What's your impression of this behavior?

[mark01]

I went to an LDS today just sort of checking things out. This is not my regular shop, but one I was considering moving to for couple of reasons which are not important to this discussion.

I introduced myself to this guy and said I was sort of looking around and wondering about trips, instruction, equipment, etc. I will say they guy took ALOT of time with me even though other people came into the shop. I liked that he took that much time with me.

However, when I told this guy the name of the shop I had associated myself with, he begain running down the shop, it's practices, instructional quality, equipment, the prices, the owner, and especially my daughter's Scubapro regulator. Apparently Scuba Pro, as Kmart, sucks in his world.

He talked alot about how he did instruction, mentioning to me several times that he trained SWAT divers and Fire Rescue guys, how he dove in all sorts of overhead enviroments, was a tech diver, how dumb my dive shop was for not having a better compressor, that my LDS owner was a nothing more than a "recreational" instructor with little experience and by, extension, not competent.

He really went into alot of detail about how my shop did not properly service regulators and showed me how he took regulators TOTALLY apart and replaced lots of O rings and what not.

I will say that I was impressed with this shop's maintenance procedures and attention to detail, at least as it was presented to me, and I think that any instuction I got from this guy would be pretty good.

On the down side, I am also not impressed with people who make their case for competency by disparaging others.

Just wondering what your thoughts might be about this guy and his behavior.

Thanks,

Mark

 

[Rainer]

The guy's a tool. What more can you say?

 

[H2Andy]

hmmm....

well, Scubapros are the brick outhouses of the diving world so ... not sure he's got a point there

as to the rest, he's puffing to get your business. some people resort to putting down the competition in order to do so

i don't particularly like it

 

[suthnbelle]

I don't like it when a LDS behaves like this. We've seen the conduct on our local board from one shop to a competing shop and the one who behaves this badly, no matter what they are selling, always ends up on the bottom. He would have done much better to talk kindly of the other dive shop as well as showing you his service area and telling you about their instruction without beating his chest. Why would someone want to go back to this dude's shop?

 

[TSandM]

I really dislike this behavior. You should be able to convince somebody your shop is superior by showing them what's superior about the shop and letting them do their own mental comparison.

 

[DawgDiver]

The guy should have been telling you about what they do at THEIR shop, not trashing everything they do at the other place. So was this guy the owner/instructor or just a clerk?

 

[redacted]

I don't much care for the delivery technique, but you need to figure out how much of his message was true and how much is BS. Can you trust his information? You should be able to readily see if his prices are better. Perhaps you could discuss his beef with scubapro in a bit more detail. Is his complaint with the products or the company? What scubapro regulator is your daughter using that he doesn't like and why doesn't he like it?

 

[ArcticDiver]

I don't like or appreciate this kind of behaviour. But, as I recently discovered on my last trip, it is too common.

When I encounter behaviour like this I try to reason with the people expounding. If that is successful all well and good. As the saying goes; I won't cut off my nose to spite my face so if I need something I'll go there. Otherwise, there are too many nice people in the world to put up with folks like this.

 

[frankc420]

If it bothered you, why not say something? Complaining about it later is pointless, IMO.

 

[mark01]

To answer the question posed in the replies:

The guy was the owner

He though ALL ScubaPro regs sucked. Said the company has done not R&D for years and only did "bandaid" fixes for any deficiencies which arose in the equipment.

I have an AquaLung Legend LX. My daughter has the ScubaPro MK 17 / R390 combo.

Thanks for the replies...I am thinking that unless my LDS goes away, I don't really want to deal with this person. I think he is probably a great technician, and probably a good diver, but I don't care for his behavior and I certainly don't wish to be diving with someone who is going to be disparaging of my gear for no good reason. Being a pretty new diver, I really need good instruction from someone I respect and can listen to and don't want to have to feel like I have to sift through alot of personal issues to sort the wheat from the chaff. I also realize there is a point of view and personal bias to deal with regardless of whom you talk with.