Hi Brenda, it is an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?
My husband and I, after being married a short time, came to St Petersburg, December of 2012. I am a native of Boston and he is a native of Toronto, Ontario, Canada where he owned and operated three dive stores. He was also instrumental in creating an environmentally friendly resort in Belize during the early 1990’s. He began diving as a 14-year-old and was the youngest Scuba Instructor in Canada at 17. After 7000 dives, he has a huge passion for the sport. Up until I met Joe, I never entertained the idea of becoming a scuba diver and had dedicated my life to medical practice management. Understanding his passion for diving, while on our honeymoon in Jamaica (2011), I decided to give it a try through a Discover Scuba program at our resort. I hated it. I was terrified, even in the pool.
To make matters worse, the instructor shooed Joe away as he peered through the bushes to see how I was doing. The idea that anyone could breathe underwater and enjoy diving to depths that I could only imagine was just not my idea of fun. Early on I learned the right Instructor makes all the difference.
I avoided diving, even the suggestion of diving, for several years thereafter. All that changed after our relocation to Florida in 2013. Here we were living in one of the most exciting areas of the country with diving opportunities all about us. Wreck, Reef, Cave, Drift, Cavern, Deep, Night, Springs diving and more. Florida truly offers something for every diver. But, I hadn’t forgotten my initial experience. I was still chicken. Joe, in his patient manner, gently suggested I give it a try again, this time with him as my instructor.
Well, we all know that spouses or partners should never attempt to teach each other anything. Under his guidance I found, wait for it, that I loved it! I completed my Open Water Certification Dives in Tampa Bay and the Gulf of Mexico and quickly went on to enjoy diving trips to the Florida Keys, West Palm Beach, the wrecks at Tobermory, Ontario, Canada (in a drysuit!-water temp 34′ F) and yes I even dove Bonne Terre Mine, a flooded and well-lit former lead mine in Bonne Terre, Missouri.
Within a year, I had completed my PADI Advanced and Rescue Diver Programs and am now a PADI Divemaster looking to become an Instructor within the next two years. Diving was becoming effortless. The respect for the risk was there but the fear was gone. I was completely relaxed, in control and weightless in a hostile environment that was so welcoming and wonderful in the truest sense of the word. I had discovered a brand-new world and another side of myself. I now fully understood the passion my husband always expressed as he spoke about diving.
Joe and I are both entrepreneurial by nature so, the next step, what else, was to look to establish Letts Dive!! his former Canadian dive here in Florida. An attempt to purchase an established local dive shop fell through. At that juncture we decided to open our own business in St. Petersburg next to the 7-11 at the corner of 49th St N and 30th Ave. As divers we had not had the best experience with many of the local dive shops. This strongly drew us to our vision and mission to create a quite different dive shop model.
We set our goal to establish a small, intimate, boutique style store. We didn’t want it to look like a 1930’s yard sale. We wanted a client to feel the difference the moment they walked through the door. Staff uniforms, be greeted and introduced to all in the shop around them. High levels of service at every turn. Carry their tanks in and out of the shop. LISTEN to their needs and so on. Our round dive flag logo with me sitting on the anchor and a ship’s wheel in the background was meant to set a different business tone.
The logo’s message is one of diversity and inclusion. Unlike the traditional square dive flag our round flag states that no one will be boxed in or boxed out at Letts Dive!!. All are to be welcomed and embraced. Women are now making up a high percentage of divers. Many may not feel comfortable in some of the shops. We are and were very conscious of that. At times, we have observed, if you are a minority, embrace a different lifestyle, come from a different station in life, maybe you will not fit in everywhere. Here at Letts Dive!! all are welcome. The anchor stands for stability and the wheel symbolizes the guidance we provide. Me sitting on the anchor with my signature pink fins? Pink is the color of diversity and inclusion.
I am proud to be the majority owner and President of Letts Dive!! We have a minority partner in the business, Erin Langenburg a PADI Instructor, and she conducts our operations on the East Coast from her home in Miami. Joe, now retired from a career on Wall Street, oversees the day to day business and training operations from our store in St. Petersburg. By the way he couldn’t be happier. Rounding out our on-site staff is Mark Sommer III, our resident equipment technician, PADI Master Diver Trainer, and SSI Instructor Trainer and Sean Harris, my Son, our tank inspector and sales associate. We are fortunate to have Pearce Daley, PADI Course Director on staff as our Underwater Photography Instructor. We have other instructors on our staff that continue to support and help us grow. We’re indebted to them for being a valuable part of our team.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
We opened our doors in 2019. November 2 to be exact. Our reasoning, open during the “off” season? Work out the kinks. From inventory control, point of sale systems, class scheduling, compressor installation, staff training and knowledge, etc. and thus be ready for “peak” season beginning in March . The first couple of months were encouraging, our business model was embraced by divers as they were showing up saying how refreshing our store was. It was exactly the encouraging feedback we needed. Our sales reflected that.
Then COVID19 hit.
The business literally took a dive in February and a deeper dive in March. Our peak season was supposed to be beginning. April, like many other businesses, forced us to shut down. While we could have easily qualified as an essential service under maritime guidelines, little was known about the virus, so we wanted to do our part to protect staff and patrons alike, so we closed completely. A tough decision for us, but the right one.
We re-opened in May with strict new CDC guidelines and our own (sterilizing equipment, gloves, masks in store, etc.) in place having lost two of what should have been our best months. Thankfully, our divers returned. We are eternally grateful for their support. We remain extraordinarily strong. Joe’s business acumen and lessons learned from his dive shops in the 80’s have served us well.
We understand our mission and vision and despite the bumps in the road, trust the diving community will recognize what we stand for and choose Letts Dive!!.
We miss the camaraderie of face to face monthly dive club meetings but ZOOM meetings have filled the gap. But a challenge nevertheless.
I founded an all-woman dive group called the Sisters of Sedna (Inuit Goddess of the Sea) at Letts Dive!! You can find us on Facebook. We’re at 155 members and growing! The intent of the group was to give women a safe space to ask any and all questions about diving, socialize with each other and participate in women-only trips and classes, all the while encouraging more women to participate in the sport at whatever level they choose. There is also a mixed club within the store that is open to men and women. In the face of COVID 19, hosting dive club meetings as we normally would has been challenging. Divers are a social bunch so our trips with restricted numbers are still popular but challenging to put together. We are eager to once again see international travel open so we may resume our more exotic trips to places like Bonaire, Grand Cayman, Canada, the Galapagos, and more.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about Letts Dive!!?
Deep Down, We Care!! We specialize in taking divers from beginner to instructor. We offer over 66 different and distinct diving educational programs at Letts Dive!! We offer a full line of rental equipment. We service most major brands. We have a compressor on site and can fill both air and nitrox cylinders. We offer an international dive travel service. We offer local travel services both into the Gulf of Mexico or to the East Coast of Florida. We carry Atomic, TUSA, OMS, DUI, OTS, Akona, Bare, XS Scuba, Suunto, Shearwater, Ratio, Poseidon – all top of the line brands. Reflecting our business philosophy, we offer a diverse product lineup. Whenever possible, we purchase local. All products are internet competitive and may be purchased in store or on our online store at www.lettsdive.com. We offer 12 months of zero percent in-store financing through Synergy Bank. We have a generous layaway program. Military, Firefighters, Nurses and Doctors receive a standing 15% on all purchases.
What sets us apart is our depth of experience and our dedication to diversity and inclusion. No one, and we mean no one, should feel intimidated, put down, excluded, or ignored when they walk into any dive shop because of their gender, color, ethnicity, lifestyle, station in life, or experience level. We are most proud of our business philosophy that “Deep Down, We Care!” We will spend as much time with a ten-year-old wanting to learn to dive as we will with the parents of that young diver or a closed-circuit rebreather cave diver. We listen. We pride ourselves on not selling but rather educating individuals about the sport and the equipment associated with it, not to mention the joys that await beneath the ocean’s surface. As I found out.
From our collective 125+ years of diving experience at Letts Dive!!, we dispense information to make the new diver or the seasoned veteran a safer, happier, content, and hopefully repeat diver. (Joe, a veteran of the Canadian Navy has 54 years of diving experience, 51 years of those as an instructor and has trained thousands of students. Mark Sommer III a veteran of the US Navy also has an equally impressive set of qualifications and over 50 years of experience.)
How do you define success?
We believe success is the outcome of an undertaking, specified as achieving its aims. Our definition of success at Letts Dive!! is every client interaction should leave them feeling that “Deep Down, We (truly do) Care!”. When this is accomplished, all other aspects of our business can’t help but succeed. We think our Google reviews reflect that. We also believe success can be defined by how much we’re able to give back to the community. We are involved with the Coral Restoration Foundation in Key Largo, cleaning coral trees and out-planting coral. We are working to do a major cleanup project with a local organization through PADI Project Aware’s Dive Against Debris. On our agenda for 2021 are community outreach programs to introduce diving to underprivileged and at-risk young men and women, because, Deep Down, We Care! We invite all divers to visit our shop, meet us and of course, BAM BAM the World Famous Dive Shop Dog!!
Contact Info:
- Address: Letts Dive!! 3010 49th St N Saint Petersburg, FL 33710
- Email: info@lettsdive.com
- Website: www.lettsdive.com
- Instagram: @letts_dive
- Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/LettsDiveLLC/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_xWGCluwWTkFilojMZ77jA
