Do They Do It On Purpose?

[Declan]

I was reading through a thread earlier and it commented on their LFS' bad advice.

It got me thinking, do they do it on purpose, give bad advice that is? Or is it genuine naivity?

I know what I think it is, on purpose.

What do you lot think?

D.

 

[petertr]

I think a lot just care about profit, along with not knowing any modern methods

 

[rocknurworld2006]

I was reading through a thread earlier and it commented on their LFS' bad advice.

It got me thinking, do they do it on purpose, give bad advice that is? Or is it genuine naivity?

I know what I think it is, on purpose.

What do you lot think?

D.

some in bohe sides some are both, its all a money making skeem, especially were i stay as we have major water issues which lfs dont tell their customers on purpose so then they uy more fish because they die

 

[Dorkhedeos]

Its mostly not knowing any better combined with trying to make a profit. If you tell the truth too much in this business, you end up losing.

 

[LauraFrog]

It really depends on the LFS. I think some of them are genuinely clueless. My pet peeve is the Australian chain stores, Pets to Pamper and Pets Paradise, which usually employ staff members in their teens who are just there for the money and because standing around cuddling kittens is less objectionable than stacking shelves at a grocery store. Not all of them are like that, but I think quite a lot are, and they just couldn't be bothered to learn much. They don't realise that fish are not a 'just add water' pet, they don't keep fish themselves and their bosses do not require them to understand things like cycling - tbh you'd be lucky to find a BOSS who did!
I think that these sort of idiots account for a fair amount of the bad advice we get, like overstocking and not cycling, because they honestly don't know. THEN you get the deliberate misleaders.

I think there are a lot of them that are largely concerned with making a sale. It seems to be worse in pet shops than specialist aquarium stores, probably because you've got to really like fish to want to spend all day cleaning up after them and monitoring that many tanks, and if you really like fish you can't stand to think of them going home to an uncycled tank.

But the ones that exist to sell stuff are out there. I think they seem to operate on the philosophy that there is an expensive bottled product to fix everything. Couldn't be bothered cycling your tank (or don't know you have to cause we didn't tell you to)? Fine, add this. pH is higher than 7? Use this. Lower than 7? Dose with this. Water's too hard - tip this in. Plants are dying - fine, add this. Fish are all dying... hmm, take home a selection of these medications and use them one after the other or tip them all in when you get desperate, just in case the ammonia was not doing an adequate job of poisoning them.


I'd also like to add something else I've noticed. Explaining cycling takes time. When you've got several hundred customers through a day and you've only got three staff, and one of them's cleaning up the dog vomit in the store room and one of them's watching that grubby-fingered little kid near the fish ornaments and the other one's bagging fish for some mother who's barely controlling a toddler jumping up and down and shouting Nemo! Nemo! - they just don't feel like it.

It's not necessarily that they don't care, or that they don't know, or that they're too concerned about making a sale. They just know that the majority of the time, their advice will go in one ear and out the other. That these people will add ammonia for a week or so, the readings won't change, they'll get fed up and go and buy fish somewhere else, go through a fish in cycle and lose just as many fish. So the fish they're going to kill might as well come from here. I know of several people whose LFS gave them bad advice, and they came on here, learned for themselves, went back - and found the LFS more than capable of having an intelligent discussion about cycling/stocking hardwater vs softwater/going brackish.

 

[Declan]

Go LauraFrog!

D.

 

[drobbyb]

Go LauraFrog!

D.

The sad thing is that she's exactly right. It's the same story here, but different store names.

 

[paul_219]

Thats normal as they said they care about money $$$$$$$$$$$. They dont care about the customer. Money talks DUDE.

 

[Davo86]

Thats normal as they said they care about money $$$$$$$$$$$. They dont care about the customer. Money talks DUDE.

Another problem is that most employees have no previous experience apart from just a basic interest in fish, and so everything they pick-up from other employees is taken as the truth, (unless they do their own research out of work hours which most aren't wiling to do)

Obviously its the managers/supervisors job to bring in sales so they are going to be more concerned in sales often missing out vital questions/information in the process,
Again newer employees hear this and like above appears to them as the right way of doing things.

TBH i think the best people in a LFS are the standard Sales people that obviously have a keen interest in fish,
These people don't really care about if they hit their sales target for the week, and aren't prepared to sell you fish that may die as a result of their actions

 

[always4lora]

I thik they proberly do want to care but dont make the money to live of it so need to tell the odd lie.

 

[SharonCC]

The only fish store in my immediate area, is WalMart. The employees are bounced from different depts. when it gets busy. There are some fairly knowledgable staff, but the checkouts were busy yesterday, so they moved those members to checkout and replaced with someone who was going to sell me a whiptail catfish for an Oto!!! A little girl was going to buy two African Clawed frogs for her fish tank. I had a conversation with the grandmother and she purchased ADFs instead. Another customer was getting a Common Pleco for a 15gal tank. The previous one had got too big and was eating her fish, so she threw him outside! She said when this one got too big, she could always do that againI really tried to steer her towards the Otos but I don't think she was convinced when I left!

 

[Syphoniera]

Seems to me, everybody (especially LauraFrog, as always) commenting is right - but I suspect the main points are the fact that they are businesses which do exist to sell things - and that even informed employees haven't got time to subject each customer to what's likely to be perceived as an insulting quiz.
Imagine the line-ups of people waiting hours while each of them were put through the mill - then try to imagine them coming back to do it again, every time...
The LFS I most often go to has people so busy caring for the fish and other animals that it's often very difficult getting any assistance for humans, which is how it should be - but can be tricky when people driving are nice enough to stop by after shopping or whatever are waiting for you to be done, and complaining about the length of time spent doing so.
Add in several hours for the rotational quiz show,,,
These owners/employees don't have enough time in their work-day to do whatever they already do, never mind extra.
Specific people would have to be hired especially for the purpose of delivering lectures and qualifying/disqualifying people wishing to make purchases, something no individually-run store could afford to do or any big chain spend money on.
Considering the vast number of animals passing through their hands, pet store people can't, obviously, be expected to all know all details relevant to each particular fish carried - that's up to the purchaser, although not all fish-keepers have access to the internet - or have time to sort through often differing advice on multiple sites, or have the awareness that much misinformation is circulated and often generally accepted.
And considering the amount of misinformation common among pet store employees, I, personally, would be unlikely to take the advice of any, unless it chimed with what makes sense to me.
Once somebody, in nightmare example, has recommended Melafix as an ich treatment, or states that bettas don't need heaters or swim-room, or states that a betta with blackened blobs on the stumps of ruined crowntail extensions doesn't have fin-rot but 'is just like that', and endless cetera, I've rather lost interest in seeking advice.
I really think sites like this, although only available to those with internet access - and threads like this, drawing attention to such problems - are about the only feasable answer to the problem.

Edit - part of sentence fired as redundant, sign of the times, lol, that and I evidently can't spell.

 

[raptorrex]

I was reading through a thread earlier and it commented on their LFS' bad advice.

It got me thinking, do they do it on purpose, give bad advice that is? Or is it genuine naivity?

I know what I think it is, on purpose.

What do you lot think?

D.

more often than not, the advice is "censored" to help increase sales. sometimes it is downright lies! apparently that's OK, if you are trying to make money???

 

[jimmyringo]

In my LFS (a large chain store) i see both sides of the story.For example:

I had a fish die within 12 hours of bringing it home.Went back to the shop(with dead fish) and young staff member(Eamon,lets say ) immediately tells me i've got a problem in my tank and tells me i have to buy a bottle of medication. I point out that the shop tank the fish came from now has 3 dead fish floating in it.He says sorry and offers me a replacement......from the same tank .Suffice to say i got a refund.

Theres another wee teenager at the same shop(Pete).He has been an invaluable help to me.He has advised me on tank mates,maintenance and other things.And when i recently had an unexplained pH crash,he asked me to come back and tell him if i got to the bottom of it,so he could advise other customers if it happened them in the future