A Message from the President

[mseguin]

I wanted to post on the topic of LFS and sponsors. I feel a bit of a wake up call is needed. These are not rules specifically (although those may be coming in the future) but rather guidelines as to how the OVAS community should deal with the suppliers in the area. I missed the latest brouhaha until the thread had been deleted, and didn't get to get my two cents in, but this has been going on for a while, and it will need to stop if this club is to maintain any kind of relationship with dealers and suppliers in this area. I've gotten very frustrated with the attitudes in this club and forum over the past few years, and this has finally brought it to a boil. I am not going to refer to any particular LFS or business, but certain ones have definitely taken the brunt of the attacks.

The first thing that people seem to forget is that its not always about YOU. Yes, we've all gotten used to the culture that the customer always comes first, the customer is always right, etc. But guess what, the customer is very often wrong. Just because you think it should be done a particular way doesn't mean it should be. Not only that, but YOU are not the only customer. Sometimes, giving in to one customer would screw over 2 or 3 or more customers down the road, and then where would that get them?

But the biggest thing that people seem to forget is that bottom line, LFS are a business. They don't OWE YOU anything. You give them money, they give you goods and/or services. If you don't like the goods and services you get for that price, then you are free to shop around until you find a better value for their money. And by the same token, if a LFS feels it is not to their advantage to bring in a particular brand or species or hold a particular sale, than that is their choice. I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that if they figured they could make money from that sale/brand/whatever that they would do so. If they don't, then don't assume they don't give a crap about their customers. Just accept that they felt it was not in their best interest to do so.

Running an LFS or other aquarium hobby business is no easy task. I have worked retail management for a number of years, including the pet industry, and let me tell you, any time you are dealing with livestock the degree of difficulty goes up a lot. Margins are tight, the livestock is finicky, people's emotions get involved, and all in all many have failed for every business that survives. With the Walmart's and the Petsmart's trying to grab the customer with low prices and easy accessibility, the LFS is being squeezed hard.

Ultimately, the consumer is the one who decides who lives and dies in the corporate world. People got so caught up with finding the cheapest prices that LFS have had a tough time to compete with the Mart's and mail order or back room suppliers. Then people go in to the stores every so often and complain about the state of the fish or the tanks, negelecting that the stores were forced to cut the hours of the employees who took care of the tanks. Why did the store have to cut hours? Because poeple would rather pay 10% less for a neon tetra or a clownfish then from the LFS. And that's their right. But it's hypocritical to then ignore the economics of the situation when you go back to the LFS to window shop.

In the end, everybody is entitled to their opinion. If you think a certain store could do a better job taking care of their fish or have better prices on dry goods or whatever, then leave them a comment or talk to their manager or send a letter to their home office. But don't come on here and bash them. We have worked hard to build relationships with our sponsors and other local businesses, relationships that we believe translate nicely for the local hobbyist. But how long will these relationships last (or new ones develop) if the sponsor feels that the forum and/or club is a hostile environment for them? How is it conducive to fostering a hobby to have posts treating sponsors like idiots who wouldn't know how to run a McDonald's let alone a fish room? You may not care, but I do, and I'm sick of a certain core group of malcontents making the rest of the us look bad.

I have locked this post because its not a debate. This is my rant, if you don't agree, I really don't care. I have seen more than my fair share of whining over trivial issues that at this point, enough is enough. Grow up and treat the sponsors with some respect, or in a few years you won't have any and then where will we be? Check your ego at the homepage, and please interact with the community in a civil manner.

Matt Séguin
OVAS President
April 7, 2010