Thinking of starting my own aquarium maintenence gig...

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boojumsnark25

Aquarium Advice Regular
Joined
Jan 18, 2007
Messages
66
Hi, I'm 17 years old and have been working with freshwater aquariums for about 10 years. I'm a senior in high school, and I'd like to get a little money stashed away for college (planning on majoring in biology and being a limnologist). Anyways, the thought entered my mind of running a little aquarium maintenance business for doctors offices and restaurants and such. I have two questions. First, do you think a 17 year old is too young to be taken seriously? Second, has anyone else tried this? What has your experience been?

Thanks,
Greg
 
If I met a 17 year old who has figured out what his college major is going to be, decided he needed to create a business that he could operate to help pay for it, identified his target consumers, and had the insight to ask for input on the project. I would take him very serious.

I have never run into such a service, but then again I'm not in a position to have needed such a service either.

Some questions that comes to mind:

Will you be able to service these customers during business hours?
What liability do you assume if something goes wrong in the tank?
What services will you provide?


I think it's a great idea myself.
Good luck!
 
SparKy697 said:
If I met a 17 year old who has figured out what his college major is going to be, decided he needed to create a business that he could operate to help pay for it, identified his target consumers, and had the insight to ask for input on the project. I would take him very serious.

I have never run into such a service, but then again I'm not in a position to have needed such a service either.

Some questions that comes to mind:

Will you be able to service these customers during business hours?
What liability do you assume if something goes wrong in the tank?
What services will you provide?


I think it's a great idea myself.
Good luck!

Thanks for the reply, Sparky. I'd be able to service these companies during business hours, and if they preferred I'd come after hours (I doubt they want me tramping through their office with buckets as their customers watch) I could do that as well. I was thinking of offering set up services for freshwater only at first (might go saltwater down the line), and ongoing maintanence after that.
 
I think it is a great idea as well. I work in swimming pool service, and you would be surprised how many people (and hotels) want weekly service just so they don't have to spend time (or unqualified employees time) dealing with the maintenance.

Where do you live? I would believe this opportunity would work better in a large city where there would be more chances someone would be interested. I would make sure you draw up a contract outlining what will be done and when, and definitely assume some liability to give the customers security.

Getting ahold of a mailing list may be pretty difficult, so you may want to think of how to get the word out.

Good luck. :)
 
Moved to The Lounge.

My husband does aquarium maintenance for a few local establishments on weekends. He got started in it because a friend has a tank in her office. No one at the office knew how to care for fish so they asked him to maintain it for them. It's fun playing with someone else's money when it comes to setting up and maintaining a tank. Word of mouth spread and now he takes care of 4. He doesn't make much out of it. He does it more for the hobby and for a little play money on the side. He could charge more but he's not in it for the money.
 
any idea what the best way to get the word out would be? I only want to do businesses, and only 3-4...anything that would work better than getting on the phone/sending out letters?
 
My LFS does that and he makes good money doing it. He said he makes more money on maint than selling fish and corals. He does SW too so I dont know money wise if there is a big difference.
 
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