What would you carry if you had a LFS?

[krap101]

personally i think it would be cool if there was like a circle room or something with different levels of tanks and a lil thing of plants or a koi pond in the center ya know and it being all white between the tanks and really bright like in those futuristic movies

 

[JPloman]

krap101, I bet you are really good at spending money! That would cost way too much, but its a nice idea.

 

[jibboo]

none of my lfs stores even have saltwater.

I have 3 mom-n-pop lfs stores, along with SuperPetz and PetSmart.

With that said ... i have one store that I prefer to buy my fish from. The prices are a little higher than say PetSmart, but the tanks look clean and the fish look healthy. It kills me to go into Walmart of any pet store and see dead fish in any tank ... how come these places don't remove them immediately is beyond me. Now on the flipside ... I tend to not buy any food or supplies from them because they are overpriced.

I love the list of stuff that felf put together ... and I would love to have a store like that near me ... but I've never seen one. For me ... i was disappointed to not be able to find any CO2 kits/pieces, Compact Flourescent lighting, and Flourish plant ferts available at any of the stores around me.

I know everyone has their favorite brands of filters and such ... but if it was my store, I would pick some good quality brands as opposed to el-cheapo low-cost one.

As per fish ... you gotta have the standard tetras, guppies, bars, platys, mollies, plecos, corys. From there I would keep some of the following on regular basis or rotation: cichlids, angels, loaches, sharks, cats, killifish, rams, rainbows, guaramis, eels.

I personally like to see new and interesting fish since I can see guppies anywhere. I also like to know that my store has quality, healthy fish.

Knowledgeable salespeople is a huge plus ... even if its the basics on setting up and maintaining a tank and knowing or being able to look up simple profiles of the fish you carry. I know every store can't possibly have true fish ppl working for them ... but it really wouldn't be that hard to equip them with the basics.\

You can peruse a store like PetSmart to make sure you have the basics ... then the question comes in ... what do consumers WISH those stores carried (ie: what do we order off the internet because I can't find it there). Then you have to determine if there's enough of a local market for those items.

Unfortunately, I think the casual fish owner prolly far outnumber the hardcore fish owners ... which is likely why I can't find CO2 products and CF lighting in my lfs.

 

[krap101]

lol i wanna spend alot of money but u cant spend what isnt there

or you can have it on the beach and have an underground tunnel and have a glass dome so u can watch the fish

 

[Felf]

jibboo said

Unfortunately, I think the casual fish owner prolly far outnumber the hardcore fish owners ... which is likely why I can't find CO2 products and CF lighting in my lfs.

that's exactly the case around here but there's another problem...shipping. i dont expect to find an lfs that has even half the things i want because of the fact that shipping all those things over the pacific just isnt worth it unless people are going to buy it. in my case, i'd have to start my own lfs or find an online store that has all those things and reasonable shipping. unfortunately, unlike everyone else the lfs around here are almost all mom and pop stores but only cater to casual aquarists with simple needs. i actually wish there was a petsmart or something similar so i'd have a better selection of merchandise but not so much livestock. there's no shortage of good quality sw fish here though

 

[lukepghpa]

natural looking a setups are always better...its gonna be tough catering to both the hardcore aquarists and the folks that got a tank cause their kids saw finding nemo