Major Industry Change re: Online Scuba Sales....

[ReefHound]

This is not a high volume business. A website can literally reach millions whereas a local dive shop can reach 'maybe' hundreds. (divers only) Major players in dive gear internet sales probably sell more in one week than most LDSs sell in 6 months.

I think you're missing the whole point of the OP, which is for the LDS to have that website.

 

[jpsexton]

dont be ridiculous, we can buy a compressor from one of those online places for around 100 bucks, who needs a LDS for fills? (this is a joke, please dont take me seriously and send me nasty notes, we all know the compressor is 200 bucks)

If air fills become scarce the demand for personal compressors will go up. The result would be the price of compressors going down. You might be surprised how cheap compressors would get if more people wanted to buy them. It's allready justifiable for a couple of buddys diving 100 or so dives a year to buy one.

 

[RJP]

So, in another 8 years we should have the PADI BP/W and Long Hose specialty course...

How about "Discover DIR-F"?

 

[Debraw]

Debra! Say it aint so! My kids need new shoes!!!
Darryl

LOL! Everyone has a price, everyone! Besides I want to become a rep like you where all the real money is at.....LOL!!!


As of 9:57PM CST on Friday the 13th, no PM's and no phone calls...come on people, it's easy, own a dive store, anyone can do it. I will also accept a bills in small denominations, unmarked, in leather brief cases. My offer does have an expiration date......

 

[fire_diver]

That only works for a little while.

Once all the small dealers are gone, the the big dealers beat up the manufacturer for price until the manufacturers go out of business.

In the end, only the manufacturers who maintained pricing are left.

This is why you can still buy a Sub-Zero refrigerator, but if you buy a Frigidaire, Tappan, Kelvinator, Westinghouse or Gibson, you're just buying a nametag on a machine made by White Consolidated Industries. The factories, people and products are all gone, crushed by the demands of buying groups and big chains in the 80's and 90's.

Sub-Zero maintained their pricing and dealer network, and stayed out of the pi***** match.

Free-market competition is really only good for the consumer in non-specialty markets.

Once the shakeout is over, people that bought one brand or another because of a particular proprietary feature will be out of luck. Maybe you won't be able to get the reg that bubbles to prevent freeflows, maybe you won't be able to get the one packed in grease. Maybe you won't be able to get anything rated for more than 50% O2. The specialty products with smaller markets tend to be dropped.

Be careful what you ask for. You might get it.

Terry


Terry

You are comparing apples and carrots here. A refridgerator is an item that every single home in America needs, and needs to be replaced periodically. Scuba is a niche market like cameras. If I want to buy a Cannon, I buy a Cannon, not some 3rd party unit with a Cannon label on it. Same with scuba gear. Manufacturers allowing dealers to set thier own prices will not cause Mares or Apeks to go out of business.

fD

 

[sambolino44]

The price of gear may go down. Small independent manufacturers will be swallowed up or edged out by Megacorp, Inc. The price of fills and training will go up, and be harder to come by. Locally-owned dive shops will be replaced by McDive, Inc. The bar you have to clear to get your cert will go lower. More new, poorly trained divers will die.

The certification agencies will lose sight of their original mission of keeping government regulation out of diving by keeping divers safe and instead concentrate on protecting the profitability of the dive business by pandering to the market and... oh, I guess that part's already happened.

All this won't mean we won't still be able to go diving. It's just another sad example of OPPRESSION BY THE MAN!

 

[budgy]

I live in the U.K. generally we don't like to travel far, it's a small island and an LDS is never very far away. I expect the main if not only reason people buy on-line is price. We have some major on-line shops. Divers warehouse, Mikes warehouse, SDS, Kent, Go-Dive. There are a few others and there is Dive Inn operating from Spain. Small retailers cannot compete with their prices, even some of the e/commerce shops cannot match prices on some lines. Some shops have closed. Many no longer carry the same amount of stock. In the past 5 years the price of an air fill has more than doubled and so has the cost of a cylinder inspection service. Equipment servicing could very well become a thing of the past. Replacement equipment is cheaper in many fields of retailing than service and repair. Although most of the small stores have had or could have web sites I think its unlikely they are able to get stock at a price where they can compete. Small scale manufacturing is also very difficult unless you go for the top end of the market, as you are often paying more for your materials that a high volume manufacturer is charging for a finished product. It's truely ironic that advances and changes in technology for the benefit of the community always seem to come at cost of peoples livelyhood.

 

[mulefeathers]

But I don't want a whole package. Sure, if you let them rape you on a few items they'll give you a break after awhile.

That speargun is on LP for $230 plus $13 shipping (less than the sales tax) but that's close enough. Now is that indicative of their product line or an exception?

Credit card processing costs a merchant about 3%. Unless a manager is pocketing the cash and not ringing it up, there's no reason paying cash should be the catalyst to dramatic discounts. BTW, Scuba.com and LP prices are good for credit cards.

The break away tip adds another $29.00 to that price. That was included. I called Scuba.com with the same package and they could only get it within $50 for that I will shop local anytime.

Also I enjoy paying cash. The only reason to ever use a credit card is for the security of online purchases. The only one I will use is American Express and it cost a merchant 7%.

Also it is not about getting raped the discount for cash is 27%

But it doesn't really matter to me I said from the start I am an online shopper. I just happen to find a local shop that wants to do buisness.

Another small example Log book from LP was 19.99 plus 7 shipping bought local for $22.00 two weeks after I bought everything else although I did buy my wetsuits from LP

 

[Bill51]

This could create some great opportunities for independent instructors who have a difficult time competing with shop classes being subsidized by equipment sales.

I could see dive shops and large on-line shops forming an alliance similar to the way ACE Hardware allows independent stores to compete with the Home Depots.

 

[ReefHound]

Also I enjoy paying cash. The only reason to ever use a credit card is for the security of online purchases. The only one I will use is American Express and it cost a merchant 7%.

Also it is not about getting raped the discount for cash is 27%

Like I said, there's no economic justification for a 27% cash discount when accepting even the nearly obsolete Amex card costs just 7%. Use VISA, it's only 3%, fees are lower, and it's accepted at a zillion more places than Amex.

There are lots of reasons to use CC other than online. You get loss/damage liability, increased leverage if there is a dispute, a 3rd party record of the transaction, etc. You don't have to make yet another trip to the ATM to get that cash and then worry about it getting lost if you don't make it by the LDS after all.

But really, price is not the only (perhaps even primary) reason I shop online. I just don't have TIME in my life it seems, when I get home from work I'm tired and hungry and just want to veg out, with a wife and kids my weekends are full when I'm not diving. I can browse online whenever I want, 24/7 (like right now while all my LDS are closed), in 5 minute time slices if necessary, even in my underwear (I know, TMI).

I just prefer the online shopping model. If I browse scuba.com I don't have a pesky salesman popping up every 5 minutes asking me if they can help me and then standing beside me while I look. I can read and do my own research. I can look for 1 minute or 4 hours, I can leave and return any number of times, without feeling like I'm annoying someone or wasting their time. I can look back and forth between several items evaluating something in my mind without someone trying to guess what I'm looking at and starting to tell me about them. The prices are listed on *every* item and it's the same for everyone. And I can compare those prices with others without being made to feel like I'm trying to steal the shoes off the kid's feet of the owner.

I think the point of the OP was that the LDS needs to adopt and integrate fully the internet. I would love to be able to go online to my LDS, browse everything in the store, see the prices, ask questions by email/form and get a 24 hour response, and then if they are competitive maybe reserve it (if not complete the sale), then go to the store.