We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Mario Lepore II. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Mario below.

Mario, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. How do you think about spending on the little things / small joys when finances are tight?

The first three years we had a limited number of scuba cylinders and had to get them filled at another shop after every dive day with students. That was becoming prohibitively expensive and time consuming but a compressor that pumps breathable air are quite expensive. It was a big decision but we purchased a scuba compressor and more student cylinders a couple years ago and its been a huge time and money saver. Michigan Scuba Sports had a couple slow years during COVID along with the rest of the world but it afforded us time to get the word out and be better prepared for the seasons that followed.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

My dad served in the US Navy so not learning to swim was never an option. He took me out on the boat when I was 5 years old and threw me overboard. That was my first swim lesson. In the years that followed, I became a lifeguard and competed on multiple swim teams and eventually found myself taking a scuba class. I’ve always been comfortable in the water so it was a natural progression. I took another scuba class and another and eventually ran out of recreational dive classes so I started taking professional scuba training which eventually led me to becoming an instructor and after a couple years of training new divers I became a Master Scuba Diver Trainer. I began by working with the owner of the dive shop where I took most of my classes and helping with his classes and overflow. Once he started flirting with the idea of retirement, I decided it was time to hang my own shingle. Michigan Scuba Sports was born in 2019 in my garage and a website. I’ve developed great relationships with a few community parks & rec centers and teach most weekends in Oxford, MI. We run Discover Scuba events for those who just want to try it out before jumping into a certification class as well as a number of basic scuba training and specialty skills classes and all the way up to the intro professional designation of Dive Master. We run lake clean-up events and dive charters to some of the most exciting wrecks in Lake Huron. We are a full service training facility and even sell a little gear.

We’d love to hear your thoughts about selling platforms like Amazon/Etsy vs selling on your own site.

We sell some gear through our own website but mostly through word of mouth. I tell students not to buy gear until after they’ve gone through a certification class and worn or used a few different pieces of gear to get an idea about what they like and what they don’t or what is most comfortable. Scuba gear should fit correctly and be comfortable to make you more efficient in the water. Efficiency translates into making your air supply last longer so you can imagine how important fit and comfort become. I don’t use any of the third party sites to sell gear. I tried but most are far too tedious and not user friendly to the web design novice.

Can you open up about how you funded your business?

Michigan Scuba Sports was completely funded from personal savings. That was an expensive undertaking at a time when the first of my three kids were starting college. The start-up cost can be high when you consider the price of a full kit of scuba gear for Michigan water temperatures and I needed to have enough for a full class of new divers in various sizes. The initial loan to the business was almost paid back and then the compressor. It was another large expense but the math made sense with the reduced cost of fills at other dive shops and the reduced travel time to get them filled, Michigan Scuba Sports is in a good position to teach new and old scuba students for years to come.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://michiganscubasports.com/
• Instagram: michigan_scuba_sports
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/michiganscubasports