duck and dive / the aqua clinic
Bradford
Duck and Dive was formed over 25 years ago. After teaching scuba diving in
Cyprus, Garry returned to the United Kingdom and opened Duck and Dive,
originally teaching theory from his grandmother’s cellar in Eccleshill in
Bradford. A few months later we had out grown the premises, so bought a static
caravan at Moor Valley Park, Hawksworth, over the moors near Baildon. This
became his base for academic training for 6 years. Previously using Shipley dive
pool for practical teaching, it was limited to 45 minutes a week and it was used
for as long as possible before moving to Tong pool, which we used twice a week
on Thursday and Saturdays. Unfortunately, Bradford MDC closed the pool, so
operations were moved to Bingley Grammar school. The pool was not deep enough
for Scuba and was not fit for purpose, it was then, we decided to be in control
of his own destiny and build his own pool In Shipley. Ten years ago, the journey
of The Aqua clinic begun. Before the pool was built we had a fully functioning
and stocked dive shop in the building next door in Shipley. It was here in the
late 1990’s he started teaching technical diving and exploring ship wrecks
around the UK. This led onto Garry forming a company called Narked at 60, which
was his own brand of diving equipment and was one of the first online e-commerce
scuba equipment web stores. This evolved into the range being sold in most major
dive shops in the UK and in an array of dive stores around the world. This
success meant bigger premises were required so we moved to a larger unit off
Preston street in Bradford. Work commenced with the famous brand RAB clothing on
our under-suit garments, Typhoon international and ISP for our buoyancy products
and Bowstone diving on the design and development of utility equipment. Garry
then worked with specialist metal work companies their services of laser
cutting, tumbling/ deburring, electro polishing and powder coating of the
stainless-steel range which helped make a more rounded product. Garry also
teamed up with local companies in the Yorkshire region to offer dry suit repairs
and produce his own branded Narked at 60 made to measure Dry suits, both in
neoprene and membrane materials. Garry worked with Business link and target
export support team (TESS) and wrote manuals for their product range and CE
marked goods. This enabled him to start travelling to worldwide exhibitions,
demonstrating the British made product range and signing up distributors helping
him to become one of the biggest British made suppliers. This was run in line
with him teaching courses in which students were using his own equipment, this
included police forces across the U.K. At its peak he was teaching over 450
students a year at all levels and became some of the youngest TDI /SDI
Instructors in Europe. Garry has been a PADI instructor for over 25 years and
retains his qualification. Garry has worked with the BBC helping produce
documentaries for the television and has written articles for the Telegraph &
Argus newspaper and technical dive magazines. Garry in 2008 started work with
building his own pools in the current premises and he was keen to teach main
stream scuba and offer specialised swimming lessons which is offered today in
Duck and Dive.
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