Breeders not responding rant

[PythonWallace]

I know it's been brought up before, but I've been trying to buy different snakes in the last week from two different breeders, and they don't respond. The first guy had an ad that I responded to by email. Later that afternoon he was posting more ads, but I guess not checking or responding to email. After 3 days of not getting back to me I called him and found out the animal I wanted was sold the day before. He had another animal that I was interested in until I found this out, that he lowered the price on by $50 in those 3 days. So he lost a $650 sale from me, then lost another sale from me and when he does sell the animal he will still have lost $100 on those two because he dropped the prices before responding to emails. The other breeder won't respond to emails, so I've been calling him and I just get what sounds to be an answering machine with a lady repeating the number. I understand if you are away from a computer for a day or more, or if you have a full time job, but if you are sitting on the internet every day posting ads, why not respond?! And if you're not available during certain hours because you work, get a cell phone or at least a real voicemail message or put something on your website that says so. This has happened to me several times, and it baffles me that I'm basically waving a handful of hundred dollar bills at someone and they just ignore you. People need to get some business sense and customer service skills.

[Freakie_frog]

Jake,

This happens when breeders just take for granted or don't care if they build a customer base. It is a shame because you were ready to buy and now you wont even look at their animals. Its this side of things that people that get in to this business tend to over look, when you sale on the net you have to be able to keep up with customers that may be on at every hour of the day.

Sorry you had such a bad experience.

[Ophiuchus]

I know what you mean, man. About a month ago, I was shopping around for a certain snake I wanted. Probably emailed 10 different dealers, basically saying I have money and I'm ready to buy something if they had it. Only 3 folks even replied back.

I suppose some breeders are doing so well they can afford to throw away business like that.

[Freakie_frog]

I know what you mean, man. About a month ago, I was shopping around for a certain snake I wanted. Probably emailed 10 different dealers, basically saying I have money and I'm ready to buy something if they had it. Only 3 folks even replied back.

I suppose some breeders are doing so well they can afford to throw away business like that.

Depends on the size of the breeder.

[PythonWallace]

I just got a response from the second breeder! They were available last night at 7:30, but as of now it looks like a sale is pending.

[NickMyers03]

i understand about not having a cell phone or looking at your email at least once a day being a bad business practice if your trying to make money and have a good rep.

even though you were so pissed at these breeders i noticed you didnt bad mouth them by name... shows more about your character than it does others

one thing to think about though is that the adds on KS and some others are put there once and paid for to come up a # of times with out doing it your self. so with the new adds you could have just seen some cycling through.

[Freakie_frog]

even though you were so pissed at these breeders i noticed you didnt bad mouth them by name... shows more about your character than it does others

[PythonWallace]

i understand about not having a cell phone or looking at your email at least once a day being a bad business practice if your trying to make money and have a good rep.

even though you were so pissed at these breeders i noticed you didnt bad mouth them by name... shows more about your character than it does others

one thing to think about though is that the adds on KS and some others are put there once and paid for to come up a # of times with out doing it your self. so with the new adds you could have just seen some cycling through.

I wouldn't name drop or bad mouth for that, as they could be top notch breeders. I figure losing my sale makes us even. On the plus side I did some searching and found a better deal on a sweet female YB, and I'm making the payment as I type here. 600g and semi local, so I don't even have to pay shipping! It just shows, if you snooze you lose. New guys should be taking notes.

Edit: Also, the one with the new ads, whether cycled or not, did have a snake available for 2 days while I waited for a reply.

[Ophiuchus]

Depends on the size of the breeder.

Yeah, but that one customer that was ignored may be willing to spend big money. Im not saying I was that customer (the snake I was looking for was rather inexpensive in the big scheme of things), but some people might 'test" a dealer with a smaller purchase to see how things go. Then, later when they wanna spend some real money, they'll come back to that breeder.

But I guess if you're Bob Clark or someone of equal caliber, and someone emails you about a normal ball python, you're probably not gonna bust your butt trying to get back in touch with them.

[pslsnakes]

I know what you mean.

I was looking for a Spider a while ago. I probably emailed about 15 different people from thier King Snake ads. Only about 5 responded. And all but one was sold out.

I also can't stand when you talk to some body about some snakes and they never email you back, but they email you WEEKS later asking to send money to them for a snake.