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Any Fish Store Owners?Help A Young Guy Out? | |
JBennett181 Hobbyist Posts: 70 Kudos: 46 Votes: 2 Registered: 10-Jan-2008 | im in highschool...and have been seriously considering opening a fish store(well a pet store, gotta keep up with competitors,id have all fish tanks if i could)but anyways yea. any advice on degrees i should get? pros and cons? income? i love keeping the fish and i know no matter what i want a carrer in icthyology, or something of the sort. thank you very much! i like feesh |
Posted 05-Mar-2008 04:12 | |
Shinigami Ichthyophile Catfish/Oddball Fan Posts: 9962 Kudos: 2915 Registered: 22-Feb-2001 | Don't think there are any owners on board, but some of the people here have worked at fish stores. I can't say anything about being in either position but I'll throw out a few ideas. Also, I was in a similar position to you when I was in a high school, knowing that I'd want a fish-related career. You'll have to determine if a particular area actually "demands" a fish store. In the almost ten years I've been in this hobby I've seen three fish stores go down, and only one new store has come back up to replace one of them (incidentally, this store is now my favorite, having risen not even a year ago). You've also got a ton of competition from superstores like PetCo, PetSmart, and even Walmart, as these places are popping up quite a lot now. For this reason, it is not likely you will survive if you only stock fish that such stores stock (take a look around to get a feeling for what these places have, usually they stick strictly to these fish). A small pet store has the freedom to pick whatever they want, and being able to take order requests from customers is a plus. My favorite fish store (that is new to the game) has rock-bottom prices on fish while keeping a huge selection, having seven rows of fish tanks (stacked 2 rows high) and another row cycling for what seems to be for marine, judging by the sand. Rows are divided into themes such as cichlids, catfishes, livebearers, tetras and small schoolers, angels and discus, gourami, oddballs, serrasalmines, plants, corals, and marine. By far it has the largest and most extensive selection of any fish or pet store in my general area. They don't stock live rock yet, but that should probably change soon. I have a feeling they feed on the low side for some of their fish, though the catfishes are often in good condition. FW tanks are undergravel and separate. I think the marine tanks are centralized, but I'm not sure; there is probably a UV sterilizer in there if it is. If it's not centralized I'm not sure how they do their marine filtration. IMO it is the combination of prices and selection that have driven this store. I don't know if it's actually doing well financially but if I could buy stock in it I would 'cuz I'm throwing a lot of money their way. I'm even a Frequent Buyer member, getting $10 for ever $100 I spend. Sa-weet. The above mentioned store, in fact, is the only pure fish store in a 30 minute radius from me; all the rest of them stock other pets, and one stocks only reptiles on top of fish. That said, even the non-chain pet stores sometimes order in some very decent fish; I've found some gems in these places certainly. Absolutely no one knows what they're talking about in the pet store, though. In the fish/reptile store at least it primarily has fish, so the owner knows some stuff and, for example, refuses to sell FW stingrays until he gets them to feed. The other fish store that's about 30 minutes or more away has ridiculous prices, though their 300 gallon aquariums always had something nice/insane to look at (tiger shovelnose, redtail, remora, nurse shark). They also had another location closer to me, but it was one of the aforementioned three stores that closed; IMO it closed because of their prices, so I guess they cut back to just one store. Their fish were miniscule with higher prices than competitors around here. A far cry from my new favorite fish store. Loving to keep fish is a big difference from running a business. Business is a tough world, sometimes when I really think about it I'd rather just sit back and get tenure somewhere. Doesn't stop me from taking business courses to prepare myself, just in case, so I can leave that option open, though, lol. Plus, you'll meet some of the most interesting and frustrating people working at a fish store. Okay, degrees. Biology should be good, and would prepare you for grad school work in marine biology, aquatic biology/limnology, or whatever. My school stresses keeping options open with the bio major, so despite the fact we do actually have a college of marine studies, there is no undergraduate major. A warning with biology, in my curriculum there is a heck of a lot of molecular crap you have to worry about; sometimes I think I'm in the wrong major as I look at the greener grass on the other side in the agriculture department, which has stuff such as wildlife conservation. It would benefit you to take some business-related courses as well such as marketing, management, finance, accounting, and economics, as these will give you a good backbone to compete in the business world. -------------------------------------------- The aquarist is one who must learn the ways of the biologist, the chemist, and the veterinarian. |
Posted 05-Mar-2008 06:28 | |
JBennett181 Hobbyist Posts: 70 Kudos: 46 Votes: 2 Registered: 10-Jan-2008 | thanks alot i have LFS that i attend everytime i get my paycheck(addiction at its finest) they guy even has a nick name for me,but he has a good selection and is very helpful..he runs it all on his own and hes been there for a several yrs. im gunna ask him about it. ive shamefully been to petsmart before i discovered this store and a few times jacks aquarium and pets(if you have those where you live) they do only have the generic species there and i know what you mean by getting the generic species plus,and also having a wide variety of other things,but im not sure about keeping things other than fish. Thanks much! i like feesh |
Posted 06-Mar-2008 01:09 | |
steven1982 Hobbyist Posts: 104 Kudos: 74 Votes: 38 Registered: 13-Jan-2008 | In Canada we have this small chain of fish stores called "Big Al's". They sell aquarium stuff as well a LOTS of fish, 100 to 200 tanks. They sell everything from guppies to sharks. So fish only stores are around and they can do well. The only thing with having a fish only store is that it needs to be in a nice sized city, 150,000 +. |
Posted 07-Mar-2008 01:57 | |
Shinigami Ichthyophile Catfish/Oddball Fan Posts: 9962 Kudos: 2915 Registered: 22-Feb-2001 | I'm not going to disagree a large population is going to help bring more potential customers, but my city is only about 30,000. We're not too far from the biggest city in the state, though, which has about 70,000. There's a community a short distance to the south that has about 17,000. Each of these cities has a store that specifically sells fish. It wouldn't take more than half an hour to go between the two that are furthest away from each other, and those two have been there the longest. And to think there used to be four fish stores in this area. -------------------------------------------- The aquarist is one who must learn the ways of the biologist, the chemist, and the veterinarian. |
Posted 07-Mar-2008 05:01 | |
FishKeeperJim Big Fish Member MTS Anonymous Posts: 348 Kudos: 208 Votes: 186 Registered: 09-Jan-2007 | I dont own a store but I do work in one part time dealing with live plants, but I do have one piece of advice for you. If you ever have someone who knows more about a subject then you do make sure you use thier knowledge. Case in point I went in today and when I got there I was told that the 20 gallon plant tank is not doing to good. He noticed it on last saturday but decided not to worry about it. by the time I got in there I had a tank with only a couple of healthy plants and several dead and dying ones. So dont be afraid to call an employee if you dont know something and that employee does. mts.gif" border="0"> I vote do you? My Tanks at Photobucket |
Posted 12-Mar-2008 23:58 | |
brandeeno Mega Fish Posts: 929 Kudos: 636 Registered: 13-Sep-2007 | also research away! i am always bothered when the LFS has incorret knowledge of certain fish... and if you decided to kep other pets in the store it wouldnt be the end of the world as you could getcertian generic reptiles, small mamals, and amphibians. this will also draw more people to your store. i know that there is a reptile and fish store near me that charges like 50cents to go in and they have HUGE reptile displays and stuff! people have birthday parties and such there... there is actually a few of them with in 50 miles of me... the important thing would be to research minimizing costs while not hurting the quality of the specimens you carry. and always listen to criticism! you want your cusomers to be happy so make the store clean, happy, and affordable... i have a few friends who wont go into the LFS next to our school, because "it smells, is dirty, and is gross." this will affect your clientele if you dont have the proper hygenic precautions and etc... also dont be one of those LFS that leave dead fish in the tanks! that just bothers me and grosses me out! \\\\\\\"an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of the cure\\\\\\\" |
Posted 13-Mar-2008 07:51 |
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