Biggest thing killing dive shops?

[BDSC]

Actually, folks should be damn glad there are a bunch of vacation divers out there. I suspect that's what keeps the equipment manufacturers in business. If the industry depended on just the "John Wayne Divers", they would soon be out of business.

 

[dmaziuk]

But members generally have their own tanks in the UK. The club might have a few - and the cost of keeping the ticket in date on these is not that great.

Aside from the part where you have to keep them somewhere. As long as you have a permanent club member whose wife doesn't mind that junk in her garage...

 

[Billy Northrup]

Not sure where you get your numbers from but if every diver would spend 10 grand or more on dive gear as you claim the shops may be frolicking.

I don't understand this, I never said anything about gear. Just shop rent and air fills.

 

[boulderjohn]

with discover divers the entry point and vacation divers much of the population, how can we get them happier *and* safer? Without requiring uber preparation and training. Not to shift the conversation from shop economics, but can more teaching off the bottom help? They would have more fun on the dives and not leave feeling as awkward underwater.

I have long argued that the real revolution will come when teaching OW students to do their skills while neutrally buoyant becomes the norm rather than the rare exception. When I made the switch, the difference in the ability of students to handle themselves in the water and the resulting increase in their confidence was astounding. Divers who do their first dives on their own with that greater sense of confidence in both their skill and their safety are far more likely to have fun while diving and will continue to seek dive experiences afterward.

It is hard to make that switch, though. Instructors who have done all their previous training to overweighted students on their knees apparently have tremendous imaginations, and those tremendous imaginations allow them to know what it would be like if they did it differently, and they therefore know it will not be any better. This knowledge gives them the permission they need to refuse to give it a try.

 

[Umuntu]

@boulderjohn I also know of a diving club in South Africa which is a huge success.
Durban Undersea Club - DUC

As a result of having a waterfront site, reasonable annual dues, a restaurant and bar open from mid-week through week-ends, they are oversubscribed for social members but new applications from divers always welcomed. A large number of social and diving members keeps the club lively.

They run their own compressor and club boat and have staff and an old tractor to help members beach launch their own boats. The club boat goes out every weekend and is available for member organised dives with a minimum of 4 divers.

There are many successful models for organising diving. They don't all have to be commercial.

 

[JamesBon92007]

Richard.[/QUOTE]

How is this persecuting/harassing/driving out the 'real cowboys' in a significant way? Granted, as long as you have different groupings, people in one group will occasionally cast a critical eye at some in another ('real divers' vs. 'vacation divers,' GUE/DIR vs. 'strokes' - and in tourism, tourists vs. 'travelers'), but if someone wants to be a strongly independent fit, capable diver with excellent skills and watermanship, diving adverse conditions, spear-fishing, tech. diving or whatever tests him/herself a bit, what's stopping that person?.

i'm guessing I fall into this category although I never considered myself "elite" or a "cowboy" or any such thing. But people do criticize me for the way I dive. If I tell someone that I did my first thousand dives or so with no BC, no SPG, and no depth gauge they think I'm nuts. It's not that I reject new equipment it's just that I didn't feel any need for it. If I'm beach diving one tank a day in Southern California and never going deeper than about 40 feet then that equipment is un-needed. As for the SPG, after you do the same dive a few hundred times you know how long your air is going to last so you do need a watch or bottom timer. As for a computer, I've never felt like I needed one of those either. The thought of trusting my safety to a piece of electronic equipment that is being immersed in salt water under a lot of pressure is not appealing to me. I'd rather just watch my NDL and make sure I don't have too much residual nitrogen after the SI. Heck, most of the dives in places like Cozumel are planned so you won't get bent unless to deviate from their dive plan. I got me one of them there SPGs back in the 80s and sure, it's nice to be able to see how much air I gots--I end up diving a few minutes longer than I might have. I started using a BC when I started going on dive trips and we're swimming over and around delicate coral and trying not to stir up the sand or harm an critters that might be in there. Off the beach in SoCal probably nobody else is going to be following me so if I did kick up a little sand it wouldn't bother anyone's visibility. I just weigh myself so I'm neutral at the end of the dive. With a steel 72 tank it's pretty easy. It's not all that hard with an aluminum 80 either.

Now, I'm not going to go away just because I'm a dinosaur but eventually I'll have to stop diving (probably due to death from old age) so I don't give a flying rat's butt what anyone thinks about the way I dive. If they want to load themselves down with a bunch if unnecessary equipment then that's fine. It helps to keep the dive shops in business. I buy some stuff but not a lot. Much of my gear is very old but I take good care of it. It someone comes out with something that I think is truly an improvement then I buy it. But the impression I get from most of the new gear is that they are just trying to sell you something new, just so they can keep making money. That doesn't mean the new stuff is better. And if they make some improvement on something like Jet Fins it'll probably only be a very small improvement, probably not worth $150 to me. In the 80s Sherwood came out with the new Magnum regulators and after I tried one and understood the design differences I bought one (along with a shiny new SPG and depth gauge) and it really is a lot better than what I had (old Calypso). I have never regretted that decision and I still dive with it. The Calypso is my octopus which I just stuck on there to satisfy my girlfriend's instructor. In case you are wondering I switch to it during my dives and use it for extended periods. It is not what you might call "easy-breathing" but it works just fine and I have always kept it in good condition and it won't free-flow when I jump into the water. Some might think it's old and un-safe while others might think it's proven it's reliability. I go with the latter, of course I recently bought a new BC, attempting to find something that would fit into my carry-on and still have room for some clothes. It didn't quite make it so I'm back to piecing together a BC using an old backpack and a new snorkel vest that I paid $10 for. So far I think it's superior to just about anything I've seen and it only weighs about 2 pounds. It only has about 15 pounds of lift but heck, what do I even need a BC for?

 

[DavBuc]

18 pages to answer a simple question, including ridiculous comments such as "the medical waivers are a hassle" and "fit people don't want to be bossed around by dive shops". Where do people come up with this nonsense?

People obsessed with rules attracting other people who love rules and like being the big kahuna

I feel all the medical waivers and liability issues has ruined a lot of things about the activity and once you own a boat it’s tough to go back

Too many divers are not interested in fitness and don’t understand risk which makes it difficult for fit people to be bossed around about safety

Most of the answers were in the very first post.

Local dive shops are failing primarily because of the following 3 reasons, in order of importance:

1- They cannot compete with the price and convenience of online shopping
2- The quality of diving around the world has taken a huge hit, with environmental changes caused by humans and direct human damage to reefs in every country which leads to reason 3
3- There is less interest in diving therefore there are less divers overall and less diving done by those who have gotten certified, because of reason 2 above, and because it's too expensive for many who have seen their expenses increase and disposable income decrease.

Those are the 3 top reasons and although many other good suggestions have been made such as "dive shop owners not adapting" and "poor customer service", if the above 3 reasons were eliminated there would not be an issue with so many local dive shops closing.

 

[StefinSB]

I don't understand this, I never said anything about gear. Just shop rent and air fills.

Really? You said: “Divers are weird about fills... They pay 10k for dive gear or more,”

 

[boulderjohn]

2- The quality of diving around the world has taken a huge hit, with environmental changes caused by humans and direct human damage to reefs in every country which leads to reason 3

I don't remember anyone mentioning this before, but it could be a good point.

I mentioned earlier that I originally intended to be only an occasional diver. What made the difference was the awe I felt in seeing the underwater world. In the past few years, I have returned to some of the sites that inspired me then, and I have been crushingly disappointed by the results. I can't help but wonder if I would be as inspired as a new diver today as I was then.

 

[SeaHorse81]

What made the difference was the awe I felt in seeing the underwater world. In the past few years, I have returned to some of the sites that inspired me then, and I have been crushingly disappointed by the results.

Same here. I was always so thrilled by being neutral that I thought the surroundings were less important than it turns out they actually were. The last times I was at my favorite places, I was looking around thinking, "Where is everybody?" (meaning critters). It was still blue and pretty and all that, but with nobody home, it just wasn't the same.