BUSINESS EDU
Rebuilding Scuba Starts at the Dive Store by Harry Truitt , Owner, Lighthouse Diving, WA
- FOR MORE THAN 30 years, the scuba industry has been trying to figure out how to grow. In the 1990s, when Gallup polling suggested
role in creating divers. Warm-water destinations often focused on introductory experiences and referred interested customers
back home to complete full certifi- cation courses. Local dive centers offered longer programs, continuing education, local dives, social events, travel opportunities, and a pathway into the scuba lifestyle. They did not just certify divers. They created
Scuba Diving Industry Magazine’s count shows 986 U.S. dive shops, using Google Street View to help verify a physical retail or training location.
that a large segment of the population wanted to try scuba diving at some point in their lives, many believed the sport would continue to grow for decades. That did not happen.
For many years, Mark Young and his industry publications tracked the number of dive training centers and dive stores in the United States. That data became one of the few consistent attempts to measure the size of the retail training base. Although those publications stopped operating in 2020 during COVID, the historical trend they documented remains important. There was a time when more than 1,500 commercially zoned dive stores and training centers were reported in the United States. Some estimates placed the number of training locations even higher. The number stabilized in the early 2000s before beginning a long decline that has continued for decades. S cuba Diving Industry Magazine’s count shows 986 U.S. dive shops, using Google Street View to help verify a physical retail or training location. Regardless of the exact historical comparison point, the direction is clear: the industry has fewer local dive centers than it once did. Fewer dive centers mean fewer places where people are introduced to diving, trained properly, mentored into the lifestyle, and retained as active customers. There are several reasons for this decline. First, the Baby Boom generation helped drive the growth of scuba diving, influenced by high-profile television programs such as Sea Hunt and The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau. Those shows made the underwater world visible and exciting to a mass audience. As they disappeared from popular culture, later generations did not receive the same repeated exposure. Demographic changes also played a role. Smaller generations following the Baby Boomers meant a smaller pool of potential customers. In the 1980s, local scuba training centers had a powerful
customers who became part of a community. As training models changed, more certification activity shifted toward shorter courses and destination-based instruction. This created convenience and opened opportunities for trav- el-based training, but it also reduced the amount of time many new divers spent connected to their local dive center.
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