Chris Galvan

Frustrated with the specialty chemicals he was using as the sole proprietor of a pool service company, Chris Galvan began developing some himself.

In 2014, he launched Blueray XL, an adjuvant formulation with mineral salts such as silver, copper and zinc. Galvan overcame two lawsuits brought against the company, one from a competitor and the other from the EPA. “The U.S. EPA informed us that we were not allowed to have a copper-based product for pools without registering it with them as an algaecide,” Galvan says, but he won the fight to become the first product of its kind in the pool service industry. 

The ordeal was financially and emotionally draining, Galvan says. “My team and I are so thankful that it all worked out,” he says. “We are now growing faster than we can keep up by helping the service trade across the U.S. and worldwide improve their work/life balance by leaps and bounds.”