Dear valued clients, I sincerely hope everyone is doing well and staying safe.

First, thank you again for all your support, kindness, and understanding during these roller coaster times. I wanted to take this time to address you all amid the ongoing pandemic and restrictions, to discuss the year behind us and ahead of us, and keep you informed on how we’re doing and what we’re doing here at MIS.

First of all, rest assured we remain at the ready to resume lessons as soon as we are given permission to safely do so. Despite the current pause, MIS is doing well and continues to stay stable and strong both operationally and financially. Our entire administrative team is working hard, as we are eager and refreshed from the Holidays and in light of our recent successes. We have a proven shutdown plan in place, and we remain open and available to all our stakeholders.

We continue to engage our staff, taking advantage of the down time to migrate more of our innovative trainings online, in order to further develop our instructors’ skills and hone their abilities. We are creatively engaging our instructors while also keeping them informed of new developments, and are constantly encouraging them to stay safe and lead by example.

We will continue to creatively engage you our clients, using our many social platforms and tools. Our team continues to work on new initiatives, like virtual fitness classes, educational blogs, at-home videos (we’re working on a bathtub version!), and fun ways to keep instructors connected with their clients.

Indeed, 2020 was a challenging year, but it yielded many lessons learned that helped evolve MIS evolved into becoming a stronger and more adaptable organization. Some of these lessons learned include things like prioritizing quick, transparent and honest communication to our staff, partners and clients; fairness and flexibility regarding credits, refunds, and time off; putting health and safety first, and supporting our staff and clients if classes need to be rescheduled due to covid concerns.

We saw the positive results of our safety-first approach, with over 22,000 lessons taught since our June restart and not a single documented case of covid transmission at our pools. While there were some close calls, our team was always quick to respond. We continue to stringently communicate and enforce our health & safety protocols, coordinating with our partners, staff and clients to ensure the safest possible learning environment, while remaining ready to act quickly and transparently in the event of any issues.

But it’s not enough to be good at running our business in these tough times. MIS is seen by many as a leader in the aquatic industry, and we take this responsibility very seriously. 2020 saw achievements like our successful October petition of the provincial government to lift restrictions on private lessons. We have joined several new federations, from the CFIB to ARAQ to the Sandbox Network (also known as the Canadian Swim School Association), to ensure we are on the forefront of developments and innovation, and so that we can contribute our knowledge to the betterment of the aquatic community.

We continue to stress the essential importance of learning to swim, and are consistently educating the community on this topic, through thought leadership and with the support of our local media. We have regrettably seen some troubling drowning statistics and swimming trends, likely as a result of the pandemic, and are working with local communities to educate and provide access to lifesaving swimming classes.

2021 will see more exciting new initiatives by our company and team. We will be launching our first ever ‘Swim for a Cause’ fundraiser, to continue to give back to the communities that have supported us so well. We are hiring more full-timers and converting our administrative structure to a more modular design, in order to better plug and play our team into roles on demand. This will ensure faster response times and ensure that our operational knowledge is more spread out, reducing downtime and delays. We are freezing lesson prices for the year, and becoming even more flexible with regarding to payments, installments,

Coming back to the current shutdown, we are beyond confident that we will be back in the pool before you know it. We continue to follow, respect and diligently adhere to all government and health authority recommendations. We are actively working with these bodies and aquatic federations to ensure we are back in the pool quickly and safely.

I would like to thank you all again for your steadfast support and understanding. We do not take for granted that you have stuck by us through this past year, and we are committed to reciprocating with the best possible service and experience we can offer you.

Until we are back in the pool, stay safe, take care of the loved ones around you, and try to make the most of these difficult times. Gratefully and thankfully yours,

 

Adam Di Fulvio

President & CEO, Montreal Institute of Swimming Inc.