Skydiving Margins Are Shrinking. Here’s How We Push Back.

For context: I’m a full-time real estate agent who has worked at a startup + small local businesses, and I’ve always ran business hustles here and there myself. Operations, margins, and pricing levers fascinate me, so when I build EZDZ I’m looking at it the same way I would any venture I’ve tried to get off the ground.

It was honestly blowing my mind reading that CSC article because I was trying to get some insight into what operating margins really look like for a busy dropzone so I could price my platform responsibly. Doug points out that fun jumper tickets have gone up while tandem prices in some markets have stayed flat or even dropped by 30%. That mismatch explains why everyone feels squeezed.

Step One of their framework is simply: know your real median tandem rate. Not the sticker price on your website, but the number you get after Groupon, weekday discounts, “bring a friend” coupons, and every other haircut we keep giving ourselves. CSC’s 2016 median was $187, and they set a plan to push it north of $210 just by tightening discounts. Seeing those numbers laid out forced me to ask how EZDZ could help a DZO actually measure that average instead of guessing.

Step Two hit just as hard. They take half of that new-found margin and immediately earmark it for marketing or the long 'someday' list—fresh student rigs, a better bathroom, a raise for the people who show up every weather hold. That's why our dashboards now break out fee revenue and median booking values side-by-side; if you can see the delta, you can decide how much to reinvest without spreadsheets turning into a part-time job.

Step Three is the homework: download the sheet, plug in your own loads, and stress test how many tandems you can afford to lose if your price actually matches the value you deliver. That's exactly how I think about EZDZ pricing. If a dropzone can toggle on fee pass-through, see the effect in the worksheet, and still keep slots full, then we're finally aligning software revenue with operator reality.

I already had the idea in my head to implement an option for dropzones using EZDZ to pass their platform fees on to their customers—because a lot of other industries have service fees—yet we keep pretending skydiving has to absorb everything.

I often see dropzones eating their credit card fees, and on top of that they’re paying absorbent amounts of money for software that doesn’t share the upside. Platforms should work with these dropzones to generate revenue together, not drain them.

CSC even compared DZ Ops to skiing, snowboarding, golf, and theme parks—industries that have no issue charging appropriately when they improve the guest experience. Vail Resorts took a $42 lift ticket in the mid-90s and turned it into $189+ today while still driving volume because they kept leveling up the value. Why would skydiving, with higher liability and more complex operations, be the lone holdout?

That realization had been simmering, but the CSC article crystallized it. So today we finally implemented the ability to flip a switch inside EZDZ and pass those platform fees down to the customer, just like resort fees, processing fees, and facility fees people already see everywhere else.

Here’s the important part—we built the feature as a choice. If a DZ wants to absorb the fees because it’s baked into their pricing or they truly love the sport and want to keep it that way, they can continue to operate and eat those costs themselves. But if you want to protect $10–$15 of margin per transaction, you just flip the toggle, customize the label, and the system calculates and routes the fee transparently at checkout.

• Fee Sharing Controls: Decide whether the platform fee is passed through to the customer or absorbed by the dropzone.
• Transparent Guest Messaging: Custom checkout copy allows you to set the naming for your fee, whether it be processing fee, booking fee, so on and so forth.
• Analytics That Matter: Built-in Google and Facebook tracking, if you have it set up for optional Rybbit integration for full funnel tracking, plus revenue, dashboards in the platform and via Stripe.
• Integrated Payments: If you use EZDZ for all payments, everything stays synced. Meaning you can sell funjumper tickets, sell tandem bookings, create custom charges, all via the platform, or use an in-person term. Just click the button to send the charges to the terminal from your platform.

The broader economy isn’t exactly giving leisure businesses a break right now. Rates are high, fuel is high, payroll is high, and customers are still expecting convenience in every channel. If software partners aren’t helping dropzones claw back a few percentage points on each booking, then we’re just asking owners to keep funding innovation out of already thin margins.

I know some DZOs will still choose to absorb fees because they truly love the sport or have already built those costs into their tandem or fun jumper pricing. That’s why the feature is optional. But at least now there’s a lever for the operators who are tired of covering processing, platform, and chargeback costs on their own while other industries openly label them as “booking fees” or “technology fees.”

Margins are clearly getting smaller. It’s time that the skydiving industry falls in line with snowboarding, skiing, golf, and even theme parks by raising prices when the experience and service improves instead of passing on those costs to themselves and their most valuable consumers, including fun jumpers.

I wanted to implement this long before we announced EZDZ publicly. I’ve watched too many dropzones make heroic weather pivots, keep extra staff on payroll, and still worry about making aircraft payments because the software stack locked them into fixed costs. That’s broken.

Passing on platform fees isn’t about nickel-and-diming students. It’s about acknowledging that dropzones deliver a premium, high-risk, high-touch experience and shouldn’t have to eat every supporting cost. Customers already understand that a ski lift, a golf tee time, or even a fast-pass at a theme park comes with service fees. Leaning into that expectation lets owners reinvest the recovered dollars into better aircraft maintenance, better instruction, better marketing—the list goes on.

If you pair this toggle with CSC’s three steps—actually tracking your median tandem price, reinvesting part of the delta into marketing, and pressure-testing the numbers—you start to reclaim control. Suddenly, funding Google Ads for off-peak tandems or resurfacing the packing floor doesn’t require gambling on daily deals or slashing prices.

And yes, we should be honest about raising prices. Fun jumper tickets have already climbed to reflect reality; tandems can’t stay stagnant or drop another 30%. A thoughtful increase plus a transparent platform-fee handoff is less disruptive than waiting until you’re one blown engine away from crisis.

I genuinely believe EZDZ is the newest and best platform for helping dropzones do this without hurting their customers or their team. We’re here so they can pass on costs when it makes sense, or keep absorbing them if that’s part of their culture, and still have the tooling to grow without feeling like their software partner is dictating how they operate.

At the end of the day, EZDZ should make money when you make money—and help you keep more of yours. That’s why every time I tweak the product roadmap, I’m asking: does this help a DZO pay their staff better, invest in safety, or breathe easier in February? If the answer’s no, it doesn’t ship, because the entire point is helping everybody grow.

If you want a walkthrough of the new fee controls or want to share how you’re thinking about pricing for 2025, shoot me a note. I’m still the founder answering DMs at midnight because I care deeply about making sure the sport we love survives and grows.