Hello awesome people! You all rock! I would like to thank all of you for your continued support of my organization, the Canada Swim School.
This past September, CSS celebrated its 2-year anniversary. It has never stopped being fun and awesome, and it’s all thanks to you my clients, my incredible team and our generous partners.
2019 was an exciting and successful year for CSS. We exceeded our growth targets, launched new programs, restructured of our management team and implemented an industry-leading onboarding process for new instructors. But what truly makes us successful is how many of your kids who learnt to swim with our program: over 500 unique swimmers in the past year became more capable, confident swimmers with CSS lessons.
Since our inception in 2017 we’ve taught nearly 12,000 private swim classes, and already had over 1400 families learn to swim with our club. We are truly proud of what we have accomplished, and are thrilled to have had each of you along on this journey with us. We are also proud to employ over 25 local swim instructors, coaches and lifeguards, while working out of 10 pools in Greater Toronto Area.
We are committed to investing in your kids, in their swimming and values alike, so they become confident, capable swimmers and more importantly, successful individuals. We continue to pioneer innovative techniques to getting your babies and kids to swim on their own younger and faster. We have implemented more flexibility to our parent & tot and lessons programs to ensure your kids can start as young as possible and keep swimming until their teen years and beyond. We are listening to you more than ever, with surveys and a bigger customer service team, so we can be pro-active, respond and resolve better than ever!
We remain heavily involved and invested in our community. We have a regular presence on local news and radio shows to encourage safe swimming and pool safety. As an industry leader, we take responsibility to educate the public through our blog and social media outreach.
Nowhere else do you see such passion resonating from all the way at the top of our club, right down to the front lines. Everyone from the President to the VP’s and management team are still involved in coaching swim team or teaching classes as well, setting a great example for the rest of our team. Our values of perseverance, respect, hard work and awesomeness are embedded into every nook and cranny of our organization.
The aquatic industry has changed a lot over the past 2 years, notably it has been impacted by staffing shortages, increasing insurance rates and competition. Indeed, this was a year with cost increases across the board on an unprecedented level, namely with rent costs average increase of 12%, salaries average increase of 7%, and insurance costs average increase of 21% (!!).
We have always been proud to pursue our mission of offering higher-quality swim lessons at or below average prices. I am proud to say we have succeeded and will continue to succeed in this regard. For 2019 we accomplished our mission by offering our classes at $25/30min, a stunning 16% below the industry average of $30/30min lesson.
Despite the increases in the costs, we remain committed to our mission of providing above-quality classes at or below average prices. Starting winter 2020, our prices will remain below industry average with our benchmark 30min private class starting at only $28.25 (still 5.8% below the average). This will allow us to sustainably plan for the future while remaining competitive, flexible and innovative.
We are looking forward to many new and exciting things for 2020. First and foremost is to continue to reach and positively impact new families and our communities. Having a positive impact, has and will always remain our top priority. We will also begin overhauling and replacing our online system. We are still heavily invested in the pursuit of perfection with regards to our onboarding and training process. Finally, growing our community and our brand is becoming a more important value for us on the whole. We are eagerly seeking and implementing better ways of connecting our instructors, parents and swimmers, so the passion and love of what we do can be shared and encouraged.
On behalf of my team, we are absolutely PUMPED to continue serving and swimming with you, now and into the future. THANK YOU so much for choosing to swim with our club, and for believing in us. Have an incredible day,
Adam Di Fulvio
President, Canada Swim School Inc.
