But a Wannabee will usually go for the big shiny one with the unrealistic promises.
That's what I mean about failing to market something. When JG helped start up Civil Flying Services one of his catch cries as such was to compare his school to Central Flying School, Central CFS being the best in military training, Civil CFS being the best in Civilian training, and he aimed at a reputation of a better standard. He even had the wings for the school mirror RAAF wings and so on. The operation became very successful, through reasonable management and the leadership of JG as CP/CFI and BS funding the show. Now in a link to what Triadic said about the RFAC, at the time non-profit aero clubs were subsidized by the government, in an effort to maintain a supply of basic trained pilots in case of wartime. Which is why there were some quite large aeroclubs in each major city. When Civil was started as a commercial enterprise with profit in mind they had to compete with heavily subsidized aeroclubs from the onset. It was simple for him being ex military to just offer a better standard of training than the clubs. They had advertising with billboard that included planes with enticing woman draped on them, and other slogans. Bibs connection with racing offered an aspect that flying was exciting like racing, so come try it at Civil as well. Of course when BS was no longer involved and JG retired the whole thing slowly drifted into oblivion. However it was slow because the 'reputation' it had built up still had people knocking on the door for training or charter up to 20 years later.
A big difference back then was in general prior to the late 80s if you didn't have an airline job by your late 20s you were never going to get in without exceptional experience. So instructors starting later in life were consigned to being life instructors or charter pilots.