Buying a Product for the First Time – A Consumer Experience

Moving from sites to sites and reading reviews to reviews it seems like everything was equally safe, some prices higher some lower, some providing Do’s and Don’ts for your first jump, size of canopies , good used gears. Also these sites talked about Mirages, Javelins and Vectors which are used in skydiving. The various sites which I reviewed were Parachute Shop, Para Gear, Extreme Sports, Jump Shop, Sky dive sf etc.

After knowing the list of equipment I would want to know that my list of equipment is comprehensive and exhaustive or not. For this I would contact with other flying schools or clubs and cross check my list. If any equipment is missing I would add it to my list and do some background research on utility of those.

After researching my confusion was that when you buy first skydiving gear it should be used or new. If it will be used equipment I will take more precautions in terms of checking its wear and tear but in case of brand new equipment I can be assured that there would be no wear and tear. Keeping in mind price and safety involved I would be inclined to buy second hand equipment which are not critical to my safety such as rescue parachute while on the other hand I will buy brand new equipment which are critical to my safety such as primary parachute. That’s where the search started that which companies sell the best used skydiving gears and I landed up a forum which displays sell of used gears called buy/sell skydiving gear.

In a typical skydiving gear you get a harness or container, reserve parachute, Automation Active Device and main parachute are there. On my research I found that Automation Active Device expires early so I made a decision to go about buying a new one. The reserve parachutes if old can be used just you have to make sure they are not torn or have holes but for main parachute try to buy a new one as this one will be your life savior and you cannot afford to buy this one with holes so better put your money into this. The harness should be the used one as I was new into this I have to make sure that there is a correct size for both canopies and for my body size as well.

The order in which a one should go for selection is selecting a reserved canopy first with correct size. After this I searched about the brands which sell harness based on the features like Para Gear, Sky dive wings etc. I used published volume carts to analyze and looked for soft or normal fit. But companies also offer tight fit which was confusing and created more problems for me. You can certainly know before buying that harness will fit you or not, for that I have to talk to the seller of rig and tell them the serial number of harness but problem was how to contact them. The options with main parachute are unlimited 7- cell, 9-cell, F111 etc. Companies like Sky lark, sky dive store so sell these. But the main problem with these again was which will be correct or fit.

Once I know which equipment’s fits my body I would be looking at brands with highest safety ratings which are approve by government and law which guides skydiving equipment gear. I will be inclined to buy those brands which provide me free trial so that I can have the touch and feel of equipment on my body and evaluate if I am comfortable wearing those or not.

The final step will be to look at the level of after sales service for my equipment’s. Safety being the first criteria for selection, price also plays a very important role. Since these equipment’s are costly hence I would like to be sure that I receive good after sales service.

Thus the difficulties that an average customer faces are listed below which a seller can pay attention to and create market for themselves

·         Knowing the comprehensive range of equipment

·         Selecting amongst range and variety of equipment

·         Getting feedback from current users

·         Knowing the range of safety parameters that an equipment needs to comply with

·         Finding stores to get the first-hand experience