Dive shops and training: the disconnect with reality

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I think Crowley hit it on the head. These are businesses like any other, with varying amounts of quality.

It seems a shame you had such a poor experience. The more experience I get, the more I appreciate the training I received for my OW certification. They sold me mask/snorkel/fins, and said I didn't need more until I was sure I was serious about it. They told me I could return any of it after I tried it out in the water.

I think some of the worst training comes from tourist destinations. They find locals (cheap labor) and certify them as instructors as quickly as possible.
 
Why carry products like retractors?

I Use a retractor. Currently I have the oceanic Pro plus 2. So i have the retractor clipped to my left chestD-ring so that its streamlined not hanging and quick and easy to access it.

There is something for everyone and a piece of equipment for different things
 
I guess some of the things that came to mind for this post are the simple things that cause a disconnect...stores full of retractors that are longer in their retracted state than your original problem or having everyone surface swim face down when most everyone will be on their back after class is over or over exaggerating the utility of a snorkel when this will not be the case after class is completed.

Why carry products like retractors?

I like my retractor. My wife likes hers, too. We like them so much that, when they both broke after a year, we bought two more.

Snorkels are wonderful when you need them, but they are a PITA underwater so we just use them when we think we'll need them.

I agree that dive shops aren't perfect.

But then, who is?
 
Whose reality?

There is definitely a disconnect between what my LDS teaches and what I learned out actually diving, however what my LDS teaches is what the employees actually believe and dive. Their instructors wear jacket BCDs on dive trips. One fellow took eleven PADI specialty courses so that he would feel comfortable giving customers advice about which dives to pick when getting their AOW.

I can hardly fault them since they seem to walk their talk.
 
Dive lights? Come on!

Shops carry the stuff they can sell. Out of 100 customers, perhaps 1 or 2 are going to buy cannister lights. Good cannister lights are many times more expensive than the cheap plastic ones. Funny thing: I still have my Toshiba UW light that I bought 20 years ago and it still works.

When you figure the high dropout rate, why stock anything beyond the entry level? The new divers won't be around long enough to need high-end gear.

Then there are warranty issues. One shop I used to visit decided to drop propulsion vehicles. Not because the product was defective but simply because users kept flooding them and wanted warranty service. Very few customers, high return rate, expensive inventory. No money here, folks! Move along!

You see the same thing with BP/Ws. Very few shops stock any part of the BP/W and most prefer to sell jacket or back-inflate BCs.

If you want high-end gear, order from high-end suppliers.

And I'll keep my snorkel!

Richard
 
When you first sign up for OW classes you assume that everyone connected with the dive shop are knowledgeable and excellent divers. You assume that you will be trained to the standards of a competent diver and that you will be sold the correct dive gear.

YOU might assume that someone who is licensed and trained in a particular vocation is competent at that vocation. I don't. In fact I assume the opposite until they prove otherwise.

You will have learned that snorkels aren't needed for diving and you may realize that all of the equipment that you were just sold could be bought much cheaper elsewhere and in many cases that the equipment that you were sold just weeks ago isn't the equipment that you now wish you had.

Snorkels have their place in diving. As an emergency piece of gear when you've got a long surface swim, or to utilize "free" surface air when swimming along the tagline from the stern to the anchor line at the bowline to save 300 psi for your dive, or for when you've got to hang at the surface and you'd rather be floating face down and looking at the shallow reef below you..to name a few.

You will then realize a few weeks after that that retractors are a joke as well. You will get tired of buying tank lights for night dives and will buy battery powered ones found at the dive shop. Soon you will wonder why in the world are you using tank lights.

I am going to "assume" as you do all the time apparently, that a nonbattery tank light is one of those luminescent "snap away" lights that glow for an hour or so. They're a waste of money, bad for the environment, and there are long lasting battery lights that are much better for the task. Guess what? They're called "tank lights" too!

And this is not something normally covered in a basic OW course. It's like saying that when you get your driver's license you should be taught all available options for your automobile.

Regarding retractors- I have my dive light on one, and my compass/slate on another. They fit neatly in my BCD pocket and when I want either one, I simply pull it out and use it. If I drop it, it doesn't fall to the bottom of the ocean, it's right there at the end of my retractor. I also use a retractor to keep my inflator hose close to my BCD so it doesn't drag on the bottom. If I was using a gauge cluster rather than my AI wrist computer, I'd have that on a retractor too, so I don't have to unclip the thing every time I wanted to read it, and it wouldn't be knocking into coral heads as I swim.

Some divers use them, some don't. For you to say they're a "joke" is rather closeminded and presumptive.
 
Am I going to recommend a bp/w to an open water student? Probably not, I recommend renting different gear and styles to find what THEY are comfortable diving, then I will recommend products that either what they are comfortable with, or a better product of similar design, and the first sentence in the first class after telling them my name, is that they have signed up for the learners permit of diving, and good divers are always learning. Most instructors where I teach use the same or similar approaches, and I don't believe that we have a disconnect, but high end tech gear is not what everyone needs...or WANTS, and yes we have tech gear in the store too
 
There are exceptions to all of these comments but in general there is a very big disconnect with reality for the newer diver that shouldn't be there.

It's not long before a diver realizes that there is nothing that they want to buy that is offered for sale in their local dive shop and that when they need expert advice that the dive shop is the last place they will turn to.

There is no need for anyone to take offense to this characterization because if you are a dive shop instructor or employee and these things don't apply to you then there is nothing to be offended by.

Personally, I think all your comments are exceptions.

I buy gas from my local dive shop and I get some of my equipment serviced from my local dive shop, so when I go there I also buy other things that are convenient. If they go out of business I have to go somewhere else for gas.

What I find offending is that you feel the need to tell everybody here on SB this load of HS as if it is the way things are everywhere in the world.

Just because you see things this bleakly in your little corner of the world only means things might seem that bleak for someone who looks at life similarly in your corner of the world.
 
You see the same thing with BP/Ws. Very few shops stock any part of the BP/W and most prefer to sell jacket or back-inflate BCs.

I think this is not true atleast the shops i have been to. They all sell BP/w and carry Parts (Parts...Wing/backplate/webbing) Not much to really stock and Price to price BP/w are less expensive to fix then Jacket's. The shop I trained Prefers BP/w When you ask there Opinon thats what you get. as I have from Most of the shops here in my area Northeast. Ultimalty its what you feel comfortable with. But Not all Diveshops are equal there a good/bad ones.
 
What I find offending is that you feel the need to tell everybody here on SB this load of HS as if it is the way things are everywhere in the world.

Just because you see things this bleakly in your little corner of the world only means things might seem that bleak for someone who looks at life similarly in your corner of the world.

I believe the word is "presumptive".

Yeah the Op makes more assumptions than anyone else I can recall reading posts from in recent history. To the point that it's almost scary. Such an attitude can get one into trouble very fast. Whether it's due to pissing off the wrong person or eliminating a piece of safety gear on the wrong dive is anybody's guess.
 
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