Groupon endorses Skyride!

[alabamaskydiver 0]

Well, as it appears, Groupon now endorses Skyride and their new alias, Sportations!

I've been noticing lately a ramped up effort in the Groupon forums by jumpers around the country to post the warnings and information about who Sportations really is and that company name's ties to Skyride.

This is not a personal attack, but I noticed that Jumpdude seemed to be the "Ring leader" so to speak, and relentlessly followed them trough several cities that Sportations ran the Groupon ads and blasted them with the truth and he and the others were gaining some serious momentum, until I logged in this afternoon, and found that every post made by jumpdude and a couple of others, were removed. Now the only evidence that they were there is the responses by the Skyride bunch.

My guess is that he over did it, but whether that be the case, or the Skyride groupies whined to Groupon or whatever happened to cause this, it is completely unacceptable that Groupon would remove only the truthful information about Sportations and Skyride thus allowing Skyride to continue their scam on a grander scale than ever before!

I propose to the Skydiving community that all dzo's refrain from using groupon and even boycott them.

One thing I noticed that Jumpdude posted in the Dallas forum that really got my attention was that if a wuffo buys a gc from groupon/skyride, that puts 2 middle men in the mix, so if they sell a tandem for $119, groupon get's their $40, and Skyride get's their $40, how much is left for the DZ? So is it really worth it to sell through groupon?

Any thoughts?

[stratostar 5]

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Any thoughts?

Yea, welcome to the mainstreaming of skydiving & greed.

you can't pay for kids schoolin' with love of skydiving! ~ Airtwardo

[jsreznor 0]

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Any thoughts?

Yea, welcome to the mainstreaming of skydiving & greed.

Also, the search button is your friend.

[davelepka 4]

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I propose to the Skydiving community that all dzo's refrain from using groupon and even boycott them

Good luck with that. The same could be said for Skyride, and it has been, but it's not going to change the fact that both of those outfits drive serious volume to the DZs they deal with.

While the DZ may take a huge hit in the profit area, if they clear $10 a head on tandems from those companies, that's $10 in the DZOs pocket and all the overhead and staff pay that a tandem covers before it turns a profit. A DZO can keep his aircraft, fuel, rent and untilities payments up to date, and keep his staff paid and on-site (want to lose staff? don't give them enough work jumps and they'll take a hike in a hurry) while cranking out tandems via Skyride/Groupon.

Like it or not, this is what it's come to. People figured out how to market skydiving via the internet before the DZOs did, and now they have the upper hand. While it might seem like a shit deal all around, if you're a DZO with money tied up in your DZ, it's a way to get your money back. It's not fast, or the way you thought you'd get it back, but if you can make payments on your plane you're building equity, and when you close the DZ and sell the plane, you get your money back.

On top of all that is the old Skyride ploy of, 'Either get with us, or your neighbor will, and he'll get all the local business'. It's getting to be the same with Groupon, where they move literally 100's of tandems in the course of a week. A local population can only support so many of those 'bonanzas', so if you're not the first DZO to make such an offering, you going to lose out.

I recall one place sold 450+ tandems through Groupn. This was a 182 DZ, so more or less they secured all the business for an entire season up front, and got paid up front. They can still market and sell full price tandems all season long, but that Groupn hit is almost enough to buy a 2nd 182, or a new engine for your existing plane. Take a hit this season, get the 2nd plane or fresh engine, and go back to business as usual next year. It's hard to argue with those economics with a guy who's going to end up owning another plane or adding a ton of value to his existing plane.

In terms of the pay from Groupon/Skyride combo deals, I'm sure they have negotiated reduced commisions for both parties based on the volume. They both are moving a huge amount of money working with each other, and I'm sure they're willing to make consessions to make it work. Keep in mind that most non-skydiving Groupon deals I see have a $20 to $30 dolalr pruchase price, so Groupon makes $5/$6 each. Considering that Groupon tandems go for $100/$120, even if they only took $10 each, it's still a higher dollar figure that most other deals, even if the percentage is down. Likewise with Skyride, they strike one deal with Groupn and move 100's of tandems at once for doing almost nothing. Again, if they took $10 each, that's $3k or $4k in the bank for doing nothing, who would pass that up?

I'm not supporting or endorsing it, just explaining it.

[matthewcline 0]

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Well, as it appears, Groupon now endorses Skyride and their new alias, Sportations!
...

Any thoughts?

Sure, they have to use the new name to try and avoid Larry Hills Collection company?

I recently read a court doc from GA and it lead me to believe they are under an ORDER or the GA Court to conduct fair business practice. For the Lawyers here, if this is true, Would failure to do so be in contempt?

Any way back to jumping and letting the State AG's handle the criminal stuff.

Matt

An Instructors first concern is student safety.
So, start being safe, first!!!

[dzjunky77 0]

Also seen an add on FB and marked it as Spam! Sent a e-mail to the head peeps to let them know and a link to this!

[Driver1 0]

I received an email about that a couple of weeks ago from a friend who thought I would like to get in on that action, but I really don't care nor have time to pursue their useless asses around like he did. I guess he undoubtedly has plenty of time to do stuff like that. I heard he got some kind of early retirement or something.
nonetheless, I actually read some of those threads and I do have to agree that he was ruthless and actually, even though I do agree that he went way too far at times, he stayed on topic, proved his points and he actually managed to get a small group of followers.
I don't have any insight of why his posts were removed, but I would speculate that as you said, he went too far just as he did here more times than I can count. However, we've got to give credit where credit is due, I don't see hardly anyone out there taking any initiative to do anything to expose the truth about Skyride's scam and shell game.
Chances are, they will win if it remains as is with only him and a handful others trying to make a difference, the bottom line is Like Dave said, there is just too much greed in the world nowadays and even if Skyride should finally go away, there will be another to take it's place, just like Groupon. It appears that greed will be the demise of skydiving.

There will be no addressing the customers as "Bitches", "Morons" or "Retards"!

[davelepka 4]

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I don't have any insight of why his posts were removed

If they were post against the provider of the service, then it would hurt sales, and there's your reason why those posts would be removed.

My guess is that the ability to post in a discussion was intended for people to talk up the item being offered for sale, discuss their favorite entree at a restaurant or favorite sylist at a salon.

I would also imagine that if there was a legitimate gripe about the item/service, that was a little more clear cut then the situation with Skyride/Sportations, those posts might be allowed to stand, but for anyone lacking the in-depth, historical, and industry knowledge that we do, the lines between right and wrong (and the lines between Skyride and Sportations) get a little fuzzy.

For most involved, they're just getting a cheap tandem, and could probably care less about the finer points of where it comes from. From the Groupon side, selliing 100's of tandems per deal at over $100 each has to represent one of the higher grossing Groupons they offer, so why would they want to screw with that?

While we're at it, I can figure out what a Groupon is, even if it sounds like a north Atlantic fish. It's a 'group-coupon'. None of that explains what the fuck a 'Sportation' is.

[Jumpdude 0]

Alabamskydiver;
You would be correct sir, I followed them all over Groupon, every time I found a new ad, I posted the info. It got to a point that I have a txt file that has the initial post, then the follow up posts as their damage control person, "Sportations National" post post rebuttals so all I had to do was to copy and paste.
At first, I was posting the proof that Sportations is another name for sLyride and even posted the physical address of both company names, but in typical sLyride style, they would lie their ass off to protect their "Dirty little secret"! I posted other proof like the fact that both websites (Sportations.com and sLyride.com) have the same "Terms and Conditions" pages and the same contact us phone number and so on and so forth. In 100% of their rebuttals, "Sportations National" would reply that they are not sLyride, but we know they are.
Then I would switch it up and post URL's for the REAL local DZ's who is running Groupon ads in the same city, that is provided another DZ was running one, if not, I would often find that the same DZ that Sportations/sLyride was selling for would be running a groupon for themselves, and almost 100% of the time, it would be $20 to $40 cheaper than the Sportations Groupon for the same tandems.
Then, when I could not find either competing DZ's running Groupons, or the DZ's being promoted by Groupon/sLyride could not be found, I changed the strategy to pointing out how the web pages for Sportations and how they claim to be in this city or that city, they blatantly avoided answering those questions, all they would do is to thank everyone for buying from them, or they would say that the jumps are in where ever, but even where ever is NOT in whatever city.
On Friday, 29 April 11, I received an email from Groupon requesting that I call Ryan Miller at 312-662-7207 to discuss the issue of my posts and the email read as follows;
Jeff,

Hope all is well. I wanted to reach out to you and discuss Sportation. We're doing diligence on our end to better understand everything around Sportation. If you have a few minutes next week, I'd like to set-up some time to talk by phone.

Let me know if there's a good time for you.

Thanks and have a good weekend.

--
Ryan
312.662.7207

Upon calling Ryan, the first thing he told me was that they had received a lot of calls from the Skydiving community from all over the country and ALL were complaining about the same issues I was posting. we discussed the connection between Sportations and sLyride, the history of sLyride and that Sportations is nothing more than a cover name for sLyride that was created shortly after losing their ass in the Eloy case. I explained that sLyride/Sportations is NOT respected in the Skydiving community and I gave him the info for the DZ.com threads that discuss both company names and I gave him all the additional info that they needed to arrive at the conclusion that they would not want to be affiliated with either company name, I the explained that sLyride and their aliases were nothing more that Middle Men, and even internet scalpers that Skydiving DOES NOT NEED!
He agreed and told me that Groupon was going to disallow Middle Men companies from advertising in the Groupon network. And he also agreed that Groupon didn't want to be affiliated with a company with such a criminal history. That was the end of that call. About three weeks later, I discovered a new Groupon ad running in Minnesota, I posted the info just as I had been and called Ryan back to inquire as to why Sportations was back advertising on Groupon. He told me that they had decided to allow them to resume but they (Groupon) had placed restrictions on Sportations that they were to start posting the location for the jump and include the contact info for the DZ that the jump was to take place at.
Then started to resume posting the info and I started noticing that other people had been in those threads posting the direct links to the DZ's, so, at this point, I turned up the aggressiveness and posted in every ad that I could find and it didn't matter if it was expired or not, I posted in it.
Then other people started to respond to my posts, some were supporting my posts, some were supporting sLyride's.
By this point, I noticed that the number of Tandem sales had dropped from the usual 500+ (+ or- depending on the city population) they were selling per city to sometimes 50 or less, but not usually more than 100 or 150. I'm not taking nor claiming any credit for that simply because it could have been anything that caused this.
You assumed that I grossly over did the posting, I can assume that I did, being that there was an estimated 750 (Groupon site wide) or more posts by me and close to the same by the sLyriders in rebuttal. I woke up Wednesday morning to make more posts and found that my previous posts had been removed and the only remaining evidence of my having been there is the rebuttals by the sLyriders.

davelepka

One problem I did discover through all this was that if Sportations sold a Tandem, they would not pay the DZO for it until the CG was used, so again in typical sLyride fashion, they made the most money considering that not all skydiving GC's get redeemed. And Also, groupon makes more than the $10 each that you posted.
Ryan at Groupon told me they make around $25 to $40 depending on the price, sLyride makes the same, so if a Tandem sells for $119, and Groupon takes $40, and sLyride takes another $40, well, I just don't see how it can be feasible to use either middle man and certainly not both. I don't know of any DZO's who would do tandems for $40. They might as well get out of the tandem business and put up jumpers back in the plane.
You would also be correct in that the people who are blindly buying the Sportations/Groupon tandems are just plain brain dead! They obviously have more money than sense, and do absolutely no research before they throw money out the window!

matthewcline

If the info I have is accurate, you would be correct sir!

dzjunky77

Keep doing that! We need all we can get!

Driver1

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"It appears that greed will be the demise of skydiving."

It's looking like it!
As long as these desperate DZO's continue to do business with sLyride or their other aliases, It's clearly imminent that sLyride and Greed will be the demise of Skydiving. The entire Skydiving community needs follow the lead of the racing community, and stop doing business with sLyride. There are no known racing schools who do business with sLyride!

Refuse to Lose!!!
Failure is NOT an option!
1800skyrideripoff.com
Nashvilleskydiving.org

[davelepka 4]

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And Also, groupon makes more than the $10 each that you posted.
Ryan at Groupon told me they make around $25 to $40 depending on the price, sLyride makes the same, so if a Tandem sells for $119, and Groupon takes $40, and sLyride takes another $40, well, I just don't see how it can be feasible to use either middle man and certainly not both

I understand that those numbers are the 'common knowledge' of both arrangements, but those are the numbers of each deal when had seperately.

If one DZO calls Groupon and wants to make a deal, one time, it might cost them $20/$40 per. If a DZO can clear $100-ish on a tandem, that pays the bills (but not much more).

Ditto for a DZO dealing with Skyride. When they do a straight deal with Skyride, the cut might be $40, or even more, but the tandems are selliing for full price. In the end, the DZO ends up collecting (hopefully) more than the $100-ish break-even.

But when you combine the two, and consider the volume that each business would see, I'm suggesting that the cuts are lower. Like you said, you can't take $80 out of a $119 tandem, and leave the DZO with $39. That pays the TI, end of story. No slots, no pack job, no rig rental, no office overhead nothing, all of those would be losses.

I wouldn't imagine that either Groupon or Sportations would be willing to openly discuss their deal with the other. You might be able to call either one and get a 'price' on dealing with them directly, but that's not neccesarily a reflection of the pricing between the two of them.

I can't imagine a DZO anywhere who would be willing to lose money on that many tandems. Keep in mind that when you drop below the break even point, and every tandem becomes and expense, volume is a bad thing, and 100's of tandems is a very bad thing. The idea between Groupon is to spur traffic and generate future customers, and that is a sound idea for restaurants, salons, and the like. Get someone in to 'sample' the goods at a discoutned price, and hopefully get on their mental list of 'I'd go back there' places around town. Things like eating and haircuts are repeat activities, so for them offering Groupon at a loss is a possibility. A DZO has no such luxury, and if they're not breaking even, they're throwing money out the window.

Again, consider the size of the transaction as well. A restaurant that gives you a $25 gift card for $12 stands to lose, at most, $12. Chances are, they know that their check average is $33, so the odds are they'll lose even less, and hopefully make a return customer. In the case of a tandem, if the DZO does it for $39, or even double that to $79, he still stands to lose almost twice that of the restauranteur, with no (very little) hope a return customer.

Again, not endorsing or supporting, just explaining. One of two things is happening here, either this is a fad in the skydiving industry and it will wear out it's own welcome in a year or two, or this is the 'new' face of skydiving, and we have to get used to it and find a way to adapt so we're not throwing money out the window into other industries. Everyone who wanted skydiving to 'mainstream', well, here it is. This is what happens when something goes from a cottage industry to a serious money making venture, the vultures start to circle. With the development of tandems, the media exposure they have, and advent of internet marketing and social networking, the need for change at the DZO level is greater than ever. Some of us recognized Skyride as being a raw deal for the industry, well now they have a friend, and two against one is even worse than before.

It's the industry's fault for being complicit. How about after the top was blown off of Skyride and the lawsuit was in the books, that Proskydiving bullshit came to light and everyone drank that bullshit koolaid as well. of course the guy knew how to package it, and what not to say, Skyride laid out the template for what NOT to do, and he followed it to a 'T'.

The simple fact is, and there's no way around it, this industry is based around the single operator dealing directly with their customer, end of story. Pricign models, pay, DZ infrastructure are all built around the concept of the $200 (more or less) tandem. For the indusrty to thrive and prosper, the DZO needs to collect that full amount, and this will keep him in business, byuing tandem rigs, paying TIs, and give him the lattitude to indulge fun jumpers and produce new skydivers.

Cutting into that dollar figure, even once like Skyride, reduces their abaility to do any of the above, and that's going to kill the industry. Actaully, what it will do is kill the DZ. Profits will be down, reinvestment in gear will drop, and the DZ won't be able to afford break-even slots for fun jumpers, and those numbers will drop as well.

It's an interesting paralell between skydiving and another industry. All of these 'marketers' are driving business to one location or the other, and upsetting the balance in the marketplace. if one DZ pulls an extra 450 tandems of the market, the other local DZs are going to suffer. If those DZs go out of business, the remaining DZ will grow, and what you'll be left with are fewer, but much larger DZs. If something should happen to the remaining large DZ, such as a lawsuit or mismagement that puts them out of business, we're left with nothing.

Sounds like a carbon copy of the banking industry to me, but in this case, there will be no bailout.

[Jumpdude 0]

My sources for the numbers I posted were from two places, The Groupon numbers came directly from Ryan at Groupon, so I'm gonna have to say that part is cut n dry. The sLyride/Sportations numbers that I posted came from multiple DZO's that I have communicated with over the years who have either tried them or still actively accept them. I can tell you that a lot of the DZO's that I've communicated with are ashamed to admit and don't openly talk about their affiliation with sLyride.
During the process of building our DZ's page, I communicated with over 150 DZO's and I found that more so than not, the ones who accept sLyride said (and we all know this) that they were backed in to a corner and essentially forced to accept them or the DZ down the road would. Those are the guys who are ashamed of it. I only found two DZO's who were proud to take a sLyride ticket.
I have tried to encourage those DZO's to stop taking the tickets and file a lawsuit so they can tell their story in court, but almost 100% of them were afraid to go there and afraid of the repercussions of pissing off sLyride and I tried to get them to talk to us here on DZ.com, they also declined (so far), so this tells me that sLyride has successfully hi-jacked the internet and bullied their way in to the market and successfully used fear tactics to stay in the market.
I really don't expect to see this, but I would love to see some DZO's weigh in on this thread and shed some light how they expect to stay in business if they continue to do business with Groupon, and especially sLyride. I'd love to see the DZO's of Skydive Temple or Skydive Duanesburg get in here and offer some explanations since those are two that run a lot of Sportations/Groupon ads.

I've said it many times and I'm going to say it again; DZO's, do your own marketing, and your own SEO and you will find that you don't need sLyride or any other middle man.
I am NOT an SEO expert, nor do I claim to be one, but I do have something to offer you that will help you with your SEO. You can start by sending me the info for your DZ so I can add it on the DZ's page. Check the page, and if you don't see your DZ listed, PM me and I will add it to the list. It's 100% free and you will never be asked for a dime. The benefits are that it will be another link to your site, and will push you further up the search engines, and it directs people straight to you, not through a middle man or someone who's going to get a cut of your money. The page is http://www.1800skyrideripoff.com/dzs/

Refuse to Lose!!!
Failure is NOT an option!
1800skyrideripoff.com
Nashvilleskydiving.org

[dzjunky77 0]

I called them and was in MT. and told them (I wanted to do a Tandem) They replied to me to go to Skydive Nampa, ID. Theres no DZ there and I know the area well as I grew up there! Well.....they hung up on me.

[jshiloh 0]

Groupon cares about one thing and one thing only...they're cut of the deal. They'll promote any business if there's profit in it for them. I've seen Groupon reps distort the truth and even outright lie in the discussion forums for offers in order to encourage people to buy. I've seen them delete "unfavorable" posts and give bogus excuses as to why.

By that same token, there's plenty of money to be made by DZs selling through Groupon. Trying to convince DZs to stop using Groupon would be like trying to convince DZs to stop advertising on the internet. I know not all DZs offer Groupons, but those that do aren't about to stop using it unless/until it stops being profitable.

I don't know all the details of Skyride. You may have better luck convincing folks to stop associating with them. Obviously, if Skyride is teaming with Groupon to sell tandem jumps at DZs, the DZs are agreeing to it. If Skiride is a scam, or doing things that hurt the sport, or engaging in criminal activity, then warn DZs not to do business with them and that will have greater likelihood of success. At least, until they change their name again. But as long as there's money being made, DZs aren't going to stop promoting through Groupon "on principle"....that's just not how life works.