Sarting a Dive Op... a candid discussion.

[Scubakevdm]

Hi. I just started a dive operation, and a good friend suggested that I write about the process, that others might benefit from the discussion, so here goes. I do have one request though... I'm trying for this to be informational, not a commercial for the operation. I like to keep my ads in the ad section, so I'd like to try to keep the discussion in sorta general terms of a dive operation, what it takes and what it's like to get things rolling. It's gonna take me a little while to type up the first section, but I wanted to get this up to try to start the thought processes out there since I'll be relying on you guys to steer the discussion. Back in a bit with chapter one.

 

[Scubakevdm]

So I'm asking myself, "Where do I start with all of this?" and I guess the logical answer to that question is to started with my first professional scuba gig. It's not impossible to break into the industry, but it can be tricky to actually make a living at it, especially if you have responsibilities like a family. I got my first job, as a deck hand on a dive boat by being willing- willing to work hard, and willing to work for free. I did, thought the gracious generosity of our customers earn some money in tips, and by reducing my needs to an absolute minimum was able to survive my first couple of months. I would work the deck, handle gear for customers, clean the boat, and ask for anything else I could do around the shop. Soon, my employer offered (forced actually!) me wages in addition to my tips. The shop also brought me up through my certs. I was an open water diver when I started working there, and one by one started knocking out each certification. A little after my first year there I completed Divemaster. I had just over 200 dives, and the experience I'd gained from working the deck for about 300 dive trips was absolutely invaluable, and cannot imagine a better way to turn out quality divemasters than having this kind of experience accompany the certification. Anyway along with the certification came a promotion, and a pay raise as well.
I should point out before I go much farther, that I was very lucky to stumble into my deckhand position. My employer was very kind, and treated me like a son. I'm pretty sure that not every employer a prospective dive-career candidate bumps into out there will be as good, but there are some good people out there. Just be careful, and look around.
So life went on and I was working and learning away, doing about 600 dives a year, and then, about a year after my DM cert, tragedy struck. My employer (who was like a mom to me) had multiple aneurysms burst in her brain. She was rushed away to the hospital, and it was touch and go for a long time. They didn't offer a very good prognosis. She was unconscious, and in the ICU for months.
Her husband was officially the dive shop manager, and was absolutely devoted to her. He remained at her side, fearing that each breath would be her last, 24 hours a day. Suddenly, I found myself in charge of a dive operation... and not a small one.
I felt as though it was my responsibility to keep the doors open, and so the show went on.

I will get this up, and then post another section in a bit.

 

[Scubakevdm]

Now, I realize that these circumstances were a twist of fate, and that signing on as a deckhand and waiting for the owner to have an aneurysm would probably not be a very effective way to go about embarking on your own careers, but this is what happened in my case, and it was the experience of being thrust into the position I found myself in was absolutely instrumental in where I ended up. I'll talk more about that later. For now, let me finish up with the events that transpired.
So I found myself in charge... suddenly in charge, and not without some obstacles to negotiate. My employer was the usual captain of the boat, and her husband filled in from time to time. Under the circumstances they were largely tied up, and so I had to figure out a way to keep the people who had made reservations in the water. On days that we only had a few folks, I would put them on other charters on the dock, and on busy days her husband would come in to drive the boat. His availability was limited though, by events at the hospital. There were many surgeries, all of which were scary, and during the times surrounding those procedures her husband couldn't drive the boat, no matter what kind of a load we had booked. Sometimes, many times in fact these procedures were emergency procedures, and occurred without notice. There were quite a few occasions where at 9:00 pm I had to scramble to find a captain to drive the boat the next day. Luckily there was a great outpouring of support from the other dive ops on the dock and we always managed to pull it off. Eventually, though I recognized the need to hire a captain, and I did.
The captain I found was a great guy, good with the people, and a good driver, but he didn't have alot of experience with our area, and so, in addition to working the deck, I would scurry back and forth between the bridge and the deck and line up the landmarks for the drops. I'm pretty sure some of the initial drops left a little to be desired, but with a little practice, and some research we started doing alright. This is another bit of experience that I consider to be key, because, although I wasn't actually driving the boat, I still had to figure out where to put it, when to drop people, how to allow for the current, the best way to pick up divers, and quite a few other little nuances that really don't get noticed much by people riding on the boat- unless you mess them up. I would like to point out to anyone reading this, that I am still not a captain, and though I am able to discuss some of the finer points of picking up and dropping off divers, my knowledge in these areas is limited, and hope that if there are any questions that I am unable to answer, or answer incorrectly, that an experienced captain will chime in. So, getting back to the story, I had to learn some of the things that a good dive captain does. We were fortunate to have a core group of very experienced divers who helped us to identify areas in the pick-up/drop-off department that we could improve on, and as I said, eventually we got pretty smooth.

 

[Scubakevdm]

So we muddled through at first, and then once the dust began to settle and we found our groove, things went alright. Like I said, we had alot of help from the dock, and friends, and it required an ungodly amount of effort between running trips, taking care of the boat, filling tanks, and preparing for the tomorrows. I was working about 15 hours a day, usually seven days a week. I was however, beyond any shadow of a doubt, running a dive op. Through the process of running the business, I had to make decisions, and these decisions had an effect on the shape of the operation. It started to reflect the way that I would run a dive op, not because I was setting out to change the way things were, but because the owner was still incapacitated. I had to develop a rule by which to make these decisions, and that rule was to try to estimate what the owner would do. Sometimes my estimation of the owners reaction to things was a bit off, and sometimes I had no idea what she would have done, and just had to use my best judgement. In any case, the business started to become a bit "Kevinesque" and I began to develop sort of a sense of ownership- not for the business, but for the decisions I had made, and for the way things were going, you know? Like this is my way, I want this done my way. That kind of ownership. This cause a certain amount of friction, when one day, happily, my boss got better.

 

[Scubakevdm]

Now at this point I'd been running the op for four months or so, pretty much by myself. As I've said, it was alot of work, an unbelievable amount of work. So besides the fact that I was glad that my employer was okay, it was nice to step down the pace a bit. So there was a great sense of relief when she returned. I also had gone back to working for tips only while she was in the hospital, since there was no one to write checks for my salary, and had gotten behind on my child support. Also, I don't want anyone to get the impression that the business operated with anywhere near what it would normally make in profits while she was away. This was for a number of reasons, mostly due to the fact that we were losing out of a good deal of revenues because we were booking passengers through onto other boats, and partly due to the fact that I didn't know what to do about a number of things. On a few occasions, I had to put my tip money back into the business to pay the other boats cash, since I couldn't access any of the funds that came in through credit cards. I did this by buying stuff that I needed anyway from the store. In any event I got a taste of the economics of a dive op, and a crash course in crisis management. I'm sure I made a big mess of alot of stuff, but at the end of the day, we kept the doors open, and my employer was very grateful.
Like I said, in some cases the way she did things and the way I did things weren't the same, and as she started to rearrange the business, I started to feel tugs at that sense of ownership I had over the decisions I'd made. Don't get me wrong, I realized that this was after all, her business, and that she had every right and reason to make changes, but the feeling that she was taking something away from me was inescapable. It had become my dive op, and now suddenly she was taking it back. I didn't realize it at the time, but looking back, I can see that these feelings were the first step, the first sign, that I was to have my own operation. It was at this point that I began to have thoughts like " I would do this differently", or "I would do that differently." Not on major issues, just some things, and inside I guess I started to resent the fact that things weren't being done my way.

 

[Scubakevdm]

So, fate had delivered me unto the diving industry, first in the form of a break working the deck, then thrusting me into the top spot, and taking it back. There were to be two more pivotal moments on my journey, but for the next two years, it was just business as usual. I continued with my certifications, and became an instructor. I didn't teach a whole lot, we had a full time instructor that did the bulk of the teaching. My place, as far as I can tell by every-one's choice, was DMing on the boat. I continued to dive almost every day, and continued to learn.
One day, we noticed that one of the fuel tanks was starting to develop a leak. We pulled the boat of of the water to get it repaired and to do a bit of fiberglass work on the back of the boat as well. We estimated that the repairs would take about 2 weeks. Somehow, this didn't work out, and a decision was made to perform a huge amount of work on the boat. My money ran out about a month into it, without any kind of income from tips or salary, and I had to get a regular job to try to stay caught up on my child support. I worked nights moving office equipment for a guy who started this business as a college project. It was kinda spotty work, and when I wasn't working for him, I was down on the boat helping to try to get it back out of the yard. Eventually about three months into the yard period, the office moving petered out and I was forced to borrow money from my dad just to get by. Now my dad is a pretty successful guy, and he loves me alot, and I love him too. He said to me, "I really don't think that I'm helping you at all by handing you money so that you can remain at a job that's this unstable." He did give me the money I needed at the time, but he also attached a condition. He said that he would loan me the money I needed at the time if I would agree to start my own dive business, which he would also help with in the finance department. My dad, along with my brother and sister each own their own businesses, and because they believed in me and what I am capable of, felt that this was the only permanent solution to the problems I was faced with at the time. There were a couple of other requirements for the deal, most of which are immaterial, but one which I feel is absolutely necessary to prospective business owners was that I was to take some basic accounting courses at the local community college.
The final twist of fate came two days after we had the above discussion, and this was the clincher, this is when I knew that my fate was to become a dive operator. While working on the boat, I saw a friend, another operator from down the dock walk by. I was glad to see him, and when I asked what he was doing to his boat (my favorite boat on the dock... in the region even), why he was in the yard, he told me that he was selling it, and that a prospective buyer was having a survey conducted. My heart sank. What awful timing. If I only would have known that he was even considering selling it, I would have been all over it. But I was nowhere near ready to go. I hadn't even signed up for my first accounting class, and I was at least two semesters away from completing them both. Everything changed three days later when he called me. The buyer had wanted to pay him in quarterly installments, which wasn't how the boat owner wanted it... he wanted it in one lump. I told him that I wouldn't be ready for months, and he said "If I can sell the boat to you, I'll wait". And so that's the story. I was able to take two accelerated accounting classes in one semester, and right after I took my final exam for the second course, we closed on the business.

 

[Scubakevdm]

Now there were, and continue to be repercussions from my departure from my previous position and my arrival as an owner which is in direct competition with them. First and foremost my old boss and I love each other very much. She was like a mom to me, and if I thought that there was better diving anywhere else, I'd move the business. The sad fact is, however, that I can't think of such a place. I wish that I could avoid the conflict down on the dock, but more than anything I want to be the best dive boat, and I can't justify operating anywhere that isn't the best diving. So there's a big flap, and I'm not saying that there shouldn't be. I'm sure my old boss feels betrayed, and I certainly don't want that, or to hurt her, or hurt anyone. But the way things unfolded, I feel like this is the way it's supposed to be, like this is meant to be. So I guess that's enough about my story, I'll start to get into the nitty gritty with the next post.

 

[Cheekymonkey]

already enjoying the story ScubaKevdm

 

[Scubakevdm]

Okay, down to the nitty gritty! First, let me qualify my remarks; I am by no means an expert on the dive industry, or starting a business. I'm just a guy. I just started a dive op, Iv'e been in business for about two weeks, who knows, I might not last until June! But, I have been involved with at least the beginng steps of a process, and I'm writing about it in hopes that others might find it helpful, or for some reason interesting.
I guess I'd like to throw a little outline up here to kinda give some element of structure to the whole thing. I might come back and fine tune this, but for the time being here's where I'm at, and again... if anyone would like to contribute to the discussion, maybe some of the old salts that have been at it for awhile, or new salts that haven't that would be great.

I"m thinking about:

1 Qualities that a good dive operator should have.

2. Experience that a good dive operator should have.

3. Good boats for dive ops.

4. How to set up the business side.

5. Good policies to implement.

6. Whatever anyone can think of.

 

[SteveFass]

Wow! What a great story, and you tell it very well. Thank you for sharing this with us. I'm fan of your father.

So far the narative is pretty non-judgemental. I'm curious to know if you felt you were treated fairly (financially) considering you single-handedly saved their business. I mean, come on, running the show and working just for tips? And then putting your tips back in the business to pay the bills?

That part about not being able to see the revenue from customers paying with credit cards is pretty crazy. I don't know how it works, but couldn't you take the forms to the hospital and get what you needed signed?

How does the rest of the story go? How's the business going? Did you marry the fairy princess?