do you ever notice negativity between dive shops?

[tstormdiver]

OMG! I see it sooo bad in so many ways, here!

There are 2 shops within 50 mi. in our area & then nothing for almost 100 mi. out. Shop "A" was about 5 mi from my house & Shop "B" was about 50 mi away. I started out at Dive Shop "A" as an OW student, for convenience. I went all the way up to Master diver in a couple of years. I got involved with Dive Shop "B" because I wanted Nitrox training, which was available at B, that was not available at A. I thought the instruction at B was superb, to say the least. I was also interested in technical diving that was offered at B & not A. That's when I really started to see the animosity between the shops. The owner of shop A kept hinting that Technical diving was too dangerous & that the Tech instructor (owner of B) was dangerous. Never anything solid, but little hints here & there. That was not what I saw out of the Nitrox course & with beginning a technical course.

In the late fall of 2006, I was interested in also going professional. I was still with shop A, but also beginning my technical work through shop B. Shop A was supposed to start a Dive Master course in Jan. 2007. The Dec. before I check into it & was informed that the class was postponed until late April/ early May, because of some high school students that wanted to do it. I wasn't happy,.. but OK that's how it goes, sometimes. In late April I inquired again about the class, to start preparing, if needed. I was then informed that the course was postponed again because on of the high school students didn't turn 18 until Aug./ Sept. & the instructor was going to wait for that. Really Not happy about that. In June, I ran into the instructor of B & he told me he was planning to start a Dive Master course. I asked if there was room. There was,.... "sign me up" I said. I was tired of waiting & being put on the shelf. When the instructor of A found out, there was a huge ruckus. What was I supposed to do? Keep my life on hold until it was decided it was convenient to start? I went with B for Dive Master & eventually on to instructor. Even though I must be affiliated with Shop B, I am OK with that. I am treated very well there. I've also completed a couple technical courses with B (A is still recreational only) & am happy with my progress. I heard through the grapevine ( a former Dive Master) that when I went fully with B, that the instructor of A threw a major fit.

Since I made instructor level, the owner of A has really been waging a smear campaign against both me & Shop B. The instructor of A has accused the tech instructor of B, of losing (killing) students in cave training:shocked2:. For fact, the instructor of B has NEVER lost a student, current or former. Just recently, I was involved in an incident where a buddy had a free flow & uncontrolled ascent. I tried to help him as much as I could, including trying to "head the problem off at the pass" at depth & trying to slow his ascent down, but I was not going to make 2 potential victims, & let him go at 20 ft. All was fine in the end, thank goodness. I did post this incident in the Incident/ accident part of the forum to get some better analysis & feedback. The next thing I know, Shop A , without using names, but listing the episode in a very obvious manner, puts on their website, that I let a student go & abandoned them. This was a trained (even deep diving) & experienced OW diver that was a buddy. Not a student. I felt I did all that I could to assist him without placing myself into undue danger. The buddy even called shop A to tell them what actually happened & the instructor proceeded to inform them how much better their training was & That I was a danger & threat to my students. Wow ,.... I had never said a single negative thing about shop A & even at times, defending shop A. After that, the instructor of A & I have been professional to each other, but not particularly friendly. I refuse to stoop to such low levels & play those games. The owner of B has never said a bad thing about A, other than what has obviously happened, that is common news. I may not agree with that, but it is, what it is & I have stated that opinion to the owner of B (whom I instruct for).

The former Dive Master of A (mentioned above) went on to open his own dive shop about 100 mi away. He has now also become a major target of shop A.

Its sad,.... I realize that sometimes shops compete, but if the owners/ instructors would just see beyond the animosity, they may be able to help each other out at times. So much more can be accomplished with cooperation than war. I am not say that "Kumbya" is the way, but the name calling/ insinuations & such needs to stop. As was once said,... "Can't we all just get along"?

 

[horsediver1]

Same up here in Northern MN. Down to 3 shops from 5 for the very reason that divers got real tired of hearing the same negative b s from the shops. One of those left realized this and will NOT say a negative word about his competitors or equipment line they sell.

We just have a standing joke with the others "Rapture of the SHOP" or permanently Narced on their ego.

 

[Wookie]

Your thoughts are very interesting. I run a liveaboard. I have partners who run essentially an identical boat to mine. We always had (I thought) a friendly banter and competition between boats, but it got far beyond friendly and far beyond banter. It destroyed a partnership and friendship and customer base because customers were tired of hearing it and feeling forced to "choose one" over the other.

Although the partnership is over and I've moved away, there is still some animosity there. In my new operating area, I go out of my way to accentuate the (what I see as) positive aspects of my competition. If you want to go spearfishing on a liveaboard, I don't offer those services, but I'll recommend a boat that does. If you want to go to the Bahamas, I don't offer those services, but I'm happy to turn you on to someone that does. My competitors and I work together (as much as they want to) to provide you with the experience you are looking for. I don't view my competitors as competition, just another way to get to the same place we all love to go. The more folks that go there, the more folks will talk about it, and the more folks will hear about it and the more folks will visit. It's a cycle that has served me far better than tearing someone else down.

 

[The Chairman]

Frank, you are a happy, happy exception in the Keys. The only other cooperation occurs because it HAS to. I have never seen so much back stabbing as happens down there. Holy Schneike!

Here's the real deal. With the advent of the Internet, competition is almost irrelevant. Look at the other forums out there. In a recent discussion with another forum owner, I mentioned that I didn't see them as competition at all. Wow... they got all snarky about that comment. But it wasn't THEIR size that prompted that. It was the size of the INTERNET that made it so. We are the largest Scuba site on the Internet and yet we entertain less than 1/100 of a single percent of Internet users. It's a wide open field and no one has much of a market penetration. No, you won't catch me dissing another forum. It just doesn't make sense. We're not in competition... yet.

 

[fnfalman]

I was curious because an area I have been too has a 2 brick and morter stores and a couple of free lance instructors within say 40 miles of where I was at. When I asked around I noticed there was a lot of like professional jealousy for some reason ( I never pried out of respect ) but its like you go to shop A and they tell you shop B is not a good shop because ..... (There excuse here). You goto Shop B and they tell you there excuse as to why Shop A is bad.

the freelance instructors seem to be totally against the shops citing their own personal reasons as well and vise versa.

Now that I probably got you confused Ill get to the question I have. This sport is a simple one in which really requires a larger clientel then whats in this area as it is so why not instead of bashing the competition try speaking in positive lite?

One place even disowned me because I arranged with Shop A a great Christmas Tree Trimming and it was open to everyone at no cost to participate. The free lance instructors just did not even ask me any questions of what happend or anything they just disowned me all together.

I know shops will have beef with each other but why do they do it publicly and tear each other down to the point that would be divers get turned away from the sport all together?

Its like internet sales as another example. One thing is obvious in this day and age and that is that people are going to buy things off the net and will from here on continue to do so. I have noticed shops just flat out turn customers away who come to them willing to pay them to service an item. When they are willing to pay them why do the shops treat them like dirt simply because they spent money else where? And my biggest gripe about this internet versus dive shop is also that while people are wanting to save money they also value how they are treated. When a person buys off the net and comes to a shop to look around they get crucified and treated horrible at times.

Instead of the terrible treatment they give these customers why dont they try to support the customers needs with good old fashioned service? You know when a customer walks in just to window shop sit and talk with them kindly and ask them about there diving adventures. Get them in the "your a potential future customer and we would be honored to have you here" mentality. Dont act like a car sales man and follow them to the bathroom trying to get them to buy now today but just you know show them they are welcomed like family.

I will say one shop in Oklahoma City really amazed me too. I went to Blue Water Divers and even when customers bash another dive shop they dont participate with "Those guys are idiots etc....." They just polietly go on to the positive about what brings you to the store. Amazingly there positive your family attitude promotes drivers to drive often 2 to 3 hours just to buy from their store and that amazes me in itself.

Anyway this is my rant about why shops dont promote more positive notes and promote divers to have a choice in where they shop without crucifying them.

That's because most people have zero business acumen.

Then they wonder why their shop went down the toilet.

 

[Lee Taylor]

Our spices has some odd behaviors. Ever noticed many nations claim (and believe) the "Lord" is on their side and the enemy is evil, of the devil, and needs to be destroyed? And the funny thing is the enemy is claiming the same thing!

I have seen this same behavior among scuba stores.

 

[2 Big 2 Fail]

That sort of thing is just plain poor management and poor business practice. Perhaps it's also something that became established in the culture. But, back in the early 80's I got to know a fair number of IBM folks when I was helping teach in a technical school they sponsored for their employees. The most striking part of the IBM culture, for me, was that a certain way to get fired was to speak ill of the competition to a customer. They understood that (1) if you have to run down the competition to make a sale, you didn't have much of anything better to offer yourself, and (2), being IBM and knowing they were good, any of their people who couldn't concentrate on their own quality was just plain ignorant of their own company's excellence and therefore no one they wanted.

That's stayed with me, and ever since, I have taken trashing the competition to mean the speaker is, at best, unprofessional and, at worst, incompetent and scared to death someone will figure it out. Trash the competition to me, and I walk, and I don't mind telling them why. I'll drive 50 miles, if that's what it takes. If you're too lame at conducting your own business that you can't think of anything but to trash the others, I figure there's a reasonable chance you're also badly motivated and will think more about how much you can make than what I really need and how fast you can push a service job through than how right the work is. The only thing they offered in exchange for their higher-than-Internet prices is something I can no longer depend upon when they reveal they are professionally troubled. I don't trust them, and I'm sure not going to pay a premium to help keep them in business. If I owned a shop, that old IBM rule would be absolute, and why wouldn't I want to do business with the kind of shop I'd want it to be if I owned it? You see, if you happen to know that Shop B has exactly what I need, and you, Shop A, can't supply it, and you let me know that the other guy has the perfect deal for me. Sure. I'll go over to Shop B to buy it, but I'm always going to start looking with you, because I can depend on you to do me right.

 

[Jim Lapenta]

It's why I stay an independent and work with a shop not for them. I don't sell gear for now. Have considered taking on a line and doing net sales and sales to the students I have that would benefit most from the type of gear that would be. Still undecided on that. Need to see what goes on with the book. That is another thing that I'm waiting to see the reaction of. Knowing some places like I do what I have in my book for OW divers is most likely to make me personna non grata with more than one. That's fine. I try not to get into the pissing contests between shops. I focus on what I offer. It's why I have standards from 6 agencies that students can compare. If they want quickie training which I do not offer or believe in there is a shop/instructor I will send them to because he does and is in fact for that type of training better than any other.

There is a lot of ego involved at least in my area and I admit to having one myself when it comes to training. Shops as entities themselves seem to have more of one. I am a member of a club that is loosely connected with a shop I have never been in due to location only. I'm the only instructor not affiliated with that shop and from a different agency. I feel like I need to be careful at times as there have been divers ask me about things the shop I work with carries and ask me not to say anything to anyone else about it. I do have relationships with shops hundreds of miles away and this is to help all of us. My orginal shop like Tammy's did not offer tech training so I went elsewhere and the owner did not like it. He made it difficult for me to get gear I wanted and I ended up going behind his back to the net and getting my stuff.

The shops do cooperate in some ways like parts for servicing gear. They will sell to each other at times when they are not able to get them due to not being dealers for a reg someone will bring in. But that also seems to be on a if I feel like it basis. Aside from the shop I teach thru I have better relationships with ones on here that have similar philosophies and truthfully see me as not being competition to them. My students are not going to come from Baltimore, Indiana, or Philly for OW classes. They might for advanced (and have) but that's different. At the same time due to my high profile here and thru my own website I get asked who I would recommend from all over the country. So I try to build relationships with shops all over and will not hesitate to recommend them for gear, training, trips, etc. Some of it here is due to simple numbers. Not enough students so competition is fierce.

But if they would try to work together and put on events for everyone they might be able to raise diving's profile to attract enough for everyone. I also think that would raise overall levels of training as students would see those who offer more and ask that they receive it as well. Cooperation would most likley help those who are good and weed out those who are not so much so. That would benefit the industry overall.

 

[TMHeimer]

My experiences in Destin, FL is the 3 shops in the area get along well. Here in Halifax area there is really one shop (PADI), but another real small outfit. The PADI shop never talks about the small one. I called the small one several years back to enquire about courses and he didn't dis the big shop, but was very uncomplementary toward PADI.

 

[TSandM]

I feel the same way about dive shop behavior that I do about political ads . . . if all you have to offer is something negative about somebody else, what that tells me is that you don't have something POSITIVE about yourself to be proud of.

I'm quite sure all the dive shop owners I've met are suffering from chronic depression -- and I think I would probably have it, too, if I were trying to make a living running a dive shop. But what they don't realize is that negativity isn't a fun experience for the customer, and as Bob so aptly observes, the competition isn't the rest of the dive shops, it's all the other things there are to do. If going to the dive shop is an unpleasant experience, I'm going to do less of it. If going there is fun and cheerful, you'll see me more often. And that's undoubtedly tripled for people who are trying to decide if this is something they want to do at all.