did this incredible like commercial on the sound check. And is this because you were literally in the pram? She's putting all the bathing suits on you as a baby. So right from the beginning, you've had fabric and color and everything else worked out, right? From.

George Panton (06:54)
It might have been conditioning from an early age, yes. Early training in my early years for sure. But yeah. Yeah, like Paula.

John Pendergrast (07:01)
Like a bathing suit savant. Yeah.

Haley Conrad (07:04)
Well, I was gonna say I may look younger than George, but I'm seven years older and I actually have memories of the fashion swimwear company and I have memories of the transition to the suits coming into the house and all being red. So I used to spend my time at the office playing with the fabric and fashion making things for myself and my Barbies while they were in the warehouse picking orders.

John Pendergrast (07:26)
Yeah, that makes sense. It's a real family business and it's amazing watching kids grow up in those businesses. And amazing you guys are a part of this today. I think that's a true legacy you guys are building.

George Panton (07:40)
Yeah, so Haley got to kind of watch it all grow and see it. And then for myself, I grew up with it. So growing up as a kid, it was I look out the window here because the warehouse is right there, but I just used to go climb on boxes all day. I would try and cut things out of cardboard with a razor blade, even though I was way too young to do it. And.

John Pendergrast (08:03)
Hold up your hands for a second. Do you have all five fingers? Yeah.

George Panton (08:08)
Have them all, but Paula can tell you my most traumatic time cutting out a palm tree out of cardboard if she'd like.

Paula Panton (08:08)
Think we have to go to the emergency room one day.

John Pendergrast (08:17)
Well I mean that's a complicated shape to cut palm tree.

George Panton (08:20)
It is, especially when you're like seven.

John Pendergrast (08:23)
Listen, I understand childhood workplace injuries. I when I was young, I was probably about five, my parents had a bookshop and it had all these shelves on the wall and some of them were wire shelving, and I for whatever reason thought it'd be a great idea to try and climb one. Well it came off and just the one sharp part on it hit me right in the forehead. And so I ended up with stitches in my forehead, lying in a puddle of books and blood. So I get it. Like so you were more successful than me. On that it sounds like.

Tim Samson (08:55)
Ma maybe that's why we get along like I had a I had a head injury too.

John Pendergrast (09:00)
Maybe this is a requirement, is that we all have to have head injuries. I don't know. Yeah.

Tim Samson (09:02)
This is our thing, yeah. Yeah. I apparently read I apparently ran full speed into a bed frame. Like Yeah.

Haley Conrad (09:13)
I was gonna add too that with I have four kids and especially during 2020 they would come to the warehouse to just hang out because there was nowhere else to go. Nobody was there. And they ended they affectionately refer to the they affectionately refer to the warehouse as Box Fort Town. 'Cause they would just build box forts all day during 2020.

George Panton (09:35)
Hey, now I realize why I was told to go build a box fort when I was a little kid because when Haley's kids come to the office, I'm like, just go build a box fort or something. Like go entertain yourself. Right. Now I understand it's 'cause the adults were busy.

Haley Conrad (09:47)
Go play hide-and-seek in the warehouse.

Paula Panton (09:51)
And they do and they're good at it. It's amazing.

John Pendergrast (09:54)
You're like Uncle Boxfort, like you're yeah, that's I can only imagine. Have you built any two story Box forts yet?

Haley Conrad (10:02)
I think they have. La last time Cooper was here, he's my six year old. We actually put him in one of the biggest boxes my mom had set aside. And it like it had, you know, four sides. It was reinforced with two by fours. It was a big box. And I put him in there. He couldn't get out. My mom went over and cut a hole in him like, What are you doing? He's trapped. Why are you making a door?

John Pendergrast (10:21)
We went from box We went from box port to box prison real quick. Yeah.

Tim Samson (10:28)
Now I'm gonna challenge you to like build your booth either at WWA or at App as a box for it.

John Pendergrast (10:36)
It's a box sport, yeah.

Paula Panton (10:38)
And whenever we get really unique boxes and that was a really unique one, I always save and I either take to their house or bring here and let play in because they're so much fun and it's so w fun to see them be creative, you know, and what they do with it.

John Pendergrast (10:52)
It was always awesome as a kid when your parents bought a fridge and you'd get that box and you'd be like, make the coolest things. And eventually you'd cut out far too many trapdoors in it and it wouldn't be a box anymore, you know, but yeah, it was great. Well, okay, so let me ask you, we'll get we could talk about box forts all day. I got lots of box forts stories, and you guys have way more than I do, so his whole podcast could be about box forts. But getting back to the topic at hand, you grew twenty-five percent in that first year after pivot. At what point.

Paula Panton (11:22)
We grew twenty five percent for the first probably ten years. I mean, it was amazing. It just kept 'cause we kept adding product too as we saw what the industry needed, so.

John Pendergrast (11:29)
So I mean it's Yeah. So they say if you're trying to build a perfect business, if you just grow twenty percent year over year, you've basically got a perfect business. Like there's nothing better than twenty percent year over year. You talk about these like really fast startups that grow like a hundred percent or two hundred percent, the stability of twenty percent a year is just wins. And at what point did you stop feeling like the gamble that the gamble was paying off or that you guys it wasn't a gamble anymore, it was just you'd hit it.

Paula Panton (12:01)
It never felt like it never felt like a gamble. It was just once we were in it and. Again, like Tim knows and we started meeting all the industry people and started selling, they were paying their bills when in the retail business they weren't. You know, it was just an amazing ride and it's continued to be an amazing ride. Nothing's changed. I mean we have competitors, so now we have to think about that once in a while, but it's still we're doing very well and it's because we listen to the customers and we try to help when they have something they need. Making a brand new lifeguard stool right now for one of our customers that had a different need than what's on the market and I actually got drawings yesterday and pictures and it looks great. So always trying to meet what their needs are and get j you know, outside the bathing suits and into any kind of equipment that's necessary.

John Pendergrast (13:01)
So let's dig into that for a second, because I think that statement of like we listen to our customers, how does that play out for each of you? Like how do you walk that one out? Because I mean, all the best, I think Jeff Bezos just came out and said the reason Amazon was so successful is because we listened to our customers. And it's kind it's such a mantra that all the really successful businesses say. How does that play out for you guys on the ground? Maybe I'll start with Haley. Yeah.

Haley Conrad (13:27)
You start with me. Well, I'm gonna start with I've officially been here less than a year, even though I've been involved in the business for many years. But an easy example that comes to mind for me is we rolled out two new short two new shorts this year, one for ladies and one for men's with a four-way stretch fabric. And I in the original discussions we were gonna roll it out in red and black to see how it does. And of course, George came to me and goes, I got somebody who really wants navy. I was like, We don't have navy fabric, George. Let me see what I can do. And of course, we were able to secure the fabric and then he's like I have two customers that want navy and they I was like well we don't have enough fabric for both of them let me see if I can get more fabric so of course we did and we were able to learn how to print on that fabric you know that was George's expertise in the screen printing side and create really cool not just navy shorts but really cool navy shorts with custom designs on them this year for the for those customers we still have a couple on the shelf because I was like you know there's gonna be a third. So we still have a little navy. Mm-hmm.

John Pendergrast (14:33)
Yeah, it'll happen. It'll happen for sure. What about you, George?

George Panton (14:38)
So for myself, I've been visiting clients over the last ten years. Sometimes I'll go directly to their facilities. Sometimes I catch up with them at a conference or a training event. And so I always try and keep my ear to the ground for what people need or want. But it is a tough line to tow also because there's a lot of things people want that may not be representative of the rest of the industry too. And so it is tricky sometimes to know, like, well, what would the rest of the industry also need, right? Because although we want to make every idea, and for me, like Geppetto was my idol when I was a little kid from Pinocchio. So the idea of being an inventor was always really cool. I have tons of ideas all the time. And Haley and Paula do often have to say, like, hey, slow down, we can't do everything at once. So I always try and listen and really take good kind of. Mental notes for pain points for customers. And I really try to make sure that I remember that so that once I've heard it a few times and I see a trend, then I go, okay, this seems like something that we can act on now. Because it is a it is tough to know what the people are going to want to buy and are not to. And again we want to make everything we can, but we also need the customers to buy in and continue to make it so we can continue to produce it.

John Pendergrast (16:09)
Yeah, that makes sense. And Paula, what about you?

Paula Panton (16:14)
Just been well, it's been actually I was thinking about it. It's actually been thirty-nine years cause we really started looking at this and starting getting engaged in 1987, but we incorporated an eighty-nine, so that's why I say we started in 1989. But I started early on, one of the ways that I learned about the customers and what their needs were by going to safety school. And I can't recall the first year I went to safety school, but I think it was around the nineties, early nineties, and learned so much about what they do and how they do it. Which was vital. And then so we started making rescue tubes because even in the rescue tube market there was a supplier, but he wasn't always he worked out on an oil rig and he made rescue tubes when he came back to Houston every six months or something like that. So the supply was difficult. So we started making rescue tubes is one of the first things we did. And then it's just listening. Fox 40 came out with their whistle for was it hockey and I was like, Man, that's a great whistle. And maybe it'll last longer. It didn't have a pea in it. Let's bring that into the market. People complain about the peas and the whistles sticking because they get wet and moist. And so it's just really about listening. And then common sense wise, for instance with this lifeguard stool, I don't know if anybody else wants it, but I can make it for even this one customer, but I suspect we'll see it getting used all over the industry once it hits the market. But it also takes about two years for a new product to be seen. Heard and budgeted for. So it usually takes about two mark two years for something to really hit the market big. So. The other thing I try to do, which I continue to do, is when somebody does come up with an idea who's part of our industry, I try to name it after So that's kinda cool. I wanna include in the whole thing because yeah.

George Panton (18:17)
And I will say there's there are a ton of products that are almost industry standard now that came from ideas from customers to Paula. A good example I think is let's say the breakaway lanyard, right? The there was no breakaway lanyard for lifeguards until I think it was 1992 or 1993, when through customer communication, Paula and the team developed the breakaway lanyard that we have today. There's also colored rescue tubes. Everyone thinks that rescue tubes just come in a variety of colors, but There were no colored rescue tubes. There was just red, maybe orange, in the beginning. And then Water Safety Products came out with fun colors like royal blue and bright blue and yellow, which was a big thing. And this was, I don't know, Paula 90, mid-90s, early nineties, somewhere there. So there's so many products that we have that, you know, have been around for so long that people don't even realize that was a new idea at one point. So it is really cool to look back on that some. Times and see what Paula and my father George helped develop as well.

John Pendergrast (19:31)
Yeah, y you think about all these things that everyone takes for granted now and you go, We invented those things. Right? And but they're so like they're so normal in the industry now that no one yeah, you're right. I can see that. That's an interesting thought. You guys have such a legacy behind you on that.

Paula Panton (19:45)
And sometimes it's not that you invented it, but you changed it to make it better, which was the thing when he's talking about the breakaway lanyard to make it safer for the lifeguards.

George Panton (19:56)
Yeah, and I will say another one that kind of is similar to that is the Scott Carruthers bead program. Which some people know of, some people don't, some people love it, some people it's not for them. But, you know, way back when Scott Carruthers out of Wild Island in Sparks, Nevada or Nevada, depending on how you say it, I never know. He and Paula were networking, right? And he was like, Hey, I do this bead thing. She's like, we're gonna call it the Scott Carruthers bead program. And we started selling the beads and through the catalogs, and it's still around today because of Scott and Paula working together.

Tim Samson (20:37)
They love The lifeguards love those beads. Right. Yeah.

Paula Panton (20:40)
Yeah, they mean a lot to them, you know. Incentives are very important when you're working with young people.

Tim Samson (20:47)
Yeah. Yeah. So those are so for those of you who aren't familiar, like, the lifeguards get beads for different accomplishments and they put them on their lanyard. So it's kinda like a badge of honor with it.

John Pendergrast (20:57)
It's like the Pandora of lifeguarding, like the Pandora jewelry of lifeguarding. That's good. I like that. I believe that. I'm For all I know they invented Pandora. Like.

Tim Samson (21:03)
It was a thing before Pandora, I think. See there they are.

George Panton (21:06)
I got my bag of beads right here, ready to recognize any of you guys for your good achievements today.

Paula Panton (21:16)
Actually one of the first programs la for incentives that I remember was actually Scott's program.

Tim Samson (21:21)
Yeah. Who knew? Who knew Scott would come up with it? No.

Haley Conrad (21:28)
I was gonna add there's a new one that George came up with this year after listening to a customer and he can tell the story better, but we have now have a whistle of the year color.

George Panton (21:37)
Yeah, so the I was visiting Ryan out in Water World in Colorado, and we were just chatting and he told me, hey man, so every year I do a different color whistle for my staff. So last year I did pink, the year before that I did blue, and that helps me know kind of like a fun seniority thing. It's not so much like, he knows that this guy's been around longer, but for the year of 2025, those staff members all got, for example, pink. That's a fun thing for them of like we're from the year of pink. And so this year we came out with a product called the Whistle of the Year, which leverages Ryan's color scheme. So this year his color's green. So the limited edition whistle win limited edition whistle of the year is green with a water safety logo on it and it says whistle of the year. And it's a another way to add to it. So it's like customers who want to pick up that program could buy the limited edition cool printed whistle. Or they could just buy green because that's the color of this year and it'll change next year to follow suit with Ryan. So yeah, we love hearing those types of cool ideas from customers and you know, little things to kind of shake up the industry.

John Pendergrast (22:46)
Yeah, that's a very cool idea. It's a very cool idea. Yeah, I mean yeah, amazing. Well, should we move on to the next section? Cause this seems like a good segue point. So the next section is called The Industry That Hugs. So I think that's a good title. The industry that hugs. So Yeah. So you've been supplying this industry for thirty no, you said forty nine years. Thirty five?

Paula Panton (23:09)
We do hug each other. No. I hope I didn't. I said we're really closer to forty 'cause we started actually started looking into it in eighty seven, probably had the first ladies' suits by eighty seven, eighty eight. But we didn't incorporate till eighty nine. So I've always called that the year we started. But now that I'm thinking about it, we're getting so close to forty, I'd like to take it back to eighty seven.

Tim Samson (23:42)
Well, you just do you do an extended you do an extended anniversary for three years. Right? So you do the anniversary of the founding and then you do leading up to your anniversary and then you do the anniversary of the incorporation. You get three years out of it. Yeah.

Paula Panton (23:47)
There you go. Yeah, I'm in.

John Pendergrast (23:47)
Yeah, that's right. Yeah that yeah, do that.

Paula Panton (23:56)
I'm totally in. And so are the water park people.

John Pendergrast (23:57)
And you have special you have special gold, silver, bronze whistles for those years and then you know.

George Panton (24:05)
Hold on a second. I don't know if I'm ready to celebrate a forty year anniversary when I was born the company the year started. Let's hold off on that forty years. I'm still I'm still technically thirty eight, not quite there yet.

Haley Conrad (24:13)
I was wondering if anybody would pick up on that.

John Pendergrast (24:21)
We'll have to invest in some counseling for this.

Tim Samson (24:21)
Yeah. It's good for the business, like we don't care about you, George. It's good for the business. Yeah. Yep.

Paula Panton (24:25)
Yeah, there you go. We could change a birth year too.

George Panton (24:31)
Forty is the new thirty, right?

John Pendergrast (24:35)
That's funny. So what is it what's it about the water park world that's different from any other business that you could have been in? Like what is it? Why this industry? You could have made spacesuits.

Paula Panton (24:47)
For me, it's because there's so many people who are in the industry and they never leave. Now I wouldn't have known that when we first got involved in this. But even like Tim, twenty years at Morey's Piers, his colleague Denise, I've known her since she was in college and I think I don't know when I'm not sure how old Denise is, but since she was in college Yeah, I'm not going down that rabbit hole. Okay, but.

Tim Samson (25:09)
Don't go down don't go down that road. She's gonna watch this. Do not go there.

Paula Panton (25:13)
And so we've all b we've all become friends because we work in the same industry that has all the same needs and the same safety requirements and everybody just cares about everybody. And even though some people move around to different parks throughout their careers, they're still in this industry and there's a reason they're in this industry. And I'm gonna tell you it's 'cause we hug each other. Just since you brought it up.

John Pendergrast (25:38)
Yeah. Yeah. I think it's true. Like I've certainly seen it. Yeah. Yeah. That's true.

Paula Panton (25:43)
We care about each other. Yeah.

Tim Samson (25:46)
What's your what's your favorite hugging story?

Paula Panton (25:50)
Well, my favorite story is the one where when we first started making staircases and we had sort of an industrial group of people making these for us, they came to one of our trade shows and, you know, we all see each other and give each other a hug. Hey, how's it going? How was your season? And Not too long after that I think I was at their offices and he goes, Man, these people hug each other You know, and I went, Yeah, we do, that's right. I never thought of it like that, but it's 'cause we care about each other. We really do care in this industry and want everybody wants to be safe and make sure that the public is taken care of and they get addicted to it and they wanna be a part of it and they never leave.

Tim Samson (26:31)
I have a I have a I'm loving the progression of this podcast because I have a feeling that by the time we get to the end of it, there's gonna be like a Water Safety Products rocket. 'Cause we started at swimsuits and then we moved to whistles and tubes and chairs and now we're staircases and we're keep going as we go. So anyway, I digress, but right? You're gonna get yeah. Yeah. So where's your rocket? Come on, compete. So.

Paula Panton (26:48)
Well, we are on the space coast, so anything could happen.

George Panton (26:53)
I do wanna I wanna chime in on this too because I think there's some other good examples of how like fun our industry is. You know, I think it stems a lot from aquatics just in general. Like water park people compared to theme park people are a little bit deeper connected. I worked in dry parks and wet parks, so I feel like I can say that without getting you know, burned at the cross. But it's the water park community just.

Tim Samson (27:20)
It's true. It's true though. So.

George Panton (27:23)
I don't know if it's because we all end up in our swimsuits around each other at some point or you know, you let your hair down a little more, but I'll say this, we didn't really touch on this a lot, but. Our roots for Water Safety Products are in the surf industry. George, my dad, Paula's previous husband, started in the I don't know how to say it, but started in the surf market. He was making surfboards, then we started making swimsuits, and then we started making lifeguard swimsuits. And so Paula's you know, beginning in the industry really started in the surf industry. And for me, growing up with a dad who made surfboards and wanting to surf myself and go on surf trips and stuff, I always thought the surf industry looked really cool too. And it is. It's super fun. But Surf Expo compared to say the World Waterpark Association is a completely different experience. When I went to Surf Expo as an adult, less interested in getting stickers and more in interested in actually networking now. I was like, man, these guys don't get together for social events like the water park industry does. Like at the water park shows and or even at IAAPA, when it's the water park people getting together, everyone's like texting each other, hey, where are you going? What are you doing? There are planned events. Whereas like Surf Expo, it's a little disconnected. People have their small groups, maybe they meet up with them, but they're not.

Tim Samson (28:27)
Well you think we have a person for that part.

George Panton (28:50)
They're not going out dancing all night, at Old Red or wherever, you know, to have a good time. And that's one of the things that I really appreciate about our industry is it is genuinely a group of fun people.

Paula Panton (29:05)
Yeah. Dancing was a big thing too. We danced a lot of nights away at safety schools and trade shows and yeah, what a blast. Yeah.

Haley Conrad (29:15)
No, I w and I would echo the same sentiments. The people, it's the fact that the things we get to talk about are fun when we're with the people. And it's funny when you guys said it's the hugging industr industry. I'm gonna give a shout out. The first person I thought of was Frank Good because I always get a big I always get a big hug from Frank and it goes way back. When I was with Water Tech, I was probably early twenties, and Frank and I went out in Vegas one night at World Waterpark all night till like two AM. We went all over the. Strip, I had like horrible shoes on for walking and Frank was just like the best buddy you could have to hang out with and our, you know, relationship has continued seeing each other year after year at every trade show. We just get to have some fun and catch up on how his kids are, how my kids are. It's just a genuine industry where people are looking out for each other and taking care of each other.

John Pendergrast (30:04)
Yeah, that's really cool. It's really cool.

Tim Samson (30:05)
I think I figured this hugging thing out with water parks, right? Like you all are inherently huggers, right? This is true of the whole industry, but more so in the water park. You're inherently hugger huggers. And I think that works well because when you go to save someone, right, you kinda like hug them and drag them, right? So it's a it's a job requirement, right? Yeah.

Haley Conrad (30:28)
Luckily it stops at hugging and doesn't get to mouth, right?

John Pendergrast (30:31)
Yeah. Moving on. Yeah. So yeah, here's a good segue. So I mean the industry has gotten more corporate as time has gone on, and there are more and more corporate parks, there are more and more corporate groups. Has that changed things? Has that changed things for you? I mean we're still the hugging industry, right? But what has changed?

Tim Samson (30:32)
I wasn't gonna go there, but thanks, Haley. That's a good segue. So.