Conversation At Lfs

[fenwoman]

me: have you any plants ? (while looking at half a dozen sorry specemins in tank)
lfs: only those. Why don't you get some nice plastic plants. They are easier to keep and don't die off and poison your water?

me: no thanks,I like live plants. I didn't see any yoyo loaches, don't you keep them?
lfs: (looking blank) what are they then? Never heard of them. I have clown loaches, they are as good as yoyo loaches.
me: no thanks. So what about some of the unusual platys, like hawaii, or tuxedos?
lfs: no call for them. We stock all the usual neons, guppies and the like. People buy lots of those.
me: but everyone sells those.
lfs: well in 35 years of business we've found that people like ordinary things and plastic plants.

The tanks were nice and clean and fish seemed healthy. He did have some nice plecs with a big sign on the tank saying "these fish will grow very large, if you want to buy these, make sure you can cater for their needs".
I dunno if he would refuse to sell if the buyer didn't have a big enough tank though.
I also saw some nice parrot fish and some gorgeous bettas, in community tanks.
On the counter was a small tank with a male and 2 female bettas and some platys.

Surely, if you are in business, with at least 3 other lfs nearby, you would want to have an 'edge' and offer something out of the ordinary? This place is not the closest to town. Why would anyone drive all the way to the back of beyond in order to buy guppies and neons?
Incidentally. I commented that he had some beautiful bettas. He said "beautiful what?" then rolled his eyes to heaven and said "oh, you mean Siamese fighting fish. That's what they are called".
I bought a bag of live bloodworms to treat the fishies, and left.

The usual lfs I go to offers to get anything for me if they don't have what I'm looking for, and seem happy to talk about fish and equipment and I'm not made to look pretentious if I call a thing by the correct name. Guess who will be getting my dosh from now on.

Some shops seem to think that they deserve your custom purely because they've been in business a long time while the newer places are up to date with things and keen to keep your custom.
On the topic of plants, I asked if he could get moss balls or java fern. He gave a big sigh and tutted and muttered about, load of rubbish, fads, and how the stuff was no good anyway."no call for it" etc.
Surely he should be educating novices , getting new products etc, not slagging off anything he didn't want to stock and praising the stuff he did stock like plastic plants.
Interestingly, there was only one other customer in there whereas the other place I go to is packed. But they sell unusual things, have a good selection of plants, offer to get anything if they don't have it.

 

[richchappy]

hes the one who will lose coustom just go to the better 1

 

[Castellop123]

There's always one...

 

[Tokis-Phoenix]

Thing is though many individual types of fish are known by a lot of names- the hillstream loach is also called Hong Kong Pleco or Butterfly pleco or just "sucker fish" etc, just like how betta's are also known as Siamese fighting fish.
My lfs is similar in that they only stock reliable commonly known fish, and rarely sell anything more unusual than an oto- their reply to why they don't increase the variety of fish they sell was the same- people like common fish. And it probably is true for most fish keepers, given than most fish that are common are either so because they are relatively hardy and don't die in their dozens as soon as they are put in the lfs's tanks, or they are commercially bred on a large scale and are cheap to buy and sell.
As long as the lfs looks after their fish/tanks and try to educate their staff at least a little on fishkeeping and don't sell too many tankbuster fish, then i don't have a problem with them. Yes, its not an amazing deal from a customers point of view at times, but the lfs's could do an aweful lot worse (Like Walmart- large variety of fish sold, but poorly treated and sold to unsuitable people).
Fenwoman, did this lfs happen to be quite small in size?

 

[fenwoman]

Thing is though many individual types of fish are known by a lot of names- the hillstream loach is also called Hong Kong Pleco or Butterfly pleco or just "sucker fish" etc, just like how betta's are also known as Siamese fighting fish.
My lfs is similar in that they only stock reliable commonly known fish, and rarely sell anything more unusual than an oto- their reply to why they don't increase the variety of fish they sell was the same- people like common fish. And it probably is true for most fish keepers, given than most fish that are common are either so because they are relatively hardy and don't die in their dozens as soon as they are put in the lfs's tanks, or they are commercially bred on a large scale and are cheap to buy and sell.
As long as the lfs looks after their fish/tanks and try to educate their staff at least a little on fishkeeping and don't sell too many tankbuster fish, then i don't have a problem with them. Yes, its not an amazing deal from a customers point of view at times, but the lfs's could do an aweful lot worse (Like Walmart- large variety of fish sold, but poorly treated and sold to unsuitable people).
Fenwoman, did this lfs happen to be quite small in size?

Not really small at all. He has been around the longest. I can remember buying my first tank from them 20 odd years ago. Bought the tank, bought the fish, brought it home and set it allup on day one. No info to the contrary offered. They advertise themselves as being one of the best in the area.
I never buy from pet supermarket places. I don't buy anything from that type of place as I prefer to shop from local independant places. They are probably one of the larger ones out of the 3 or 4 locally.

 

[Underwurlde]

Hell, the way I'd look at it is that if he couldn't be bothered to give a shi... then why on earth sould he expect his (lack of) customers to? Businesses like that are simply asking to go bust beceasue of their inherent ingorant arrogancy.

Supply and demand. If you have a potential CUSTOMER with MONEY in your SHOP, then it does not take Sherlock bloody Holmes to conculde the SUPPLY bit!

It seems to be a trend in this poxy county. Cheap Cheap Lazy Cheap Can'tBeBothered. Oh, at top dollar prices of course. What do you expect, everything is utterly smothered in taxation and bureaucracy....

rant over...

Andy

 

[chibi]

My LFS has a few tanks full of plants, but they all have snails in them. I've seen some pretty cool fish there, like the "Crazy Fish" (Crocodile fish, butis butis, and it really lives up to its name!), arowanas, gars, a catfish that looked like a cory and was 2 feet long, and full-grown scats, not to mention the awesome saltwater fish. I thought this was going to be about strange conversations you've heard in LFS, and I was going to reply that I heard two people fighting once. It was over something stupid like how the guy thought the employees were rude to him or something. The fight was one of those fights where they're reaching the threshold where it becomes a physical fight rather than a verbal fight, but it remained a nasty wordy fight. I thought it was funny that the guy would care enough about how the employees don't support his fish choice that he would start fighting about it... He probably wanted to put an arowana in a 10-gallon or something.

 

[kribensis12]

My petstore is huge, just started 3 years ago and everybody goes there and petsmart and all those other chain stores are always emty, I am telling you, I am in there sometimes over 40 minutes waiting for others to be served in teh fish room! And there fish are always best of quality and they always know what they are talking about. And they also have a 55g long filled with healthy live plants!

 

[Underwurlde]

Hey hey!

Gap in the market! Start up your own pet store!?!?

 

[George Farmer]

And another anti-LFS thread!

Vote with your feet (or PC), shop elsewhere if you don't like a shop.

 

[nuttsaboutfish]

We have the same problem in belfast, the store that just wants to sell all the normal stock is mostly empty with sometimes not so clean lookin tanks and very little knowledge about fish I sometimes like goin in to catch them out talking s*** , but the store i use (grosvenor tropicals) is 30 mile trip but always packed, spotless tanks, great quality fish, can get you anything you want and they know wot they are on about. Have different staff who specialise in one area or the other.

 

[fenwoman]

And another anti-LFS thread!

Vote with your feet (or PC), shop elsewhere if you don't like a shop.

All very well if you live in a city with plenty of good shops about. But if you are in an area where you have to do a 15 mile round trip to get to one, it is a pain.
I may come over to Peterboro' one day to have a mooch around the lfs over there when I have a spare day.

 

[CFC]

15 miles is nothing, i usually travel over 50 miles one way to buy fish as all the local stores only sell the normal community fish and a few african cichlids, and thats with at least a dozen stores within 10 miles. There are probably only around 20 shops in the whole country that are really worth visiting on the merits of their fish stock, the rest are just "bread and butter" shops with small average selections, but they are invaluable for those every day items such as water conditioner and food.

 

[andywg]

Hell, the way I'd look at it is that if he couldn't be bothered to give a shi... then why on earth sould he expect his (lack of) customers to? Businesses like that are simply asking to go bust beceasue of their inherent ingorant arrogancy.

Supply and demand. If you have a potential CUSTOMER with MONEY in your SHOP, then it does not take Sherlock bloody Holmes to conculde the SUPPLY bit!

...

Andy

However, with supply and demand you may have hit the nail on the head. If the OP's fish store has survived for 35 years selling stock community fish and plastic plants, why would he want to change a winning formula?

Essentially, he has had customers coming in with demands for community fish such as neons and guppies for years, so he stocks those fish that he knows he has a demand for.

Remember that he runs a business, not an attempt to become well known on a fish forum for stocking rare fish. The fact he has been in business for 35 years would appear to indicate he actually has a pretty good grasp on what his customers want.

You seem to be upset that he isn't stocking what you (one customer) wants because he is catering to all the other customers who do want those items he stocks.

 

[fenwoman]

15 miles is nothing, i usually travel over 50 miles one way to buy fish as all the local stores only sell the normal community fish and a few african cichlids, and thats with at least a dozen stores within 10 miles. There are probably only around 20 shops in the whole country that are really worth visiting on the merits of their fish stock, the rest are just "bread and butter" shops with small average selections, but they are invaluable for those every day items such as water conditioner and food.

15 miles may be nothing to you. I'm glad you are able to find the time to drive 50 miles to buy fish. I don't have the time so I have to shop fairly locally unless I take a day out to make a special trip which would mean rushing my normal chores before I set out, plus the cost in diesel aswell as time.