US Navy Diver Starting Hulling Business

[NavyDiver12]

I know that there is a lot of competition in Southeast FL just from research I have done, but in your honest opinion from someone who is in the business, how realistic will it be to open a new company down there to be able to support a family? I know clients won't come knocking on my door, but with my background as a Navy Diver and my experience, being honest, doing reliable work, customer service, marketing, etc, how long do you think it would take to get my name out there to turn a profit?

 

[Wookie]

I remember getting out of the Navy too....

Here's some advice from a guy who EAOSd in 1989, but I'm sure it holds true today.

First, if you're still in, start making contacts now. Drive all of the Marinas. Ask the dockmaster if he's happy with his current service provider. Why? Why is he unhappy, or why is he happy? If his clients are happy, he's happy. It's no skin off his balls to tell you what you want to know, if he's happy he isn't going to recommend you, if he's unhappy he'll let you know why.

Have 3 months living expenses in savings for you and the family. This business will not come up overnight, and Spring is the busy time in the SE. Everyone wants to get the scabies off of their boat. Start now. You can start with a 12", a 4", and a 1 1/4" scraper. If you are going to do shrimp boats, you will need a chain with wooden toggles at each end to clean the keel coolers. You want to do Shrimp boats and commercial fishing boats, BTW.

I used to charge by the tank. It was $150 to get in the water, then $100 bucks a tank for the second through whatever. That was for cleaning, ropes in the wheel, pulling wheels, whatever you wanted me to do. If I had to go offshore because a trawler had backed over his gear, the price went up exponentially. If the weather was bad, the price went up exponentially for offshore work. Seems they never back over their nets unless it's blowing a gale.

Never turn a job down, unless it's really unsafe. Then, don't take the job in the first place.

Go get a drysuit. Marinas are full of poopoo. Shrimp boats are disgusting, crewboat crews will flush a brown trout while you're under the boat just to have a laugh. You will probably end up with an AGA and a tender unless you plan on using your 17/27/37. You can do it on scuba, I did, but I wasn't trying to make a living, I was trying to make rent in the winter. Beer money, etc. A compressor, gas distribution panel, and tender, just like you were taught is the safest way to go.

I can easily see spending $25-50 K to have a compressor, gas panel, comms, masks or hoods, etc. You can do it for less money. How old did you say your kids were? Should they be without a daddy?

 

[fstbttms]

I know that there is a lot of competition in Southeast FL just from research I have done, but in your honest opinion from someone who is in the business, how realistic will it be to open a new company down there to be able to support a family? I know clients won't come knocking on my door, but with my background as a Navy Diver and my experience, being honest, doing reliable work, customer service, marketing, etc, how long do you think it would take to get my name out there to turn a profit?

Developing a clientele that can support you takes a long time. I worked nights for 5 years while building my business during the day before I felt it could support me. Most boat owners that want a dive service already have one, so developing a clientele is long process. As Wookie says, go to the marinas and introduce yourself to the harbormaster and put your business cards on any bulletin board you can. Don't forget chandleries like West Marine will also have bulletin boards. That will be your best advertising intially. Once you become established it will be word of mouth that brings in the most customers. Regarding pricing; find out what the competition is charging and base your rates on that. My philosophy is that I don't have to be the most expensive diver in the marina, but I sure as hell aren't going to be the cheapest. Undercutting the competition will only bring you the worst clients- those that don't want to spend any money maintaining their boats. They are the clients that will jump to the next cheap service as soon as one appears. Plus their boats are in the worst shape.

I will disagree with Wookie about the gear you need to do the work. He is describing a hard hat operation and that is just not the way the hull cleaning business works, at least not in marinas and servicing pleasure craft. Most hull cleaners use a small gas or 110-volt hookah rig, some use "snuba", leaving the tank on the dock. Fewer still actually wear the tank. You do not need an AGA mask or comms or a gas panel and you certainly aren't going to need a tender. Working in marinas is not particularly dangerous, especially if you use common sense. Getting innoculated against tetnus and Hep B is a good idea however and something I've done. I can't even imagine spending a spring/summer/fall in a drysuit here in the Bay Area, not to mention doing it in Florida.

 

[Superlyte27]

Wookie's advice comes from working in Florida business. What he knows, that many non-floridians might not know is that OSHA and the diving industry is a PITA.

When I started my business (this was almost a decade ago) I was told that if I were getting paid to work as a diver, that 3 man dive teams were the rule. Comms were mandatory, surface supplied, while not mandatory was strongly advised. Now, I later found out that comms could be line signals, it didn't have to be radio communications, but I was warned that I couldn't be a one man show. Wookie probably knows this.

Granted my info is nearly a decade old now, and I know there was a bunch of things that got easier with OSHA, the DOL and Worker's Comp Admin, but I'm not sure how lax it has gotten. I'm nearly certain 3 man dive team still applies.

 

[fstbttms]

Wookie's advice comes from working in Florida business. What he knows, that many non-floridians might not know is that OSHA and the diving industry is a PITA.

When I started my business (this was almost a decade ago) I was told that if I were getting paid to work as a diver, that 3 man dive teams were the rule. Comms were mandatory, surface supplied, while not mandatory was strongly advised. Now, I later found out that comms could be line signals, it didn't have to be radio communications, but I was warned that I couldn't be a one man show. Wookie probably knows this.

Granted my info is nearly a decade old now, and I know there was a bunch of things that got easier with OSHA, the DOL and Worker's Comp Admin, but I'm not sure how lax it has gotten. I'm nearly certain 3 man dive team still applies.

I have been in the hull cleaning business for over 20 years and know hull cleaners on both coasts, north and south. I'm not saying that OSHA hasn't stuck their noses in on isolated situations but I also know that nobody in the recreational boating hull cleaning business anywhere is doing it with a diver, supervisor and tender. We've had this discussion before here- if you take the OSHA regs verbatim, then hull cleaners probably fall under them. But the reality is that those regs were written for hard hat operations and would be onerous for the hull cleaning industry to abide by. Which is why they are largely ignored by the hull cleaning industry. There would be no hull cleaning industry if those rules were strictly enforced.

 

[Wookie]

I have been in the hull cleaning business for over 20 years and know hull cleaners on both coasts, north and south. I'm not saying that OSHA hasn't stuck their noses in on isolated situations but I also know that nobody in the recreational boating hull cleaning business anywhere is doing it with a diver, supervisor and tender. We've had this discussion before here- if you take the OSHA regs verbatim, then hull cleaners probably fall under them. But the reality is that those regs were written for hard hat operations and would be onerous for the hull cleaning industry to abide by. Which is why they are largely ignored by the hull cleaning industry. There would be no hull cleaning industry if those rules were strictly enforced.

Remember, his training is different from yours and mine. The CG just came down hard on the local hull cleaners (one got chopped up in a mega-yacht) and they regulate diving on commercial vessels. OSHA showed up eventually, and this resulted in a diver unable to work ever again (search DiverJudy Key West), a lawsuit, Marshall's seizure of a Marshall Islands flagged boat, and a raise in awareness. Now, everyone is tended and on voice coms. NavyDiver is trained on a hat, not that he needs one for hull cleaning, but still, if I had a hat and a drysuit, I'd wear it for sure. Tropical drysuits aren't that big a deal to wear. Yes, I know the difference between the regulations and reality, IJS that reality is creeping closer to regulations as divers get hurt cleaning hulls in South Florida.

 

[fstbttms]

When you say, "Now everyone is tended and on voice comms," you're saying that every 30' sailboat in Florida is being cleaned by a 3-man team? I find that a little difficult to believe.

 

[Wookie]

When you say, "Now everyone is tended and on voice comms," you're saying that every 30' sailboat in Florida is being cleaned by a 3-man team? I find that a little difficult to believe.

Perhaps not Florida, but they sure are in Sector Key West, which goes from Dry Tortugas to Key Largo.

 

[fstbttms]

Perhaps not Florida, but they sure are in Sector Key West, which goes from Dry Tortugas to Key Largo.

And what has that done to hull cleaning prices?

---------- Post added February 23rd, 2015 at 04:36 PM ----------

OK, I just got off the phone with Down Under Bottom Cleaning in Key West and the owner of that dive service tells me that nobody is being required to use a 3-man team unless they have actual paid employees and are paying Worker's Compensation insurance, which pretty much excludes every dive service in the area. This guy has been in business for 10 years, knows the details of the Diver Judy situation and says he has not been asked (even by the Coast Guard, with whom he has done contact work) to provide comms, or a tender or any of that by any client or government agency.

---------- Post added February 23rd, 2015 at 05:00 PM ----------

Just got a return call from the owner of Bottoms & Props Llc., who essentially reiterates the same thing- it's business as usual for hull cleaners in the Keys and nobody is being required to use a dive team or adhere to any particular OSHA regs that they hadn't been before.


So straight from the horse's mouth (as it were) it seems as if there is no new regulation affecting hull cleaners in the Keys (or anywhere else), at least according to these guys.

 

[trefoil]

quick story.

Back in the late nineties I was diving with a crew placing rip rap under and around dock/boatlifts (and area were the barge crane couldnt place. At noon we shut down. the dive crew had lunch on barge. Few minutes go by and we hear a darth vader coming from somewhere, we look at each other and made sure we are accounted for, kept hearing a diver breathing/singing over comm. Looked across the canal (maybe 200ft) here is a hull cleaner with a full S.S rig nobody around except for the diver flag on a ladder and a comm box. Curiocity got the best of me so I wandered over to were he was working (behind a house). Turned out this cat was wearing a miller (knows quality LOL), pony bottle bail out, hundred foot umbilical (with synflex hose), com box/diy manifold, deck whip back to his truck in the front yard, gast compressor, volume tank all nicely arranged on a caged wagon in back of truck. Niffty rig I might add. when we got to talking found out that he put his time in offshore and inland got tired of the crap we all take on industrial jobs and set his sights on the hull cleaning biz in 1993. Yes he works alone, yes he is a one man show. I asked him if he felt safe doing this sort of thing alone. His response was classic. His response: "Hellva alot safer than some dim witted craneman using my bubbles for target practice." Fast forward he is still in biz. Both his sons are also cert. hard hat this family has the area from Sarasota to Fort myers.

What amazed me, this cat would gather his rig figure eight the umbilical fold and tie. shoulder the hose grabbed hat with same hand ladder in other with combox walk to the truck wearing a miller weight belt. sling the hose on tailgate ladder on rack coil the deck whip and shuck the harness and weight belt in less than two minutes I asked how many times he did that in a day. Said I do 8 to 10 boats a day. Now mind you we are talking a community were almost all homes have a 30+ ft vessel docked behind their house.

That area of Southwest Florida there are a "few" hundred" hull cleaners and only a hand full make a decent living.

So the moral is. Yes, hard hat divers can make a wage cleaning pleasure craft. Just halfta size your rig for the work.