Don't go to Pets at home/Petsmart!!

[misancha]

I have had several bad experiences there myself.

when I first set up my aqaurium I visited PetSmart just to get an idea of the quality of their fish keeping - shock horror when I saw a sales girl attempting to catch her 'prey' by relentlessly chasing the fish up and down the tank. Now if those fish didn't die from shock when the purchaser got them home I'd be surprised.

I find it hard to keep quiet when insensed by such cruelty albeit caused by inexperience on her part. I suggested maybe she should hold the net still until her victim came by, thereby ensuring much less stress being inflictedand less chance of the poor thing dying, her answer was that it takes too long to do that and there was a queue of customers!!

Maybe they retrict themselves to pet supplies not supplying the pets!

 

[Jo]

Thats good news, hopefully the ones around me will take a leaf out of Bradford's book!

 

[KimmyFishy89]

I have had several bad experiences there myself.

when I first set up my aqaurium I visited PetSmart just to get an idea of the quality of their fish keeping - shock horror when I saw a sales girl attempting to catch her 'prey' by relentlessly chasing the fish up and down the tank. Now if those fish didn't die from shock when the purchaser got them home I'd be surprised.

I find it hard to keep quiet when insensed by such cruelty albeit caused by inexperience on her part. I suggested maybe she should hold the net still until her victim came by, thereby ensuring much less stress being inflictedand less chance of the poor thing dying, her answer was that it takes too long to do that and there was a queue of customers!!

Maybe they retrict themselves to pet supplies not supplying the pets!

Ugh its terrible. Almost like fish are toys or something. Who care about the people, there lives aren't at stake with their fish

 

[TearsTurnToAshes]

the petsmarts down here blow. there fish section is more like a fish market, sometimes its hard to see whats realy in the tanks with all the dead fish swirling around.
But they do have excellent frozen fish foods

but ive made it a point not to buy any fish from them, i bought a seemingly healthy pleco from a tank that was to my surprise in very good condition. so when i bring him home and put him in one of my 20/g's i find that hes not a healthy pleco....buy a harbringer of disease and pestilence! the next day i found all of my fish dead, all from a 1in pleco from teh dirty rat infested petsmart.

and all they did was refund me my 1.99 for the pleco!

petsmart can burn in hell

 

[Polarhound]

I went back to the Petco where my sick Mollies came from to pick up some flakes. While I was there I checked around some of the tanks. The tank my silver molly had come out of had 2 decomposing corpses floating on the surface, and other fish picking away at them. Just looking in the tank I could point out 3 different diseases present.

I went up to the 2 kids they had working on the tanks and brought one over to show him. All I got out of him was a "duh, that sucks" and he walked back over to continue chit-chatting with his friend who was working on another tank.

At that point I put the flakes I was going to buy back on the shelf and went to the front to ask for a manager. I made my complaint to him (very calmly) and he said he would take care of it. At that point I walked out of the store.

For anyone in New England, this was the Holyoke, MA Petco.

I went to another lfs near me and had a long talk with one gentleman who obviously knew what he was talking about. He agreed with my diagnosis of my silver Molly's troubles and explained the different antibiotics and how different ones were better for specific diseases.

I just put the second dose of Kanamycin in the tank today, and there is already a marked improvement. She no longer sits on the bottom gasping, and the fuzz around her mouth is just about gone. She still isn't feeding, but has been swimming more and more all around the tank, and even comes up along the surface. Although still clearly sick, the improvement is noticable.

One way to tell if a lfs is on the up and up is if they are willing to recommend other stores as well. I mentioned how I sometimes travel to another certain store in CT for some items, and he came right out and said that he shops there himself, especially for some more exotic items.

 

[Nix]

my petsmart is very nice. I've never seen a over stocked tank and everything is clean and i havent seen a dead fish in the for... well i dont remeber seeing a dead fish in there.

 

[Inchworm]

I wen't to this AMAZING fish store yesterday. It was simply called "Pets" and boy did they have some amazing fish!

I see you are in New York, KimmyFishy89 I live there too.

Would you mind telling me what town that pet shop is in? If it's anywhere near me, I'd like to check it out.

I hope that whenever anyone finds a really good lfs they tell their friends and spread the word about it. It's a shame to see people spend their money in the chain stores when local people who work hard to set up and run nice shops end up going out of business.

 

[KimmyFishy89]

Sure Its in either bethpage or plainedge long island.

 

[christine]

I know how you feel, I went to Wal-Mart ( Iwould NEVER buy fish there) and half the bettas in the little cups were just dead, but still selling....

 

[Inchworm]

I know how you feel, I went to Wal-Mart ( Iwould NEVER buy fish there) and half the bettas in the little cups were just dead, but still selling....

It just goes to show that some people will buy anything.......

 

[Inchworm]

Sure Its in either bethpage or plainedge long island.

Thanks, KimmyFishy89, It's close, but not close enough. I live further out in Suffolk County. But if I ever get in that way I'll look for it and check it out.

 

[cichlidmaster]

Reality check folks...................

First,

Knucklehead..........I feel for you!! When the first PetsMart opened in Michigan they ran an ad for a manager for the fish dept.

Given I had not only many years of fishkeeping experience, but many years of management experience I went to apply.

After going thru their ridiculous application, personal history forms and tests they told me they would hire me for a worker position at $5.50 an hour!!

They told me the manger's position had been filled. Several weeks later the ad was still running so I went and asked about it. They told me the had paid to run the ad for x amount of weeks and it had one more week to run. Three weeks later the ad was still in the papers so again I went and asked about it.

They finally told me they have a practice of promoting from within and that was why I was not offered the job.

I simply asked them this.....If you promote from within why did you run the ad??

Now I have no personal experience with them except that I have seen items priced 2-3 times higher than quite a few of the small fish shops in my area so I will not comment on them in that manner.

For those of you who think it would be great to own and run your own fish shop...take it from me....it's hard work!!

My wife and I operate and maintain 110 or so tanks and I spend double the time every week with this than I do my management position with the hospital I work for.

Owning your own shop is not all it's cracked up to be. If you like long hours with little pay, having to deal with suppliers who short your orders or delay your orders or substitute one species for one they want/need to unload and then can't get anywhere with them, then maybe this IS for you!!

Or how about the customer who...no matter what you do for them is never satisfied?? And don't think that just because you have a clean shop with clean tanks and a good variety that this will not happen....because it does.

Now....if your lucky enough or been in the field (working for a shop) and have made contacts with quality suppliers and can manage to bring in enough stock to get the best possible prices in order to sell your stock at a competitive price, then your one leg up.

This is not meant to be crass or intended to flame anyone or shoot down ones dream of owning a shop.....it's simply a reality check.

We all have delusions that we could run a shop better than the ones that are out there....and maybe this is true, but keep in mind it is not easy!!!

Now I have been lucky!! Thru years of experience from breeding Africans and bringing in wild fish, I have developed a sense for picking good suppliers.

I have yet to have any fish arrive in poor condition or dead. In fact the fish come in so healthy, I would not hesitate to sell them immediately, but don't!!

In closing I would simply like to add this.....running a shop and tending the number of tanks necesssary to make it profitable is a whole different ballgame then taking care of 1-2 or even 20 tanks!!

Good luck to any of you who decide to pursue this as a career. It can be very rewarding!!

CM

 

[Jo]

Owning your own shop is not all it's cracked up to be. If you like long hours with little pay, having to deal with suppliers who short your orders or delay your orders or substitute one species for one they want/need to unload and then can't get anywhere with them, then maybe this IS for you!!

Thanks for the reality check CM, but it still seems like something I want to do eventually, what you have descibed seems exactly like what I have to deal with everyday, bad customers that are NEVER satisfied, working long hours, not getting paid much, problem suppliers not delivering the right stuff, or even anything at all. I have always wanted to work for myself and I know that you didn't mean this as a personal dig! ( ) but I feel bound to justify myself (i dunno, call it the lawyer in me!) I didn't start this thread to say that I could do a better job than the lfs's round, me, but just to let people know of what I had seen at pets at home because I was upset.

My problem with slogging my guts out for a company is that the long term gain is not felt by me...sure they pay me a salary, but I'm the sort of person who needs to be out there doing things for myself. I have a few friends that are self employed, so I understand that it will be a hard thing to do, but I'm putting myself through business school to get more clued up on that side and would like to make it clear that this is something that I wanna do longterm! he he, I'm not talking about quitting work and opening a shop NOW and it being a success (although that'd be great! )

I'm talking more learning a lot more about the whole business, then perhaps getting a part time job at my lfs, finding out if I like WORKING for a fs, then seeing where it goes...!

this may seem a bit of a strange thing to post in reply and I don't mean to offend. I'm glad that you put the reality check in.

Thanks.

 

[cichlidmaster]

geeza,

I thank you for not taking it personal as it was in no way intended to be.

Nor was any comment directed towards anyone poster here.

I read a lot of replies and this was just meant as a general reply to them all.

I understand what you mean by the gains are not felt or realizes by you!!

I wish you luck in your endevour. As I said...I have been lucky enough to latch on to good suppliers with quality stock, but it takes time.

Been in this (breeding/retail) for 10 years and still nowhere near where I want to be.

It sounds like your on the right track tho geeza. I am sure if this is something you really want it will happen for you.

Good luck!!

CM

 

[Jo]

Thanks CM,

glad that my reply didn't come across in the wrong manner (is so hard to make things seem like I mean them on here!) ...never know I may be coming over to your shop for some advice one day...if you feel like setting up a chain and having a shop in the UK, let me know! he he