awap:
If you are refering to Scubatoys and their Scubapro line, I don't believe Larry "lost" the scubapro dealership. Rather, I believe he discarded it. My impression is he abided by the dealer agreement and dropped the line because it did not fit in his business model.
I won't bash the ever popular Larry at Scubatoys, but lets not misrepesent the situation either to make him look like a martyr.
Larry was selling SP stuff on-line in clear violation of the dealer agreement. SP wanted it stopped due to complaints from other SP dealers who were in a position of following the rules and then being undercut by Larry who was targeting their cutomers with on-line sales at prices they could not legititmately compete with.
When SP called him on it Larry, at best, excercised his option to not comply with the request to stop and consequently to no longer be an SP dealer, at worst they did not give him an option. As I am not privy to the exact details, I can't tell you exactly what happened. However, whether he "gave up" or "lost" the dealership is just semantics. The fact was if he wanted to be an authorized SP dealer he could not engage in internet sales of SP equipment or selling it for more than 10% below the MSRP and he knew it.
I agree with and share his frustration that SP claims it cannot track the stuff it makes and sells to dealers, and in particular the serial numbered items. If they were serious about stopping internet sales they would track the items and then either stop the US dealers who pass it on to internet stores like Liesure-Pro and/or stop the European or Asian dealers who pass it on the internet stores by canceling their dealerships.
With regard to Scubatoys and Scubapro, you can blame SP for not stopping internets sales while at the same time not allowing authorized dealers from engaging in internet sales. But you cannot blame the other SP dealers who were being impacted by a loss of business to Scubatoys as Larry was not following the agreement and was consequently placing them at a unfair disadvantage. SP cannot allow one dealer to get away with something it will not allow other dealers to do, and until the rules change, that's the way it needs to stay.
On the other hand, I have a hard time critisizing Scubapro for not wanting to embrace internet sales, especailly at cut rate prices. A large internet store can survive on a enormous volume of sales with only a few percent margin, but a small brick and mortar local dive shop cannot, and if those LDS's start failing, then the service and support network for Scubapro will crumble with it.
The reality is that a low volume LDS is never going to be able to compete with internet giants. And to me, it is not worth the bucks I'd save buying on line to lose a local shop and then have to send everything away for service or warranty support, not to mention the costs of buying and maintaining my own compressor.
A possible solution is to level the playing field and allow authorized dealers to engage in internet sales, but only within certain price parameters to prevent the large Wal-mart equivalent of internet equipment dealers from killing off the local dive shops who provide the warranty and annual service work, training, expertise, local dive knowledge, dive club support, local dive charters and travel packages and the other little things like air.
Detractors of this plan will cal it "price fixing" but I see this as vastly preferable to what Wal-mart has done to mainstreets and locally owned small businesses all over the country. And at least Wal-marts are located all over the country making local purchases possible, while Leisure Pro, Scubatoys, Dive Inn, etc are not - and the odds are that they never will be given the small number of potential dive equipment consumers compared to enormous number of Wal-mart consumers.
