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April 3rd, 2009
Koh Tao’s Award winning dive center wins again!

Crystal Dive Resort, Koh Tao have once again been recognized as industry leaders with yet another award.

In a change from past years the annual awards now see regional winners that are then nominated for the Asia Pacific awards, announced later this month at the ADEX in Singapore.

2008 saw Crystal win an unprecedented three Asia Pacific Finals nominations, winning the prestigious ‘Diver Training’ Award.

PADI’s Official Press Release

To better recognise the achievements of those PADI Dive Centres and Resorts who have made significant contributions to the growth and development of diving, PADI Asia Pacific is pleased to announce details of the finalists of this year’s PADI Asia Pacific Member Awards programme.

Adopting a fresh new format, one that provides a system in which all PADI Members can participate, the PADI Member Awards programme was based on eight separate Asia Pacific regions; a system that ensured PADI Members compete with other PADI Members within their own geographical region for one of five Awards.

All PADI Dive Centres and Resorts within each of the eight regions were considered for nomination by a specially convened selection panel, who selected up to three finalists for each of the regional Awards.

A panel of PADI judges then considered all of the finalists within each region and we are very pleased to announce the following finalists and winners of this year’s awards. PADI congratulates all of our Members on the outstanding job you do training divers and we wish you the best of success for the remainder of 2009.

Crystal Dive Resort, located on the beautiful island of Koh Tao is in ‘Region 26’ . This region has over 250 PADI Dive center’s & resorts located in Thailand, Vietnam & Cambodia. Crystal was nominated for three awards. They are:

Diver Retention Award - "This award is to recognize outstanding achievements in customer service & retaining students divers."

Outstanding Dive Centre/Resort Business Award - "This award is to recognise outstanding business performance, initiatives and achievements across all areas of business operations."

Project AWARE Marine Environmental award - "This award aims to recognise outstanding ecological achievements with a focus on fostering environmental and cultural understanding, appreciation and conservation."

Crystal was awarded the ‘Diver Retention’ award, testimony to the great atmosphere around Crystal Dive and the fantastic group of dive professionals currently on staff. This award recognizes high customer service levels as well as high numbers of returning customers. Crystal we’re also finalists in the Project AWARE Marine Environmental award and the Outstanding Dive Centre/Resort Business Award.

This latest success now takes Crystal Dive Resort to a new level, unprecedented for a Thailand based Dive Centre. Over the past 3 years Crystal have received 13 awards, either regional (Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia), continental (Asia Pacific) or worldwide, including the prestigious ‘Diver Training’ award for the Asia Pacific region and the Project AWARE Worldwide Achievement Award, both in 2008.

On top of these, individual Instructors at Crystal have also received major awards including two winners of the Top Achiever Award for Region 26 (Danny Blanchard & Jamie Cox).

Our top man, PADI Course Director Matt Bolton, became one of only a handful of PADI Course Directors in Thailand to receive the prestigious Platinum status for 2009. This has now been awarded to Matt for the third year in succession and he is still Koh Tao’s only current Platinum Course Director.