What is the fundamental reason that prevents scuba diving from becoming popular?

[Seaweed Doc]

Cost and time. College age people don't have the money, people my age don't have the time.

Of the two, cost is more important. A teenager that gets into the sport may participate for 50 years or more. A 55 year old, well, not quite as many.

 

[Compressor]

Remember: Scubaboard is rated Parental Guidance (PG).

Well I will take a different position: It is a very popular sport. I was in Florida last week and saw so many divers going in the water it was fabulous. All had smiles on their faces. Isn't that priceless?

It's in my opinion the best sport that one can engage it. And I engage in other hobbies and sports. Nothing remotely compares with it. It takes you to places you would never be able to visit. It's not a popularity contest after all. As others have said, there is costs and then there are enormous benefits. Love it and dive often.

 

[Rose Robinson]

Remember: Scubaboard is rated Parental Guidance (PG).

Hello Scuba,

Never considered scuba diving to be unpopular.

Like any sport/hobbies you want to name, it's not everybody's cup of tea.

I'm fortunate, in as much as I live in an abundant opportunity area, others who live in land-locked areas are not as fortunate, and have to travel, sometimes great distances, which adds extra cost to to sport.

As far as cost, tell me a sport or hobby that's not expensive. Motor cycles/snow mobiles/specialty automobiles/serious camping/hunting/rock/mountain climbing/skiing, and the list goes on.

And, considering some which I have listed above, scuba diving is a lot less expensive.

A lot of avid divers incur unnecessary costs, simply by having far too much gear/multiple systems/multiple rebreathers, kind of like specialty cars, one is fabulous, so a whole warehouse full has to be better.

Diving, in most cases, can be as economical or as expensive as the enthusiast wants it to be.

I own, primary/spares/backup, one system. For me, that's more than enough. I have no barriers preventing me from purchasing more, but for me, personally, I have no need/want/desire. Also, when I buy new, I trade in old, I have no need for 20 sets of regs/closets of old suits, or a garage full of tanks. In with the new, out with the old!

On a final note, I've never been anyone's captive audience, and in this sport, staying far away from the LDS, unless there is a need, will save you lots of money. Retail is retail, with the prime objective being, ''keeping the till well fed''

LOL,

Rose

 

[Ulfhedinn]

Thalassophobia and $$$ from people I speak too.

What derailed me for a number of years is I live 90mins from the closest beach. Well there is Lake Perris but that's not a place to really enjoy underwater.

Find someone I actually trust underwater. Get to the beach... Have decent conditions. (All I ask for is decent)

Vis can be low, waves can be high, but if I get another DAMN day of high surge I'm gonna scream!

--

Side note:
What got me into Scuba just like skydiving and riding street bikes is that there is nothing I know that is more cathartic, nothing and I have tried most things. "Try any ill to find a cure".

This is what I tell people but to each there own I guess.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

There are many reasons.
Not all the reasons apply to all people, but here is my take.
1. Expense
2. Lack of time and patience for classes and training
3. Not much cultural popularity for influence.
4. No where to dive without travelling.
5. Lack of dive shops for exposure.
6. Lack of dive magazines and visual stimuli for exposure.
7. Too many other hobbies and distractions.
8. Gear is complicated and intensive.
9. Fear of sharks (big reason)
10. Fear of water.
11. They don’t live close enough to any diveable body of water.
12. It’s not radical enough or glamorous enough for a young person.
13. Politically incorrect to hunt anymore.
14. They have no one in the family to influence them anymore - fazed out.
15. Something old people do.
16. Less hands on physicality these days as compared to past generations.
17. And once again, gear intensity, time, and cost.

I also think geography has a lot to do with it.
Take a kid in Kansas and take a kid in Southern California or Florida and who do you think is more likely to be influenced by the water culture to become a diver?
Even up here in Northern California where the water is rough and cold we have a small number of young people who actually are interested in diving.
However many of them are into freediving and hunting rather than scuba because it’s easier to get into. Gear is much less intensive and no formalized training to take part - not having to go through the whole program to take part in scuba. Some do though.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

And to add one more point,
Scuba diving has never been popular and never will be. It’s a very small niche sport and will remain somewhat exclusive.
They’ve tried many times in the past to artificially popularize it and it always returns back to it’s natural state of a small group of dedicated followers.

 

[Paul M]

Do you have another activity in mind which is equipment heavy, expensive, involve some risk and yet more popular than scuba?

Ice hockey.
Very geographic dependent.

 

[Degenerate]

And for the vast majority of people also involves traveling to a destination you can’t drive to or easily drive to (say, for a day of diving and back home in time for dinner). I think of popular sports like cycling. Sure, a bike can be expensive, and there is some risk of injury, but you don’t regularly need to make travel plans.

For some perhaps, a lot of people live nearby water.
I got a ton of dive sites, both ocean and quarries within a half hour drive which I would definitely classify as easy to access.

The most common reason I've heard for people not wanting to get into diving is fear of water, and also time and money as mentioned several times already.

 

[Scuba-74]

Do you have another activity in mind which is equipment heavy, expensive, involve some risk and yet more popular than scuba?

Skiing?

 

[Scuba-74]

Scuba is popular enough in the areas with legitimate diving attractions. In fact, I don’t think it should be popularized more than it already is.