Dive Industry Association, Inc.

A New Diving Season Begins
 by Gene Muchanski, Editor
The Dive Industry Professional

The recreational diving industry has a seasonality curve all its own, unlike other recreations.   Understanding the diving industry’s seasonality curve will help you prepare for peak and off-peak activity levels in the industry.  Basically, a season is a period of time when most of the annual activity occurs within a recreation.  When we add pre-season, post-season, and off-season periods to our “season” we arrive at an annual seasonality curve.  Using the seasonality curve for the diving industry helps us to prepare for the flow of goods and services in the Global Diving Business Network and the flow of diving activity in the Global Diving Community.  It’s a major analytical tool that informs dive industry professionals of the best time to prepare for the annual spending habits of their customers.

I started this month’s Editorial talking about seasons and seasonality curves and the more I wrote, the more I realized we would never keep the September Editorial between 1,300 and 1,500 words. In the diving industry, seasons and seasonality curves are not openly discussed by everyone in the industry nor are they agreed upon by the ones who use them in their planning.  There is a lot to know about our industry’s seasonality curve and what factors influence its numbers.  We decided to write a full-fledged article about Dive Industry Seasonality Curves in this issue and keep this editorial short and to the point.  We hope you will read the entire article and discuss it with your peers.

When we speak about the diving industry’s seasonality curve, we are really talking about the rhythm of diving activity and diving commerce on an annual basis.  For over 40 years now, I have worked in many different sectors of the diving industry and have gained first-hand knowledge and experience about the annual activities of the manufacturing, training, retail, travel, non-profit, media, and the shows & events sectors of the industry.

Recreational Scuba Diving may have started out as a summer seasonal recreation in the early 1950’s but over time it has come to be a year-round global activity.  That means we have divers participating in the recreation in the winters, springs, summers, and falls of many countries all across the globe.  As we see in global diving activity, each season has its own activity levels.  Weather plays an important part in our seasonal dive planning.  Divers who are active on a year-round basis may avoid certain locations during hurricane season, thereby cutting down on the activity level for those affected areas.  There are other factors that must be taken into consideration when looking at seasonal diving activity.  Industry planners have to be knowledgeable about the working schedules and vacation timing of its local population.  Another factor that affects our industry’s seasonal curve is the number of people who have children in school, are attending colleges and universities, or are teachers in an educational institution.  Another important factor is a country’s Holiday schedule.  Holidays have a significant effect on diving activity and sales.  Finally, the planning and production schedules of the equipment manufacturers, training agencies, and travel companies have an overwhelming influence with the diving shows and events circuit and the introduction of new programs, products, and services.

The new, post pandemic definition of the recreational Scuba Diving Season is that it is annual in nature and has many interlinking parts to it. Our new seasonality curve model is based on the business activity of the Global Diving Business Network and the diving activity of the Global Diving Community.  The Diving Business Network produces and sells diving and diving related programs, products, and services to the consuming diving public we call the Global Diving Community.  That means that all economic activity is included in our new business and planning model.  Our new model integrates the economic activity of all the various stakeholder groups in the diving industry.  It is based on the global flow of goods and services on an annual basis within the diving community.  Regional and local dive businesses can use this global model as a template and adjust it for their own local seasonality curve.  That will put the entire diving industry on the same wavelength pertaining to the economic rhythm of the industry.

Our scuba diving industry seasonal curve includes more accurate start dates for the diving equipment manufacturers and their sales agents, the diving training agencies and their reps, and the dive travel businesses including dive resorts, liveaboards, and their dive operators.  On an international level, we are also including the providers of diving-related products and services that we include in the Lifestyles product category.  We classify this entire group as providers and sellers, or more commonly referred to as our supply chain.

The larger diving equipment manufacturers historically introduce their new products the day after Labor Day.  They normally hold their sales meetings in August and outfit their Regional Sales Managers with their samples for the next season.  As soon as Labor Day is over, the dive equipment sales reps are on the road visiting their dealers, demonstrating new products, and taking orders.  Sometimes, for immediate delivery.  Engaging in a September 1 Launch has its merits.  Retail Dive Centers are winding down the summer season but are still active, they should be flush with cash, their inventory levels should be down for the year, and their open-to-buy budget should be significant.   The advantage to the retailers is they are able to bring in the next-season products to have on hand for the Christmas Holiday and it gives them the opportunity of selling off last year’s inventory with a Fall Clearance Sale.  This increases store traffic at the end of the summer season, clears out old inventory, and restocks new products for the upcoming Holiday Shopping Season.  Dive Centers that have not participated in a September Launch before have lost important holiday sales to their competitors.  One of the most significant errors in the timing of past New Season Launches for the diving industry is that Dive Retailers have lost out on the significance of the Christmas / Holiday Shopping Season.  Retail Associations have reported that holiday sales can account for up to 25% of a store’s annual sales.  That is not something our industry should be missing out on.

The Training Agencies in the diving industry tend to kick off the new season at the annual trade show in November.  That makes a lot of sense due to the fact that many dive instructors are either still teaching their summertime classes in September or are just starting new classes at their colleges and universities.  Having their annual Professional Development Conference around Thanksgiving gives these instructors an opportunity to get updated on all of their professional development training.

The dive travel industry has an annual rhythm of its own.  Incorporating it into the Global Diving Business Network seasonality curve is necessary, as dive travel accounts for so much activity and revenue in the global diving community.   Many Dive Resorts have told us that January is a good time for them to start their new season.  Many have told us they prefer September.  When we incorporate dive travel into our planning, we take into consideration high travel season (Jan-Mar), normal occupancy months (Apr-May), normal summer season / family travel (Jun-Aug), off-season and/or hurricane season (Sept-Nov), and Holiday Season (Dec).   Of course, these are just averages.  Every geographical destination has its own unique differences.  According to Debbie Helms from Roatan Charter, many of her colleagues in the dive travel business who are exhibiting at the DEMA Show this November will be booking group travel for the years 2025 and 2026.  Much of their 2024 season was booked last year or before.  When I asked her about pricing for the next season, she said that many dive travel wholesalers receive their new pricing by September.  Wholesalers advertise their new pricing as Show Specials in November, yet many are releasing them as pre-DEMA Specials in September.  If they don’t receive new pricing by September, they usually honor the current year prices.

Shows & Events have a significant impact on Seasonality Curves.  The Surf Expo has been conducting their trade show twice a year for over twenty years.  In my opinion, they are the watersports role model for introducing the next season to their attendees (buyers).  Surf Expo conducts their event every September and January.  Having two expos per year gives the exhibitors the option of introducing their new season in September or January.  Apparel exhibitors use both Surf Expos to introduce their Summer and Winter lines at more appropriate buying times.  It’s really all about introducing the next season to the consuming public by the buyers and sellers who make a living out of moving products from conception to consumption.

This is an exciting time to become part of the Global Diving Business Network.  For more information, contact Gene Muchanski, Executive Director of the Dive Industry Association, 2294 Botanica Circle, West Melbourne, FL 32904.  Phone: 321-914-3778.  Email: gene@diveindustry.net  Web: www.diveindustry.net

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Gladiators In the Arena
 by Gene Muchanski, Editor
The Dive Industry Professional

Being a Dive Industry Professional can be as rewarding a career as any.  It’s all about doing what you love to do and being the best that you can be.  Whether you decide to do this full-time or part-time is your choice.  You can work for a company that hires you for your skill set or you could go the entrepreneurial route and work for yourself.  It’s all about deciding what you want to do, exploring the options that are available to you, preparing for the role you want to play, and making the effort to secure the position you want to fill.   Once you begin your career in your chosen profession, it’s up to you to learn, grow, and succeed from there.  If I make it sound too simple, please excuse me, it’s not!

There are many career options for people who want to make a living as a scuba diving professional.  Colleges and Universities hire scuba instructors to teach classes on campus.  Universities that have diving programs usually hire a Diving Safety Officer.  Aquariums that employ divers usually do the same.  Dive stores around the world hire scuba instructors as employees or private contractors.  Dive Resorts and Liveaboard hire Divemasters, Instructors, and Crew to staff their vessels.  As an employee, your professional development responsibility is to keep your scuba instructor certifications and competency level current.  You could live the dream and get a paycheck too.

When a scuba instructor decides to go into business for themselves, their whole perspective and priority changes.  As a small business owner, a Dive Industry Professional has to balance their knowledge, skill set, and tools of the trade as a Scuba Instructor and Business Owner.  As a scuba instructor you still have to keep your diving professional development credentials current, and maintain your certification, agency affiliation, and insurance requirements.  As a business owner you have to promote your instructional service in order to fill your classes.  You will need to keep track of your income and expenses, as required by local, state, and federal law.   The more time you spend teaching classes, the less time you will have for pre-class promotion and post-class government compliance.  If you teach diving part-time and have another full-time job, your available time for business matters will be significantly less.

The most common mistake made in the diving industry is focusing too much time on the diving part of your life at the expense of the business side.  If you have a full-time job and you spend every moment of your free time teaching diving classes, going on dives, and attending professional development classes (about diving), your business will fail and may even lead to legal problems.  If you are able to successfully complete all of your job related, diving related, and business-related responsibilities, that is commendable.  If not, then something has to give.

Having too much on your plate is bad enough for scuba instructors who have a full-time job and run their own part-time diving business, but the same thing goes for those of us who run full-time diving businesses.  Operating a dive store as an owner-operator often turns into an 80 hour per week addiction.  That’s when you get so busy that you feel like the Gladiator in the Arena.  You are so busy doing what you do, that you can’t focus on the big picture, and things start falling through the cracks.  If only you could back away for a moment to get the Emperor’s view of the arena?  Pilots call it the view from 30,000 feet.  Either way, it is difficult to work on your business when you are up to your eyeballs in the day-to-day tasks of doing what your business does.  That’s why Michael Gerber, in his book The E-Myth, said that one person needs to work in the business and another person needs to work on the business.  But the purpose of this editorial is not to remind you of problems you are probably already familiar with, but to offer suggestions on how to overcome some of these challenges.

The idea for this editorial came to me today when I was online in a social media group, reading about the problems some members were having about a lack of market demand for their products and services.  They stated, quite correctly, that their vendor of choice was not developing market readiness or consumer desire for their services.  There was no question that the products and services of this vendor were excellent, but their follow-up support for this group was lacking.  What no one mentioned was that if the vendor’s products were superior to the competition, but they provided limited or no brand marketing support for their clients, why were the instructors still doing business with them?

I’ve learned that unsolicited advice is rarely appreciated, but as a paid Marketing Advisor, I believe there is a deeper root cause to this problem.  First of all, if a company produces a superior product but limited marketing support, maybe their focus and core competency is product related, and not marketing related.  If they offer limited marketing support, maybe it’s because not all of their clients need, want, or value marketing support.  Or at least they don’t think they do.   That leaves their other customers, the Gladiators in the Arena, out in the cold with no support.   It could also mean be that the vendor just doesn’t know how to market successfully, or they have the wrong employees or corporate managers.  Maybe they even have the wrong Corporate Culture!  A good marketing assessment may be in order to get to the bottom of this serious channel conflict.

As a life-long Marketing Professional, I firmly believe that buyers and sellers are strategic partners within the supply chain.  It is to the vendor’s advantage to stimulate demand for their products in the marketplace.  It’s called Brand Marketing or Brand Management.  After all, it’s not the end user who is their customer, it’s the instructor who gets certified through their agency, pays dues, and registers their student through them.  Increased brand marketing is usually accompanied by increased demand for your products and services.   When your best customers are so busy using your products and services that they don’t have time to market their own business, it behooves a vendor to stimulate demand for them.  After all, they are in fact, building a market for your product and your company.

There is another aspect to the Gladiators in the Arena concept that is so misunderstood in the diving industry.  Our Industry Gladiators in the Arena are the Industry’s Rainmakers.  They are the instructors, Retailers, and Sales Reps.  They perform in the training, sales, and travel arenas every day.  They make the sales and bring in the revenue.  They have always reminded me of combat soldiers fighting on the front lines.  If their vendors expect them to continue to fight, or teach, or sell for them, then they have to supply them with ammo and air support.   In the business world, this translates to marketing support and brand management.  If you want to grow your business, you need to take care of your Gladiators and Rainmakers. 

The other mistake made too often in business, and not just the diving industry, is taking your best Gladiators and turning them into Sales Managers, or worse, General Managers.  Great salespeople sell.  Great teachers teach.  The golden rule of management is never take your better salespeople away from doing what they do best.  It’s better to wait until they have come to the point in their career when they are ready to transition from the active lifestyle of sales and continue their career as a leader, mentor, and manager.

Running a business is a team sport.  It is part science and part art.  It takes education, knowledge, and experience.  It also takes a significant amount of time, money, and manpower.  For many of us, a business is like a puzzle, with many interlocking pieces representing numerous business components, performed by people with different talents and abilities, all inter-connected to achieve a common purpose.  A business is a compilation of numerous systems and sub-systems created and performed by people from different generations at different stages in their careers, to create products and services for a consuming public that is equally as diverse as they are.  When we think about Gladiators in the Arena, we think of people engaged in their work, dealing with their narrow perspective of the moment, only supported by their current knowledge, education, and experience.    Our role as managers is to help these Gladiators use their talents and abilities to achieve great things for themselves and our companies.

This is an exciting time to become part of the Global Diving Business Network.  For more information, contact Gene Muchanski, Executive Director of the Dive Industry Association, 2294 Botanica Circle, West Melbourne, FL 32904.  Phone: 321-914-3778.  Email: gene@diveindustry.net  Web: www.diveindustry.net

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An Industry Search For Its Key People
 by Gene Muchanski, Editor
The Dive Industry Professional

This is the perfect time to rebuild the diving industry from the ground up.  As the world struggles to enter the post pandemic economic recovery period, there are still going to be challenges that need to be overcome, dealt with, accepted, or ignored.  As a lifelong optimist but a practical realist, my latest conversations with some of the key people in the diving industry have confirmed the fact that we are in a recreational & leisure business that is severely affected by downturns in world economic fluctuations.  As the Global Diving Business Network delas with supply shortages, inflation, a looming recession, under employment, transportation irregularities, political squabbles, and global tensions, there is still a market for diving and adventure travel that needs to be addressed and serviced.

Our recreation will not survive if we are in different boats, paddling in opposite directions, while we are taking on water.  I challenge all Dive Industry Professionals who are reading this to think about the current industry fragmentation, the lack of unity, the lack of vision, and the lack of corrective action we have experienced in our industry in the past 10 years.  Can you honestly tell me that our industry has gotten better in the past ten years?  Ten years ago, we said the industry was flat.  No growth.  What about now?  Has the industry improved?  Is it the same?  Is it worse?

The Dive Industry Association is working on an exciting program.  It’s called DIVE LOCAL.  I hope you have been reading about it in our Industry Trade Magazine, The Dive Industry Professional.  So far, we have defined the program (concept), introduced the levels of participation, defined a geographical breakdown of the Global Diving Community, and outlined a professional trade breakdown of the stakeholder groups comprising the Global Diving Business Network.  This month we are identifying the Key People in each stakeholder group who are running the top companies and organizations in the industry.  That’s about as far as we can go before we begin to discuss the industry challenges, problems, and setbacks.  That’s because we have to first get the industry’s key people engaged in order to discuss the roadblocks preventing our growth and future success.   We will then need the same group of engaged key people to discuss potential solutions to the industry’s challenges and take corrective action to move the industry forward.

The goal of DIVE LOCAL is not to tell the recreational diving industry what to do.  Not by any means.  Our purpose is to build a Global Diving Business Network that will work together to identify problems, challenges, and lack of opportunities in the Global Diving Community.  We can define the global community by conducting primary research and outlining a workable foundation that we all can work with, but the industry will need a significant number of Dive Industry Professionals to participate in the analysis of our problems, the recommendation of solutions, and the agreed upon course of action the industry needs to implement.

To be honest with you, I don’t expect all of the key people in our industry will jump onboard at first.  Some can’t be bothered and some “have their own thing.”  In the past twenty years we have all been to seminars, workshops, and summit meetings that have discussed industry problems.  We listened, we participated, we even offered our opinions as to the challenges, solutions, and action items that were needed, and then everyone went home and did nothing about it.  Well, at least until the next meeting the following year.  I think we can all agree that we have had enough of those types of meetings.  This is not one of them.  We are creating a foundation, putting it in writing, posting it to our websites for all to see, and we are following up.  Worst case scenario is that we end up with a perfect plan that tells us what the industry should have been doing.  A more likely scenario will be that a small group of progressive Dive Industry Professionals will start working on the program and see their sales increase, their market share increase, and their belief in working with their peers in the network, justified.

Searching for and identifying Key People in our industry is very important to the success of our industry.  Each dive business should have at least two Key People.  One to represent the company to the public and one to orchestrate the strategic path that the company follows.  In simple terms, one person represents the company, and one person is the company.  The key person who represents the company is usually the person in charge of marketing.  The strategic powerhouse of the company is usually the owner or Chief Executive Officer (CEO).  We’ll refer to the person who is in charge of the company and its strategic growth plans as the Internal Key Person and the person who communicates the company plans to the public and is the company’s main contact person as the External Key Person.  Both play a vital role in the industry.

Internal Key Person:  A good internal key person is someone the whole company knows and it’s someone the whole industry wants to know.  It’s someone people respect and follow because they have a vision for the company and communicate that effectively to the people who work at the company.  It’s someone who has the authority to make decisions for the company and has the clout to make things happen.  Employees who agree with the company vision and want to be a part of it, are loyal to the internal key person.  The diving industry needs the expertise and presence of these internal key people at round-table discussions on industry growth and direction.  As an industry, we need to identify one person from each company to engage with us.

External Key Person:   The External Key Person is the one person who represents the company to the public.  It usually is the Marketing Director, Sales Manager, or Communications Officer if the company is large enough.  It should be the one person you could contact to find out something about the company.  External Key People are the spokespeople for their company.  They communicate the company’s story to the public and act as the first line of contact for the company. It’s important to note that an effective External Key Person is a company person who is in charge of communicating company information to the public.  It is not the responsibility of business professionals you hire to carry out sales, marketing, or reservation services.  They are vendors you pay to perform specific revenue generating tasks.  They are not your company spokespeople.  When you think about it, they are actually the company spokesperson for their own company.  The one you hired.  We will address this shortly.

Problems Identifying Key People:  Every diving company has an Internal Key Person running the company.  Unfortunately, not all of them are the final decision makers nor are they all considered Industry Leaders.  Many times, in our industry, key people inside the company take a low profile when it comes to public recognition.  Consequently, they shy away from participating in industry round-table discussions and keep their company strategic plans to themselves.  We cannot argue with that.  It’s their choice.  What we would appreciate is an Internal Key Person from each company who would be available for input and comments on our industry growth plans.  That would give them the professional courtesy of being asked to participate but leave it up to them on how engaged they choose to be. The importance of having a reliable inside contact in every company is that they will never lose contact with the Global Diving Business Network should they loose their hired spokesperson.

Employee & Non-Employee External Key People:  Company Communication Officers were once considered an expensive luxury position to have, especially at small and medium sized companies.  In today’s modern, competitive environment, a sharp Communication Officer is worth their weight in gold. Their job is to communicate their company’s programs, products, and services to the general public.  By being the official spokesperson for the company, they are the link between the company and the consuming public.  An External Key Person is responsible for making sure their company’s marketing plan is carried out in the public sector, to achieve the outcomes their company has in its plans.  Communication Officers build extensive marketing networks by developing long-term business relationships with the people that help them do their job.  It is critically important that the company maintain those relationships if the company transitions between one Communication Office and another. All to often we have seen Resort Destinations across the globe lose all of their contacts in the Global Diving Community when they switched sales agents, reservation services, or marketing companies.  That should not happen if the Key Internal Person is actively involved in maintaining their important business relationships.

It is important that companies in the Global Diving Business Network identify their Key People, both internally and externally, and work with the Dive Industry Association to maintain business stability and continuity of purpose.  Our mission as a Trade Association is to help diving businesses maintain current market share, identified new markets, and recapture markets and market share that has been lost.  Identifying and working with the Key People that could make that happen is the first logical step.

This is an exciting time to become part of the Global Diving Business Network.  For more information, contact Gene Muchanski, Executive Director of the Dive Industry Association, 2294 Botanica Circle, West Melbourne, FL 32904.  Phone: 321-914-3778.  Email: gene@diveindustry.net  Web: www.diveindustry.net

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Why We Built A Diving Industry
by Gene Muchanski, Editor
The Dive Industry Professional

As we enter into the post-pandemic economic recovery phase of the diving industry, I feel that it is upon all of the Dive Industry Professionals to pause for a moment and reflect on what we do for a living and why we do it.  For the benefit of all of us who work part-time or full-time in some sort of diving business, it might be a good idea if we look back at our industry’s history, our present career situation, and our future potential as Dive Industry Professionals.  I’ll tell you why I think it is important for new members of the industry to learn and for industry veterans to remember.  I believe that the vision of a diving industry that was created by our Founding Fathers has not been fully understood by many and has definitely not been taught to the generations that followed.  By the way, I use the term Founding Fathers rather than Pioneers to affectionately describe our first generation of Dive Industry Professionals like John Cronin (U.S. Divers & PADI), Dick Bonin (Scubapro), and Bob Hollis (Oceanic).  These early Entrepreneurs were responsible for breaking away from the National Sporting Goods Association and creating an industry of our own.  There was a reason they did that, and I think it should be revisited and expanded upon at this time.

Before we begin, it’s important that we define what is meant by an industry.  An industry is a group of like-minded businesses based upon what type of program, product or service they produce.  So, our diving niche market is really a collective group of industries that specialize in the creation and sale of diving and diving related products.  The North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) is the standard used by Federal statistical agencies in classifying business establishments.  Our Founding Fathers were from the Manufacturing Sector (31-33) and were targeting the Retail Trade (Sectors 44-45), specifically subsector 459 (Sporting Goods Retailers).  As the market grew, Educational Services (subsector 611) and Recreational Industries (subsector 713) joined with the Manufacturers and Retailers.  Soon, the Travel Industries and Non-Profit Industries became actively engaged in the new niche market, and the “Diving Industry” was born.

In the early days of the diving industry, our Leaders were mostly business owners and entrepreneurs.  They had a vested interest in working cooperatively with other Dive Industry Professionals.  They worked together to carve out a niche market and created a trade show that brought buyers and sellers of diving and diving related products together.  The early trade shows had a high concentration of divers and became a cost-effective annual meeting place to do business.  The show also became the annual conference for professional growth and development.  The disadvantage to having an annual national show was minorly overcome by moving the location of the show to different regional locations every year.  A concept we need to go back to.  Soon, Regional Dive Shows sprung up across the United States in the regional diving communities of New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Houston, Tacoma, Miami, and Raleigh, NC.  The Regional Shows became popular with the local diving community and flourished for 20-35 years.  I remember well, the rapid growth of the industry in the 1970’s and 80’s.  Many young Dive Industry Professionals in their late 20’s and early 30’s held key positions in the manufacturing, training, and retail industries.  The travel industry was growing at a rapid pace and was being spearheaded by young baby boomers.  So, what happened?

Looking back, I think the beginning of the decline in the recreational diving industry started while we were still experiencing the unprecedented growth of the 1980’s.  As the U.S. economy began to slow-down in the early 1990’s, the Baby Boomers were now in the early to mid-40’s.  Less people per year were taking up scuba diving and the number of dive stores started to decline.  The major change, as I saw it, was that as our early entrepreneurial pioneers were growing their businesses and passing the torch on to the younger generation, but their replacements were employee types and not business owners.  I saw an industry-wide shift of priority begin to change from a total industry perspective, to a more myopic focus of their individual businesses.  It seemed that most of the new industry leaders were more interested in the individual success of their own business rather than the success of the collective industry.  That could be my own take on things, but the more I think about it, the more sense it makes to me now.

I believe that if diving industry professionals at the time had focused more on working together on a collective industry growth strategy, instead of circling their wagons in an attempt to isolate their dealer bases, they would have grown the industry and become more proficient at target marketing.  Instead, they spent more money on duplicate marketing efforts that basically targeted the same customer base as their competitors.  This, in my opinion, brought them a significantly smaller return on investment for a larger marketing outlay. This fragmented approach and duplication of marketing efforts diluted their dealer base and put national and regional consumer and trade events on a downward spiral of profit and popularity.  By not understanding the difference between a true dive industry professional and a dive consumer, manufacturers, training agencies, travel companies and shows & events producers were unable to correctly market to either niche group successfully.

I can show you the industry stats that back up my comments.  Dive equipment manufacturers have gone through major consolidation and many brand marketers are selling the same OEM equipment under different labels.  There are over 50 certification agencies in the United States alone.  There must be a reason we need 50 certification agencies.  There are over 800 dive resort destinations and liveaboards around the globe.  And that’s just the ones we know about.  There may be more we haven’t heard about yet.  And they wonder why their occupancy rate is so low while other resorts are booked solid well into 2024 and beyond.  What about the industry’s retail dive stores.  Why has our industry gone from 2,400 stores to about 1,200 stores in the last 30 years?  And tell me why trade shows and consumer dive shows have dwindled down to a mere few?  Remember Our World Underwater?  Sea Space?  Seas Scuba Expo?  The Tacoma Dive Show?  The Florida Dive Shows?  The Texas Dive Shows?  What did they all have in common?  Better still, what things did they all lack in common?  From an exhibitor standpoint, trade and consumer dive shows peaked between 2006 and 2012.  I’m waiting for a 2024 Revival, but unfortunately we are not ready for a revival until we have one thing – UNITY OF PURPOSE.

The challenges that face the industry are pretty clear to most of us in the business.  The solutions to our challenges, in my opinion, are pretty clear also.  First of all, not every certified diver should be led to believe they should follow a predetermined path to become a Dive Industry Professional.  Not every person we certify as a diver wants to become a Scuba Instructor or Divemaster.  Let’s just be happy they took up scuba diving as a recreation!    And second of all, even if we become Dive Industry Professionals, we are still dive consumers.  So don’t tell me that DEMA is not a consumer show.  Of course it is.  We are all consumers, and Dive Industry Professionals buy a lot of dive equipment, training, and travel.  Let’s open up the industry instead of continually restricting its growth.

The good news is that we know the diving industry has a problem.  The bad news is that I think the problem is us.  I’m not quite sure who is not at fault here, but I can tell you I feel pretty safe knowing that only those amongst us without sin can cast the first stone!  I don’t see any rocks flying.  Do you?

Albert Einstein once said that mankind cannot get out of a problem using the same thought pattern that was used to get them into the problem.  With that said, I might suggest we get back to the logic that our Diving Founding Fathers used to create the industry.  Maybe it’s time to hold a round table discussion to establish where we currently are in our industry life cycle, what the problems that we face are, possible solutions to our problems, and actionable items we can collectively take to change our path of trajectory.  I believe that if we are unified in our approach, we can indeed, solve our problems and overcome our challenges.  In the meantime, our association will continue to build and organize Regional Diving Communities and work with Regional Leaders to promote diving shows and events that build and bring local diving communities together.  We will continue to fund primary research into market analysis and business best practices and we will do everything we can to bring buyers and sellers of diving equipment, training, travel, and lifestyle products together.   This is a call for industry unity and engagement.  Are you ready to step up to the challenge?  We can’t do it alone and the industry definitely cannot continue to do it the way it has done it in the past.

This is an exciting time to become part of the Global Diving Business Network.  For more information, contact Gene Muchanski, Executive Director of the Dive Industry Association, 2294 Botanica Circle, West Melbourne, FL 32904.  Phone: 321-914-3778.  email: gene@diveindustry.net  Web: www.diveindustry.net

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Becoming an Engaged Dive Industry Professional
by Gene Muchanski, Editor
The Dive Industry Professional

The biggest bottleneck to growth in the recreational diving industry today is fragmentation.   The industry wasn’t always fragmented.  In fact, early pioneers in the 1960’s worked together to unify the industry by working together and focusing on the goals and agendas they had in common.  As a young man and a newly certified diver, I saw our recreation break away from the Sporting Goods Industry and begin to take shape as the diving industry.  It was an amazing paradigm shift to watch, study, and become a part of.  Interesting to note, the breaking away from the Sporting Goods Industry and creating a new, smaller Diving Industry, was in fact a fragmentation strategy.  Keep this in mind because it is happening again in the 2020’s for reasons I will explain.

The diving equipment manufacturers were the first to break away and unite under a single banner.  They invited the sales representatives to join them as they worked to develop and sell to the retail dive store market.  Seeing the need to safely train people how to use underwater breathing equipment before allowing them to make a purchase, the certification agencies developed training programs to teach and certify Instructors, who could in turn teach new divers.  As diving became more popular, more certification agencies entered the market.  Did you know there are over 50 certification agencies today?  Most of the diving in the early days was local diving, although the concept of dive travel entered the market and began to grow.  The industry saw a flurry of diving magazines, dive shows, and dive clubs introduced into the market.  That kept divers diving and was a key factor in the recruitment of new divers.  In my opinion, based only on personal experience, the diving industry was in full bloom in the early 1990’s but unfortunately was also at its historical peak.

From the beginning days until 2019 (COVID Pandemic) we saw the growth and prominence of the dive equipment manufacturers, certification agencies, and travel companies.  The only group that declined significantly was the retail dive store sector.  In the 1990’s there were over 2,400 dive stores and yet today there may be only 1,200 dive stores in the United States.  But there is a silver lining to this declining niche market.  It’s a positive post-pandemic paradigm shift for Retail Dive Centers and Dive Industry Professionals who become actively engaged in the Global Diving Business Network.

Even though we have lost a number of dive stores, the ones that have stayed in business have gotten bigger and have grown.  It’s getting harder to compete against the more organized and professionally run dive stores in this country, without changing the way you do business.  The ones that have focused on creating their own local market and selling to it are doing well.  Retailers are the focal point where the supply chain meets the demand chain.  They realize that by focusing on the sales of diving equipment, training, travel, and lifestyle products they can pretty much control the industry’s main channels of distribution.  If retail stores adapt a strategy to teach people how to dive, sell them the equipment they need, take them diving, and keep them active in our recreation, they can carve out a sizable market share locally, regionally, and maybe even nationally.  Successful retailers realize they are the primary ambassadors of the recreation and if they are well informed as to all of the options they have in the Global Diving Business Network, they can pick and choose the best vendors to partner with to serve their client base.  The world, in fact, could be their oyster.

If the Retail Dive Centers are the focal point of the Global Diving Business Network, then Dive Industry Professionals are the ones who make it work.  There are more options available to Dive Industry Professionals today than ever before.  They have their pick of over 800 manufacturers to buy equipment and diving related products from, over 50 certification agencies to affiliate with, and over 800 diving resorts and dive operators to work for or partner with.   Being a Dive Industry Professional gives you a plethora of choices in diving equipment, training, travel, and lifestyle products.  But only if you take the time to learn about the Global Diving Business Network and get engaged.

During the pandemic era, I believe the industry was heading down the road of increased fragmentation.  Probably because of declining sales, increased supply shortages, declining interest in scuba diving, the cancellation of trade and consumer dive shows, and of course, declining marketing budgets.   As we enter the post pandemic period we are going to be faced with high inflation, a possible major recession, more supply chain shortages, or worst is accelerated supply chain activity coupled with declining consumer sentiment.   As these economic conditions unravel our industry, you may see equipment manufacturers exit trade and consumer shows, reduce their marketing budgets, reduce their staff, and make an expensive attempt to maximize their current Dealer’s purchases by increasing Dealer requirements.   I don’t even want to discuss the foolishness of trying to sell direct to the final consumers.  Other sectors of the industry are already circling their wagons to get their current customers to only do business with them.  As I’ve heard so many times before, you just can’t keep all the good ones on the farm anymore!

In my opinion, any of the abovementioned tactics will only increase the fragmentation of the industry and force all qualified buyers of equipment, training, travel, and lifestyle products to seek out sources (and associations) that define and market to the current, in business, working members of the Global Diving Business Community.  There is strength in unity and more available options in a well-defined, organized, and unified industry.  Marketing the message of industry unity and product availability is the Dive Industry Association.  Three marketing tools were developed to assist buyers and sellers to do business with each other.  1) The Weekly Dive News Press Release Service.  2) The monthly trade magazine, The Dive Industry Professional.  3) The Annual Trade Directory & Buyers Guide.  Each marketing tool has its own page on the Association’s website at www.diveindustry.net

The Dive Industry Association will lay out its vision for industry unity and growth by introducing a 12-part series entitled, Becoming an Engaged Dive Industry Professional, starting with the January Edition of The Dive Industry Professional.  The completed series will be published as a white paper for the entire diving industry.

This is an exciting time to become part of the Global Diving Business Network.  For more information, contact Gene Muchanski, Executive Director of the Dive Industry Association, 2294 Botanica Circle, West Melbourne, FL 32904.  Phone: 321-914-3778.  email: gene@diveindustry.net  Web: www.diveindustry.net