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>Rick Fincher said: >Since then, several new stores appeared, some died, and there is intense >competition for student $$$. One store offers OW certification for $150. >The training has become a loss leader to get people in the store to buy gear. >To make matters worse sporting goods chain "superstores" are selling dive gear >in the area. The clerks aren't divers and they refer people to local dive >shops >for training. >It's getting harder for the stores to pay the instructors enough to make it >worth their time, so we are seeing a lot of minimally qualified instructors >that are doing it as a part time job as grad students, etc., rather than the >experienced greybeards of a few years back that worked in or owned the store >and were in it for the long haul. That is certainly the quandary many shop owners face. As a full time professional who owns a dive school, we've made a decision to keep our lower level courses higher in price (including nitrox and deep air where tuition has dropped very low - $79.00) and not actively sell equipment. Not many places can (or want to) do that. As an analogy, consider the plight of the neighborhood computer store not so long ago. The only ones that survived made a change in what they pushed (software instead of hardware) because they saw the larger stores and mailorder business as a threat. While that cannot happen to the same degree in the diving business it gives one reason to pause. Consider also what the future impact of the internet will have on education and the need for the <graybeard> instructor mentioned above. Where does that leave us? I think it leaves us with a need to have newly trained instructors (at least in the short term) under supervision just like their recreational and intro tech divers. >I think the instructor standards are going to have to be raised by all the >certifying agencies to eliminate all but those doing it because they love it >or as a serious profession.< Whether or not participants on this list like the standards of the various agencies, raising them does have an effect. I have noticed a marked change in the numbers and types of individuals who are moving into scuba as a profession. This is directly attributable to the new PADI standards (whether that holds true long range is speculation, but it has held true all of 1995). They are older, more experienced divers than just one year ago, and many bring with them a business or experiental backround that can only help the industry improve the quality of the instructor "stock". Dave xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Dave Schubert Executive Director, Dive USA Singer Island, FL. 33404 407/844-5100, FAX: 407/848-0627 xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
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