October 16, 2018: Clay Hauk

Clay Hauk, COO, Hauk Custom Pools

Clay Hauk’s background as an entrepreneur began at the age of fifteen when he started his own mobile car detailing service in high school. He started with a rag and a bucket of soap and went on to have multiple clients, three additional employees, and multiple detailing routes each week that continued for four years. When he graduated high school, he sold all of his routes to another detailing company to start a new chapter as a new college student at Texas State in 2008.

Hauk is a forward thinker and a visionary, which is why a business degree was right up his alley. He spent his four years at Texas State understanding the value of ethics, learning basic business principles and management styles, and developing new business plans, etc. All throughout college he kept a running list of inventions and business ideas on his phone where he constantly added new ideas. Texas State gave him the tools necessary to lead him to post-college success.

In 2012, Hauk graduated and days later began what would become his new career path at his family’s business in Celina - Hauk Custom Pools. For the next five years, he was successfully placed in every position within the company, making him one of the most well-rounded assets for the business. Although certain positions were not geared toward his strengths, the experience allowed Hauk to be able to relate to every employee’s position and understand how to better take care of each employee’s needs. Today, Hauk is the COO of Hauk Custom Pools and has helped the company to grow from building 50 pools in a single year to building over 275 this year.

Along with being the wheels that keep the company rolling, Hauk is in the process of developing new software with one of his previous pool clients for the construction and service industries that will track all employees and contractors and streamline the entire industry without pressing a button. The software is set to launch in late spring of 2018.

A Texas native, Hauk spent his high school years at Celina High School, where he grew up playing peewee football and continued as a cornerback all four years of high school. Hunting and fishing are his passions. He’s a Texan through and through.