POOL

Pool Corporation

The world's largest wholesale distributor of swimming pool supplies, this company sells more than 200,000 products—chemicals, pumps, filters, and patio furniture—to roughly 125,000 pool builders and retailers through networks like SCP Distributors and Superior Pool Products. It started in 1980 when Frank J. St. Romain opened a single shop called South Central Pool Supply in Metairie, Louisiana, and grew into a nationwide network renamed Pool Corporation in 2006. Its stock ticker is literally "POOL."