The LDS of the future

[Thalassamania]

My point is that I don't quibble about price, I am either free or very expensive, at my whim. If you need to price shop, talk to me and many be it'll be free, I'm afraid that there is not other price.

The fact of the matter is that diving, even when you include dive travel (which is BS, no one includes plane tickets to Aspen at part of the ski industry) it is not a billion dollar industry.

 

[leabre]

It seems as though there is no real consensus of what the LDS of the future will be. Could it be because different people prefer different business styles? I contend there will be several different business models. Just as there is now. A single business model will never fit all people in all parts of the scuba world.

I think the implication that there will even be "an LDS of the future" stems from the disgust at how the typical dive shop is perceived to be run today and a general yearning for change. It is not only popular to discuss the decline of training standards but it is also a reality -- in some locales more than in others. Besides the sentiment about training is also the issue of vendors dictating how the industry should be run when a shop operator is more closely subjected to the economics and expected business practices of the locale and can better run business than what the vendor requires, but otherwise cannot because of the dealer agreements.

It is hard to predict what will be the LDS of the future because no one really knows. I'd like to say that if all vendors begin allowing internet sales or changed their MAP/MARP policy, that would be good. But not every LDS can afford to become an internet retailer either or survive on reduced markups (even the good shops). Lacking an internet shopping presense isn't bad, but opposing it is. I've noticed many local shops allow you to browse their inventory and make purchases on some items that are allowed. Some even allow you to see whether the item is stocked in inventory on-hand. Perhaps shops can affiliate with a larger online presense, similar to Amazon affiliates and Amazon to expand options to buyers.

In general, the following suggestions, if done, could probably do more to become the LDS of the future than most other things.
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1. The overwhelming sentiment by shops to treat customers as enemies once the customer desides to shop online or enquire of any specials or discounts that may be applicable to a purchase must be cease. This one aspect alone probably causes a very high amount of disdain in divers. No one likes to enter a store exciting about their sport and leave with a guilt trip. I've seen people leave shops in tears over the attitudes of the shop keeper. This sh!t just shouldn't be acceptable. The Internet is not only an acceptable form of commerce in the 21st century but a preferred one at that.
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2. A higher quality control process for instructors. Someone should not be an instructor if they are not a good diver. I do not understand the sentiment that a good instructor is different than a good diver because 'teaching and diving are two different skills'. On the contrary, an instructor needs to be a good diving role model in the class and outside the class. I've seen people who can demonstrate quite well in the pool or 20' of ocean water but they are very poor divers otherwise. Students need role models. They yearn to grow and naturally do so by immitating what they see.
   
   The PADI 'GoPro' campaign, while well-intended, tends to get abused locally such that divers do not feel comfortable diving with anyone but a DiveMaster until they themselves are a DiveMaster. If the training was of higher quality, then they would feel comfortable relatively quickly after OW and without the need for 10 more classes + DiveMaster rating.
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3. Customer Service needs to really improve by stop pushing only high ticket items to bring in the highest revenue but to instead understand what the diver needs and then paring the needs of the diver with appropriate gear for those needs. Those needs can be budget, expected dive frequency, mid-long term dive aspirations, locale, etc. but not 'only' the profit margin for the shop.
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Perhaps If every shop made these changes it could become the 'Dive Industry of the Future'..

 

[Thalassamania]

...
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1. ...
2. A higher quality control process for instructors. Someone should not be an instructor if they are not a good diver. I do not understand the sentiment that a good instructor is different than a good diver because 'teaching and diving are two different skills'. On the contrary, an instructor needs to be a good diving role model in the class and outside the class. I've seen people who can demonstrate quite well in the pool or 20' of ocean water but they are very poor divers otherwise. Students need role models. They yearn to grow and naturally do so by immitating what they see.
   
   The PADI 'GoPro' campaign, while well-intended, tends to get abused locally such that divers do not feel comfortable diving with anyone but a DiveMaster until they themselves are a DiveMaster. If the training was of higher quality, then they would feel comfortable relatively quickly after OW and without the need for 10 more classes + DiveMaster rating. ...

An instructor should be an exemplary diver first and then become an instructor, but that's not the way it works today, every new mark through the door is a potential cash cow until they are certified as an instructor.

As far a not diving with anyone but a DM, that might be because a DM is at about the same skill and knowledge level that an entry level diver was in the 1960s and 1970s.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

[/LIST]An instructor should be an exemplary diver first and then become an instructor, but that's not the way it works today, every new mark through the door is a potential cash cow until they are certified as an instructor.

As far a not diving with anyone but a DM, that might be because a DM is at about the same skill and knowledge level that an entry level diver was in the 1960s and 1970s.

I'm in complete agreement with the first comment ... the biggest reason why so many people are poorly trained today isn't because of agency standards, so much as because the path to dive instructor became somehow seen as a revenue stream for the agencies and the shops who represent them ... and this sometimes results in people achieving instructor status while lacking both the competence and knowledge they're supposed to be passing on to others.

The second comment is too broad ... today's recreational DM and instructor corps comprises a broad spectrum of diver competence ... from barely competent to extremely so. And FWIW - I've dived with several folks who were trained in the '60's and '70's who ain't all that ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

1. The overwhelming sentiment by shops to treat customers as enemies once the customer desides to shop online or enquire of any specials or discounts that may be applicable to a purchase must be cease. This one aspect alone probably causes a very high amount of disdain in divers. No one likes to enter a store exciting about their sport and leave with a guilt trip. I've seen people leave shops in tears over the attitudes of the shop keeper. This sh!t just shouldn't be acceptable. The Internet is not only an acceptable form of commerce in the 21st century but a preferred one at that.

What it really boils down to is a misunderstanding of who your competitors are ... and with many dive shop owners and staff it's misplaced. I know of no other industry where consumers are expected to do all of their shopping at one place. And it goes beyond the internet. I am currently in the market for another drysuit. There's one manufacturer I'd love to consider ... in part because I've owned their products before and like them, and in part because they offer instructor discounts. But the requirement is that I purchase through a local dive shop. In my area there are only two shops that offer that brand ... and both of them treat me as a competitor because I'm an independent instructor, and not with the same agency as their shop. So I won't buy there. This hurts both the shop and the manufacturer, because I'll end up with someone else's drysuit ... and as most people know, students tend to want to buy what they see their instructor using.

There are other shops who treat me as a partner and potential revenue source. They carry other brands. I'll end up owning one of those.

Guess which of those two business strategies will, in the end, be more successful ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[Peter Guy]

As far a not diving with anyone but a DM, that might be because a DM is at about the same skill and knowledge level that an entry level diver was in the 1960s and 1970s.

JUST NOT TRUE!

I know, I was there -- and now I am here. (Note -- even though I admit that "If you remember the 70's you weren't there" has more truth to it than I'd like to admit, I WAS there and I do remember my 1966 training.)

The training is different, of course, but so is the gear and what is known about diving.

Please, as my dearly departed Grandfather was fond of saying (someone who, in fact, rode the range in Montana, was in the Yukon Gold Rush and was on one of the first ships sunk by a Japanese sub in WWII):

"Good old days? Good old Days? HELL, there WEREN'T any Good Old Days!"

 

[Mike]

Prospective divers still don't know who will properly cover the material they they need to learn, even with certification agencies. .

Yes they do.

It's the certified, affiliated dive shop that they sign up for an OW certification course that will cover the material, because the course will be taught by someone who has at least been through a standardized system. The instructor has passed written tests and performed skills as outlined by a standard written course manual. There is also accountability since there is an agency to answer to.

You might want to be taught by some amateur who will show you his diluted, personalized, whatever he remembers and whatever HE thinks is important, but not me. I'll plunk my money down for somebody with some accountability and certifications.

I don't need to learn to dive like some hillbilly teaching his 3rd cousin how to distill moonshine.

Ditching the agencies wouldn't be a great loss.

With no industry behind SCUBA, only the truly motivated would bother finding and instructor and learning to dive,

And as the sport slowly vanishes without any new divers entering it, you will be sewing your own wetsuit out of inner tubes and taping coke bottles to your head for a mask since there won't be any professional equipment available after the sport dies.

and they would find out "who is a good instructor" by asking their friends, the same way they find roofers, mechanics and masons.

You're extremely uninformed if you think referrals drive businesses and can keep businesses healthy and growing. Show me a roofer a mechanic or a mason who lives off of referrals and you're showing me a roofer, mechanic or a mason who lives in a doublewide trailer and doesn't have 2 pennies to rub together.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

It's the certified, affiliated dive shop that they sign up for an OW certification course that will cover the material, because the course will be taught by someone who has at least been through a standardized system. The instructor has passed written tests and performed skills as outlined by a standard written course manual. There is also accountability since there is an agency to answer to.

This works well in theory ... but in practice it often doesn't work so well. There are many, many, posts and threads in here from people who felt that they came out of a class having not learned anything. This happens because instructors have been rushed from class to class to class and have become instructors who are adequately "book smart", but know very little about real-world diving.

In one local case we had an instructor who had managed to pass her written test and instructor exam without ever having learned how to don her fins without help ... she actually asked her students to help her put her fins on. How would you feel signing up for a class with your local LDS only to have your instructor ask you that?

You might want to be taught by some amateur who will show you his diluted, personalized, whatever he remembers and whatever HE thinks is important, but not me. I'll plunk my money down for somebody with some accountability and certifications.

I don't need to learn to dive like some hillbilly teaching his 3rd cousin how to distill moonshine.

While I agree in principle, in practice it's still a crap shoot. Some certified instructors teach like some hillbilly teaching his 3rd cousin how to distill moonshine. On the other hand, some of the most important lessons I ever got in scuba diving came from someone who isn't an instructor.

And as the sport slowly vanishes without any new divers entering it, you will be sewing your own wetsuit out of inner tubes and taping coke bottles to your head for a mask since there won't be any professional equipment available after the sport dies.

I think as long as there's a demand for product, there will be people out there offering them for sale. It's the nature of business.

You're extremely uninformed if you think referrals drive businesses and can keep businesses healthy and growing. Show me a roofer a mechanic or a mason who lives off of referrals and you're showing me a roofer, mechanic or a mason who lives in a doublewide trailer and doesn't have 2 pennies to rub together.

I can think of several very successful instructors who get their business strictly through referrals. The majority of them are tech instructors ... but some also teach at the recreational level. All of my students come to me through referrals ... although after nearly burning out teaching too much, I've limited the classes I will teach. As a result, I find myself referring potential students to other instructors nearly as much as I accept them as students. On the other hand, I don't teach because I need the income ... I make a good living outside of scuba, and only teach when I want to.

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[redacted]

Yes they do.

It's the certified, affiliated dive shop that they sign up for an OW certification course that will cover the material, because the course will be taught by someone who has at least been through a standardized system. The instructor has passed written tests and performed skills as outlined by a standard written course manual. There is also accountability since there is an agency to answer to.

You might want to be taught by some amateur who will show you his diluted, personalized, whatever he remembers and whatever HE thinks is important, but not me. I'll plunk my money down for somebody with some accountability and certifications.

I don't need to learn to dive like some hillbilly teaching his 3rd cousin how to distill moonshine.




And as the sport slowly vanishes without any new divers entering it, you will be sewing your own wetsuit out of inner tubes and taping coke bottles to your head for a mask since there won't be any professional equipment available after the sport dies.





You're extremely uninformed if you think referrals drive businesses and can keep businesses healthy and growing. Show me a roofer a mechanic or a mason who lives off of referrals and you're showing me a roofer, mechanic or a mason who lives in a doublewide trailer and doesn't have 2 pennies to rub together.

It makes you wonder how such a complex industry so dependent on training agencies and LDSs ever got started. Evolution is not monotonic.

 

[Mike]

I can think of several very successful instructors who get their business strictly through referrals. The majority of them are tech instructors ... but some also teach at the recreational level. All of my students come to me through referrals ... although after nearly burning out teaching too much, I've limited the classes I will teach. As a result, I find myself referring potential students to other instructors nearly as much as I accept them as students. On the other hand, I don't teach because I need the income ... I make a good living outside of scuba, and only teach when I want to.

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

There are exceptions to every rule, however I, nor the other 99% couldn't feed their families based off the stories about two instructors out of 10,000.

This works well in theory ... but in practice it often doesn't work so well. There are many, many, posts and threads in here from people who felt that they came out of a class having not learned anything. This happens because instructors have been rushed from class to class to class and have become instructors who are adequately "book smart", but know very little about real-world diving.

In one local case we had an instructor who had managed to pass her written test and instructor exam without ever having learned how to don her fins without help ... she actually asked her students to help her put her fins on. How would you feel signing up for a class with your local LDS only to have your instructor ask you that?

Certifications and standards are the baseline. They aren't going to guarantee everyone you would hire is a diving and instructing God. The majority of American consumers need to be protected from themselves, they simply aren't sophisticated enough to do the research to figure out who is who.

The simplest thing to be changed in the dive certification game should be dive requirements.

If it was up to me -

OW - require 10 dives for certification, with a major stress on boyancy control.

AOW - can't take it till you have 50 dives under your belt.

Rescue - should require 100 dives before you can take it

DM - should require 200 dives at a minimum before you can start the course