Online and Local
The Scuba Doctor is not only an online retailer, we are also a local dive shop to our local and visiting divers. Our Mornington Peninsula location is ground zero for some the best and most varied temperate water diving in the world and certainly in Australia. There are many excellent dive shops in the Melbourne area, so to avoid their challenges and stand out from the crowd, our focus at The Scuba Doctor has always been on the needs and expectations of the experienced sport and technical diver... along with those who want to become one.
- We Dive Locally. We are located in Rye, just a few minutes from the some of the most amazing shore dives in Australia, plus we have the Great Southern Reef on our doorstep, and shipwreck dive sites galore, including four WWI submarines. All of our team members are certified recreational divers, and include sport, technical, rebreather, and instructor ratings.
- We Teach Locally. We currently choose to teach only bespoke diving courses. All of the diver training courses we arrange are guaranteed to exceed the requirements of the training certification organisation the training is being conducted under, plus Australian Standards.
- We Stock Locally. We keep our dive shop shelves and warehouse area full of equipment sought after by experienced sport and technical divers, but we only sell the dive gear our team use and recommend. We try to filter out products that are outmoded, mere duplicates, mediocre quality, or poor value. This greatly simplifies in-store product selection, allows us to stock nearly everything we like to sell, and the consolidation of our sales volumes enable us to present very favourable prices. However, having only a local dive shop for our premises and thus limited space, means we're extremely selective as to the products we stock locally. While we carry more stock that almost all other dive stores in Australia, we can't fit it all in. So we have arrangements with many of our suppliers so that even if we don't have it in stock, we can have them quickly drop ship it to you.
- We Serve Locally. We are what is known as a "destination retailer", so we don't need the hassles and expense of a high traffic frontage location. Our local dive shop is conveniently located in the Rye Industrial Estate, off Melbourne Road, in premises that have been a dive shop for thirty years. Google Maps will bring you right to our door where you'll find plenty of free parking (even for boats) and a customer lounge and kitchen. In-store you can inspect our favourite products, try-on and purchase. We will help you in-store with knowledgeable advice and no sales pressure. Our in-store and online prices are always the same, we present our lowest price everyday to everyone, and we are proud of our five-star quality customer service.
- We Fill Locally. Our diving breathing gas fill station is based on meticulously maintained oxygen compatible air compressors with inline continuous analysis for carbon monoxide, together with a gas booster and bulk air storage banks, plus medical grade Oxygen and Helium for Nitrox and Trimix fills. (Friends do not let friends dive Air.) Our team includes a Gas Blending Instructor. We provide Air (up to 300 bar), Nitrox and Trimix fills for our customers.
- We Boat Locally. Most of the area dive charter boats are independently operated. We can hook you up with our favourite local dive charter boat operators. But frankly, that's for the tourists who don't know better. We'd rather discuss what kind of diving you want to do, then recommend exactly the right dive trip as a combination of shore dives and boat dives.
- We Are Online Locally. By design, in-store and online in our company are seamlessly integrated because who we are as a local dive shop is also influenced by the unique nature of our online dive shop and vice versa. We have dedicated high-speed Wi-Fi for in-store guests. The Scuba Doctor team creates and maintains almost all of the content and graphics on our website.
- We Are Local. From the first day we opened our locally-owned locally-operated small business in Rye, our earnings have been retained in the business to support our growth with experienced sport and technical divers. All our team members live in the surrounding area. Our team and our company also support local diving and give back to our community in a variety of ways.
- We Are Australia Wide Too. We are experts at assembling, inspecting and packing the orders we ship everywhere in Australia. We do not ship outside of Australia. Many of our customers from around Australia tell us they consider The Scuba Doctor to be their "local" dive shop no matter where they live.
Dont Buy Life Support Equipment from just any supplier
Get your scuba gear from an authorised dealer like your local dive shop like The Scuba Doctor Dive Shop.
NO Bull!
For The Scuba Doctor customers, diving is often their primary hobby and for a surprising number of our customers it's part of their job. Some customers are serious hunter gatherers seeking out crays, abalone and scallops for their dinner table, while many other customers prefer to take pictures with their underwater photography and videography setups. A lot of our customers are doing dives where planned decompression stop are required, or physical overhead dives (cave and wreck), and they are doing those dives deeper and longer than ever before.
Many of our customers already have a garage full of expensive, but no longer appropriate, entry level gear that is just gathering dust. Experienced divers know that durable equipment in streamlined and reliable configurations make for the best diving.
Local or online, our customers want premium quality products for their style of diving at the right price along with product knowledge and customer service they can rely upon. We summarise this as our customers are divers and divers expect... NO Bull!