Future of DiveShops?

[Water Boy76]

People will have research and hypotheses about the shifting retail environments and blah blah blabbady blah.
At the end of the day, people need air fills, immediate repairs, Hydro's, equipment that day, and knowledgeable staff.
LDS are not going anywhere anytime soon.

 

[DiversSupplyPDC]

Lake Hickory, No offense taken and much of what you express applies. Your business and comments are well respected. Quality business people exist, No matter one's size.

Side note: The part in reference to Diver's Supply was not meant in any way disrespect or any way condescending towards them, it was merely used as an example. Diver Supply is a very large retailer both brick and mortar and online, and I believe currently have 3 shops on the east coast. They have been very successful and are a prime example of how shops can have store and online sales. As far as them switching from PADI to SDI, is merely hear say from current customers that we share in our area. I wish them all the best.

Divers Supply certainly has not always been the successful 4 retail outlets we are today. Over 35 years ago Mr. McNatt began the business in Macon, Ga. As a smart business man the company has grown and added stores through out the southeastern US. With economic times and as you stated "location, location, location" stores have opened, closed and grown within themselves.

With the growth of the internet, those that can and have the ability have evolved, Divers Supply has a strong internet presences and serves divers across the US and internationally.

Just like being here on SB talking with divers and Instructors, we enjoy when folks to stop by our stores. Many of you have seen the BIG divers flag as you driven by the Macon store on 475 on your way to Florida.
- Many of you have stopped here in Jax just off 95 and we've met, shook hands and talked about many of the Scuba topics we all enjoy.
- At this years Beneath the Sea in NJ back in March, I shook hands with lots of divers from NY, NJ and the NE that have visited our shops, ordered on-line and get our e-mails.

We've added SDI, TDI and ERDI to our PADI training abilities, not replaced it, for a number of reasons. One is SDI gives us the ability to train Instructors and Assistant Instructors beyond the PADI Dive-Master limit.

Lastly especially following the theme of this thread.

Divers Supply has a very active Independent Instructor Assn. with over 350 Instructors across the US. It's free #1 and provides the opportunity for Instructors to purchase items directly for their "Basement or Garage" Scuba business. No store front or compressor required.

 

[oly5050user]

On line sales have impacted every aspect of retail. However, my local shop still does a great business, for the following reasons:

A. WE TRAIN A LOT OF DIVERS FROM OPEN WATER THROUGH INSTRUCTOR, AND HAVE AN ON SITE WARM SALT WATER POOL
B. Most students purchase some, and some purchase a lot of gear from the shop
C. Students get a discount on purchases, making the pricing competitive.
D. Everything we sell can be serviced on site (except cameras). On site service and repair is a HUGE deal.
E. The shop offers good variety of price ranges in all equipment areas, but no junk.
F. The shop keeps a good inventory of gear, but will order you anything they don't have on hand.
G. As to most equipment, you can try it on, and try it out (on sight) before purchase.

It's all about service and convenience and a little about price. This shop, by the way, is in Lakewood, Colorado, a suburb of Denver.
DivemasterDennis

Exactly right. Need to spend $$$ to make $$$.
A modern facility that expects to actually be able to make a living has to have a $1 million + investment for property,pool.parking,inventory to have a chance at success.
Basement instructors may be the best or the worst in the industry. But they may only teach a limited amount of students due to lack of demand or the basement instructors schedule.
LDS based instructor may teach many more classes. We have a basement instructor that we see maybe once every 2 or 3 months that comes in with his 2 or 3 students.He rents the pool and classroom from us. He is a good instructor and does a good job teaching his students. This is a sideline that he does for himself.
I have classes of 2 to 8 students running just about every week,sometimes multiple classes in a week. Not counting any refreshers that walk in the door. I am associated with a LDS here in NY.
To have a successful LDS today takes alot of $$$$$. the one I am associated with owns its building,has a parking lot, an indoor salt water heated pool, fully stocked inventory (gotta have it to sell it-cannot depend on making a sale if you have to order everything)..All located in very busy location on a major shopping avenue in Westchester NY. So its probably an investment of over $2 million.
I alone teach and interact with more students in a month than what the nearest dive shop does in a year. There are 3 full time instructors and 5 part time instructors in this facility.The time for the "basement facility/instructor" is very limited in my opinion. At least in our local market here in NY.

 

[RJP]

People will have research and hypotheses about the shifting retail environments and blah blah blabbady blah.
At the end of the day, people need air fills, immediate repairs, Hydro's, equipment that day, and knowledgeable staff.
LDS are not going anywhere anytime soon.

I'm not sure that the LDS's landlord, their bank, or their suppliers are going to care whether you need some nitrox for the weekend when they start collections proceedings for bills far in excess of what the LDS can cover with just fills, repairs, hydros, and knowledge.

Economics can be a real bitch.

The shops that will be around are the ones that add enough value to get you to buy your gear there, and get new divers coming in the door, and getting them to buy their gear there too. And, what they hell, if they do it right they can even charge a premium over online retailers.

The smart businessperson focuses his efforts on doing everything they can to support their own higher price... rather than worrying about what they need to do in order to match someone else's lower price.

 

[scubadada]

I love my LDS and give them essentially all my business, even if it does cost me a little more in time or money. It's all about the relationships and the trust, absolutely priceless.

I'm lucky to be located about 20 miles from Dudas Diving Duds in West Chester, PA, owned and operated by Evelyn Dudas, of 1967 1st woman on the Andrea Doria fame. She is a humble, nice, friendly woman with whom I enjoy talking about diving and the old days. I met her when I needed to get a repair done on a rip in the leg of a relatively new 7mm wetsuit. She took me out behind the shop to her workshop and glued and stitched a repair using some of her unique, old equipment from her days in custom wetsuit manufacture, the whole time entertaining me with stories

Her son, Mike, helped me get reinstated in Scubapro's parts for life program when they restructured the program and my 6 reg sets had lapsed by a couple months. He also rebuilt my beautiful MK5/109 that I still use occasionally today. I implicitly trust all my service to Dudas and bring up all my regs from Florida every 2 years for that purpose. I once got my wife's BC back with a patch in place. They had found a pinhole leak from an pinch insult when they tested the BC in water after the routine service. They went ahead with the repair, charged me nothing

Of course, Dudas expertly sells. services, and rents equipment, very actively teaches, including several local contracts, and runs trips to make a living as a dive shop. But, it's the people that keep me coming back year after year, I don't plan to change.

Good diving, Craig

 

[Water Boy76]

I'm not sure that the LDS's landlord, their bank, or their suppliers are going to care whether you need some nitrox for the weekend when they start collections proceedings for bills far in excess of what the LDS can cover with just fills, repairs, hydros, and knowledge.

Economics can be a real bitch.

The shops that will be around are the ones that add enough value to get you to buy your gear there, and get new divers coming in the door, and getting them to buy their gear there too. And, what they hell, if they do it right they can even charge a premium over online retailers.

The smart businessperson focuses his efforts on doing everything they can to support their own higher price... rather than worrying about what they need to do in order to match someone else's lower price.

I'm not sure what your point is? Because what you said proves my point. I probably I wasn't clear.
The fills, hydro's, repairs etc... gets them in the door. That is by far the hardest thing to do in any retail environment. While you fill, repair etc... you have a captive audience to make your sale and a friend. If you think about it, that is a distinct advantage that the LDS has over online retail.

 

[RJP]

I'm not sure what your point is? Because what you said proves my point. I probably I wasn't clear.
The fills, hydro's, repairs etc... gets them in the door. That is by far the hardest thing to do in any retail environment. While you fill, repair etc... you have a captive audience to make your sale and a friend. If you think about it, that is a distinct advantage that the LDS has over online retail.

Yup, it seemed that you were saying that the revenue from those things will keep an LDS in business. You are right, those things will get existing customers through the door. However, I'm not sure that very many people pick-up a new Shearwater computer or Titanium regulator as an impulse buy when they are dropping off their tanks, or sign up for a DM program or advanced tech training on a whim while picking up their regs from an annual service.

A handful of customers might LOOK at something while they are there, but the sad reality for most LDS's is that the majority of those few people will happily check something out in the shop, ask their questions, make product comparisons, etc... and then go home and buy the item on-line to save a few bucks. In fact, with a smart phone they will usually know just how much cheaper something is online before they even pull out of the LDSs parking lot.

Google "Showrooming" for details on impact on US retail sales in general. I would have to imagine this is even MORE prevalent in dive gear, especially for high-ticket items.

"Showrooming" Affecting U.S. Retail Sales

As I mentioned above, however, this is an "LDS problem" not a "consumer behavior problem." It's incumbent upon the LDS to ensure that their customers feel that the LDS adds sufficient value to the transaction to warrant the customer making the purchase from the local shop rather than from an e-tailer. In many respects, getting existing customers to come through the door is the EASIEST thing for the LDS to do. Most have a harder time getting them to spend incremental money once they do.

However... while important, none of the things that you and I are pointing out do anything to get a NEW diver to come into the shop.

New business is the lifeblood of any business.

 

[cerich]

The smart businessperson focuses his efforts on doing everything they can to support their own higher price... rather than worrying about what they need to do in order to match someone else's lower price.

Yup, and when it become clear that something needs to change, they change.

---------- Post added November 4th, 2014 at 12:39 PM ----------

The fills, hydro's, repairs etc... gets them in the door. That is by far the hardest thing to do in any retail environment. While you fill, repair etc... you have a captive audience to make your sale and a friend.

Hmmm, fills, hydro's and repairs are jack all. really, yeah they should be a profit center but for most dive stores in most areas that business is maybe a quarter of their customer base and nowhere near enough to keep a shop in business.

Captive audience??!! LOL, unless you are there and need something NOW and can't wait there ain't no such thing anymore

 

[GrandpaScuba]

I have been thinking about this for about 5 or 6 years. The dive shop is based on a paradigm that doesn't really fit current retail models. Though a similar model is still used with other sports related shops. I specifically am referring to ski shops and golf pro-shops. There is no reason the dive shop paradigm can't change. After all, you don't buy your car at the same place you buy the gas. You don't learn to drive at the same place you buy your car. The overriding problem is the need for conveniently located air-fill stations.

I've toyed with the idea of a diving-school. That just teaches diving, does not sell gear. It could provide air fills, it is going to need air for the students, anyway. If the dive shop functions are separated into separate businesses, divers are going to have to get used to paying what stuff is worth. In our area, the dive shops have a long-standing competition to undercut each other for the cost of Scuba classes. In our area, scuba classes are ridiculously cheap and no one makes any money from them. The classes are just there to sell gear.

In our geographic area there are probably about 100 dive stores. That might even be under-estimated. I can see a future where about 30% to 40% just close. Another 40% to 50% become dive schools with air fill stations. And, 10% remain as full-service scuba shops. And where most gear sales are from the internet.

Local, regular divers are decreasing in numbers. Scuba diving is becoming more and more a destination activity. With people learning to dive on vacation. The dive business is under a lot of pressure with more and more businesses trying to get their piece of an ever-shrinking pie. This is short sighted. The industry needs to pull together and work to make the pie bigger.

We need to return the wonderment of diving. When I was a kid, if you asked a little boy or girl what they were going to be? The answer was frequently "marine biologist." Ask that now, and the answer is that they just want to be "famous."

Getting back to the original question: The industry needs to work out a business paradigm that draws people in and makes it easy for them to become participants. So the business can grow and everyone can make a decent living.

 

[Adobo]

I've toyed with the idea of a diving-school. That just teaches diving, does not sell gear. It could provide air fills, it is going to need air for the students, anyway. If the dive shop functions are separated into separate businesses, divers are going to have to get used to paying what stuff is worth. In our area, the dive shops have a long-standing competition to undercut each other for the cost of Scuba classes. In our area, scuba classes are ridiculously cheap and no one makes any money from them. The classes are just there to sell gear.

I haven't done any research or surveys but my guess is that many of the best instructors of higher level classes are either completely independent of dive shops or have only very loose relationship with dive shops. When I say higher level classes, I am referring to technical diving classes or cave diving classes. It seems that the idea of a diving school, be it a one person or a multi person operation, is already implemented by many instructors.

Personally, I like my instructors to only have a loose relationship with a dive shop. Teaching someone to dive is a very different thing that selling someone dive gear. Teaching someone to dive and to buy specific gear from a specific shop, to me that is just marketing and advertising.