Seal-Krete high performance flooring system has flooring boutique swimming in new business

Exquisite Floors, a full-service custom flooring and design company, was recently approached by Leslie’s Swimming Pool Supplies with a floor replacement opportunity. Leslie’s had a vision for their network of more than 600 stores nationwide. As they remodeled their stores, they wanted to replace the VCT floors found in most of their locations with polished blue flooring that would resemble pool water. The flooring also needed to be extremely durable and resistant to chlorinated pool chemicals and UV rays.

When Leslie Pools approached Troy Lewis, owner of Exquisite Floors, about their flooring concept, he chose Seal-Krete’s High-Performance Epoxy-Shell concrete floor coating system for the project. Exquisite Floors said it had recently started using Seal-Krete products because of their extended pot life, workability and color finish.

To get started on the Leslie project, Lewis created a demonstration on a two-car garage concrete slab using Seal-Krete’s Epoxy-Shell System with a metallic pigment and finished with a Seal-Krete Poly-Shell 7000 topcoat. “Epoxy-Shell is easy to use and by adding a blue pigment and experimenting with layering applications, we were able to create the desired color and depth of water,” said Lewis.

The first Leslie Pools store to be remodeled with this special floor was in Davie, Fla. After that, Exquisite Floors did three more stores, tweaking the application technique with each location. By the time the fourth store in Bradenton, Fla., was completed, Leslie Pools had their executives from corporate headquarters review the look.

“They were blown away at how the floors have the color and look of water. It’s not a flat blue, but has light and dark areas much like looking into a pool of water. The depth is created by how the blue-pigmented Seal-Krete Epoxy-Shell is applied,” said Lewis of his company’s proprietary application technique. “Not only is the look perfect, but the product stands up to chlorine spills and provides excellent resistance to UV rays.”

Leslie Pools corporate executives asked Exquisite Floors to redo the flooring in all of their Southeastern retail locations, beginning with 20 stores in Florida and 15 in Texas. “I estimate with an average square footage of 2,500 per store, my flooring crew will require 100,000 sq. ft. of epoxy for just these first 40 store remodels,” said Lewis. Leslie Pools remodels about 50-90 stores nationwide annually.