Survey Results | Dive Professional Career | Scuba Diving Industry Market

Are dive centers & instructors equipped to provide a quality experience to scuba divers?

Can scuba divers trust dive training agencies, instructors, dive shops & dive resorts? Why do we lack consistency in the quality of the experience?

Darcy Kieran is the author of the handbook “Your Career and/or Life as a Scuba Diving Instructor: How to Make a Good Living Out of Your Passion for Scuba Diving” and a unique advanced logbook & checklists for scuba divers, divemasters & instructors.

InDepth Magazine and the Business of Diving Institute are collaborating on a series of scuba diving industry surveys to better understand where we stand on key dive industry issues, identify workable solutions, increase awareness of opportunities, and fuel discussions among dive professionals.

We thank the following scuba diving industry leaders for supporting this initiative: Shearwater, DAN Europe, and GUE.

Our latest InDepth / Scubanomics study is part of a deep dive into the current dive industry business model. Our November 2022 survey focused on the quality of the experience provided to scuba divers. If our existing business processes do not deliver the quality experience expected by today’s demanding consumers, we must reconsider how we do business.

Please note:

• For the purpose of this study, “dive center owners” include dive shops and dive resort owners, “dive instructors” include instructor trainers and course directors, and “dive professionals” include them all.
• When there is a significant difference, we compare results between PADI-affiliated instructors and dive centers vs. non-PADI-affiliated ones simply because PADI is the largest dive training agency and therefore, it can be valuable to see how PADI dive professionals feel compared to those affiliated with smaller training agencies.
• Among respondents to our survey, 70.0% of dive centers were affiliated with PADI (exclusively or simultaneously with other affiliations), and 58.5% of instructors had at least one PADI instructor rating. At the bottom of this post, you may get more details on who participated in the survey.

Let’s start with the almost obvious…

The Quality of The Experience (or Lack Thereof)

I wrote numerous Scubanomics articles mentioning how we need more consistency in the quality of the experience. But am I the only one to think like that?

Between two dive centers associated with the same training agency, the quality of the service provided is often significantly different.

There’s almost a consensus around this statement.

• Among dive center owners, 83.7% agree or highly agree with that statement. In fact, 59.2% highly agree. Only 4.1% disagree, and nobody highly disagrees.

It’s a topic on which dive center owners and instructors are in sync.

• 84.8% of dive instructors agree or highly agree with that statement, and 50.0% highly agree. Only 5.1% of dive instructors disagree or highly disagree.

And it is not an opinion limited to dive professionals.

• 89.2% of scuba divers agree or highly agree with that statement. Only 3.9% disagree, while 4.9% have no opinion on the matter.

This lack of trust in what kind of experience they will get at a dive center ought to have an impact on dive travel and the dropout rate.

• 58.3% of scuba divers say that when they book a vacation that includes scuba diving in a destination they have never been to, they have no reliable way of knowing the level of service they will receive at that location.

Because of a high turnover of staff in the dive industry and because the quality of the service is highly dependent on the dive professional, reviews cannot be trusted. The 5-star review from last month may be related to a staff member no longer being there.

In any other industry, I usually can trust the brand. For example, if I book a room at the Hilton, I have a reasonably clear image of what I will get. But that is not so with dive training agency brands, as we are seeing in the results of this survey.

• 89.4% of scuba divers wish there were a reliable way besides online reviews to know the quality of the experience provided at dive destinations.

So, scuba divers and dive professionals do not trust that they will get a reliable quality experience when switching dive centers. Is it better when changing dive instructors?

Between two dive instructors associated with the same training agency, the quality of the training is often significantly different.

The consensus is as strong here!

• Among dive center owners, 85.7% agree or highly agree with that statement, including 59.2% who highly agree. Only 2.0% disagree, and nobody highly disagrees.
• Meanwhile, 81.2% of dive instructors agree or highly agree with that statement, and 51.9% highly agree. Only 7.7% of dive instructors disagree or highly disagree.
• And scuba divers are on board with that conclusion. 86.5% of scuba divers agree or highly agree with such a statement, including a majority (52.9%) who highly agree.

So how can a scuba diver decide where to learn to dive?

It’s the instructor that matters!

One piece of advice dive instructors often give to people thinking about learning to dive is to carefully pick the instructor more than the dive center. It is unfortunately not easy to do for somebody who has never been diving before and knows nothing about anything!

Are dive instructors simply promoting their own agenda?

Well, a majority of scuba divers agree with them!

• 69.2% of scuba divers say the service quality they receive depends more on the person they are interacting with (e.g., the dive instructor) than the dive center.

So, we almost all agree that there is no consistency in the quality of the experience from one dive center to the next and from one dive instructor to the next.

So, where does the problem come from?

Do we have the training, tools, and support to deliver a quality experience?

Let’s look first at dive center owners.

• 54.2% of dive center owners believe they have the training, tools, and support to properly manage a dive center. This number is 48.5% for dive centers affiliated with PADI.
• 64% of dive center owners believe they have the training, tools, and support to properly manage the quality of the courses provided at their dive center (57.1% for dive centers affiliated with PADI).

So, a majority of dive center owners believe they have the training, tools, and support to deliver a quality experience to scuba divers.

Where do dive instructors stand on this?

• 69.7% of dive instructors believe they have the training, tools, and support to properly manage their business activities related to teaching scuba diving (69.6% for PADI instructors).
• 75.2% of dive instructors believe they have the training, tools, and support to properly manage the quality of their dive courses (76.1% for PADI instructors).

Therefore, overall, it seems:

• Dive instructors believe they have what they need to provide quality scuba diving courses, although they are better prepared for teaching than managing the business part of their activities.
• Although the majority of dive center owners also believe they have what they need on that front, they are less numerous to feel prepared to manage their activities than instructors are.

Is the training of dive professionals adequate?

When preparing a survey like this one, we limit the number of questions to increase the completion rate. In this case, we bundled “training, tools, and support” together and survey respondents answered based on that statement.

From other questions, it seems the training is adequate in terms of being ready to teach scuba diving, but that may not be the case in providing customer service. At the very least, a majority of dive professionals would welcome further training on that front.

• 87.8% of dive center owners would like to provide more customer service training to their staff.
• 59.7% of dive instructors would seriously consider taking a customer service training program for dive professionals if there was a good one.

A few years back, I worked on a project with John Kinsella at DSAT, a branch of PADI, to set up a business training program. But PADI restructured as part of one of their numerous changes of hands, John Kinsella left, and the project died.

There is a clear need for business training programs for dive professionals. Last week, we looked at a Bachelor's degree in Malta that is making some inroads in that direction, although it also lacks on the customer service front.

If we want to improve consistency in the quality of the experience of scuba diving consumers, we need to train dive professionals to do just that.

But would that be enough? How can the experience be so highly inconsistent between dive centers and dive instructors affiliated with the same scuba diving training brand? After all, dive training agencies have quality assurance departments, right?

The Role of Dive Training Agencies & Quality Assurance

It would be fair to assume that if an XYZ course varies so greatly between various XYZ instructors and dive centers, there has to be a problem in how the XYZ dive training agency standards are applied, right? And that is, indeed, what a majority of dive instructors believe.

• 69.8% of dive instructors consider the quality assurance done by training agencies insufficient to ensure that consumers have an excellent experience in dive courses (72.5% for PADI instructors).

Even worse:

• 61.3% of dive instructors believe the quality assurance done by training agencies is insufficient to ensure that consumers receive safe courses (63.8% for PADI instructors).

We may be slightly better at ensuring safety than a good customer experience, but overall, dive training agencies need to improve on both fronts. And a higher percentage of PADI instructors consider there’s a lack of quality assurance.

About Free Dive Professional Membership

Big dive training agencies shouldn’t take the low level of satisfaction with quality lightly, especially now that a smaller agency recently offered free annual membership to active dive instructors.

We tested how receptive dive instructors were to this concept.

• 51.8% of dive instructors say they are or will seriously consider a cross-over to a training agency offering free membership to active dive instructors (56.5% among PADI instructors).

Of course, consumers are notoriously receptive to anything that is presented as “free.” So we have to take these results with a grain of salt. However, when mixed with a lack of satisfaction with the quality assurance provided by dive training agencies, the ice gets thinner!

Is there a need for a high-end dive training agency?

A clear majority of dive center owners and dive instructors think that the dive training agencies are failing at ensuring quality, resulting in consumers' inability to trust what they will get when going from one dive center to the next or from one dive instructor to the next.

So, is there a need for a “better” scuba diving training agency? Let’s see.

• 60.0% of dive center owners would seriously consider affiliating their dive center to a higher-quality training agency if there was one (same percentage for PADI dive centers).
• 69.2% of dive instructors would seriously consider a cross-over to a higher-quality training agency if there was one (70.1% of PADI instructors).

When PADI launched the National Geographic instructor and dive center program, I thought we would finally see a high-end brand in dive training, but the program rolled out just like any other one. Although my dive center had to commit to higher standards to become a National Geographic dive center, there was little effort put into ensuring it was living up to its quality commitment. And the program died.

So the need remains.

It could be hard for a current dive training agency to roll out a real quality control system because it could lead to the expulsion of a significant number of their current instructors and affiliated dive centers. However, a dive training agency could launch a separate higher-quality brand that could act as a “quality seal” limited to instructors and dive centers following higher standards.

If current dive training agencies do not act quickly on this front, I expect an outsider will eventually move in and eat their lunches. In fact, in many industries, it is common for real change to come from a new player. And perhaps we will have to entice one to come in for our industry to wake up.

With Apple diving head first (or fins first) into the dive industry, it may eventually open the door to other outsider brands to do the same.

To dig further into the quality of the experience we provide scuba divers, we request your help with a survey specifically dedicated to your experience during your first entry-level open-water diver course. Please take part in this new survey.

Until we see the rise of a scuba diving brand ready to spend on ensuring the quality of services at locations displaying its brand, is there something we can do?

How do we teach? Do we spend enough time?

Another statement we regularly hear in the dive industry is that courses are too short to provide a quality experience. Do we agree on that?

• 74.8% of dive instructors would like to spend more time with scuba diving students to provide better quality training.

So, presumably, these instructors question even the quality of their own courses!

Since that is directly related to how we sell our services, we can do something about it.

To be able to spend more time with student divers, we need to charge enough for the course. Time is not free — pool time and our own time. So we have to move away from competing on price. Dive professionals must find a way to differentiate their services so that consumers believe they are getting better value by paying more.

It is in our hands! Today.

Coaching vs. Selling Courses

In my recent book on having a successful career as a scuba diving instructor, I promoted the idea of selling your dive instructor services per hour instead of per course, in other words, becoming a coach instead of an instructor peddling c-cards. It is beyond the scope of this article to dive into the details of it, but a majority of dive instructors are receptive to the concept.

• 62.2% of dive instructors would prefer coaching scuba diving students “per hour” until they are ready to graduate instead of teaching “courses.”

OK! So, what are we waiting for?

The Cost of eLearning

Otherwise, could another pricing issue be related to the high costs of online learning provided by some dive training agencies?

• 48.2% of dive instructors believe the amount of money taken by dive training agencies to offer online learning to their students is not reasonable compared to how much they get paid for teaching.
• 21.4% of dive instructors think the amount of money dive training agencies get for that part of the training process is reasonable.
• 21.4% have no opinion on the matter.

In comparison, 58.1% of PADI instructors believe the amount of money going to PADI for the eLearning part is not reasonable compared to what the instructors get for teaching.

For any product and service, you can only increase the price to a certain point, after which consumption comes crashing. It’s called price elasticity. Perhaps eLearning has reached that breaking point.

Talking of costs and prices, are we earning a good living?

Am I making a good living out of my passion for scuba diving?

Earlier this year, InDepth and Scubanomics released a complete study on the economics of being a dive instructor. New results from our current survey reiterate that, unfortunately, a career in diving is more a hobby than a career.

• Only 13.6% of dive instructors say they make a good living out of their passion for scuba diving.
• This number drops to 5.9% among PADI dive instructors.

We often hear dive instructors complaining that dive store owners underpay them with the underlying tone that the dive store owners are making big bucks. Is it true?

Well, dive center owners appear to do only a bit better than dive instructors.

• 26% of dive center owners say they make a good living out of their passion for scuba diving.
• This number drops to 20% among owners of PADI-affiliated dive centers.

What does that have to do with the quality of the experience? Well, when you barely make ends meet, you may feel forced to cut corners for short-term survival.

Could we charge more for scuba diving training?

A majority of dive professionals are barely making ends meet. Dive instructors need to spend more time in the water with student divers. We need a genuine quality control system.

Solutions to all of these observations require money. So, could we charge more? Well, it seems like scuba divers are willing to pay more.

• 87.4% of scuba divers are willing to pay more for a better dive instructor.

This number is significant since consumers tend to say ‘no’ to survey questions related to paying more.

So, the short-term solution becomes a question of better marketing of teaching services for scuba divers to see the value in paying more.

How are we doing on the sales & marketing front?

We can’t discuss business models without looking at sales and marketing. Besides, we need money if we want to spend more time with students and increase quality control.

Here are a few findings from our November dive industry survey of dive instructors, dive center owners, and scuba divers.

Sales, Marketing & Business Support for Dive Centers & Instructors

• 31.3% of dive center owners say that training agencies provide them with enough marketing and business management support, while 43.8% disagree.

In other words, dive training agencies are better at providing sales & marketing support than ensuring quality, but they are lacking overall on both fronts.

Yet, training agencies are doing better than dive gear manufacturers.

• Only 17.1% of dive center owners say that dive gear manufacturers provide them with enough marketing and business management support, while 71.4% disagree.

Otherwise, the need for staff training is as big in sales as in customer service.

• 78.8% of dive center owners would like to provide more sales training to their staff compared to 88.2% for customer service training.

We often think that dive instructors are not receptive to selling. Well, that may be a misconception.

• 48.7% of dive instructors would seriously consider taking a sales training program for dive professionals if there was a good one.

Perhaps dive instructors are simply reticent to becoming like a used-car salesman in dive centers where quality is not present or, at the very least, not constant. Selling is, at its core, about listening to customers and helping them get what is good for them. It is part of providing customer service.

And dive instructors care about customer service. As reported earlier in this analysis, 59.7% of them would welcome customer service training.

Expanding Into Other Watersports

On Scubanomics, I often discussed that not all consumers want to “be” labeled as scuba divers, even if they may be interested in “doing” some scuba diving as part of other activities they do during their vacations or at home.

• In our survey, 44.2% of scuba divers declared participating in scuba diving, although it’s only one of the numerous water sports and outdoor activities they are interested in.

In the past, I suggested that dive centers, at least in some markets, would benefit from converting themselves into watersports or outdoor centers. And attending the Outdoor Retailer show next year may be more valuable than yet another year of the same old at the DEMA Show.

Well, some dive professionals are open to this idea.

• 67.7% of dive center owners would seriously consider offering other water sports activities if they could integrate them into their dive center.
• 42.4% of dive instructors are interested in learning how to teach or coach other water sports or outdoor activities.

Do we have the right dive center owners and managers?

Here’s one more nugget about dive center owners.

In many cases, it’s a dive instructor who becomes a dive center owner as a way to make a living with scuba diving, not because they have the training or the interest in managing a retail store.

• 45.5% of dive center owners would rather not own a dive center if they could make a good living by teaching scuba diving and leading dive groups.
• 34.3% of dive center owners believe they are better at teaching scuba diving than at managing a retail store.

Think about it! Almost half of current dive center owners would rather not own a dive center. There is something very wrong with our business model!

Dive instructors and dive leaders must make a good living with teaching and diving activities if we want to have a chance at increasing quality in the dive industry. And dive centers should be managed by business managers.

Are tech diving instructors providing better quality?

In our study on the economics of being a dive instructor, we found that tech diving instructors tend to earn much more than other recreational dive instructors. But does it translate into better quality?

The jury is divided on that one.

• 39.4% of dive center owners believe that dive centers offering tech diving courses typically operate with better quality in their operations, but 27.3% disagree, and almost one in three (30.3%) have no opinion on the matter.
• The results are similar among dive instructors, with 38.4% believing that dive instructors offering tech diving courses typically have better quality in their teaching, while 18.5% disagree, and 33.9% have no opinion.

Digging Deeper

To dig further into the quality of the experience we provide to scuba divers, we launched a survey dedicated to your experience during your first entry-level open-water diver course.

Whether teaching advanced recreational diving courses or even more when teaching tech diving, we’ve all seen students showing up with poor skills. I have witnessed divemasters showing up for one of my instructor development courses and being unable to hover in mid-water. Tech diving instructors often complain about having to redo basic skills before starting a tech diving course.

Quality starts at the entry level. So please take part in this new survey about your first scuba diving course.

Survey: Quality of Entry-Level Scuba Diving Experiences

Suggestions Received From Survey Respondents

At the end of the survey, we asked respondents what business process dive industry professionals should improve or change to increase participation, retention, and customer satisfaction in scuba diving.

Besides the word “quality,” which was repeatedly mentioned, here are some notable observations.

From Dive Center Owners

• The industry needs some type of training in operating a business. Maybe offering some type of certificate program like colleges do.
• More time spent “listening to” customers, instead of “talking at” them about how good an instructor they are (especially when that is not true).
• Provide entry-level divers with quality training. Our center has a very high retention rate for new customers because we teach in neutral buoyancy and our divers are very comfortable in the water. Because they are comfortable, they keep coming back!
• It’s much too easy to become a pro, starting from divemaster. There is limited experience and knowledge. The scary part is that out of these so-called “professionals,” we get the new generation of course directors. The quality of training is far below reasonable standards.

From Dive Instructors

• The image of diving as “safe and easy” leads customers to think that short classes are enough to “be divers” while they are just being able to stay alive underwater. We can’t retain customers if they’re not trained well enough to dive well and have fun underwater.
• Dive shop owners need to learn how to run a business. People will pay for quality instruction.
• Focus on value provision rather than price. Take time to deliver quality training, then you can produce safe, competent, and confident divers, who will thereby be more engaged.
• The value proposition needs to be higher. The business needs to retain its clients and make lifelong divers more than turn and burn open-water divers that don’t stay.
• Typical open water courses teach people how to survive underwater, not scuba dive.
• More in-water time for students.
• The “certification guaranteed in a week” approach doesn’t help. It only leads to very uncomfortable and dangerous dives and divers. It must stop. It must be something like “your tempo, your comfort, finish whenever, wherever you like.” A more modular approach.
• Most instructors are simply horrible at teaching.
• Proper staff training. How a diving center trains its staff ultimately defines the quality of the diving center. Teach them the bare minimum, and they will do the bare minimum. Teach them how to guide, how to organize, how to sell, and how to care for customers, and they will do just that.
• For the PADI IDC, they need to emphasize how important real-life situations are… There is too much slate reading.
• The industry should reject the bargain model of scuba diving training as it all comes down to offering non-quality training and slavery to all professionals.
• We need to focus more on the customer experience and ensure that it is safe and fun. Students come to us to learn a new tool that they can use to explore other parts of their world. If they don’t enjoy their time in the water and don’t feel comfortable by the time they have finished their training, they are far less likely to continue diving.

From Scuba Divers

• I would disagree with the concept of an all-in-one shop. Let clubs handle the training as they do a better job because they get more benefits from competent divers.
• Go to a training model more like fitness programs and yoga studios: pay a monthly fee to work with an instructor to build your skills. Start in the pool and, when ready, move on to open water. People would still need to show proof of skill mastery to earn a certification and dive without an instructor, but following this model creates an indefinite revenue stream and keeps people invested.
• From what I can see by taking and asking questions, the current generation is about saving the planet. So, in order to recruit more divers, place an emphasis on what’s important to them.
• The quality of training needs to improve. I have qualifications in BSAC, PADI, SSI, CDAA, and TDI. And in all these except BSAC, people passed the courses who shouldn’t have. Most divers I know see dive qualifications as a joke.
• Train those dive instructors about their toxic behavior and masculinity. Make them understand that they must serve the client, not the opposite.
• Good communication and a clear time frame so that stress can be avoided. In my experience, some dive centers have a really laid-back atmosphere until you have to get into the water! Then everything needs to go fast, buddy checks being missed, stress going into the water.
• Better quality control than what is in place at the moment.
• Too often, training is only associated with the bottom line, and students are treated like items in a factory line. Partly, it could also be the agencies’ fault, resting on their laurels for too long.
• Many dive shops have small business mindsets and try and get as much money out of a customer now rather than build a long-term relationship.
• Deliver training so the diver feels confident in diving not just surviving.
• Make the OW course a better experience so that those students come back instead of dropping out.
• Instructor quality control is nearly non-existent.
• Incompetence with cards that provide confidence is a recipe for disaster.
• Quality control of instructor development and putting real meaning back into PADI’s 5-star store rating (currently very misleading and unreliable).
• Completeness of training. Many divers leave their initial class without the confidence to dive, and they never dive again because of this.

You may also be interested in:

Don’t Blame The Internet! The Traditional Dive Shop Business Model Was Dead Before That

Who answered this survey on the quality of the experience provided by the dive industry?

307 scuba divers participated in this November 2022 InDepth/Scubanomics dive computer survey.

• 20.5% of respondents owned a dive center (of which 81.3% were also dive instructors)
• 39.7% of respondents were dive instructors who had never owned a dive center
• 39.7% were scuba divers who had never been instructors or dive center owners

Some questions were only asked to one of these groups, as outlined in the analysis provided in this report.

Among dive instructors:

• 50.0% were primarily teaching through a dive center
• 33.0 % were primarily teaching independently
• 10.2% were no longer teaching
• 6.8% were teaching through dive clubs or educational facilities like universities

Survey respondents were residents of the following geographic area:

• 38.9% Europe
• 37.7% USA (including Alaska & Hawaii)
• 23.4% The rest of the world

Scuba divers who answered our dive computer survey were in the following age groups:

• 0.0%: Under 18
• 2.1%: 18–24
• 8.0%: 25–34
• 27.6%: 35–44
• 35.6%: 45–54
• 19.7%: 55–64
• 7.1%: 65 and over

Also from Darcy Kieran:

• Handbook: Your Career and/or Life as a Scuba Diving Instructor: How to Make a Good Living Out of Your Passion for Scuba Diving.
• Logbook: Advanced Scuba Diving Logbook with Checklists for certified scuba divers, divemasters & dive instructors.
• Handbook: Advanced Guide to SPF Scuba Diving for Scuba Divers, Divemasters & Dive Instructors: Develop Better Scuba Diving Skills, Dive Safer, Save Money & Have More Fun!
• Handbook: The Ultimate Beginner’s Guide To Scuba Diving: How to Increase Safety, Save Money & Have More Fun!
• Logbook: STARTER Scuba Diving Logbook with Checklists while getting your open water diver certification!
• Reference book: Scuba Diving Industry Market Reports, Data & Statistics.

Side note: During your surface intervals, have a look at my novels with a scuba diving twist, starting with “Mystery of The Blue Dragon” and “Shadows on Ocean Drive.”

You could help the dive industry by taking part in ongoing dive industry surveys. You will also find results from our past scuba diving market studies here.

Don’t be left out! Subscribe to Scubanomics: The Dive Industry Compass to be the first to know about new dive industry market data & insights. Otherwise, be our “dive business buddy” on LinkedIn, Facebook, and elsewhere.

What now? Have a look at the complete Scubanomics Table of Contents.

Let’s make a good living out of our passion for scuba diving!