‘Plunge pools’ making a big splash for home upgrade projects in San Francisco North Bay

Homeowners are diving into a smaller version of swimming pools called plunge pools, creating a ripple effect for North Bay businesses like landscape designers and installers.

A national trend that has spread from Baja resorts to the Bay Area and beyond, plunge pools got their start from the desire for minimalism a few years ago — about the same time Allison Messner launched her Sausalito-based landscaping company Yardzen. Minimalism is often associated with a scaling down of oversized goods, and in this case, the size of a backyard pool.

That popularity mushroomed during the coronavirus outbreak, as people wanted just a quick and easy way to cool off as they nested at home. That’s how it got its name — plunge pool. Many dwellers have turned their humble abodes into outdoor havens.

Swimming pool advocates and installers cite many reasons why homeowners would want smaller pools. This includes the Western drought, in which local water agencies and the state of California are asking homeowners to curb their water use and restrict how much water they consume, fill up or top off pools. As for another motive to opt for one, this “cocktail-type” pool’s $20,000- to $70,000 price tag is less than a standard swimming pool’s cost of at least $75,000 to $100,000.

More importantly, they don’t take up as much space. Traditional swimming pools span 15-20 feet wide and 30-40 feet long. Plunge pools commonly are 10 feet by 20 feet and about 5 feet deep. They’re traditionally built on site.

“These pools tell us how we want to live. The temperature is hotter; we’re in a drought; there’s COVID; plus, they’re less expensive and stylish — they can make your home feel polished,” Messner told the Business Journal. “People have been homebound. If they can’t make it out (to a resort), it makes sense to build it in their yard.”

Messner’s 4-year-old Marin County company has attracted customers from across the United States, making up 70% of Yardzen’s designs since last fall. She fields about 10- to 20 requests for designs a month from North Bay homeowners seeking this new type of pool.

Kristy Hootman of Livermore called on Yardzen to create a design to accommodate “a long, skinny backyard” with a 5-foot-deep, sunken pool, surrounded by a flush, concrete patio that provides for the “infinity” look. The two long steps inside the pool serve as a sitting area where the family hangs out or when a few friends come over. It was installed last April.

“We had enough space to do a swimming pool, but that would be the only thing back there. We wanted to have other sitting areas,” she said. “And we would have never used a huge pool.”

The Hootman pool price tag added up to about $65,000 including the crane service to lift it into the backyard, but she said the family has saved on water in contrast to what she said it would have paid to fill and top off a standard-size pool. It’s unclear by how much since Hootman’s floral business uses water as well.

When asked why not put in a hot tub and turn off the heater, Hootman’s answer was simple: “We don’t like hot tubs,” adding the built-in seating is too restrictive.

When entertaining, the pool has caught the eyes of Hootman’s guests, many of whom have asked about getting their own design.

Matt Perezchica, general manager of Johnson Pool and Spa in Windsor, said he’s seeing the trend grow in Sonoma County.

“Florida’s got its solariums. The South has its screened-in porches for outdoor space. We’ve got (plunge pools),” he said. “A pool either fits or it doesn’t, but some people want other elements in their yards,” he said.

John Norwood, a California Pool and Spa Association lobbyist, said homeowners just “want a place for people to come over.”

Whether involving just the immediate family or their “pod” of friends and loved ones, home entertaining accelerated during the pandemic, Norwood cited, listing outside kitchens and firepits as other backyard features that gained popularity in the last few years.

Norwood installed a plunge pool at his home in La Quinta near Palm Springs and hasn’t looked back.

For all its water-and landscape-savings benefits, the pool advocate boiled down the reason to have one as “it looks good.”

Susan Wood covers law, cannabis, production, tech, energy, transportation, agriculture as well as banking and finance. For 27 years, Susan has worked for a variety of publications including the North County Times, Tahoe Daily Tribune and Lake Tahoe News. Reach her at 530-545-8662 or susan.wood@busjrnl.com