making money from pythons

[mainbutter]

This morph drops in value from 2500 to 100 in 6 years. Sorry, don't buy that for a recessive gene animal.

Just a bit of info from my own research on BP prices, the little bit of digging I've done on fauna going back to 2004 and earlier has had a steady decrease in morph prices of very close to half price every 2 years, and I remember I looked into three or four distinct morphs (including pieds).

While that can't be a sure predictor, that's the number I've been using to try to estimate the potential shortfalls or profits in my own BP ventures for the next 10 years.

[Egapal]

So I have been reading a lot of different posts over the last sveral weeks and the theme seems to be that this is a hobby, and you will be lucky to break even by breeding ball pythons. Maybe I have not done enough research, but I dont see how that is possible, if a person makes wise decesions on the animals he (or she) purchases, profit should be made after the first year or two. For example, I bought 2 racks on craigslist, a 3000 gram normal female, and a breeder spider male for less than $600. I also bought 1.1 pieds and .2 het pieds, paid way more for these 4, but around $2500. One of the hets can be bred this year, so my pied project is a little ways off, but I can pick up a .1 breeder pastel for around $600 (I think) and sell two clutches of spiders, pastels, and possibly bees early next year and pay for everything (excluding pieds, I know that will take a while to pay for).

On another note, I enjoy these snakes very much, it is not just a dollar sign to me, I have a full time job, make good money, and have some disposable income. I just started a rat colony so I know I will be buying them from the store when I need them though, so my only costs from here out is rat food, an occasional rat, and electric right? I know there are possible vet visits, and clutches that dont happen, but it all seems pretty idiot proof to me? Maybe that makes me the idiot , anyway, just wanted to see what everyones thoughts were

At the end of the day the point is in your definition of "make money". In order to "make money" you need to do a lot right, get a little lucky, and put a lot of blood, sweat, tears and investment cash into it. I have read a lot of threads and my family (parents, and their parents) made a living with animals (horses). I think that the point of so many of the posts you will find is that if you are in it to make money there are far better ways to make money. Breeding snakes has to be a love of yours and something you are willing to get paid relatively little for the amount of work you put into it. I can easily make 50 to 100 dollars fixing a single computer. Why don't start my own business? Because the business is not just fixing computers. Its talking to customers about stuff they don't know. Its about keeping financials, ordering supplies, dropping off and or picking up computers. Same goes for snakes as it does for any business. There are lots of things that you need to be good at/willing to do in order to turn a profit. Can it be done? Of course. There are lots of great breeders out there as examples. Ask any of them if it was as easy as they thought it would be. I am guess every one of them would tell you it was much harder than they ever imagined. Not to mention that for every example of someone who made it there are countless others who failed. This post and the others like it aren't about discouraging people. If you have a dream by all means go for it. If you are discouraged its probably for the best though, as you need to be single minded in your pursuit of your dream to make it work.

[Monster Dodge]

Read this transcript Kevin McCurley did on Kingsnake back in 2004.

http://www.kingsnake.com/articles/KevinMcCurley.html

They talk about how Mojaves were going for $11,000 and how Spiders were going for $4,000. You can now get both for around $600 combined.
Think about how much that sucks for breeders who spent that much for these two morphs back in 04' to what they are now
Sure some big name breeders might have made some money, but who could also put up that kind of money and time!! Think about how many people though lost a ton of money who couldn't sell the offspring right away!

Selling BP's as your only source of income is a hard life I'm sure. You will probably have your good months but more often than not you will have more bad months. Especially if all you have is the Norm... (Pastels, Spiders, Pinstripes, etc.....)

You will need to drop a few thousand dollars to get yourself 1 amazing morph, then try to get it to breed, then hope to god the price doesn't drop before you can sell off the offspring all the while keeping some holdbacks to continue your bizz. But then your looking at another 2 to 3 years to do it all over again......

[NewParadigms]

Just a bit of info from my own research on BP prices, the little bit of digging I've done on fauna going back to 2004 and earlier has had a steady decrease in morph prices of very close to half price every 2 years, and I remember I looked into three or four distinct morphs (including pieds).

While that can't be a sure predictor, that's the number I've been using to try to estimate the potential shortfalls or profits in my own BP ventures for the next 10 years.

Half price every 2 years equals about 30% drop a year, that's significantly less than the 50% average drop used in the article.

[Reps4life]

Making money from breeding ball pythons is a secondary thing for me. the first is making sure the snakes are happy and healthy. Don't get me wrong making money from something you enjoy doing is a great thing and no one should feel bad making money off of ball pythons. Thats just my opinion.

[LotsaBalls]

Honestly you can "make money" from just about anything. Should you "get into pythons" to make money? I would say no. Unless you have some exp with breeding and marketing. Also it depends on what you think of as making money. I spend around 6-8 hours a week cleaning feeding and just looking at and holding 15 snakes. I spend about $150 a month caring for them. If I hatch something and sell it for $ I'm ahead. Because I would have spent the money and time anyways.

[ColinWeaver]

Who breeds only one morph endlessly without introducing other combinations?

Thank you for taking the time to read what I wrote.

The profitability question should not have to be answered through continuous re-investment. The question I want to answer is whether or not an investment in a single group of animals can be profitable. If the answer only becomes yes if we continue to buy, year after year, more animals with different genes then we are tainting the question.

It goes without saying that almost all of us will breed our morphs into other morphs in order to take things to another level; that is the nature of what we do. But is it required? If spending additional hundreds or thousands each season is what it takes to put profitability within reach then I hope people who are doing this for money will understand that. That has to be part of the business plan.

A requirement for continuous reinvestment is not the nature of other forms of investment. If I invest in gold coins I do not have to buy more gold coins the following year in order to make money on the ones I already have. The same is true for stamps, stocks, diamonds or many other things in which people choose to invest. To suggest that this is an absolute requirement for a successful ball python husbandry program is an important thing for every for-profit breeder to understand.

[LeviBP]

To me, profit really is not an issue, and any money that I may make, is honestly going to go into MORE Ball Pythons
But, if you do want to make profit, more power to you, many people have tried and been successful!

[Blue Apple Herps]

They talk about how Mojaves were going for $11,000 and how Spiders were going for $4,000. You can now get both for around $600 combined.
Think about how much that sucks for breeders who spent that much for these two morphs back in 04' to what they are now

But you have to think long term. Lets say this year I buy a '10 banana male for $15k. He first breeds for me in '12, and lets say prices have fallen to $4k for banana males by then. Lets say I breed him to a pastel female and two normals. The pastel gives me 6 eggs, and the two females give me a total of 9 eggs (being conservative here). Lets say I get one banana pastel that I hold back and a total of 4 other bananas that I sell (again I'm being conservative here with the odds being hit).

I'm able to sell the 4 bananas for $4k a piece and end up with $16k. $15k is for the investment in the banana bp, then lets say $1k for food, heating, misc other costs for that year. Now I've broken even with my investment, so even if in '13 I'm able to hatch out 5 more that I can sell for $2k (prices have fallen again), that's still $10k. Then maybe the following year your banana pastel is up to breeding size, so now you can make super pastel bananas or sell your original breeder male, etc.

Lets say even if you lost a clutch the first year, and only made $8k, then the next year you could make it back up. Or if he doesn't breed the first year and you have to wait a year, you could still end up on top.

Now, let me clarify, this is purely hypothetical. And by no means is it this easy. But if you plan carefully, and long term, then it is quite possible to break even or come close to breaking even. With bps, I'm to the point where they are able to pay for themselves, I'm not making any money, but I'm not losing any money either (now the cornsnakes, they're a money pit, but I still love them!).

So again, if people are looking to make back all their money in a year and be rolling in the dough, guess again, but if you come up with a 5 year plan, and are conservative and factor in all of the costs and potential costs and losses, then its feasible to at least have the hobby pay for itself.

[LunaBalls]

But you have to think long term. Lets say this year I buy a '10 banana male for $15k. He first breeds for me in '12, and lets say prices have fallen to $4k for banana males by then. Lets say I breed him to a pastel female and two normals. The pastel gives me 6 eggs, and the two females give me a total of 9 eggs (being conservative here). Lets say I get one banana pastel that I hold back and a total of 4 other bananas that I sell (again I'm being conservative here with the odds being hit).

I'm able to sell the 4 bananas for $4k a piece and end up with $16k. $15k is for the investment in the banana bp, then lets say $1k for food, heating, misc other costs for that year. Now I've broken even with my investment, so even if in '13 I'm able to hatch out 5 more that I can sell for $2k (prices have fallen again), that's still $10k. Then maybe the following year your banana pastel is up to breeding size, so now you can make super pastel bananas or sell your original breeder male, etc.

Lets say even if you lost a clutch the first year, and only made $8k, then the next year you could make it back up. Or if he doesn't breed the first year and you have to wait a year, you could still end up on top.

Now, let me clarify, this is purely hypothetical. And by no means is it this easy. But if you plan carefully, and long term, then it is quite possible to break even or come close to breaking even. With bps, I'm to the point where they are able to pay for themselves, I'm not making any money, but I'm not losing any money either (now the cornsnakes, they're a money pit, but I still love them!).

So again, if people are looking to make back all their money in a year and be rolling in the dough, guess again, but if you come up with a 5 year plan, and are conservative and factor in all of the costs and potential costs and losses, then its feasible to at least have the hobby pay for itself.

x2 I like the way that you put it. I agree with you.