I agree, however in the PNW what choice do they have? Its not like students are pooring thru the doors. Most instructors out there are not even close to full time. I did a study awhile back while I was in that state. I came up with an average of 53 students per month taking an O/W class. The median cost was 185.00 for the course thats 9805.00 per month of revenue for 20+ "truly active" instructors... Thats assuming the shops dont take any of that money which most do for books etc... So its even less then that. And they wonder why there are bad instructors,Why instructors cut corners, Shorten pool and ocean training etc... I dont condone this but you and I can both agree that it does happen. The ones who are truly loosing are the students. The price wars between the shops like lighthouse and underwater sports have driven the price so far down that its has become truly a situation of "you get what you pay for..."
... and you just summed up beautifully what I see as the problem ... scuba instruction has become more about attracting new business than about diver education and safety. It's a numbers game ... and the students are the numbers.
And they have a choice ... they can choose to place a reasonable value on dive training and offer quality in return for a higher price. There's absolutely NOTHING wrong with an instructor being paid a fair wage for their efforts ... I strongly believe in it and encourage it.
But the answer isn't to market classes more aggressively by reducing prices ... it's to cut the dead wood out of the forest of available instructors ... reduce the training options to those who are able and willing to offer the most value for the dollar ... and focus on the original intent of those classes, which is diver education.
I don't wonder why there are bad instructors out there ... I KNOW why there are bad instructors. It's because divers are encouraged to keep signing up for classes, and getting pushed into becoming DM's and instructors before they, themselves, have truly learned how to dive. I know far too many instructors who can cite the standards and course curriculum by heart ... but who haven't much of a clue what it really means, or how to apply it outside of a classroom.
Right now, for far too many, dive instruction is a matter of only providing that which is minimally required ... because offering quality is expensive, and as you noted those price wars are making classes cheaper and cheaper. If the instructors don't place value on their time, how are they expecting the students to?
Yes ... you are correct ... the ultimate losers in all of this are the students. But hawking more classes isn't going to solve the problem ... it just perpetuates the marketing game in which "he who can teach the most classes wins" ... the ultimate loser will still be the students ... because far too many of them will come out of that class with a c-card, and very little confidence in their ability to perform the skills that class was intended to teach them.
The ONLY way to turn this into a winner is to offer more value for the class you teach. Because that's how you will ultimately keep people diving. And people who are actively diving are far more likely to take another class than those who dive rarely, or who give it up altogether.
The reality of the industry today is that three out of every four people who learn how to dive will give it up within a year ... and the prevalent business model is to capture that market by selling as many con-ed classes and as much equipment as possible before they have a chance to move on to some other recreational activity. That's bass-ackwards ... what we SHOULD be doing is providing adequate quality to our customers to keep them involved, which will keep them coming back for years to come.
Dive shops tend to treat active, experienced divers as less important than new divers on the assumption that once they've purchased their gear, they won't bring much money into the shop. I think that's an upside-down business model. Most active divers I know continually purchase new equipment, upgrade old equipment, sign up for additional training, spend money on dive charters and trips, and regularly spend time in the dive shop of their choice.
The dive industry as a whole needs to quit playing the numbers game and start concentrating on the quality game ... because therein lies their best chance for survival. It's not more aggressive marketing that will keep them in business ... it's focusing on offering quality in return for the customer's money. An instructor who allows a student to walk out of a class feeling like they didn't get their money's worth has failed ... regardless of how many students they run through their classes ... because that student will either go on to find a different instructor for their next class, or they will drop out of diving altogether.
We need to stop focusing on short-term profitability and start focusing on long-term viability ... and that means increasing the retention rate of our divers. You can't do that by pushing people from class to class to class ... you HAVE to, at some point, teach these people how to relax and have some fun.
... Bob (Grateful Diver)
