Worst trend in Scuba Diving instruction many of us have ever seen...Avoid Groupon!

[dumpsterDiver]

It is not actually a sanctuary designation, yet. It is a park, and it is a delicate and crucial estuarine system and marine nursery ground.
The last time we pushed, developers, Yachties, fisherman and collectors showed up at the meeting to fight the designation. They argued it was just one site within the intracoastal, essentially no different than everywhere else in the intra coastal. The yachties were deathly afraid of this injuring their traverses through the area, and the collectors of course selfishly believe all the rare life at the BHB should be there for them to take.

We have done some very extensive scootering around the area for over a mile in most directions....Even in the mangroves to the north about half a mile, there is nothing close to the level of biomass found in the BHB park area, and no where near the number of juvenile species.
The "Money" is against the BHB becoming a sanctuary...this has too many ramifications the "money" does not like.

There is still alot we can do without the sanctuary status.

I think there is not much anyone can do. Scubaboard has pumped this small place up to be the best place in the world to dive and it is free, shallow, reasonably clear, zero wave action and has easy shore access. Now "hordes" of divers show up and kick the hell out of the place.

Only a couple of years ago, you might see 15 divers at high tide on the weekend, now the number is probably approaching 150? maybe more?

As I said before (in another thread where I was attacked for being a troll), the over promotion of the site on SB and the concomitant onslaught of bottom kicking scuba clowns is far more destructive than a few collectors.

 

[furby076]

This is not the problem of Groupon. Poor diver quality and ability is the natural product of cheap. It's the way the world goes around. Instructors who are being paid 25% of their worth are being benevolent when they impart 70% of the knowledge and skills a student could obtain with a regular class.

A baker using this service who advertises a a cake at half price can, and will, simply bake a smaller cake. It's like my old friend Ton Staafl once said, "There ain't no such thing as a free lunch".

One thing to note about Groupon is what is offered needs to be the same quality as the non-groupon price. It's not much of a deal getting a cake at 50% of the cost if they give you 50% of the cake. Obviously the shop owner can lie/fudge the truth and say "oh yea we always sell 5 inch cakes for $30", when in reality they sell 10 inch cakes for $30. If customers do not get the full value, at the discounted prices, they have no incentive to get the deal. If they do get the "deal", and they are happy with it so they become repeat customers, only to find out that they were shorted on the deal (meaning the 5 inch cake they got should have been 10 inches) they are supposed to report the company to Groupon.

Obviously for service, quality of work is harder to control. Which in a sport like diving would mean someone might get injured/killed.

Hopefully the instructors (employees of the shop, who are most likely not getting a cut of the gear sold) are still getting paid the same. Frankly, if I was an instructor I would tell my boss "my hourly rate is X, and every hour I am here I get X. If you want me to take a loss on groupon, then I expect to get something on the back end." That is a very fair statement to tell the boss. My mom is a hair stylist, a fairly pricey one, and when her boss runs specials (which are at about 1/6th the cost of my moms services) my mom tells the boss she will not join in the special unless she gets paid her normal rate. So, her boss has decided to not make her a part of the special, which works just fine for my mom.

 

[The Chairman]

Scubaboard has pumped this small place up to be the best place in the world to dive

This is simply untrue. ScubaBoard neither promotes or disparages BHB. However, you, along with other users have done the wonderful job promoting it. That being said, it doesn't appear that the average ScubaBoarder is the issue here either. Instructors use BHB because its convenient, provides optimal diving twice a day, is incredibly fun and is FREE. With today's economy, I can understand a shop wanting to go from two boat trips to just one. Why dive in a dingy lake when you have the bridge to go to?

What's needed are some viable options to relieve the pressure. BTW, we have some great places down here in the Keys if anyone is interested!

 

[captjohnr]

Take the Acid Test about cut-rate groupon scuba certifications.


Would YOU allow a member of YOUR family to dive with this person?

 

[Pullmyfinger]

I wouldn't allow my family members to dive with many instructors out there, including a percentage of the instructors that post here.

On the flip side of that statement, there are a few that I'll have on my short list to travel to when it comes time to select instruction for my kids and myself.
Scuba Board, along with personal observation and experience has proven to be a great tool in evaluating quality, or lack of it.

-Mitch

 

[danvolker]

This is simply untrue. ScubaBoard neither promotes or disparages BHB. However, you, along with other users have done the wonderful job promoting it. That being said, it doesn't appear that the average ScubaBoarder is the issue here either. Instructors use BHB because its convenient, provides optimal diving twice a day, is incredibly fun and is FREE. With today's economy, I can understand a shop wanting to go from two boat trips to just one. Why dive in a dingy lake when you have the bridge to go to?

What's needed are some viable options to relieve the pressure. BTW, we have some great places down here in the Keys if anyone is interested!

Actually, we have a new option that is pretty good.....there was a mitigation reef put in off the beach on Singer Island about 6 years ago...it sits in 11 to 14 feet of water, around 100 yards off shore at the furthest points....in all, this is a series of rock pile islands, running for about 600 to 700 yards, which you can see on Google Earth. most of these come up around 6 feet, some go from 14 feet to within 3 feet of the surface. There are lots of fish on them, and I expect many critters as well...We will have to get some of the BHB regulars to begin cataloging and photographing the life on it....I will be getting Sandra and Ari on this soon....maybe this weekend. While this is not good when the surf is big, now, and in summer, this will be a good alternative to the BHB. I dove it last weekend. Some may like it more than the BHB.

Parking can be at the Hilton, as long as you have a burger or something they will be fine with this. They actually have awesome burgers in their Divers Down menu selection.
Getting tanks to the reef area means getting about 100 yards south of the Hilton...directly in front of the Marriott Ocean Palms Time share ( where you can't park). Some divers may tip the beach concession guys to run their gear down to the reef area with an ATV..others may just walk the gear down....it's not a terribly long walk

If many start diving here, I am sure we can work something out for ease of access. If the weather is good this coming weekend, I will spend a few hours diving there, and anyone who would like, is welcome to dive with me, and that means there would be no transportation issues, as I know all the Hilton and Beach concession people. Unlike the BHB, this is not tidally dependent, and the current is almost non-existent.
Actually, it would be great if we got a big group, all that much more likely we could find some nudibranch colonies, or other small creatures you have to really look for....This is also cool when there is no parking at BHB..there is always a way to dive the Hilton beach site, as long as the seas are calm. Let me know if anyone wants to try this!

 

[LGHT]

Just took a groupon class this weekend and I can say the dive shop didn't prepare for the amount of students that signed up. Took me a few months to finally get into a class and now that i'm done with the pool session I can't do the beach dive because the last 4 weeks of beach dives got canceled due to weather. Now there is a backlog of 2 months because you have hundreds of students all trying to do the beach dives at once and only a few instructors. As a result I just opted to pay for a boat dive instead of waiting another couple of months to finish my training.

 

[captjohnr]

What certification course are you taking, PADI Open Water, SDI Open Water or another agency? How many pool sessions have you completed and how many boat dives are scheduled for you to be Open Water Certified?

 

[k ellis]

Ok pardon my not reading most of the thread but I had to chime in here. Groupon is a demonstration of where society has gone and where we are headed. My dive center used it and had an unbeleivable deal going on that surprised me it was such a good price. The owner stated he sold a large number of discover scubas through the program and in turn had several turn out. I do mean several too!

Americans are so cash strapped they are looking for anything and everything that would land them a good deal even if it in fact only appears to be a good deal. In our instance I honestly believe more people took it as a why not its a great price and something to do for a weekend. In fact very few actually signed up for an actual open water course.

Groupon as I said is hitting people where they are most vulnerable and that is a price too good to pass up. We all want for example an oil change but when groupon sales a series of oil changes for 9.99 cents and has fully synthetic (I am not aware of this happening and this is only used for the purpose of my point being) then people may not need an oil change but they see "FULLY SYNTHETIC" and "9.99" they instantly think they will never get another good deal like this again and will buy it even if they just got home from the oil change previously and got on the computer to see it.

Americans are undervalued and over charged and are looking for any escape from reality. The good paying jobs are drying up and everyone else is trying to raise prices on everything literaly.

I think Groupon is a good thing dont get me wrong but when you fool people in to thinking that its a deal of a lifetime and it may never ever happen again it can be a recipe for a mad dash and a swamping on the sellers part!

 

[LGHT]

What certification course are you taking, PADI Open Water, SDI Open Water or another agency? How many pool sessions have you completed and how many boat dives are scheduled for you to be Open Water Certified?

I was taking padi OW. Basically we met for 2 hours reviewed chapt 1-3 then did a full day of pool. Now I need to do 2 boat dives before i'm done. The deal was the beach dives where free, but with such a backlog most people are now signing up to do the boat dives at $99 extra. The training cost $200 WITH gear rental so even with the 2 boat dives i'm pretty much paying about the same as a regular training center, but I get my boat dives free.