I have now been Diving since 1993 and professionally since 1995. In these years I have experienced a change in the Diving industry and specially the learn to dive concept. Once upon a time the adventure sports people enjoyed could be skiing, diving or sailing. They were often considered extreme sports requiring experience and training that might be in some cases vigorous. With 'Sea Hunt' on television and Jacques Cousteau exploring the deep blue, many baby boomers spent my youth with the indisputable fact that breathing under water was an adventure with many vowing to complete it before they die.

With the introduction of other extreme sports from abseiling to white water rafting there was a bit of competition for the adventure dollar. Introduce the following generation Y or X with the necessity for instant gratification and the notion of completing a 4 day course learn to dive course just to go under the water suddenly lost its appeal. You can get more bang for your buck carrying out a tandem skydive in a couple of hours albeit for exactly the same cost of accomplishing a scuba dive course. This had an effect on the amount of people learning how to scuba dive. When "JAWS" hit the silver screen the single biggest drop in dive certifications. Ever since then we've had tsunamis, global warming, 9/11, and some other number of incidents that have all reduced the uptake of diving or the decline in certifications worldwide.

Let's look at what happened to the PADI Figure out how to dive course where in fact the learner diver typically begins.

In the 80s, the learn to dive course in Sydney, Australia was around AUD $495 for 4 days + the expense of kit you needed to get going. The schedule would have spent a day in the classroom and sometimes additional nights, a day in the pool, and 2 days in the ocean to perform 4 dives.

Before long dive centres started condensing the course down seriously to a shorter period. In 1996, I had the initial 3 day scheduled course theory - Thursday night theory, Saturday in the pool for skills, a bit more theory Saturday afternoon followed by 2 days in the ocean dives. Did this assistance with certifications? Well yes it did however in an attempt to improve value we would take the clients away on a dive trip for the final 2 dives followed by 2 fun dives off a boat. However even though the schedule was now longer then 4 days it gave greater value to the client in the eyes of the dive operator. But certifications on weekends away still dropped as people did not want to pay two weekends diving or spend a weekend in a bunkhouse. In 2001 the possibility of completing the diving course in Sydney without the weekend away was standard.

Now if you do not offer different things how will you distinguish yourself from your own competition? Well advertising and price. Which means this begins the price decline in learn to dive courses, which led to dive courses selling for $199 & $149 or bring a buddy and get 2 for the buying price of one padi ddivemaster gili islands. This led to the major players such as for example Pro Dive delivering more certifications but not making hardly any money on the course, and having to utilize gear sales and dive trips to steadfastly keep up profits. Followed was a spiralling price war, starving small players. Consequently the capacity to retain customers was lost because of the concentrate on Figure out how to dive course.

In 2006, with the introduction of the PADI DVD, prescriptive teaching gave the possibility of owning a competitively priced course on a schedule that could suit more people. The 2 day learn to dive course was born. This schedule has proved to be successful for both client and dive operator. It does require more administration and a stricter booking policy but with the bugs ironed out this schedule has improved certifications from learn to dive courses right through to continued education courses. It has a competitive advantage for the dive operator that fulfills all the required requirements.

This past year 2007 Pro Dive Drummoyne had significant increases in certifications and moved against the trend of the dive industry by being one of the only dive centres in Sydney to complete so. It has been made possible through fine tuning the tools from PADI and putting a system that leads to a secure fun and timely certification course. As the initial dive operator to provide the program I am now convinced that this is the way forward to contend with adventure sports and the changing nature of the consumer where time is money.