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Meet Jaime Zilverberg
SafeSplash team member since 2006. Franchise owner since 2013 in Castle Rock, Colorado
Jaime Zilverberg has been swimming her whole life. A fourth-generation Colorado native, she started teaching swim lessons in high school and went on to swim at Brown University. After college she worked as a local TV news producer, but her love of swimming and working with kids pulled her back to the pool. She joined SafeSplash in 2006, when the company had a single location. She worked across marketing, management, and instructor training, and later helped sell SafeSplash franchises.
That last role changed her path. Talking with prospective owners every day, Jaime realized she missed being in the building with the kids and the instructors. “In the end, I believed in the brand so much, I sold myself a franchise,” she says. She opened her own SafeSplash in 2013 and calls it the best decision she ever made.
For Jaime, the work has always been about more than lessons. “We are not selling hamburgers; we are teaching kids a life skill,” she says. She has watched nervous beginners go on to join swim teams and swim in college. She has also seen how much a weekly lesson can mean to a child going through a hard time, which is why she pushes her instructors to get to know every swimmer, not just teach the skills.
She’s candid about the challenges, too. Staffing has been the hardest part of ownership, especially building a team that sees the job as more than a job. Her advice to new owners: every business has up years and down years, but parents will always want their kids to learn to swim. Today Jaime also mentors new SafeSplash franchisees, often just by picking up the phone to help or to listen.
Meet Mike Scrivner
Among SafeSplash’s original franchise owners. Hosted and Dedicated locations in Flower Mound, Keller, and Murphy.
Swimming shaped Mike Scrivner’s life long before he owned a swim school. He was an All-American and Division I swimmer, then spent 25 years in banking. While still in corporate life, he and his wife, Monica, went looking for a business they could build on the side and eventually run full-time. They became some of the very first SafeSplash franchise owners, opening two Hosted locations inside local gyms in 2010. By the end of 2016, Mike had left banking to run the business full-time.
Their path shows how the two SafeSplash models can work together. Hosted locations got them started without building a pool. But teaching inside someone else’s gym meant depending on that gym, and when host facilities closed, the Scrivners had to find new water. In 2021 they opened a Dedicated SafeSplash school, which gave them full control of their schedule and a more stable home for their swimmers. Today they run that Dedicated school alongside Hosted locations, growing only as fast as they can without giving up quality. “We didn’t want to grow too fast and lose quality,” Mike says.
Mike leads from the pool deck, not the back office. He says there’s nothing in the facility he wouldn’t do himself. He also believes enrollment and quality go together: “Quality lessons are what drive word of mouth and customer loyalty, and that’s crucial for long-term success.” For him, consistency matters as much as passion, which means following proven processes even on the busiest days.
His advice to new owners is practical: study your market before you open. Dallas-Fort Worth is one of the most competitive swim markets in the country, and Mike has seen a new competitor open nearby and pull families away. Stay alert, know what makes your school different, and be ready to adjust your pricing and offerings when you need to.
REVIEWS FROM OUR FRANCHISEES
When looking to purchase a learn-to-swim franchise, the curriculum was a critical piece of the puzzle. If I was going to put my name on a franchise curriculum, I wanted to be sure it was the way I would teach and something I truly believed in. [Corporate’s] curriculum does not disappoint!
Cammile Adams
Olympian, Multi-Location Owner
Houston, TX
When we started looking at swim schools and franchises it was clear [SafeSplash] was for us. We wanted to create a legacy for our children. Corporate listens to the franchisees, and that’s huge.
Robert & Dolce Canales
Multi-Location Owners
San Antonio, TX
We love the fact that we can run our own business that is financially viable and interesting to us. But it also brought a life skill to people that they can keep forever.
Scott and Tracey Ray
Owners
Colorado Springs, CO
We are teaching a life skill, the most important thing. It has meaning, we have passion, and two years later our business is right where we want it to be.
Jaime Zilverberg
Owner
Castle Rock, CO
