Funniest LFS statement you ever heard?

[Taso]

OOOH!~ I got one!

LFS Employee with 25 years experience: Hi boss! Myself and this other employee (with another 25 years experience) are taking care of 10,000 gallons of reef and freshwater. We have doubled your business in the last 2 years. Everyone who used to steal or give customers "discounts" are gone. We have doubled the amount of livestock you carry. We have improved all your techniques for coral and transship fish, acclimation, everything. We have one other employee who knows nothing and does nothing, and 20 "maintenance dudes" who eat from the trough but don't help one bit with store maintenance. We have a manager who is a complete idiot. Can I have a raise up from the poverty wages you are paying me now? Can we hire more workers? Can you show like you give a darn about whats happening in your own company?

LFS Owner: Here, I'll hire this one employee from Petco. Otherwise, no raise, and do the best you can and don't take stuff too seriously.

LFS Employee with 25 years experience: Doh!

One month later, both of those experienced dedicated employees either move on to another job, or are "fired". The LFS then hires 8 new people to run the store they expected two people (and one lazy 'marine biologist') to run.

So before you crap on your LFS, recognize, they don't pay well and anyone who knows what they are doing can't stick around to get paid 12 dollars an hour and do the work of 3 people because they won't hire anyone with knowledge because most people with knowledge of the aquarium trade wouldn't work for these scummy owners.

 

[RareEarthCorals]

Keep in mind this is all in fun. We have some that have experience the raw underside of the business including customers, workers, and owners. This isn't the venue for those experiences. Lets keep it light and funny so it remains something we can all laugh about and not take too seriously.

 

[Cleo642]

I'm originally from Louisiana, but got transplanted up to the artic circle (aka northeast Ohio).

Sounds like the artic circle to me. I don't like that cold stuff.lol

 

[bobman]

I guess I am lucky I have 6 LFS all under an hour from my house and one right down the street. Quality differs from store to store but what I can say is they really are there for their customers. Never really have heard any bad advise. There is a local Ace Hardware that has a row of freshwater and saltwater fish. They keep some really big fish in 5 gallon tanks but surprisingly the fish stay healthy. About the worst thing I see the kid that runs the fish section do is when someone wants a reef tank like the one he has in the store. He says its all about the lighting and takes them to his over priced marine land double brights. At least he is honest enough to tell them they can only have lower light corals. Every time I smack my head and say you know that lights not good enough. Your reef tank sitting there has t5 lighting. He just sighs and says he cant get the owner to go with better lighting at a cost if they dont move. I guess being a hardware store and not a pet shop I get it. The rest of my LFS are top notch you can usually tell the quality of there stuff through the price tag though. The really nice LFS has a really high price.

 

[Eric C]

Me: how much for the tang
LFS: says right there "yellow tang $25"
Me: I'll take it. ( it was a purple )

 

[4FordFamily]

"A fire shrimp and a clown trigger should get along just fine"

"A dogface puffer won't eat mushroom coral; they are reef safe"

 

[RareEarthCorals]

Sounds funny dont it?

A dogface puffer, a fire shrimp, and a trigger all walk into a LFS.....!!!!

 

[zoo]

ya I see that at a lot of ignorant LFS employees. But my LFS has my friend who is a marine biologist like me and is extremely honest and if he doesnt know a certain topic he will call me or look online if he not busy

 

[CarBoy]

These are all great! But being serious for a moment, owning a LFS is tough. I think a lot of people think it's going to be "fun" turning their beloved hobby into a business. Then they get into it and start losing money like crazy. That causes them to get desperate, and when faced with financial ruin many people will resort to being dishonest/unscrupulous. Even if they know better.

This is so thrue.
I used to visit a certain store that had a few partners. One of them used to always give me good advice and I considered him to be an honest person.
Later on he left ownership of that store and opened his own. About a year into business I went to work for him. He was struggling, but still seemed to be the same honest peson, but about a year after that I would see him doing things that was not in the customers or animals best interest.
The tipping point that opened my eyes was when he sold a 6" stingray and a Huma Huma trigger to a teenage kid, knowing that both were going to be going in a 55gal tank.......guess it was time to pay the rent...
Kid came back in a couple days with the stingray all beat up.....
I lost a lot of respect for him over that......

 

[PaulKreider]

Working at a LFS, I feel like I should start a thread for all the stuff I've heard customers say..... You think this stuff is bad just wait lol.

 

[MadisonHarshbarger]

Went to my LFS, there was a new girl behind the counter. I wanted a coco worm, and asked for her help. This girl looked apprehensively at the tank, then tentatively asked me if they would bite her if she grabbed one. I had to explain that they didn't have teeth, or an oral opening that was capable of biting at all. She yanked a cluster of worms up from the sand, and said she didn't want to untangle them, and was I interested in getting more than one. I just walked away at that point.

 

[maxxin69]

This'll be off topic, but working at an LFS I have heard some rather interesting things. There's two that really stick out for now.

Me: Thank you for calling, how may I help you?
Customer: Do you guys have any rodi water? (May I note that he did not spell out RO/DI, he simply said rohdee. It was hard to not laugh.

The other is a bit of a story. I was cleaning tanks when I overheard a customer talking to one of my peers. He was stating about how he used to be in the hobby some 30 odd years ago. He said that seahorses were his Achilles heel of the hobby. So they get into a bit of a conversation about that and he asks when they do to have such a high success rate nowadays.

Turns out that he never knew that seahorses come from the sea, and therefore need saltwater.

 

[Flashy Fins]

So before you crap on your LFS, recognize, they don't pay well and anyone who knows what they are doing can't stick around to get paid 12 dollars an hour and do the work of 3 people because they won't hire anyone with knowledge because most people with knowledge of the aquarium trade wouldn't work for these scummy owners.

I'm sorry you had a crummy experience. It's true that employees are often a poor source of information for the reasons stated, but I have a big problem when the store OWNER is giving bad information. This is not limited to bad stores run by scumbags. Stores around me seem to know plenty about coral and next to nothing about fish; some owners admit this freely and others pretend to know everything. Even at the "best" store in my area, the owner only knows the names of his fish by what his wholesale list says; when he had a "blue filamented wrasse" in his tank, he couldn't tell me if it was a blue flasher or a filamented flasher (not the same fish), and when I asked if his tierra anthias were resplendents, he gave a blank stare and repeated they were tierras, as if he'd never heard of resplendents (same fish). It might sound nit-picky, but I expect the owner of a nice shop to know more about fish than that.

Another problem is how little any store seems to know about fish disease. They can't tell you how to treat disease, because they don't treat disease. Sick/dead fish go in the trash, unless they are particularly expensive fish, and even then, treatment is usually done wrong and the fish sold to someone before it is well. I realize it is asking above and beyond what a store can afford to expect vet-level care of all fish, or even vet-level advice on how to take care of the fish they sell, but this is the kind of stuff that turns hobbyists to online sources with guarantees. While I want to support local and still do for coral purchases, I prefer to buy fish online and limit buying fish in the store to species I can't find online, or color variations I'm particularly choosy on and can't find through LA Diver's Den. I've been on the hunt for a certain variation of Lubbock's wrasse, for instance; when I see the color I want in a healthy-appearing specimen, I'll buy it. If it's through DD, I'll feel confident in my purchase; if it's from a store, I'll go home with it assuming it has ich, flukes, and possibly worse.

 

[ebushrow]

This'll be off topic, but working at an LFS I have heard some rather interesting things. There's two that really stick out for now.

Me: Thank you for calling, how may I help you?
Customer: Do you guys have any rodi water? (May I note that he did not spell out RO/DI, he simply said rohdee. It was hard to not laugh.

The other is a bit of a story. I was cleaning tanks when I overheard a customer talking to one of my peers. He was stating about how he used to be in the hobby some 30 odd years ago. He said that seahorses were his Achilles heel of the hobby. So they get into a bit of a conversation about that and he asks when they do to have such a high success rate nowadays.

Turns out that he never knew that seahorses come from the sea, and therefore need saltwater.

I say Winner!

 

[mochaclownlover]

I think were all getting some amusement out of this thread

 

[Flashy Fins]

I was cleaning tanks when I overheard a customer talking to one of my peers. He was stating about how he used to be in the hobby some 30 odd years ago. He said that seahorses were his Achilles heel of the hobby. So they get into a bit of a conversation about that and he asks when they do to have such a high success rate nowadays. Turns out that he never knew that seahorses come from the sea, and therefore need saltwater.

So funny it's sad!
Reminds me of a story I read on a local store's webpage where a woman used bath salts in her tank and couldn't figure out why everything was dying.

 

[Mike in CT]

My wife told me a story that when she was a teenager, a LFS sold her a complete 5 gallon freshwater setup, including about 10 fish all at once. 2 of the fish were sea horses :/ Of course the horses died and the rest of the tank crashed a week later.

 

[shadow1013]

The thing is - and I cannot stress this enough - there are some good LFS out there worthy of your business. You just gotta find them and not allow your thinking to become poisoned from dealing with the bad ones. I worry that the mom & pop LFS will go the way of the Dodo, and all we will be left with is Petco.

I will gladly pay a little extra to support a good LFS. And I benefit as well. Sometimes I like actually getting to see the specimen I will be buying. And when I need a medication, I don't have time to wait on Amazon, I need it NOW!

I totally agree. We went to about a half dozen stores before we found two we like to go to.

 

[stscream4187]

Great thread. And yes, once you find the good local store you are set, but in my experience there is 1 good LFS to every 3-4 bad ones.

Got one:

Me: (staring at tank with 2 Helfrichi Firefish and 2 normal Firefish) How much for the Helfrichi? It is not labeled.
LFS: We don't carry whatever you just said. Firefish is labeled right there and price is 19.99.
Me: So all 4 fish in this tank are 19.99?
LFS: Yes, all the same fish.
Me: Then bag up the 2 purple ones with the yellow heads.

 

[ebushrow]

you gotta wonder how much $ they lose by not paying experienced people ... I bet it would offset the increased wages...