Petco RANT

[geckofrog]

Monday night I went to my local petco looking for Glass blanks (baffle) for my homemade wet/dry filter. And of course like any of you I checked what kind of saltwater fish they had.

Im looking at the clownfish and they had ich all over them! It was horrible, so I look at the next tank and the next tank and EVERY fish had it!

I go up to the counter and let them know that they have ich, and a young guy comes up and says "Oh yeah, well we can't really treat them since we have anemones in other tanks, so were going to have to do a water change..."

Normally that would be fine, however, 75% of the fish were close to dying, and why can't they setup a quat tank for them, 4 different tanks would be enough for all the personalities of the fish they had on hand.

Im going there tomorrow to see what has survived, i'll take photos

geez, makes me really mad!!!

The petco is in Sherman, Texas (an hour north of dallas)
Steer clear of them!

[krap101]

pretty much all chain pet stores around here deteroriate within 2 years. when they first open their usually great, but then people start getting lazy etc etc. my petco use to have a decent selection of fish, now its like guppies platies cories and the rest of the more common fish.

i was suprised they went to saltwater because they could barely keep up with fresh.

[zenn]

Yeah, i've observed the Petco's in my area doing very irresponsible things with the saltwater life. Probably half of the time I go in there, about 75% of the saltwater fish they have look ill, dying, or are already dead and floating around the tank. I think most Petco's really don't know what they're doing. I think they loose a lot of money on it too though. I wonder if they won't eventually stop carrying saltwater fish. I know if I was the CEO of Petco, I would cut that end of the business.

[ntswift]

I noticed that at my local petco also. I asked one of the guys there, that actually semi-knew what he was talking about, about why they have so many fish that die. He said its because the people that put the fish in just float them for 10-15 minutes and just drop them in like freshwater. I told him they should train them or something but he just said that they wouldnt do it because it would take too much time to acclimate them properly. I think they need to hire people that are half way intelligent and that actually know what they are doing.

[BeGiNeR_7]

I went in to mine the other day and saw they had three dogface puffers put in a small maybe 15-20 gallon tank. They were all under a lot of stress and looked near death. Then they had about five or so mandarin's and there of course were a lot of people interested in them. The lady was saying of yes they are very easy to care for and so on.... I went over and about lost it. I said "no" they need a well established tank with a healthy supply of pods and so on... Of course, I completely embarrassed my boyfriend and my sister but it just makes me so mad to hear things like that. I was so close to buying one of them because I knew they had a better shot in my tank than the other people looking at them. I of course didn't because while a mandarin is on my list I don't plan to get one for another year or so. Although, I have not noticed any ich, mostly due to the fact that one of the guys that works there comes in on Thursdays (when they get their shipment) and the weekends to try to help. He has had tanks for a few years and tries to help with experience. I give him credit for trying but I think his time would be better spent training the staff. I could go on but I need to get some work done. Until next time...

[krap101]

i actually think they dont really lose money on dead fish. i worked at a petland for a summer, and i think they report the amount of dead fish to their distributor and they replace them or something...

[fishfreek]

Moved to General Retailers as that is where all discussions on businesses need to be. Additionaly I must remind all that post in the thread that they need to keep their comments within their area of knowlege. Be that a set of local stores or stores that they frequent vs making statements about how all the stores are.

We will premit open discussion on stores and their quality as long as the discussion is kept to be on facutal elements.

In the defense of petco and every other national pet chain. The stores are only as good as their employees. With low pay rates stores will have a difficult time keeping employees for long periods of time. The end result is high employee turnover and cross training amongst different departments. Instead of having specialists for aquaria you get cross over employees that might cover aquaria as part of their duties but they do not focus on the aquaria areas.

Since there is often some level of specialized knowlege needed as to the operation of the tank systems and medication when required its often a store manager or some other level higher up than the floor personell that ends up having to do the regular maintance on the systems.

While there are no doubtly many stores that have quality control issues from time to time I have a very hard time buying the idea that all stores of a given national chain are consistantly poor in their aquaria husbandry.

[geckofrog]

Originally Posted by fishfreek

Instead of having specialists for aquaria you get cross over employees that might cover aquaria as part of their duties but they do not focus on the aquaria areas.

This may be true but it is the companies fault for not training the employee all about how to take care of animals, regardless of what their "duties" are.
My father owns a 100+million dollar company a year and each employee has to go thru at least 4 weeks of training, plus additional if say he/she is in a specific field, etc. And that 4 weeks of training is if you want to be in sales, an additional 4 weeks for being a tech, and its not a complicated industry either!

Originally Posted by fishfreek

While there are no doubtly many stores that have quality control issues from time to time I have a very hard time buying the idea that all stores of a given national chain are consistantly poor in their aquaria husbandry.

If a resturant has quality control issues, what happens to it? Yup, eventually it dwindles down and dies, nobody wants to go there.

Fishfreek, I noticed that you have always defended stores (namely PETCO) in your posts, im starting to wonder if you work for Petco, or your just concerned that you will not get any more sponsors (banner ad revenue thru your phpadsnew system) for fear that your members might "complain" about their products. I'm not being mean, I'm just stating a possible reason...

Regardless, I reported PETCO to ASPCA

[fishfreek]

Fishfreek, I noticed that you have always defended stores (namely PETCO) in your posts, im starting to wonder if you work for Petco, or your just concerned that you will not get any more sponsors (banner ad revenue thru your phpadsnew system) for fear that your members might "complain" about their products. I'm not being mean, I'm just stating a possible reason...

You trying to threaten me? I in no way am assocated with PetCo, Wal-Mart or any other store that I have and will continue to stand up for in the past/future. Its a simple fact that its oh so easy to bash a company for issues at the local level. There are more appropriate ways of taking recurse. First contact the store manager and express your concerns, then contacting a regional manager with your concerns and if still unanswered or not taken care of take it to the national level.

If you would go back and read the terms of use on this site linked here for your convience http://www.aquariumadvice.com/viewtopic.php?t=26 everything I said in regards to making sure ones comments are factual and are statements of truth an not making general unfounded statements about the organization as a whole is covered under these rules and regulations of using the site.

As far as training. Its corprates repsonsiblity to train regional managers and its the regional managers responsiblity to train more local managers and thus local managers responsiblity to train store managers and then finally store managers to train employees of a given store. Simply stating that its corporate responsibility to train the floor sales staff is a quick and easy out.

[crazyred]

To say nothing of the fact that, as the owner of this website, if fishfreek is seen as endorsing blanket allegations about certain corporate, chain petstores that may prove to be untrue, he could be left wide open for a libel or slander lawsuit by said corporation.

That's why he wants you to limit your allegations to individual stores that you've been to and not be so general about Petco overall. They could have a fabulous store just the next town over where they take VERY good care of thier fish....you can never be too sure. It's also why he seems, as you say, to defend the corporates. You can't say that they do that in every store and that Petco is a horrible coporation. Have you been to every single Petco that there is? My guess would be no.

Just FYI....I don't work at any pet sotre anywhere. I work for the City of Harlingen, just thought I would let you know.