Recent content by dpetruescu

Thanks Nancy. Like I've said before, there is no reason the two can't coesist. For one, most stores, due to their overhead, can't afford to keep a whole lot of inventory, where an online place, due to lower costs, can keep a lot of species that might not move as fast but offers the consumer more...

I have read those articles a while back, but thank you for reminding me about them .

Great catle analogy. It would be nice if one of these days, someone would start a competition on farm raised fish, as they do with fresh water fish. This way, kids, adults and especially breeders could compete to have the best line of fish they can have. As they do in catle, dogs, pigeons and...

you are absolutely right. Myselft, wanted to start quite a few businesses but after duing the business plan for them i've decided not to. Had a couple that were quite sucessfull tho. That is exactly what I am doing now. Running the numbers, looking at ROI, marketing, suppliers, cost etc... It...

Thanks for all your help Jenn, I appreciate it. It shouldn't be any harder than I've worked so far. Even during the "boom' years, I've worked 14hrs/day. Every few months I would send my fammily to leave with relatives for 2-4 weeks at a time because I had to work. During that time, maybe I...

You both are making very good points. And I agree with you completely. If my plan works out, retail/service will be a big part of the business. Maybe only part, who knows? Just like retail, if my product is top quality, cyanide free or aquacultured, there will be customers interested in the...

I agree. In a lot of cases, eBay for one, that is true. Just out of curiosity... Why is e-commerce not good for the industry? I though that you can apply same standards of doing business to both venues. You should be able to do cyanide free (Marry has) on the Internet just as well as in your...

Jenn, Points well taken. In the end, it's all about balance. Maybe I'm just a computer geek that prefers buying some things online rather than in a store, and that's fine. I believe we all try to do the best we can. You obviously have a lot of experience in a brick and mortar market place; I on...

Jenn, Points well taken. In the end, it's all about ballance. Maybe I'm just a computer geek that prefers buying some things online rather than in a store, and that's fine. I believe we all try to do the best we can. You obviously have a lot of experience in a brick and mortar market place, I...

JennM I appreciate you taking the time in discussing this and I appreciate the input. I think there are two different customers: 1) walk-ins. These customers are just starting out, need handholding... 2) Aquarium geeks. These customers have had aquariums for a long time (I would not appreciate...

While I do agree that face to face has its advantages, I also believe E-Commerce has its place also. Some people don't have good LFS close buy, or are too busy to go to different stores, wait to talk to people, and then not have the selection. One can have great support and customer service...

Ok, after a lot of soul searching, I've decided to try to open an online store where only cyanide free and aquacultured fish are sold. The site is under construction at: http://www.sustainablereef.com. It will be an educational site as much as retail site. I'm panning to host articles, news...

I agree with Louis and Vitz that aquaculture will be the way to go. References were made to the fresh water fish industries, I am sure that the natives were faced with the same problems. Meaning that if the fish they catch from the wild will be aquacultured they loose their livelihood. But I...

Very cool :lol: How does the water circulate between the sump and the display? What am I missing? How often do you do water changes? And how much of the water do you change ? I may want to try this as I think it would look good in my office :D Please let us know how it goes. Thanks