Latham’s CFO discusses the pool maker’s growth strategy, AI adoption, and navigating market cycles.
This article appears in the October issue of Global Finance Magazine.
Oliver Gloe has been the CFO of Latham Group Inc. since October 2023. Headquartered in Latham, New York, the company designs, manufactures, and markets in-ground residential swimming pools serving North America, Australia, and New Zealand. Latham Group employs approximately 1,900 people across more than 40 locations. It’s been listed on Nasdaq since 2021 with the ticker “SWIM.”
Global Finance: What do you consider your biggest achievements since becoming CFO nearly three years ago?
Oliver Gloe: The past three years have been about guiding the company through a cyclical downturn. I joined Latham just as the post-COVID boom in swimming pool demand was fading, so our priority was to stabilize the business and make disciplined decisions on costs and resource allocation, while protecting the investments that would drive our future growth, particularly our brands and strategic initiatives. Those were difficult trade-offs, but they were essential. Now that we’ve stabilized the business, we’re shifting into expansion mode. We’re providing guidance for 12% growth this year in what we expect will be a flat industry, and that’s the result of the balanced decisions we made during the downturn.
GF: How dependent is the swimming pool business on the economic cycle?
Gloe: About half of the company’s customers pay cash for a swimming pool and tend to be less affected by economic cycles. The other half rely on financing, making demand highly sensitive to consumer confidence, interest rates and inflation. As a result, roughly half of the market remains relatively resilient, while the financed segment is much more exposed to economic downturns, as was evident following the global financial crisis.
GF: Everyone says having a great team is critical. What does that mean to you?
Gloe: A business-partnering mindset is the most important quality I look for in my finance team. Functional expertise is essential, whether you’re in treasury, controllership, audit, or FP&A [financial planning and analysis], but it’s equally important to apply that expertise beyond your own area and truly understand the business. Employees at all levels are encouraged to take on “stretch assignments” that broaden their experience.
GF: What kind of assignments are we talking about?
Gloe: Just two weeks after joining my first employer, I was asked to represent finance on an M&A project while my manager was away. These opportunities accelerate development, increase your visibility across the organization and earn finance a seat at the table. That’s the culture we’re trying to build.
GF: How are you approaching AI, and how are you using it within the finance function?
Gloe: We are still in the early innings of AI adoption, but we are already seeing significant value. AI is particularly powerful because it can process large amounts of data and identify patterns, so we use it to find inconsistencies, detect outliers, and highlight data points that may not belong in normal recurring processes.
Looking ahead, AI will make us faster and allow us to incorporate far more variables and connections than we could identify on our own. It will be especially valuable for scenario planning and forecasting, like, assessing the potential impact of a major disruption such as oil prices reaching $150 [per barrel]. The ability to analyze those complex scenarios will be very powerful.
GF: What keeps you up at night?
Gloe: Given the dynamic environment we have experienced over the past five years, I have certainly had a few sleepless nights. It comes down to two things: protecting the company while also being agile enough to turn unexpected developments into productive strategies.
What I appreciate is that the uncertainty and challenges we have faced have made us much more agile and dynamic as an organization. That is not just a finance responsibility; it is about how the entire company works together. Whether it is our operations team adjusting production in response to tariffs, working with suppliers, or our sales organization responding to changing market conditions, we all became more adaptable.
GF: What advice would you give to someone aspiring to become a CFO of a publicly listed company?
Gloe: The three things that helped me most were stretch assignments, being curious, and raising your hand for opportunities that others may not take. I also benefited from moving around—both geographically and within the company. I moved 24 times in my life and worked across Asia, Europe, and the US, and those experiences gave me a broader perspective.
Tiziana Barghini is a contributing writer based in the U.S.
Source: gfmag.com
