Please open a store in Red Deer:)

[dunl]

Definitely tempting.

[the marine apprentice]

I am sure Greg has been waiting for my reply lol. We do have a store but the guy who owns it is way over priced and won't even price his stock.
If you ask him a price he says well it depends on if I like you or not. He smokes dope in his shop as well as cigarettes and drinks more beer then anyone I know.
He has recently banned me from his store as well as Josh (bauder1987) because he thinks we have a plan on tryingto sabotage his store.
There are lots of saltwater enthusiasts in red deer and area and I believe we deserve a store that is worth while.
Just my 2 cents

[The Grizz]

Well it's about time

My idea was to start something small here in my office, decent selection of corals & fish to a minimum, ability to get certain equipment / salt / additive items for a reasonable price, ability to order in requested livestock and custom build's and see how it goes before jumping into something big.

[MMAX]

Originally Posted by DiverDude

The real question is: is there enough demand in RD for such a store ?

Rent, insurance, fixtures, payroll, inventory, etc. this all costs and if there aren't enough people buying....

I can assure you there is more than enough demand.

[Slick Fork]

Originally Posted by MMAX

I can assure you there is more than enough demand.

I'll be the local skeptic.... I really don't think there's enough demand to support a full time store in Red Deer. A Fish store with a salt water selection maybe but not a dedicated salt water store.

Look at it this way, I think most of us buy our drygoods from the mail order guys anyways.... free shipping beats paying for gas to Calgary or Edmonton. So dry goods prices had better be REALLY competitive. My personal threshold to buy local is the lessor of $20 or 10% of the cost I can pick it up for online. If the idea to save on inventory costs is not to stock anything for drygoods... why bother, if I've got to wait I will probably be in Calgary before long or will be able to aquire it from J&L cheaper and faster.

As for livestock, IF there's an excellent selection and pricing then people will probably buy local. If the selection is marginal, the fish not healthy, prices a little high the store owner will find that people are just giving the place a pass.

The other factor will be location. Greg, I know you are dying to set something up at your acreage but I really think all you're going to do tie a whole bunch of your space and money up with inventory that will sit and stagnate. I just don't see your average consumer driving 20 minutes out of town to drop in on your acreage. I'll be honest, if you had something I wanted and I knew the price and health of it before hand I would absolutely come out and buy it from you. However, I would probably NOT feel comfortable showing up at your place and finding that it had Ich, or wasn't the same as advertised or the price was way high etc. and then passing on it. For some reason it's different at someones house as opposed to a store, same with showing up just to browse... and if it's uncomfortable to go as a consumer, people will not go. There's no doubt in my mind, a storefront in town is critical to the success of any aquatic entrepreneur in Red Deer.

As I stated originally, A storefront downtown or in one of the shopping centres at the south end selling mostly freshwater fish is what I see succeeding in Red Deer. Something that your average guy can go in and buy a guppy or some cichlids for his kids and maybe see the coral and sw fish and say "Hey, I'd really like to try that".

[ponokareefer]

Originally Posted by Slick Fork

I'll be the local skeptic.... I really don't think there's enough demand to support a full time store in Red Deer. A Fish store with a salt water selection maybe but not a dedicated salt water store.

Look at it this way, I think most of us buy our drygoods from the mail order guys anyways.... free shipping beats paying for gas to Calgary or Edmonton. So dry goods prices had better be REALLY competitive. My personal threshold to buy local is the lessor of $20 or 10% of the cost I can pick it up for online. If the idea to save on inventory costs is not to stock anything for drygoods... why bother, if I've got to wait I will probably be in Calgary before long or will be able to aquire it from J&L cheaper and faster.

As for livestock, IF there's an excellent selection and pricing then people will probably buy local. If the selection is marginal, the fish not healthy, prices a little high the store owner will find that people are just giving the place a pass.

The other factor will be location. Greg, I know you are dying to set something up at your acreage but I really think all you're going to do tie a whole bunch of your space and money up with inventory that will sit and stagnate. I just don't see your average consumer driving 20 minutes out of town to drop in on your acreage. I'll be honest, if you had something I wanted and I knew the price and health of it before hand I would absolutely come out and buy it from you. However, I would probably NOT feel comfortable showing up at your place and finding that it had Ich, or wasn't the same as advertised or the price was way high etc. and then passing on it. For some reason it's different at someones house as opposed to a store, same with showing up just to browse... and if it's uncomfortable to go as a consumer, people will not go. There's no doubt in my mind, a storefront in town is critical to the success of any aquatic entrepreneur in Red Deer.

As I stated originally, A storefront downtown or in one of the shopping centres at the south end selling mostly freshwater fish is what I see succeeding in Red Deer. Something that your average guy can go in and buy a guppy or some cichlids for his kids and maybe see the coral and sw fish and say "Hey, I'd really like to try that".

Sorry to say it, but I couldn't agree more. Unless you are able to get a store front going, get in a lot of stock regularly and move it out at a good pace, I can't see it working. This would take a lot of dedicated reefers in the area to be spending money. Customers are typically sceptical of a new business as well and this won't help.

[sphelps]

From a business point of view a saltwater only store makes little sense to begin with. Out of every person involved in the aquarium hobby what percentage of people are doing saltwater, at most it would be like 10% so by going salt only you're loosing 90% of the market right off the bat. Then if you were to setup something home based out of the city you're targeting a very small crowd of people in the hobby, basically just people you know. You're not going to get the new people like you would with a store front in the city so you're again loosing more potential market.

With that said I would agree that you won't have anywhere near enough demand, basically your customers would be mostly from this site and most those people are perfectly comfortable ordering online so your customer base is already flooded with competition.

Basically if you do go ahead with such an operation make sure you're not doing it for the typical purpose of a business, it would be an expansion on your hobby at best.

[MMAX]

hmmm...Wonder how Red Coral Lethbridge is doing? Simalar sized city as Red Deer.

[Slick Fork]

Originally Posted by MMAX

hmmm...Wonder how Red Coral Lethbridge is doing? Simalar sized city as Red Deer.

Completely different situation. Red Deer is smack in the middle between Calgary and Edmonton. If you're from Lethbridge you have a much bigger drive to get anywhere.

People will travel to Lethbridge from the surrounding towns and cities. If you're more than 20 minutes north or south of Red Deer you may as well drive to Calgary or Edmonton to go see 4 or 5 stores instead of just one here.

A fish store would be nice... don't get me wrong. I just don't see a dedicated salt water store lasting more than 2 or 3 months here. It would have to be a freshwater store with a smallish saltwater section.

[ponokareefer]

Originally Posted by MMAX

hmmm...Wonder how Red Coral Lethbridge is doing? Simalar sized city as Red Deer.

Well over 2 hours to the next closest salt water store is the main difference.

I see Slick Fork already pointed that out.