SP is a company people like to hate as they have a couple of price related policies that people do not always view in terms of the big picture.
It's rare to find a dealer that does not sell another line just because Scubapro does not allow more than a 10% discount. This is almost always true with regard to BC's, masks, fins, wet suits, etc as SP products have traditionally been over priced compared to the competition (athough SP is getting a little better in that regard.) The upside of this is that you can almost always find an SP dealer. The two are related - if a company making equipment sold to a niche maket does not provide a structure that protects low volume brick and mortar dealers from high volume discount internet sales, you won't have many local brick and mortar dealers.
Also, I agree its not the most ethical practice in the world for dealers to sell SP gear and claim all other gear is second rate, but it is just as unethical for a dealer selling cheaper gear to claim SP is lower quality and over priced.
When it comes to regulators SP is hard to beat in terms of quality or cost of ownership. SP does charge a lot up front and (just like Aqualung/Apeks who almost never takes heat for the same dealer and marketing practices). Both companies have price controls and marketing practices designed to curtail on-line sales, although both companies are not great at enforcing restrictions of on-line sales.
Up front cost is the downside of buying Scubapro regs, but they have historically continued to support discontinued regs for decades and their design philosophy has whenever possible allowed older models to be upgraded to current standards with new parts allowing them to remain on the cutting edge of performance. There is just not another company out there that will service and upgrade a 40 year old regulator and it is extremely common for divers with 20-25 year old regs to still be diving them and still be getting parts service and waranty support for them - and still own a regulator that equals the performance of anything sold new today. Over its history Scuabpro has only discontinued service support for the Pilot, Air 1 and first generation Air 2 and most models are still fully supported in terms of the soft parts subject to wear.
In the rare event SP discontinues service and parts support for a particular model or no longer provides the parts needed to repair it, warranted regs are replaced with a new one of comparable performance. No one else offers that level of support.
In that context the up front cost of a Scubapro reg is a bargain when you consider the discounted competition's response is often to discontinue parts or service for your "bargain" priced reg 5 to 10 years after it was introduced requiring you to buy another one.
Scubapro/Uwatec computers are also "over priced" but Uwatec has also tended to introduce some truly cutting edge designs. Similarly, SP has been known from time to time to offer steep discounts on new computers when older models are discontinued and replaced with the newer model. Few if any other companies will ever offer a 40% discount for customers to upgrade to a new computer.
SP/Uwatec also offers great long term computer support. When SP was bought by JWA and began selling Uwatec computers, SP replaced my TRAC when it was in need of a battery replacement that could no longer be done at the factory. It cost me absolutely nothing and when a buddy of the day dropped a tank on that one a few years later after it had been discontined, SP provided me with a new one of comparable capability and features for a "simulated repair" cost that was less than the dealer cost on the new computer. In contrast, when the warranty provided by most other companies expires in 1 to 2 years, you are just out of luck and will end up buying another one. That bargain purchase is no longer a bargain when you have to spend the money 2 or 3 times in a given period of time.
So when you look at the total cost of ownership in terms of purchase price, free parts and long term service and support, I'd argue that the higher purchse price is more than offset over time and the SP reg or Uwatec computer ends up being a much better buy.
