Im going to be selling different ball python morphs.

Within the next two - five years i will be selling a couple of different ball python morphs. I will be selling normals, bumblebees, spiders, spider albinos, albinos, pastels. etc. this is all potential and may not happen but as far as i know, this is moat likly going to happen. it would be great if you guys would ever be interested in buying some from me and some info on how to get some connection to nation wide selling. my hobby has only just begun and im really quite interested in this. i will garentee proper sexing, great health etc. it will be much appriciated if you could reply to me if you have any interests in this. thank you.
p.s. my names Quinton.

well i would be intrested what would your prices be remeber about shiping and yea i will be breeding to in about 2 years im breeding carpondros then back to carpets and the other a gtp soo hope everything goes good

yeah its really exciting huh. im only 14 so my parents are limiting me to only 2 snakes now but as soon as i buy a spider and a pastel every thing listed will hopefully come true.:please:

im 14 too but i have 4 snakes and i lizard soo im jsut waiting to sex them and get the sexes right then ill do the big bussiness well i g2g talk about this tommrow

Congrats on your plan! As long as you stick with it, you should do well.
Some tips? Make sure to sound professional and competant at all times. This includes full punctuation and spelling when you talk back and forth. You'll only be 16(if you start selling in 2 years) so you want to impress folks with how mature and serious about this hobby you are.
If you hang around and keep talking with folks here, and show everyone how commited you are to the snakes, then you're sure to have no shortage of customers when the time comes!
Good luck and good for you for planning ahead!
Wolfy

thanks man. ill try to. hahaha. im still in middle school so ive got some grammatical things to overcome. hahaha:8::rofl:

Well, what is it that you want to really know?

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Originally Posted by LadyOhh

Well, what is it that you want to really know?

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??????????? i dont understan ???????????

"some info on how to get some connection to nation wide selling."

Well, other than announcing that you want to sell them, you wanted advice?


I personally don't think this was the best venture to announce your selling, but hey, more power to you...

I wish you all the best with it for sure. :)

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Originally Posted by LadyOhh

"some info on how to get some connection to nation wide selling."

Well, other than announcing that you want to sell them, you wanted advice?


I personally don't think this was the best venture to announce your selling, but hey, more power to you...

I wish you all the best with it for sure. :)

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I agree with Heather.All i can add is if you try to make this a big money making venture you will fail majority of the time.Take your time enjoy raising up some quality animals then proceed :)

I say get back to us in a couple years... I have big plans for breeding as well but wont be pairing up until 08' so theres no point in me letting everyone know i plan on selling. If your serious work on setting up a website now so it a couple years youll have more backing. Also your pretty young... have you thought about your hobby and your future? If you plan to go to college what will you do with your snakes? What will you do with the snakes your cant sell? I totally support your wishes to breed down the road theres just some things you need to think about before you get that far.

good luck! wanna hook me up with a spider albino? $200 cash!!:D

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Originally Posted by jdmls88

good luck! wanna hook me up with a spider albino? $200 cash!!:D

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hahaha more like $4000

but i do plan on going to collage. i want to go to uc davis to be a veternarian. iv always loved animals. i definatly have my heart set on this. but, formy first 4 yrs of collage i plan on staying at a collage close to my home so i can live in my dorm and go back and forth between collage to my home. then when i (hopefully) graduate:rofl:, i will venture off to davis, and buy an appartment. i know this will be alot of money, but hopefully i can get a job in the meantime and work up from there. and in two yrs when ill be producing some het albinos, ill have some extra cash there. in three yrs i will hopefully be producing hets and albinos, and in 4 yrs i will hopefully be producing all albinos. and then after that i will buy a spider, pastel and... im getting carried away any ways im definatly taking a risk. but i fing that its a good thing. i have a roth IRA, anda banking account. im not going to touch the roth though. only the banking account, you know. so all and all. being a vet is my long term plan. and on the side i plan on breeding snakes. my parents are tottlay supportive and really plan on helping me along the way! so thats all i have to say! woo that turned into alot more writing than expeced.

when in college take some business classes

hey thats a good idea!

I do not begrudge you your wanting to be a breeder. It is a fun thing to do!

BUT! I think announcing this aspect of trying to get customers NOW is a bit premature to say the least.

Best of luck with College. I lived near UC Davis, and it is an excellent Veterinary school.

The best advice I can give you now is to study to get into Vet School. Don't focus on the BPs now. Vet School is VERY competitive, and there are very few schools in the nation.

Once you get that all done, then do what you want to do with BP breeding.

:gj:

Some great advice has already been given, however, I'd add;

- You have to spend money to make money. If you want to do well, I'd suggest signing up for a small business (entrepreneur) course at a local college. There is not usually an age limit on these courses. Maybe you can find a night course in your area. You can learn a lot about the fine points of setting up your own business, how to handle finances, creating a professional business plan model, and all the things that go along with it.

- If you just want to breed them and sell them tax-free at local shows or through classifieds, you won't need to register as a business. Check your local taxation laws, just to be sure you (or your parents, if you are a minor at the time) can't get in trouble for undeclared income.

- Be sure to establish a business policy in writing that is available to your potential clients - something you can realistically live up to.

- Plan to deal with difficult customers and how you will handle those situations. If your people-skills are not what they could be, take a weekend or night course on Mediation. It will pay itself off big-time eventually.

- Don't forget the internet; when it comes time to sell, get yourself a good website or, at the very least, set up some ads and post in forums. Again, you have to spend money to make money.

Good luck.

Well I wish you a ton of luck, because you're going to need it! Breeding is not this easy process where you just toss 2 snakes together and instantly have a bunch of bouncing babies, and people are lined up at your door to pay for them fast. I don't even know where I would begin in advising you.. I would firstly get a top-notch incubator fully set up and regulated with flexwatt and a Helix or comparable thermostat. I would never skimp on a t-stat. I learned the hard way, using a hovabator back in 2006, and you know what I got? A bunch of dead eggs and heartbreak when our power went out and the incubator spiked when it went back on. Good t-stats are not cheap, and flexwatt is eather inexpensive, bit this will still cost you.. This is just for the heating elements, and assuming that you can make an incubator housing itself.. that would be something to research.
Then I would also get the potential hatchlings' housing ready before you even breed. I say this from bad experience.. I admit that I was cynical and did not think that my eggs would hatch. I am just a pessimist like that.. but my incubator kicked butt and I had lots of babies. We were able to put a rack together fast and buy tubs, but this is really somerhing that a potential breeder should have ready beforehand. There again you'll need another top-notch thermostat, flexwatt for all of the little tubs.
Now comes another fun part of breeding. Should you be rewarded with many smiling BP babies.. they need to eat. Small rats (fuzzies or maybe even pinks) or hopper mice. Once a week roughly. Let's say that you get 8 hatchlings, out on one breeding. That's the need for 32 smaller rats or hopper mice, a month. If you breed, it might seem easy to just pluck them out of your rat tanks.. but then you have nothing to grow up into subadults to feed your larger snakes.. this was my fun part here :) I know now to step it up before babies come this year; I am starting that now, running 10 female rats but I don't even think this will be enough and I plan on adding maybe 5? And one more male. If you do f/t, I don't know how you'd feed babies on this. The thing that triggered my babies' feeding response was the movement of the baby mice.
Then... the Joy of Selling! Selling any animal is wrought with stress. You'll get many window shoppers who try to ****er prices down, who want a 50-month payment plan.. who complain about shipping costs. I was extreeeemely fortunate to find two awesome buyers off of this site, but it was tough to sell the rest of my snakes. I finally found a local guy with a shop that will be happy to buy anything I hatch out from now on, so having potential sale venues is what you should do. You should always be financially and mentally prepared to keep everything that you produce until you can find a satisfactory buyer for it that fits with your ethics and ability to pay for the snake.
And.. oh joy of joys! Fedex! It took them 4 months to fully certify us. The only reasn that our rep said that it "only took this long" was because he bumped our legal paperwork up.. otherwise we would still be waiting. It is not easy..
There. I think that I said most of it. I didn't really get into readying the adults or any technical aspects of breeding, because better people than me have already made awesome sites about that (like one Adam Wysocki..) I am just giving you a few words about what curveballs breeding can toss you.

I agree - you're really jumping the gun at this point. Build your reputation here over the next several years, then tack on 2-3 years to raise your breeding stock, you have quite awhile before you'll have your first animal to sell.

Work on the grammar - buyers aren't going to take you seriously if you can't write clearly and concisely. If you're going to be a businessman, you need to present yourself professionally.

And finally, I'd recommend reading this link: http://www.ball-pythons.net/forums/s...ad.php?t=49580

You also should take into account that in 2-5 years prices on the animals you're talking to will drop CONSIDERABLY. An albino spider won't go for $4K necasarily. It might be super cheap by then, but you can always change WHAT you want to breed, since it's so far in the future.
And like others have mentioned, the way you present yourself is SUPER important. You do not want folks equating you with someone who couldn't express themselves well. Start out making the effort now. It won't do much good if you act like a little kid up until you are ready to sell, so start now.
Local classes on business things, checking into animal places to talk to the owners, being will to learn new things about your animals, all these are very important to success.
Don't count on making money off ball python morphs. If you want to keep morphs and maybe get a little of your money back, that's fine. But Making a Profit... that's very very hard to do.
It sounds like you're thinking ahead, and that's great!

I am not a breeder, but I am a buyer and a businesswoman...so I'll stick to advice I know about.

1) you will find that many (most?) buyers won't want to deal with someone who is under 18 years old. no offense but there it is.

2) the advice about checking local laws is crucial! you don't want to get in trouble with your local laws, the IRS, or your insurance companies (homeowner's insurance or business insurance).

3) if you are dealing with high-end morphs especially....find a vet who is a fully qualified reptile specialist. This is true for any pet snake as well, but if this is an investment you don't want to mess around or you could see your money fly away if you have egg-binding, illness, or other health troubles. Also read some books and get well-versed in methods of getting babies to eat.

4) you must be willing to commit your time first to your customers, second to your snakes, and third to everything else. One bad transaction, if you fail to immediately make it right to the customer's satisfaction, can end your career as a breeder. Assume that as a fact and you'll be a good seller! Be prepared to lose money on a sale to preserve your reputation - even if you think the buyer is mistaken. Never let a dispute get personal. This takes a great deal of self control and takes practice.

Good luck! Being your own boss is great...if you are willing to go the extra mile.

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1) you will find that many (most?) buyers won't want to deal with someone who is under 18 years old. no offense but there it is.

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110% CORRECT! Most people like to deal with people that can be held responsible for their actions. No offense but there is no way I would send money to someone that if things went really really bad I couldn't take to court and deal with.

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2) the advice about checking local laws is crucial! you don't want to get in trouble with your local laws, the IRS, or your insurance companies (homeowner's insurance or business insurance).

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Agreed. Being in compliance with local laws and ordinances is key to keeping our hobby in a good light

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3) if you are dealing with high-end morphs especially....find a vet who is a fully qualified reptile specialist. This is true for any pet snake as well, but if this is an investment you don't want to mess around or you could see your money fly away if you have egg-binding, illness, or other health troubles. Also read some books and get well-versed in methods of getting babies to eat.

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Bingo. You'll need to learn at least in theory how do deal with the majority of issues that you WILL have. You will have mites, you will have RI's, you will have clutches go bad, there are things you will have happen and you need to be prepared to deal with them

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4) you must be willing to commit your time first to your customers, second to your snakes, and third to everything else. One bad transaction, if you fail to immediately make it right to the customer's satisfaction, can end your career as a breeder. Assume that as a fact and you'll be a good seller! Be prepared to lose money on a sale to preserve your reputation - even if you think the buyer is mistaken. Never let a dispute get personal. This takes a great deal of self control and takes practice.

Good luck! Being your own boss is great...if you are willing to go the extra mile.

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One thing I do want to add. You mentioned that your parents will only let you have 2 snakes right now. Cool some things you'll need to think about.

1: Where will I house the babies for a month or more before they sale.

2: What will happen to the morphs that don't sale. Because they don't all sale

3: How will I feed every week 10-100 snakes

4: am I prepared to to keep and feed every snake I produce for its entire life if I can sale a single animal.

Best of luck there.

the only advice i can give you is get rid of that normal male and get a male spider or an albino... or at least a het albino.

dont waste your time making normal hets when you can start making hets that will help you out towards you "dream" projects

my 2 cents

Another piece of advice;

Never start treating your animals like soulless commodities that can be tossed away on a whim. People will quickly pick up on the lack of compassion you feel for your animals and will avoid you like the plague.

My 2.022 Canadian cents.

everyone here has pretty much hit the nail on the head. prolly not what you expected to hear, but its the truth. not to be rude but even if you were 16 i dont think i would trust something like that. without having your parents sign the permission slip hahahha.

but keep the dream. dont let everyone here smash it (i know that is NOT wat they are trying to do)

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Originally Posted by lovepig78

the only advice i can give you is get rid of that normal male and get a male spider or an albino... or at least a het albino.

dont waste your time making normal hets when you can start making hets that will help you out towards you "dream" projects

my 2 cents

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im definatly not gonna get rid of my normal male. i love him. i have an albino and im going to get a spider and a pastel.

thank you all. its so nice to have all of you guys helping me out. its tough love you know. thats life. i understand where all of you are coming from ans i do have a ling way to go! but nothing is impossible and i am 100% prepaired. i have a grat pet store that will most likly be willing to buy from me. im going to check. but ive seen them with spiders, albinos, burms, retics, etc. they have somewhere around 100 different snakes.(not including the ball python) so im hoping they will buy.

Not sure if it was addressed, but you`ll need a pretty strong contingency plan.

Purely, anecdotal, but classifieds are full of people selling off one to twenty snakes, as a person`s life style changes (residence, college, income, etc.). And they either lose the time, commitment, or space to pursue the hobby... and for the first five years... it will be purely hobby.

Best of luck,
Bruce

All I can say is slow down man. No one is 100% prepared for anything in life, it's impossible. Someone already made the recomendation on professionalism, including punctuation and spelling. If you want to potray professionalism in your future business:

dotn tipe lik this... hahaha lol lmfa

Seriously, just slow down with everything (including your typing) and pay attention. There is a ton of knowledgable people at BP.net just waiting to help you out.

-Ben

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Originally Posted by bcampos

All I can say is slow down man. No one is 100% prepared for anything in life, it's impossible. Someone already made the recomendation on professionalism, including punctuation and spelling. If you want to potray professionalism in your future business:

dotn tipe lik this... hahaha lol lmfa

Seriously, just slow down with everything (including your typing) and pay attention. There is a ton of knowledgable people at BP.net just waiting to help you out.

-Ben

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i think you mis understood me. I'm 100% prepared to prepare for life.:rofl:

Hey. Im 15, and a quick tip is definitely act more mature than you are, because nobody wants to buy from a minor who acts like a minor. Act like a business person, and a friend, when dealing with potential customers. :cool: PM me, and I'll tell you some other stuff Ive learned about this hobby:gj:

But I have to go, because HOUSE is on!!!

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Originally Posted by Petboy15

Hey. Im 15, and a quick tip is definitely act more mature than you are, because nobody wants to buy from a minor who acts like a minor. Act like a business person, and a friend, when dealing with potential customers. :cool: PM me, and I'll tell you some other stuff Ive learned about this hobby:gj:

But I have to go, because HOUSE is on!!!

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Nobody wants to buy from a minor because you can get screwed.... If I buy "from a minor" it will be through his/her parents.

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Originally Posted by Petboy15

Hey. Im 15, and a quick tip is definitely act more mature than you are, because nobody wants to buy from a minor who acts like a minor. Act like a business person, and a friend, when dealing with potential customers. :cool: PM me, and I'll tell you some other stuff Ive learned about this hobby:gj:

But I have to go, because HOUSE is on!!!

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Here you have one well spoken 15 year old. They are the rarest of the teenage human morphs.

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Originally Posted by pythontricker

i think you mis understood me. I'm 100% prepared to prepare for life.:rofl:

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I don't really know what it means to prepare to prepare. Would that be pre-preparing? And if so how would that differ from preparing?

Have some fun kid, you will be all grown up with a job and responsibilities soon enough. Breed some snakes for fun and sell them to your friends. Not to bash your future venture, but I would not buy from a minor; there is a large lack of legal responsibility for the sale.

-Ben :salute:

well my parents are full on in helping me. every thing is going to be in they're name. its just that its my idea.

i mean im going to name the company QM ball python morphs. (my initials) and hen ball python morphs. im going to coordinate it all. find all the people who want to buy. but my parents are going to be there to help. i mean they will be there to make sure im not getting riped off. make sure im not ripping anyone else off etc just kidding:rofl: they're going to make sure i get payed for this all, and all the legal document stuff.

Ok. Sure. Good luck. Even though you are not taking the advise of anyone on this thread; such as checking grammar, and using capitalization.

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Originally Posted by pythontricker

well my parents are full on in helping me. every thing is going to be in they're name. its just that its my idea.

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Bad idea for many reasons. Starting a business and selling snakes is your idea and you should receive all the credit you earn. I have heard of many business horror stories of business with family. Its very tricky and can turn families upside down.

Also I think you are seriously under estimating business and business aspects. There is a reason people go to college for 4 years to learn this stuff. I'm almost a sophmore and a business major and its not easy, and there is much to learn.

Having both an associates and bachelors in Business Administration I can second that there is much to learn. College teaches you many different things but thats only half the process... The other half you learn out in the real business world. What you learn and what actually happens are two completely different things. College only prepares you for the real world. I'm sure many other older posters can vouch that many things come up in your life that you never expected. I know if I had your dream in highschool it would have vanished the second I went away to college. I support you wanting to breed I just think you need to take it slow. Your only a kid once so live it up while you can.

Mini lesson, take it and use it.

they're = they are
their = "everything will be in their name" shows ownership
there= "look over there" location

Brimstone,
To do business with a minor you put yourself in a tough spot...if the minor were to agree to you on a trade for example, and it fell through you are basically SOL.

You can not form a legal contract, verbal, written or any other with a minor...

It doesn't have to be a family business...but the parents should be representing the business with him for any transaction that is conducted. Many breeders will not sell snakes to a minor for those reasons.

I think it's great to aim high, and start working out a plan early, but the move from high school to college is really a much bigger change than you think it's going to be. I'm not saying that it's always a lifestyle change (I still live and act alot like I did in high school most of the time) but it's when you figure out who you are and what your doing on your own. Your priorities get shifted, and your views change. If you want to breed snakes one day, start building up your collection slowly and start working towards what you want, just keep in mind that you need to keep some flexability in there for when you do end up out of the house and at school. College is very time consuming and very expensive. I know money is a major issue as to why I don't have more snakes...there are alot of unexpected costs at school. If you start breeding in a few years, it's going to be about the same time when you are getting ready to graduate and go to college. That's alot happening all at once...eggs incubating/hatching, keeping food for all the snakes, keeping your grades up, dealing with graduation, college apps, then college classes.

If breeding is something that you want to do, IMO, go for it. Just build up slowly, and make sure there are enough hours in the day, enough money in the bank, and the determination and perseverance to keep going with it, even with things get tough.

**Edit** So going back and reading that, I sound all preach-y, which wasn't my intention, but having gone fairly recently from high school to college, I can think of all the things that changes, and I think that there's some insubstantial things that are being over looked. Just some stuff to keep in mind ^_^

well...im about to graduate college with a BS in 3D Development, and my life is STILL not straight. sure i have snakes that id like to breed. sure id like to make some money at it, but i know i oculdnt run a business like adam or nerd or all the other magnificent people here. to me it almost sounds like this is going to be your hobby, where you sell a lot to your friends. going into business is serious, if you do it the legit way

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It doesn't have to be a family business...but the parents should be representing the business with him for any transaction that is conducted.

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A good point. I have made all of my transactions myself, but I know if there are any problems, a parent can help me. This goes for buying and selling. If you mess up and someone wants to take legal action against you, it is really going to go against your parents, so make sure they are willing to bail you out in that situation.

Oh, and definitely watch the AIM talk. A business person doesn't say to a customer

"ya, their doing good, the grl just took a mouse and the boy just took too. let me know if u have more ?'s...ttyl"

You can't do it. I know I defiantly wouldn't bu from someone who can't take the time to spell things right. Most people feel the same way. ;)