Nothing like a verbal assault from Petsmart....

[Carlene16]

Absolutely agree! I've been with Petsmart for over 3 years. The policy is for the best of the animal. Petsmart does care about it's animals, they bring every one to the vet if any problem arise and that's policy.

I disagree with you on this because every petsmart I've been to I have had bad experiences.


Sure they care for SOME of their animals, but when I got to the reptiles section I was disgusted at how they kept them! They were keeping two adult crested geckos in with three OTHER different kinds of geckos/lizards. All shoved into the same little box! And you could tell the cresteds were stressed, they both had lost their tails. The box was probably a 6 inch box on all sides, and there was barely any room to move. Maybe I'm wrong but I'm almost 100% sure that different species should be kept apart.

They also had some of the snakes mixed together, the only one kept alone was the ball python. Same for the toads and frogs. I think this Petsmart had it all wrong

Maybe this isn't true for all of them, but obviously this petsmart wasn't in it for the good of their animals, and I'm sure it happens quite often.

I've never had an issue with anyone being rude about mice there, just because I don't buy them there. I go to Petco and they know me pretty well by now, they greet me by my name and ask what size mice I need and how many.

I've never had any employee at either pet stores be rude, but the care of animals at both are sometimes unsatisfactory for ME, I don't know about you guys.

[BbyBoa]

I have a friend that breeds rats so I don't have this problem, why cant you just say they are going to be pets? Especially if they are going to be breeders and your not walking in there every week. If you tell them what they want to hear that they are going to be little furry pets, they cannot turn you away by law. Stores can not pick and choose who they sell to. If they did this it would open them up to loads of lawsuits. They can have policies that stipulate a sale, but they cannot say "oh hes telling a lie these aren't going to be pets" that is a judgement=discrimination=big trouble for petsmart. Aside from this I have never had a problem with petsmart by me they have all been pretty cool for whatever I needed. My advice is don't go in looking to pick fights, be nice to them they most likely will be nice in return.

[sarahlovesmiike]

I guess what I don't understand is the fact that the frozen rats are almost the same price as the live animals... Sorry but when I go into a store and see that they are keeping a ball python at 75* and 30% humidity I am a little disgusted. They seem to do their research when it comes to the fuzzy animals but when its a scaly critter they don't give a crap. I'm not basing this on one store, I'm basing it on all the three different Petsmarts that I've been to in my state along with all the Petsmarts I visited while down south. It's not limited to Petsmart. Petco is the same way, possibly worse. There are other pet stores around here (who have a "reptile guy" who breeds balls) they keep them in tanks with no water bowls, no hides, and no heat. I mean COME ON, if you're going to sell something then you need to at least know what the husbandry needs are.

[packer43064]

I disagree with you on this because every petsmart I've been to I have had bad experiences.


Sure they care for SOME of their animals, but when I got to the reptiles section I was disgusted at how they kept them! They were keeping two adult crested geckos in with three OTHER different kinds of geckos/lizards. All shoved into the same little box! And you could tell the cresteds were stressed, they both had lost their tails. The box was probably a 6 inch box on all sides, and there was barely any room to move. Maybe I'm wrong but I'm almost 100% sure that different species should be kept apart.

They also had some of the snakes mixed together, the only one kept alone was the ball python. Same for the toads and frogs. I think this Petsmart had it all wrong

Maybe this isn't true for all of them, but obviously this petsmart wasn't in it for the good of their animals, and I'm sure it happens quite often.

I've never had an issue with anyone being rude about mice there, just because I don't buy them there. I go to Petco and they know me pretty well by now, they greet me by my name and ask what size mice I need and how many.

I've never had any employee at either pet stores be rude, but the care of animals at both are sometimes unsatisfactory for ME, I don't know about you guys.

In all honesty there are over 1000 stores it's not that easy to control over 1000 stores. If you think so become a district manager and be in control of about 10-15 stores. You have to visit each store almost every week. All I'm saying is this....if you see this then CALL the careline(aka corporate) or tell upper management as in the store manager. Don't tell the petcare associate they probably are doing what they are told by the petcare manager. Tell some one high up. Believe me, I have visited every store in out district which is 12 or 13, I can't recall and some were a little bit under my personal standards compared to our petsmart, but everyone wasn't doing as you just told me. Every store is NOT like the ones you have just explained. Believe it or not, they do care. When you have thousands of thousands of employees some people don't care and just working for that paycheck or they do care and have the wrong information. I absolutely agree that all of those animals shouldn't be in the same cage, AGREED. Now as the responsible customer which I hope you are, I hope at least you mentioned to someone that they should not be together.

People need to stop basing negative connections with 3-4 stores around them and hating all 1000+ stores. This was not directed soley at you by any means. I'm with Jaybunny here, but I honestly think it doesn't matter what we say.

[packer43064]

I have a friend that breeds rats so I don't have this problem, why cant you just say they are going to be pets? Especially if they are going to be breeders and your not walking in there every week. If you tell them what they want to hear that they are going to be little furry pets, they cannot turn you away by law. Stores can not pick and choose who they sell to. If they did this it would open them up to loads of lawsuits. They can have policies that stipulate a sale, but they cannot say "oh hes telling a lie these aren't going to be pets" that is a judgement=discrimination=big trouble for petsmart. Aside from this I have never had a problem with petsmart by me they have all been pretty cool for whatever I needed. My advice is don't go in looking to pick fights, be nice to them they most likely will be nice in return.

Thank you, honest and to the point. You look like your in the middle here. Which is good, a honest opinion then. Like I said before....ask for a pet, it's that simple. As a Petsmart employee I did not even know about not selling rats or etc. as feeders, i found out about 6 months after I started when I asked my Petcare manager about it and she admantely said no. I told the customer and she was a little dissapointed, I offered her the frozen rats and said give it a try. It wouldn't be the first 10 bucks you've wasted in this hobby have you, I said. She smiled and got the frozen rat. Now if she asked for a rat, and never said absolutely anything about using it as a feeder then I wouldn't have known and she would have a feeder in the box I just gave her. Either way....happy customer.

[Carlene16]

In all honesty there are over 1000 stores it's not that easy to control over 1000 stores. If you think so become a district manager and be in control of about 10-15 stores. You have to visit each store almost every week. All I'm saying is this....if you see this then CALL the careline(aka corporate) or tell upper management as in the store manager. Don't tell the petcare associate they probably are doing what they are told by the petcare manager. Tell some one high up. Believe me, I have visited every store in out district which is 12 or 13, I can't recall and some were a little bit under my personal standards compared to our petsmart, but everyone wasn't doing as you just told me. Every store is NOT like the ones you have just explained. Believe it or not, they do care. When you have thousands of thousands of employees some people don't care and just working for that paycheck or they do care and have the wrong information. I absolutely agree that all of those animals shouldn't be in the same cage, AGREED. Now as the responsible customer which I hope you are, I hope at least you mentioned to someone that they should not be together.

People need to stop basing negative connections with 3-4 stores around them and hating all 1000+ stores. This was not directed soley at you by any means. I'm with Jaybunny here, but I honestly think it doesn't matter what we say.

I did tell two of the employees there and one of them said "Oh, I'm pretty sure it's ohkay." And she made a face and walked away. Like I was crazy or something.
I also told her the humidity needs to be up too, because both of the cresteds had some stuck sheds which looked pretty nasty.

The thing is for me, I won't visit every petsmart in the world. I visit the one local to me. If they aren't getting it right then I won't go there, and I will probably be biased, and that's just how I am. I get upset when people don't take care of their animals correctly. I've seen this time after time with big chain pet stores.

I understand that there are some great people who work at these places, and they educate people on how these animals are supposed to be taken care of, but those people are rare. Out of all the people you know, how many of them can recite the care of all these species, be it reptiles or the furry ones?

Not many unfortunately. I'm just a firm believer of if you don't know how to take care of an animal you shouldn't have it.

[Sarin]

There are two Petsmarts fairly close to me in a neighboring City. They are both awesome stores and seem to take very good care of their animals. However, they carry no reptiles. (City Bylaw - not allowed to own Reptiles )

I don't ever shop at Petsmart because I am good friends and also a part-time employee at my local Mom&Pop shop, but I used to visit (Petsmart) all the time and enjoyed seeing their animals. It was always so bright, nice and clean. I used to buy a lot of bird toys and fish/fish supplies there and the staff was very helpful. The fish person was very knowledgable and when I was setting up my first community tank before I knew much about fish, she steered me away from the pretty Oscars, and told me why it wasn't a good idea to put them with my Danios and Mollies.

There is one question I have for you Petsmart employees. I know it is your policy to refuse the sale of Rodents for feeders, but I heard that also you cannot feed live to your snakes for sale? Is this true? And if so - what do you do with the snakes that absolutely refuse live?


On a side note, it also does bug me that a lot of people think that pet store employees are dumb. (However, a lot of them DO seem to be unkowledgable... So I cannot blame people for assuming we all are.) Although I do not work at a chain store, and I don't know everything about every species, I try my best to stay knowledgable. And when I really do not know the answer, I tell them, and try to help the customer the best I can.

We breed Mice, ASFs, and Hooded Rats as feeders and we rarely have any customer wanting one for a pet. If they do, we special order one for them. We would rather not sell our feeders as pets because they are not socialized. Kind of the same policy, just opposite! We also breed hamsters as pets or feeders, it doesn't matter to us. People do not seem to mind either way. Most customers are understanding.

[packer43064]

I did tell two of the employees there and one of them said "Oh, I'm pretty sure it's ohkay." And she made a face and walked away. Like I was crazy or something.
I also told her the humidity needs to be up too, because both of the cresteds had some stuck sheds which looked pretty nasty.

The thing is for me, I won't visit every petsmart in the world. I visit the one local to me. If they aren't getting it right then I won't go there, and I will probably be biased, and that's just how I am. I get upset when people don't take care of their animals correctly. I've seen this time after time with big chain pet stores.

I understand that there are some great people who work at these places, and they educate people on how these animals are supposed to be taken care of, but those people are rare. Out of all the people you know, how many of them can recite the care of all these species, be it reptiles or the furry ones?

Not many unfortunately. I'm just a firm believer of if you don't know how to take care of an animal you shouldn't have it.

I respect what you have said. I wouldn't go into a store that repeatedly didn't follow the basic rules of mixing reptiles. I would probably skip that Petsmart too with how your explaining it....the reptiles at least.

[packer43064]

There are two Petsmarts fairly close to me in a neighboring City. They are both awesome stores and seem to take very good care of their animals. However, they carry no reptiles. (City Bylaw - not allowed to own Reptiles )

I don't ever shop at Petsmart because I am good friends and also a part-time employee at my local Mom&Pop shop, but I used to visit (Petsmart) all the time and enjoyed seeing their animals. It was always so bright, nice and clean. I used to buy a lot of bird toys and fish/fish supplies there and the staff was very helpful. The fish person was very knowledgable and when I was setting up my first community tank before I knew much about fish, she steered me away from the pretty Oscars, and told me why it wasn't a good idea to put them with my Danios and Mollies.

There is one question I have for you Petsmart employees. I know it is your policy to refuse the sale of Rodents for feeders, but I heard that also you cannot feed live to your snakes for sale? Is this true? And if so - what do you do with the snakes that absolutely refuse live?
On a side note, it also does bug me that a lot of people think that pet store employees are dumb. (However, a lot of them DO seem to be unkowledgable... So I cannot blame people for assuming we all are.) Although I do not work at a chain store, and I don't know everything about every species, I try my best to stay knowledgable. And when I really do not know the answer, I tell them, and try to help the customer the best I can.

We breed Mice, ASFs, and Hooded Rats as feeders and we rarely have any customer wanting one for a pet. If they do, we special order one for them. We would rather not sell our feeders as pets because they are not socialized. Kind of the same policy, just opposite! We also breed hamsters as pets or feeders, it doesn't matter to us. People do not seem to mind either way. Most customers are understanding.

Hopefully Jaybunny can answer that question. I do not work in the Petcare department so I don't know everything. Hopefully she does. Never thought about the fact that the rats, and etc. wouldn't be socialized so it would be best not to sell as a feeder. Good info there.

[Carlene16]

I respect what you have said. I wouldn't go into a store that repeatedly didn't follow the basic rules of mixing reptiles. I would probably skip that Petsmart too with how your explaining it....the reptiles at least.

All the other animals were in great care, just not the reptiles And I have to admit that I am partial to reptiles. I think most people on this website are

Yay for the people who take care of their animals properly I love those people!