The Aggressor "Fleet" is a marketing scam, a con job...Michael Goldberg - Recreational Diver/AttorneyJune 9, 2003 at 20:58:36The Aggressor "Fleet" is a franchise marketing concept and in my opinion a scam
and a con job. That's because "fleet" is a misnomer and deceives people into thinking that all Aggressor boats offer certain standards of quality. No way! Actually there is no "fleet"--not in the sense of ships sailing under one corporate flag and certified to a uniform set of safety standards. The so-called "Aggressor Fleet" is a loose-knit organization comprised of individual boat owners who bought into Hasson's franchise pitch about the
advantages of pooling their marketing resources and paying him a percentage of the take to hype the boats, handle reservations, hold the microphone at trade shows and brush off newspaper reporters with spurious comments to the effect that Aggressor divers are responsible for their own deaths (when Aggressor chase boats can't find them) because "they signed the waivers". Barbara Cohen is right--there is no quality control in the Aggressor "Fleet" and that leads to accidents
and deaths. Some boats may be seaworthy and well maintained; others less so. Some crews may be professional and on top of safety procedures; others less so. Pay your non-refundable money, take your chance! But my problem with the Aggressor "Fleet" is that I just cannot trust a liveaboard operator in some distant corner of the planet who is too cheap and too stupid to understand that cutting a franchise deal with a fat obnoxious lying slob in
Louisiana to save a few bucks on advertising is an extremely bad decision. Boat owners who get involved in franchise operations to reduce advertising costs are also likely to cut corners when hiring crew and hauling out for annual maintenance. | 
