OP
Let me address the average dive consumer...
For all of you new to diving, or old... Scuba is a very young sport (hobby, whatever you want to call it.) Recreational Scuba diving is only around 40 years old and even younger in it's current appeal to the masses.
From the beginning a small group of families has controlled the industry. Much like the mob they built their businesses, incorporated territories, price controls, distribution networks etc. It started out I believe innocently enough, but as with all modern corporations, corporate greed and the bottom line lead to MAP (Minimum Advertised Pricing) and MARP (Minimum Allowed Retail Price.) The idea was to protect the mom and pop businesses from one another, keep pricing on equipment high (profits) for both the manufacturer and the retailer, ensure territories so that each shop owner would get all the business in their "protected" territory and business would be good for all. All that is except for the unwary consumer, who simply thought the price was the price and back in the early days, didn't have a reason to travel elsewhere looking for a price - and even if they did, they found the price was the same no matter where they went. It was either pay the price to get into the sport or go play something else.
The concept worked well for many years. The manufacturers profited and grew and the sport flourished. Dive shops popped up across the country. Some run by good business men, others by hobbyist who were not very good at business. These hobbyist needed protection and help from the manufacturers, so they bought into the MAP and MARP pricing idea and as the industry and the internet evolved (over the past 10-15 years or so) they were taught how to rip of you the consumer with inflated pricing. They used excuses for prices being so high like - We give you a manufacturers warranty... and the internet is gray market goods. They'd tell you sometimes that the price was in fact controlled by the manufacturers, which in many cases was the only truth they spoke.
As the good businessmen took more to the internet and volume selling worldwide, the manufacturers found ways to move mass amounts of their goods all the while working less. While the manufacturers have been selling goods directly to these internet entrepreneurs, they've been telling the LDS's they aren't. Continuing to enforce MAP and MARP pricing on LDS's all the while selling for less to high volume buyers.
The uneducated, average consumer - possibly you - was walking into dive shops for more than a decade and still paying inflated prices at your LDS. Some of you may not remember a time before the internet, but I do. I was alive for the first Commodore 64. In those days, diving was propspering. These days it is stagnant and shrinking.
The end result of corporate greed is that you the consumer will buy more and more of your gear on the internet. This alone is OK, and good for many. Many divers become self sufficient rather quickly. The bad news is that opportunities within the industry will shrink. Advanced training, group travel, cool places to hang out with other divers, less buddies out there - as less are trained, a reduction in local diving as air fills are harder to find.
You see the idea currently floating is that cheap internet sales, poor training (by independent Instructors) and less dive shops is somehow good for the industry. The reality right now is LDS's are closing at record rates. A culmination of the economy as a whole and years of abuse by manufacturers. Right now, many of you will walk into an LDS, try things on and then go buy them for hundreds less on the internet. Soon, the ability to try gear on will be gone.
I don't know about you, but buying dive gear without a chance to try it on first worries me. It also worries me that in a sport where retention is horrible (1.5 out of 10 stay in the sport after OW,) making it less personable can't be good.
You, the consumer ultimately pay more for everything in the sport without your LDS.
You'll pay more for training, you'll pay more for gear service (shipping it to and from - and shipping rates keep rising,) you'll not dive as much locally, you'll have to return gear through the mail when it doesn't fit... etc.. etc..
Give it some thought... It's your money, it's your sport... what can be done?
For all of you new to diving, or old... Scuba is a very young sport (hobby, whatever you want to call it.) Recreational Scuba diving is only around 40 years old and even younger in it's current appeal to the masses.
From the beginning a small group of families has controlled the industry. Much like the mob they built their businesses, incorporated territories, price controls, distribution networks etc. It started out I believe innocently enough, but as with all modern corporations, corporate greed and the bottom line lead to MAP (Minimum Advertised Pricing) and MARP (Minimum Allowed Retail Price.) The idea was to protect the mom and pop businesses from one another, keep pricing on equipment high (profits) for both the manufacturer and the retailer, ensure territories so that each shop owner would get all the business in their "protected" territory and business would be good for all. All that is except for the unwary consumer, who simply thought the price was the price and back in the early days, didn't have a reason to travel elsewhere looking for a price - and even if they did, they found the price was the same no matter where they went. It was either pay the price to get into the sport or go play something else.
The concept worked well for many years. The manufacturers profited and grew and the sport flourished. Dive shops popped up across the country. Some run by good business men, others by hobbyist who were not very good at business. These hobbyist needed protection and help from the manufacturers, so they bought into the MAP and MARP pricing idea and as the industry and the internet evolved (over the past 10-15 years or so) they were taught how to rip of you the consumer with inflated pricing. They used excuses for prices being so high like - We give you a manufacturers warranty... and the internet is gray market goods. They'd tell you sometimes that the price was in fact controlled by the manufacturers, which in many cases was the only truth they spoke.
As the good businessmen took more to the internet and volume selling worldwide, the manufacturers found ways to move mass amounts of their goods all the while working less. While the manufacturers have been selling goods directly to these internet entrepreneurs, they've been telling the LDS's they aren't. Continuing to enforce MAP and MARP pricing on LDS's all the while selling for less to high volume buyers.
The uneducated, average consumer - possibly you - was walking into dive shops for more than a decade and still paying inflated prices at your LDS. Some of you may not remember a time before the internet, but I do. I was alive for the first Commodore 64. In those days, diving was propspering. These days it is stagnant and shrinking.
The end result of corporate greed is that you the consumer will buy more and more of your gear on the internet. This alone is OK, and good for many. Many divers become self sufficient rather quickly. The bad news is that opportunities within the industry will shrink. Advanced training, group travel, cool places to hang out with other divers, less buddies out there - as less are trained, a reduction in local diving as air fills are harder to find.
You see the idea currently floating is that cheap internet sales, poor training (by independent Instructors) and less dive shops is somehow good for the industry. The reality right now is LDS's are closing at record rates. A culmination of the economy as a whole and years of abuse by manufacturers. Right now, many of you will walk into an LDS, try things on and then go buy them for hundreds less on the internet. Soon, the ability to try gear on will be gone.
I don't know about you, but buying dive gear without a chance to try it on first worries me. It also worries me that in a sport where retention is horrible (1.5 out of 10 stay in the sport after OW,) making it less personable can't be good.
You, the consumer ultimately pay more for everything in the sport without your LDS.
You'll pay more for training, you'll pay more for gear service (shipping it to and from - and shipping rates keep rising,) you'll not dive as much locally, you'll have to return gear through the mail when it doesn't fit... etc.. etc..
Give it some thought... It's your money, it's your sport... what can be done?
Shall we :worship: your holiness?
