BioLab has created a marketing program meant to encourage customers to shop at brick-and-mortar stores.

The BioGuard Tru-Blue Promise, offered exclusively through brick and morter stores, kicked off March 1. It states that if pool owners use BioGuard products, follow the company’s recommendations to keep their pool water clean, and get their pool water tested regularly, they should consistently have clear water that’s fee of algae. If algae or cloudy water does appear in a customer’s pool, he or she would receive the products necessary to fix the problem, free of charge.

“Our research clearly shows that people really do prefer to buy from the independent pool store,” said Brian Holliday, vice president of marketing for BioLab North America. “And the reason they like to buy from them is…their expertise.”

Holliday said the system was created to remind customers about the value of buying products from pool and spa professionals, and that the Promise offers them something that the internet and mass market retailers cannot.

The program works like this: BioGuard Platinum dealers, who agree to purchase the majority of their chemicals under the BioGuard brand, are automatically enrolled in the Tru-Blue Promise at no cost. However, they may opt out if they choose. Dealers receive free merchandising kits to promote the program.

Customers can enroll when they purchase at least one product from each of BioGuard’s sanitizer, shock, and algicide collections, along with a water enhancer. “These are the products that most pool owners would buy during the year,” Holliday said. “All we’re asking is that [customers] buy them all at once.”

BioGuard is backing up the program with $500,000 worth of dealer incentives. Retailers and associates who sign up customers have a chance to win Visa gift cards worth between $100 and $1,000. Additionally, store owners can win the Grand Prize: $100,000 worth of free BioGuard products.

The reward program runs March 1-July 31, and the winners will be drawn and announced on Sept. 1.

The Tru-Blue Promise runs until the end of 2017, but BioGuard is already working on the details to extend it to 2018.

“We truly know that it’s going to be wildly successful, because when our dealers get behind something it’s always a runaway success,” Holliday said. “This is something that we hope to [do] each year.”