Breeding shrimp for profit?

If you are breeding shrimp you might be able to make a tiny amount of cash, but nothing really spectacular. Unless you go on a really big scale (which I would not recommend until you get a little more comfortable with the shrimp) you will make just enough money to help pay for the upkeep of your tanks.
 
pixl8r said:
Newbie breeder,

I want you to have a clear, real world perspective of what it takes to be a successful shrimp vendor. With any business, you should start out asking a few questions.


  1. How much money do you have to invest (tanks, testing kits, livestock, website creation/maintenance, shipping supplies, food and maintenance equipment)?
  2. How much free time do you have to maintain your tanks, equipment, and get shipments packaged and delivered on time (think about how you spend your time; school, social life, sports/recreation, family obligations).
  3. What is your target market? Local pet stores(very difficult to do, you need to provide high volume for them), local hobbyists (cheap shipping, but very limited market) and online (wide market, more expensive shipping, international orders may be prohibitively expensive, and there are complex laws regarding shipping breeds of livestock over state and country boundaries).
  4. What are your operating costs (difficult to accurately predict with no experience. Here are a few; equipment replacement (filter media, testing equipment, electricity, shipping material).
  5. How much money do you realistically want to make. You'll have to plan on loosing money for a while, with the costs of purchasing tanks, breeding stock, and shipping material. FYI, depending on the type of business, a startup tends to loose money for the first year or more.
I had a semi commercial successful shrimp breeding business. It was not my sole source of income, so it was not scaled to provide such. I do not feel comfortable, nor do I think it appropriate for me, to state here how much I made from it, but I will share some insights to help you.

Here are some of my answers to the questions above.
I invested multiple thousands of dollars into the business (equipment, breeding stock, finding clients, shipping materials and costs).
I took care of the equipment, with limited help from others, while working full time.
Primarily, I sold to local and regional pet stores. I sold excess stock online via auctions and limited advertising.

If you want to be as successful as possible, you're going to need a good reputation as a breeder, and a seller. Unfortunately, a good reputation is difficult to create rapidly. The simplest way to do so is to start selling to people here, and on auction sights, where you can record and archive feedback. A good seller is someone who accurately describes the wares they sell, and ships them as well as possible. This is the type of reputation most vendors rely on. A good breeder is someone who takes the utmost care in acquiring breeding stock, and refining their breeding pools to breed true to the standard they advertise. Those are the breeders that have the potential to sell individual shrimp for large sums. It is not guaranteed though, demand drives the market.

Now, you can have success selling shrimp in a small easy to maintain setup, but don't plan on making hundreds of dollars annually.

Good luck.
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Believe it or not I have asked myself all of these questions and i have a business plan written up with a clear cut path of my goals as well as other factors I need to achieve them. Thank you for taking the time to type all that out and getting me to think about it a little bit more than I have been previously.
 
newbie breeder said:
Believe it or not I have asked myself all of these questions and i have a business plan written up with a clear cut path of my goals as well as other factors I need to achieve them. Thank you for taking the time to type all that out and getting me to think about it a little bit more than I have been previously.
Click to expand...

A problem is, you didn't mention any of this in your earlier posts.
You didn't mention your father's 280g salt water tank and RO unit.
... Now we know you've got more experience than the normal 14 year old.
You didn't mention you were already selling items and shipping them.
... Now we know you have more experience than many.
You popped in, said you'd done a few hours research and were ready to make a profit based on the math.
... You're still wrong on that part, but luck is part of business too.

... In a couple of decades you'll understand why we were concerned you didn't know what you were talking about. It may require you to have a couple of kids of your own before it really sinks in.

As a kid, young adult, adult, bachelor, married man, married man with the first kid - I didn't understand other parents commenting on not having money for this or that. I was fortunate enough to have money coming in and the economy was stable.
After the third kid, starting to realize college costs for the first one, and having quit one job - taking six months to find another one - and an economy that is unstable I am part of the parents commenting on not having money for every this or that.

We're just trying to help.
I wish you the best of luck in your endeavors.
 
Good luck with your endeavor. Even if it is not terribly profitable, it should be a great learning experience.

Are you a part of a fish club? I think it could be a great help in getting you started. It can be a great source of breeding stock and an outlet for sales. I wasn't aiming to make money when I was in high school, but I did defray my costs selling kribs and java moss.

A couple of specific pieces of advice. You may find that 10 gallon tanks are the most economical. You can often find people giving them away or $10 for a new one. Also once you get a group of fish or shrimp breeding for you, separate them into at least 2 tanks. That way you don't have "all your eggs in one basket". Or at the very least have some growouts separated.
 
Every one of these people have given good advice, and every one of them knows shrimp keeping better than you so its wise to take note. I got into the RCS breeding things like 6 months ago and even though they are easy to breed you wont be making a profit. Your costs on everything for your fish will far outweigh any "profit" made from the shrimp sales, thats if you can get them to breed. Although they are easy plenty of people run into problems getting females to be berried or keep the eggs read some of the forums about it. Boy will you be dissapointed if you get 25 shrimp and still only have them in a few months. I have a 10 gallon tank that I breed RCS in and the quantities for me havnt been great iv sold off some but nothing that even near offsets my aquarium spending. To make money you HAVE to do it on a large scale period. Making money means coming out of what you spent, your upkeep costs, and making it worth your time. Also if shipping prices increase or the quality of service decreases alot less people will order online, especially for something so common. RCS you absolutely can find locally or have a store order in for you at a nominal price at no risk to you verses ordering $40 worth of shrimp that might die unless you spend like $15 shipping the shrimp which I have never really found to be worth it. Rare fish and inverts will be shipped, not the common stuff. It is almost always a bad idea to go into something with the mindset of making money off of it, it takes patience, skill (which despite reading you dont and will not have until you actually get experience with not only breeding but the troubles that can come along), money to start, finding the right amount you need to breed, and finding sellers. I can tell you now it is very unlikely that local stores will buy from a 14 year old, they dont want to risk getting bad stock and getting a bad name for their store because they bought their shrimp from a novice breeder. You wont listen to this probably just like you wont to the rest but it is true and youll figure it out eventually just hopefully you at least dont lose too much on this. IMO if you want to breed them for fun or to try to get a little back get yourself a 10 gal, buy 10 shrimp and watch them. It is fun to do I love my RCS, but again its not a profitable business.
 
I must say, if you are going to sell your shrimp, stores won't buy them. I am 14 as well and if I said I was selling most people would laugh. Your best bet is selling online.
 
Stores will buy them, but they will scam you into lowering the prices for them, and they will use the "I'm an adult, I have more authority" thing over you. Just be confident in your selling price or even come with a parent so they know you're not a joke.
 
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