Chemical Brands-Is there a difference?

[DrOperations]

Yes, I'm still a newbie.  But, I have been researching the popular spa chemical brands and wonder if anyone has discovered any differences in the Leisure Time and GLB/Rendezvous chemicals?  I think they are both manufactured by Advantis in Georgia.  I have found locally and online that the GLB chems are about 10-15% lower in price than the Leisure Time for the same product/size.

Does anyone have a preference or can shed any light on this?  Is this a case of the same product in different packages?

Any comments are greatly appreciated!

[hottubdan]

They are the same if you are comparing like products.  Each has a few specialty items that are unique.

[Vinny]

Here's a mind blower ... some chems are available at the supermarket!

Alkalinity up is baking soda. $1.00 for 2 lbs.

Dichlor is dichlor - regardless of brand as long as you're looking at the available chlorine. It comes in strengths of 52% to 62%, not to be confused with the active ingredient which most dichlor is 99%.

If you can buy pool quanities, you can get some chems really cheap. I bought 15 lbs of calcium hardness from Leslies pool supplies. It was way cheaper than spa supply amounts.

Buy the brand that costs you the least - Doc has some great prices ... 5 lbs of dichlor for around $30, some places sell 2 lbs for $15 or $16.

[Brewman]

Ph and alk adjusters can be purchased at big boxes and similar places for really good prices, too.  The ingredients are identical- they're just put into larger containers for pool use.  
 I've started to use muriatic acid to adjust my tap water on refill.  Otherwise I'd be adding over 20 ounces of Ph decreaser- I only need a cup or so of the muratic acid, a gallon of which costs about $2.  So I'm saving substantial money and adding less stuff to the water.  
And I still have all my fingers, toes, eyebrows and hair.

Sam's club offers a large pail of dichlor, cost comes out to less than $1/pound, but you get a really large amount of chemical- somewhere around #75.  Not sure if this stuff has a shelf life or not.