morons buying fish

I was at walmart buying a clown pleco today and some lady and her kid was there at the tanks... I heard her tell the worker she had a 10 gallon and has 1 betta in it... She wanted to buy the kid another fish.. She said it was a cold water tank and the worker says to get a COMMON PLECO, that they are a cold water fish and they would be good for a 10 gallon.. I had to but in and say that they grow 2 feet long and live for 20+ years, and also require heat... the guy shuttup and she eventually left. Its really sad.. Every pet store I go to have atleast 40 common plecos and red belly pacus.. I can only imagine how many ppl are putting them in their 10 gallons.. It sickens me... There was also a tank FULL of white mountain cloud minnows all swimming side ways and trying to eat **** off the gravel and glass... I have them in my other tank and they never do that no matter how hungry they get..

Anyways, yes it sucks. I just wanna blow up walmart and such stores :x
 
We need more LFS owner/workers like Oddball. Definately not the norm.

Any Big Als/Aquarium Services store is also a good place for knowledgabel store help.
 
Matak said:
I'm thinking of getting business cards printed up with AC's web address on it. More than once I have told newbies and parents whose kids want Nemo that they should go to aquariacentral.com to keep the fish healthy. A card would speed up the process. Can't let the shopowners see me though. Good advice is contraband at most LFS's.
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What RAD idea! I'm going to do that, too. I often get stopped by people at Michaels asking me for advice on acrylics, oils and pastels and stuff as well. Need to print up two sets: one for the artists' community and one fore th aquarists' community.

Thanks, Matak
Roan
 
How many people here have had the fun of arguing with some snot nose pimple face 16 year old kid about fish?

I can understand a non-experienced person working at a private owned LFS. And have ran in to a few. Mostly all of them say they don't know and get someone who does. What i can not understand is a large corp like Wal-mart or petcrap having people like this running the department.

I was at petco and the dempartment manger (who i had to talk to because of a stupid employee) turned out to be 18 and never even owned a fish tank.

Anyway companys like Chili's, Applebee"s, and Ruby Tuesday's send their employees like bartenders and servers to Inbev. Inbev is a company that trains them to pour beer and make drinks. Then why can not petco and wal-mart send people to fish training.
 
There's a way for places like Petco and Petsmart to give better customer service and still hire low wage staff: LABEL EVERYTHING CLEARLY and instruct the employees to read the labels. PROVIDE HANDOUTS to all customers AND STAFF with cycling and basic fish care instructions

Common Pleco
Min tank Size
Temperature
Community fish? Yes
Blah blah blah

In the tank section, stick instructions for cycling tanks on the tanks.

All this would cost is research, a little time, some paper, and the willingness of the manager to enforce it.

That's all. I think all LFS should have this information available to any customer without them having to ask.

My 2 cents.

Roan
 
BELLUM said:
Anyway companys like Chili's, Applebee"s, and Ruby Tuesday's send their employees like bartenders and servers to Inbev. Inbev is a company that trains them to pour beer and make drinks. Then why can not petco and wal-mart send people to fish training.
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Because that would cost money and why would they want to put money on a short term investment? Most employees at pet places don't stay very long.

That would be like sending a Tim Horton's employee to a baker's convention.

Hrm, guess you have to be Canadian to understand that analogy :)

Roan
 
Roan Art said:
Because that would cost money and why would they want to put money on a short term investment? Most employees at pet places don't stay very long.

That would be like sending a Tim Horton's employee to a baker's convention.

Hrm, guess you have to be Canadian to understand that analogy :)

Roan
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Then an in house training. Like Mcdonald's. They can have a binder of common fish knowledge.

God they can make a video and make employee's watch it. That would be more cost effective.
 
Yeah, at my walmart it says the red belly pacus get 10" long, and anyone that knows about these fish know they get well over that and FAST...

I dont remember what the common pleco said about how big it gets... But I will bet anyone a thousand bucks that its way under the truth..
 
mandimoron said:
Honestly, do common plecos ever -stop- growing? O_o
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Actually, from what I understand, fish don't stop growing at all. If the conditions are correct, they will reach their "max" genetic size, but still continue to grow. Slowly, but they continue to grow until they die.

I think that's just neat.

Roan
 
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