Check Out Bunim Laskin’s Story

Today we’d like to introduce you to Bunim Laskin.

Hi Bunim, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today?
My name is Bunim Laskin, and I’m from Lakewood, New Jersey. I’m the oldest and of 12 children (9 sisters and 2 brothers) .

School was never really my thing. In fact, three weeks before graduation I got kicked out of high school for throwing a pool party at one of my teacher’s houses. (The irony isn’t lost on me.) I never received my diploma.

In 2018, my mom had her 12th child. With 14 people in the house, we never really had the means for family vacations or summer camp, and owning a swimming pool was completely out of reach. Summers mostly meant all of us being stuck at home.

Around that time, my next-door neighbor built a beautiful pool for her grandkids. The only problem was they didn’t come nearly as often as she’d expected, so the pool sat empty most of the time.
I knew pools were expensive to build, but I also knew they were expensive to maintain. So I made her a simple proposal: what if our family could use the pool when it wasn’t being used, and in return we’d cover 25% of the monthly maintenance costs?

She loved the idea.

Before long, six local families were each contributing 25% of her monthly expenses in exchange for scheduled pool time. Her pool wasn’t just paying for itself anymore-it was actually making money. At the same time, families like mine suddenly had access to something we never thought we’d be able to enjoy.

That was the moment everything clicked.

I figured if this neighbor-to-neighbor solution worked on one street, it could probably work everywhere.

So I opened Google Earth, found about 80 homes with pools, and started knocking on doors. 76 doors said no but 4 said yes and my first 4 pools for rent.

There was no app. No website.

People would call my cell phone and tell me the date, time, and number of guests they wanted. I’d call the pool owners, negotiate a price, call the guests back, collect payment over the phone, and every two weeks I’d drive around delivering checks to homeowners.

Four pools quickly became 50 and in 2018 with my phone I did 400 reservations.

Eventually I realized this was way too much to manage manually, so I decided to build softball ware that could automate the entire experience.

On July 4, 2019, Swimply officially launched.

Today, Swimply operates in more than 400 markets across the United States, Canada, and Australia. What started with backyard pools has grown into a marketplace for underutilized recreational spaces, including private pickleball, tennis, and basketball e many more categories on the way

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Definitely not. Building Swimply has been a wild ride, and there have been plenty of moments where things felt uncertain. One of the biggest challenges was getting people to believe in the idea in the beginning. Renting someone’s backyard pool by the hour was a completely new concept, and we had to build trust on both sides of the marketplace. We were asking people to open up their homes to strangers, and asking guests to trust that experience.

We also had to navigate the challenges that come with growing a company quickly, especially during COVID, when demand exploded and we had to scale our technology, operations, and team very quickly. There were plenty of mistakes, tough decisions, and moments when I had to question whether we were on the right path.
But those challenges taught me a lot. They made me more resilient, helped me become a better leader, and reinforced the importance of staying close to our customers and believing in the mission even when things get difficult.

What are you most proud of? What sets you apart from others?
I’m most proud of what we’ve built for people. Swimply started with a simple idea: make it possible for anyone to enjoy a private pool, even if they don’t have one. Over time, we turned that idea into a marketplace that creates real value for both guests and hosts.
What makes me especially proud is that we’ve helped people turn an underutilized asset in their backyard into a source of income, while giving families, friends, and communities a new way to spend time together.

What sets Swimply apart is that we’re not just building a technology platform. We’re building a new category around access to spaces and experiences. We think differently about how people use the assets they already have, and we’re willing to take risks on ideas that other people might initially think are unconventional.
I also think our willingness to move quickly, stay close to our community, and keep pushing the boundaries of what’s possible has been a big part of our success.

What were you like growing up?
I was always pretty entrepreneurial and curious. I liked figuring things out, taking things apart, and understanding how things worked. I was also someone who enjoyed coming up with ideas and finding ways to make them happen.

I’ve always had a lot of energy and a natural tendency to question the way things are done. If I saw a problem, I was usually more interested in figuring out how to solve it than accepting that it was just the way things were.

I also loved being around people and creating experiences. I think a lot of those qualities have carried over into how I approach building companies today. I’m still curious, I still get excited about new ideas, and I still enjoy taking something that doesn’t exist and trying to turn it into reality.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://swimply.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/swimply
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/swimply.official
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/swimply/
• Twitter: https://x.com/swimply
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHjwUOt5AxobBWXTD2eUi7w

Image Credits
Swimply