Choice nuggets from the LDS

[docmartin]

so why do the shops not bundle? offer class plus equipment for one price and class only for a different price. in my view it does not make sense to turn students away. just name your price and let them decide.

 

[JimC]

Increase cost of classes and offer training credit with equipment purchases!

 

[Damselfish]

It's just an honesty thing. Especially if someone advertises classes, they shouldn't then decide not to offer it to some people based on this. Give people realistic options and let them choose. After all, there's no guarantee people will buy gear there after the class either.

One drawback to the bundled gear arrangment though, gets back to the whole "buy before class, or wait until you know what type of gear is best for you" discussion. It would be best if a certain amount of time and flexibility was built into a deal like this.

Certainly seems bad business to tick off potential customers. Treat people well, and some of them will come back with some of their business. Treat people badly, and they won't. There's a number of shops around here; the 3 I thought were run by jerks went out of business years ago.

 

[CincyBengalsFan]

docmartin once bubbled...
so why do the shops not bundle? offer class plus equipment for one price and class only for a different price. in my view it does not make sense to turn students away. just name your price and let them decide.

There are some SSI facilities that do this. Not all SSI facilities but a bunch of them across america.

 

[MikeFerrara]

IMO, the answer is to seperate the finances of training and retail. If you charge enough for a class to make money you can sell classes. Then, you can also afford to sell equipment for a decent price because you don't need it to finance all the things you give away. Until the basics are addressed it'll all remain a mess.

What some of you don't realize is that when a shop has to sell classes for what they're going for they have to do it as efficiently as possible using the cheapest help they can get. A shop that wants to make money will take advantage of every possible loop-hole in the standards to cut costs as much as they can. The most successful shop I know of teach the worst classes. They can do it though because most divers don't know the difference.

You might be getting a deal by buying equipment on-line but you're getting junk when you buy a class. Now, the word junk might be subjective but all you have to do is look at all the bottom walkers or read some of the stuff on this board to see what I mean. You have options when it comes to places to buy equipment but finding a good instructor is hard because there are so many that are products of the current system and they dive and teach like rank beginners. If you pulled out the checkbook and decided that money was no object you would still have a hard time finding a really good instructor because there just aren't many.

You're not getting the deal you think you are.

 

[scubajoe]

Mike,
Thanks for some sanity on theads like these. I also find lots of humor in them!

Joe

 

[cornfed]

MikeFerrara once bubbled...

You might be getting a deal by buying equipment on-line but you're getting junk when you buy a class.

Mike, are you saying that online gear sales are (in part) responsible for poor training?

 

[MikeFerrara]

cornfed once bubbled...


Mike, are you saying that online gear sales are (in part) responsible for poor training?

Not really. I'm saying that a business model that gives away training to sell equipment doesn't work as well as it used to. The internet is certainly one of the things that has obsoleted the model I think. If you don't sell gear or if you sell it at a lower price then training is just a loss. How much time or effort do you put into something that you loose money doing? Where do you find good instructors who work for lousy wages? If a fast cheap class sells more gear and makes more money than a good one, which are most going to provide?


In the three and a half years I had my shop I can count, on one hand, the number of times a stranger walked in and bought a reg or a bc. It's students and former students that you sell to. As long as the mark up on equipment is good it makes sense to give away training. The problem is that the few who buy equipment must pay for all the loss leader services that every one else is taking advantage of.

While the internet isn't at fault there are companies who had the forsite to take advantage of the situation. LP doesn't teach do they? They don't support a fill station? Has any one there spent thousands and thousands of dollars on there own dive training? No they just buy and sell. There are several huge differences between them and a shop. They don't have many of the expenses that a full service shop has, they're online so they have a bigger market and they don't play by the manufacturers rules (they're not a dealer) so they have more room to work.

It sounds like ths shops are the stupid ones and maybe they are but in order to get a dealership with most of the manufacturers you are required to be a full service shop. That means you are forced to spend a ton of money on things that you might not be able to cost justify (on their own) just to get your first reg on the wall. I've mentioned before that where my shop was we didn't sell enough air to even justify having a compressor. In order to be a dealer though I had to have one (along with the insurance). That means that I needed equipment sales to pay for that too. Of course it didn't. Amertise the cost of my fill station into a modest couple of years equipment sales and see what you get.

All those things cost money but tose activities don't generate the revenue to pay for it so...where does it come from? Equipment sales.

I can't believe that in the current market shops aren't raising the cost of training. It takes knowledge and skill to provide good training. LP can't do it. People still have to go to an instructor to get trained. Instead of going after the revenue in activities that they can sell they're just trying to play the old game harder than ever. If less student buy from the shop, they seem determined to pump out that many more students. Of course it really doesn't help that in response to the need for cheap instructors that the agencies make it easier to become an instructor. The market is loaded with instructors who are still new divers themselves and don't know anything to teach. I guess the inability to learn would meet the definition of stupid.

Well, anyway, these are the people that the average new diver gets their training from.

 

[jrg]

Hooked4Life, you could write a letter to PADI and let them know the reason why their classes aren't available. Tell them exactly what your LDS told you -- that you're not worth training any more since you bought your own equipment. If all 3 of you wrote letters it would get their attention better. See if they think it's BS or not. Maybe they can do something to help.

 

[cornfed]

jrg once bubbled...
Hooked4Life, you could write a letter to PADI and let them know the reason why their classes aren't available. Tell them exactly what your LDS told you -- that you're not worth training any more since you bought your own equipment. If all 3 of you wrote letters it would get their attention better. See if they think it's BS or not. Maybe they can do something to help.

I agree. Everyone likes to pick on the training agencies, but how are they supposed to know about problems if no one tells them.