bare dry suit questions

[hunter991]

Bare makes a great drysuit and used to be my go to suit for budget suits. DUI and OMS have recently taken the budget suit focus for my store with either the TLSSE suit or the Yukon. They also have a pretty interesting trade up program where you can trade in an old wetsuit or a drysuit for credit off of the price of a new suit.

Before I became a dealer for DUI I was a bare dealer, but I still wore a DUI drysuit. That's "bad form" for a dive shop, but I liked my DUI suit that much. A Bare representative told me awhile back that Bare makes more drysuits than all the other drysuit makers combined. I'm not sure if I believe that, but it sounded impressive.

B

 

[scubadiver888]

I was thinking about getting a drysuit. My local shop rents Bare HDC. I tried one on and really liked it. So I figured when would be a good time to buy one.

Then I saw Bare had the HDC on sale. I went to my local dive shop and the owner called Bare to find out the details. After talking with them he recommended buying the suit. Was a great deal. They also have the T100 undergarment on sale. So I order one of those as well.

My local shop has always treated me well. So even if the service from Bare is a little questionable, I trust my shop to take care of me.

Darrell

 

[Aqua-Andy]

Huish and Bare make great products and we have been a dealer of theirs for many years. Recently I think they are just overworked and understaffed due to their recent expansion. I think it will get back to the great service we all expect, but it isn't there yet. If the shop you are dealing with has a rep, get them to call him, and hopefully he will be able to provide answers to you.

B

I don't buy this argument for one second. Why would bare be under staffed because they were purchased by Huish? Answer? Because Huish canned a good majority of Bares employees in the restructuring thus making the existing Bare and Huish employees take on more work than they can handle. You also have to figure in that morale at Bare is at an all time low as the people that are still there have had to endure all this change including seeing their friends loose their jobs. So you now have people that are over worked an most likely don't give a s**t anymore. If they truly are under staffed the only way to resolve the issue is to hire more employees, so why did they not keep the Bare employees in the first place? I wouldn't hold your breath for their CS getting better.

 

[rick00001967]

i may be wrong but i assumed the comment was along the same lines as i mentioned earlier. and that was the fact that huish now reps for oceanic and hollis. maybe not.
in any event, i have been happy with previous service from bare but having two people calling for a total of like 6 times and not being able to get through to anyone should not be considered acceptable.
it has been two days now since my email was sent. it will be interesting to see how long it takes to get a reply. and if/when i do, will it be helpful and answer all my questions. i will let you all know.

 

[scubadiver888]

I don't buy this argument for one second. Why would bare be under staffed because they were purchased by Huish? Answer? Because Huish canned a good majority of Bares employees in the restructuring thus making the existing Bare and Huish employees take on more work than they can handle. You also have to figure in that morale at Bare is at an all time low as the people that are still there have had to endure all this change including seeing their friends loose their jobs. So you now have people that are over worked an most likely don't give a s**t anymore. If they truly are under staffed the only way to resolve the issue is to hire more employees, so why did they not keep the Bare employees in the first place? I wouldn't hold your breath for their CS getting better.

Is this speculation? If you know people who worked at Bare and were let go due to the acquisition then you might have something.

If it is speculation then it could be fair to answer your initial question with... Huish acquired Bare and as part of the acquisition, Huish had a better sales team and were able to create more sales than the current Bare staff could handle. This speculation would reflect my own experiences...

I worked at a small company. We were doing a great job at digital signal processing (DSP) tools. A large company, which produced DSPs, could not compete with our tools. So they acquired our company. For the first year we had to complete contracts we already signed plus the company which acquired us wanted us to take over projects they had been trying to complete. For the first year we were working like crazy (I got a 17% raise) and we would hire new staff when we could. After the first year we had double in size (staff and office space).

In another company I worked at, we were 250 staff and had a really nice setup. Business was growing and things were good. At some point a large computer company decided to offer the owner a deal he could not refuse. Many of the staff liked the small, family feel of the original company. There wasn't anything wrong with the new company. It was just different. So many of us quit the company and found work elsewhere. The company was then forced to find staff to replace us.

So I would never assume a company acquiring another company immediately means the acquired company staff will be let go.

Darrell

 

[Aqua-Andy]

Is this speculation? If you know people who worked at Bare and were let go due to the acquisition then you might have something.

If it is speculation then it could be fair to answer your initial question with... Huish acquired Bare and as part of the acquisition, Huish had a better sales team and were able to create more sales than the current Bare staff could handle. This speculation would reflect my own experiences...

I worked at a small company. We were doing a great job at digital signal processing (DSP) tools. A large company, which produced DSPs, could not compete with our tools. So they acquired our company. For the first year we had to complete contracts we already signed plus the company which acquired us wanted us to take over projects they had been trying to complete. For the first year we were working like crazy (I got a 17% raise) and we would hire new staff when we could. After the first year we had double in size (staff and office space).

In another company I worked at, we were 250 staff and had a really nice setup. Business was growing and things were good. At some point a large computer company decided to offer the owner a deal he could not refuse. Many of the staff liked the small, family feel of the original company. There wasn't anything wrong with the new company. It was just different. So many of us quit the company and found work elsewhere. The company was then forced to find staff to replace us.

So I would never assume a company acquiring another company immediately means the acquired company staff will be let go.

Darrell

Yes, I'm speculating but based on what I have heard from when they took over Zeagle. Lets hope you speculation is more accurate.

 

[rick00001967]

it has been two days now since my email was sent. it will be interesting to see how long it takes to get a reply. and if/when i do, will it be helpful and answer all my questions. i will let you all know.

just back tonight from a bit of time off. it has been 11 days now and still no reply from Huish. i must say i am more than a little disappointed. i will try one last time by resending the email and will ask the store to see if they can reach anyone by phone on monday. otherwise unfortunately i guess i will have no choice but to look at other options.

 

[ScubaSteve858]

just back tonight from a bit of time off. it has been 11 days now and still no reply from Huish. i must say i am more than a little disappointed. i will try one last time by resending the email and will ask the store to see if they can reach anyone by phone on monday. otherwise unfortunately i guess i will have no choice but to look at other options.

I purchased a Trilam Tech Dry back in October. I love the suit and so does everyone that sees it. I did have one issue with the zipper and was able to reach Bare directly at their us number mtiple times while trouble shooting. Every call they offered to send a return label to take a look. I eventually did accept and had the suit back with brand new zipper in 8 days! During that process I they put me through to their lead drysuit tech in Canada named Sandy. He was so cool he gave me his personal line number. If you pm me I am happy to share it. I highly recommend Bare and all of my experience was post Huish takeover.

 

[rick00001967]

finally got my reply. took almost 3 weeks. at least they gave me a detailed answer to all my questions