big al's(innes) list of dead fish for october!

[repeej]

Unfortunately being "understaffed" is not a good enough excuse for offering sub par service.  The customer doesn't usually care why you can't meet a certain level of service consistantly.  I too am not here to bash BigAl's (I have spent alot of money and will do so again) but I have noticed on many occasions that I have not always received the same level of service that we as customers deserve.

I like doing my shopping during the week when there are less customers in the store.....not on the weekend when entire families are shopping and as you said you are "understaffed".

I'm somewhat disappointed that I have to make a special trip this weekend to get these fish....even though the I was there and willing to spend my money last night.

[Julie]

I like to impose my family on ba's anytime of the week, and am always happy with the service I receive, though I did have a sore back one day.  

Julie

[Sailfin]

In all, I think all the petstores (head office of course) need to look at their sales strategy.  It's not only Big Als with poor fish care......it's all stores with prices!    I've noticed that the same group of Blue JD's have been sitting at the SuperPet Merivale location for some time now.....Nobody will be buying them at the price that they want!   I also been watching the T. Duboisi there.....One them actually matured in the tank there!  I first started watching them when I noticed one losing it's spots and the yellow stripe started to appear.....over the months, it's still there...still for sale.....still nobody will buy it at the asking price.

It's a little thing called retail mark-up. Any price you see on anything in any store is obviously not what the store paid for it. In the case of Super Pet Merivale, I do believe when they first opened the fish room manager there did not do all of her own ordering and thus some items (although incredibly interesting) were ordered in without regard to the price or what they would have to be sold for. It's part of working in a retail, sales environment.

And believe it or not there's a lot of people out there willing to pay a lot of money for fish. They may not be incredibly knowledgeable, and you could argue that they're being 'taken advantage of', but in the end they pay it.

For some people it's not about getting stuff as cheap as you can. It's about getting what you want when you want it.

Speak to any fish store manager, and they'll tell you that pricing of the fish, is "sometimes" based on the rent of the building or sometimes based on availability of the fish.   The thing that they don't know is the law of supply and demand!  Obviously there is no demand for these fish at high prices!   It doesn't matter what you ask, they never have an answer..I audit petstores with a private company, and we ask alot of questions why so many fish if no one is buying these type of fish...they always respond, they sell what they order,   or head office puts on their weekly sales..  ..or a good one is...."we didn't order it, it just came with the order"   :roll:  When I first got into fish, I would search the internet for suppliers who had low shipping rates with no minimum purchases......For small fresh water fishies, I never seen $60 for a fish!  The most expensive back then was maybe between the $8-$10 range.   I was into mollies  and angels(various types).....the most that they would ask for is 1.00......and here you have petstores selling them at $6 each to $10 a pair. ...with Angels going beyond the $12 mark for something the size of a twoonie

[mseguin]

Why shouldn't the rent be factored into the markup? It's called overhead, and it ahs to be paid somehow. As for rarity and demand, it probably comes into the price at the supplier level but NOT at the LFS level (at least BA). I have seen the pricing frquently, and it is done according to fairly standard markups. If we can get fish that will sell for cheaper than the ones we get regularly from our normal suplliers, we will. (Just check out the cheap Apistos we've gotten from South America or teh killies we got from Montreal).

[rockgarden]

Now that we have moved on into November and onto a different topic perhaps the current thread could be closed.

Let the October list rest and let B/A Innes get on with whatever it is that they are trying to do.  

Let's assume that B/A Innes wants to sell a wide variety of healthy fish and suitable fish products to a broad segment of the population (some well informed, some complete novices), provide employment to a significant number of students and part -time employees who might have thought at one time or the other that they might like a career in pet retailing, and along the way pay the rent and make a profit.  They and all the other LFSs out there don't want their livestock to die but it is good business practice to keep track of what arrives dead or in poor shape - B/A isn't the only store in the world that keeps such lists.

BTW - I don't work for any B/A or LFS, though who knows, some day I might.

Sometimes things don't work out as well as they might but, from what I have seen of B/A Innes (even including the unfortunate SW disaster that struck them earlier this year), they are certainly not the worst fish store in the world. Any of the employees that I know who work there certainly are trying to do the best that they can to keep the livestock healthy and the customer informed and happy about their buying decision.  

Maybe I've just been lucky, but that is my take on the situation and I have probably visited close to a hundred retail pet shops in Canada and the US in the past two or three years and B/A Innes more than a few times.  

Who else would admit to being in more LFSs than pubs.   Is it time for another  :beer:.

As far as "sales" are concerned, don't you just hate it when you visit the B/A weekend sales site and see that another B/A somewhere in Canada has a great sale price on something or other that you really thought you wanted but no B/A within driving distance of Ottawa has the same creature on sale or for that matter even carries it? Or even worse, when the fish you don't want is on sale and the one that you do want isn't.

Oh well, sales is sales.

Ron

[Marc]

Now that we have moved on into November and onto a different topic perhaps the current thread could be closed.

Excellent suggestion.  This time Ron gets the last word.