Swan Pools

The worst! We had our pool done when an office was in Napa. I continue to tell people never to use them. We put a propane heater in, and the contractors didn’t dig the line and put the pipe at the right angle. So propane just sits in the line. Can’t make it up to the heater. So when we contacted swan pools, when it was still in warranty, they answered with oops! That contractor is no longer in business. There’s nothing we can do about it! We have NEVER gotten to use the heater, and we spent $ 6000 on it. Problem after problem. Avoid at all cost!

Aside from taking longer than expected, we are extremely pleased with our pool remodeled by Swan.
Amanda in the office was a great source for updates whenever I had questions regarding the project. Adele in the office does a great job of taking care of billing.
John in the office was very helpful when I would stop by the showroom to look at tiles and different finishes for the pool. Made some great recommendations.
The masons were also great and did a beautiful job with the brickwork.
Thanks very much to all at Swan for our beautiful pool.

Great company and great product. Robert Vennes and company went above and beyond the call of duty in delivering a superior swimming pool. Our structural needs called for piers to be drilled and Swan Pools oversaw every facet of obtaining dirt samples to drilling. It was a total turnkey solution. Everything cost what Robert said it would. In our case, he had to deal with a new home construction and he choreographed his end perfectly. I only wish that the general contractor we hired to build our house proved as knowledgable, polite, and professional as Robert Vennes.

Our pool was built in Sept 2013. I purposely waited to write my review, had I wrote this in September it probably would have been much more harsh. I really wanted to include as little emotion as possible, making this review useful to others.
We survived the process, we love our pool. Did not love the service and experience we had with Swan. Thus the 1 star.
Sales with John started out mediocre and just got worse. It began with a change order with no explanation. Without going into all the details and issues that arose (I could write a book) the change order with no explanation sums it up. Smug attitude towards their mistakes, lack of professionalism towards the design and explaining the overall process and overall lack of service. When he instructed us payments would be required after certain milestones were completed we asked for a timeline to show the milestones. He was dumbfounded that we would ask for such a request and ended up emailing us a version made for another client in 1997. Not a good start, this momentum just snowballed to the end with John.
As for Mike the project manager, really poor communication and lack of management of the job. In the end it seemed to me that it was the end of the pool building season, Mike was juggling too many jobs and was rarely on our job site and when a problem arose we were the ones initiating contact. Unlike John, I could see Mike was a nice guy just not a good communicator or project manager when it came to our job.
1. Our concrete was cut in the wrong place, John of course blamed us, Mike indicated there was poor communication on our part. After showing them the pictures of the cut made, 5 feet away from the agreed chalk line smack in the middle of our patio instead of just removing a walkway, Mike apologized his guy made the mistake and we got stuck with ripping out and installing a new patio at the hefty price of $ 5k above and beyond our pool budget.
2. Numerous sprinkler heads and lines were damaged in the beginning of our job. Our sprinklers are on two different systems, instead of asking for our help Mike’s guy guessed and shut off the wrong valve forcing pressure to build and bust other pipes and flood part of our yard. When this was discussed, again blank faces. More money above the pool damage to repair plumbing.
3. Tile was installed incorrectly, as a result they had to order more to finish the job. John assumed we were happy with the incorrect installation because more of the expensive tiles were used, regardless that the design and aesthetic made no sense and looked awkward. He angrily agreed after admitting there was a mistake in communication to have the tile reinstalled as we originally requested. We too were pretty angry at this point.
4. The beam installed in the area that housed our automatic pool cover equipment was installed inadequately, causing the coping finishes to be upgraded to support the change that had to be made from this mistake. (It’s complicated). Long story short John wanted us to pay for this mistake. He ultimately said we changed the design, it was our fault. When we showed him it was no different from the last artist rendering he himself emailed us he gave in and finally covered the cost of a mistake. We had to get pretty confrontational with him in order for him to agree to cover this one. At this point we’d had it especially after the concrete cut mistake, if we had to kick and scream then this is what was going to happen. It was interesting how fast things moved after that point, I think they just wanted to be done with our job, almost as much as we did.
Overall, I think if this is your first pool build DO NOT USE SWAN POOLS. If you have some experience with pools, they’re inexpensive and use the same subs as all the other pool guys we interviewed (5 other companies). So essentially if you can manage your own job you’ll get the same quality pool as you would from a more expensive pool company… just without the service.
On a side note, the excavators, the tile guys, gunite company all awesome.

I hired Swan Pools to remodel a pool this year. I can say without hesitation that this was by far the WORST experience in basic customer service I have ever received. The project took 6 months when it was quoted at 6 weeks. They demo’d our entire yard before they applied for a permit, which took about 2 months. Nobody answered my calls, nobody ever communicated with us about why nobody was showing up to work, and it went like that for the duration of the entire 6 months. I would send emails asking for better communication, and would explain my unhappiness with the project and they just wouldn’t respond. I was spending tens of thousands of dollars with this company — you think they would at least pretend to care. Nope. The ONLY positive thing I can say is that the workers who came to actually do the labor were great (on the few days work actually happened!) The management of this company, however, is shockingly horrible; it actually pained me to continue to write large checks in payment to them. So glad it is over.

The owner of this company refuses to talk with customers for any reason at any time. Really.
Swan Pools was a very poor choice for redoing our pool. It took forever, they did not work well with the engineering company that provided the specifications for curing the problem that caused the need for a redo. The finish on the pool is awful. They scheduled the finish right before we were going on vacation, didn’t discuss timing with us in advance, and didn’t make clear what was required in the days following application of the finish. There are permanent hand prints and boot prints from their workers visible in the finish of our pool, which also appears mottled and quite ugly. The tiles surrounding the pool have already begun falling off, although we used all their materials and followed their suggestions.
We would never work with them on anything, ever again.
Update 2÷1÷14 in response to Robert Vennes comment:
Robert, you were the one who would not talk with me after Swan Pools renovated our pool in 2008. Swan had not built the pool, but Swan did the renovation. Mike Willard was the General Manager of Swanpools Napa at that time, and he oversaw our pool.
The finish of the pool was and still is awful. It is mottled, and bears numerous boot– and hand-​prints of the workers who did the terrible job of finishing it. The plaster is not the color I wanted. During the duration of the job I kept telling Mike I wanted a white finish, and he agreed that would be available. When it came time to do the finishing, he said it was too late to do the order for it, so he did the finish in a really ugly gray, which immediately mottled and bore the above-​mentioned marks, which are still there.
During the duration of the work, nothing was ever done on time. I had to pretty much take over communication with the subcontractors and the project engineer because Mike was negligent and often wrong when communicating with them.
I tried to talk with you about these issues, and your office told me you never spoke to customers. By that time, Mike was no longer working for you, so there was no one to whom I could turn. I left $ 2,500 unpaid hoping to get your attention that way. Without communicating with me in any way, you put a lien on my house, just when I was refinancing. To finish that and avoid any further delay, I paid the lien. But I have never felt good about the job, about you, or the way you run your company. I felt obligated to let other potential customers know about this.
Now, 5 years later, trying to get rid of this review, you’ve finally decloaked. Too little, too late.
P. S. You can try to say that Swanpools Napa and the one in Walnut Creek are separate, and they may be different legal entities. But you are/​were the owner of both, as your employees specifically gave your name to me when I tried to speak with the owner or general manager, and YOU refused to speak with me. If the two were separate companies, why didn’t you tell me that at the time?

Swan Pools saved us from our many problems with a pool and spa we had installed by another pool company 21 years ago. After several years, the jets on the spa, which had not been properly installed, leaked and failed. The other contractor bowed out saying it was out of warrenty. We were referred to Swan by a friend. A representative came out and quickly analyzed the problem, fixed it, and refinished the spa efficiently, promptly and for a fair price. Since then, I have used Swan to replace my filter, remote pool and spa contols, broken diving board, pumps, and whenever I have had a problem. They have always provided a good solution for me at a fair price. After 21 years, the plaster on my pool has worn out. I plan to use Swan this year to replaster my pool as they do good work at a fair price and follow through with what undertake.

The worst possible choice we ever made. Sales guy was rude, workers were horrible. Pool is black but they spilled acid on the bottom and stained it. Had to refill at our expense. Spa jets have blown out revealing the incorrect fittings used. The pool leaked through the unglued sweep connections. All in all a shoddy expensive job not worth half what we paid.

It is with great pleasure that I recommend Swan Pools in Walnut Creek as an excellent pool contractor. My husband and I interviewed several contractors before selecting one, as this was a huge financial decision and a time commitment and would impact our house for a long time. Mike Morey, the head contractor and project manager was super patient with us and did a great job assisting us to make decisions that not only improved our original design but added cost savings! From breaking ground to water in the pool, it only took about 8 weeks total and looks beautiful! All of the sub contractors they used were very experienced and worked like machines and cleaned up after themselves, not leaving huge messes that we heard other companies leave.
Also, Mike was present and on-​site for each phase of the job, making sure everything was on schedule and according to plan. We had a free form pool with hot tub and rock coping with tile. It looks great-​we get tons of compliments!
Not sure when other people had their pool done by Swan Pools but ours was just done this past April of 2011 and the guys were awesome. John in the office helped to coordinate everyone and make sure we had all of our equipment. We had a pool sweep, two pumps, LED lights, Shamu shelf and a waterfall.
Mike and John with Swan were up front, honest and educated us along the way about every aspect of being a pool owner. Several other pool companies we met with, would not disclose their costs or even provide an itemized cost breakdown of the phases or equipment and some were much more expensive. Swan worked with us to teach us about different systems (salt, chlorine, ozone) and helped us make the best decision for our son who has asthma. They showed us how to maintain the pool and still continue to check up on us to see if we have any questions, almost 7 months later. We could not be happier!