Haggaling?

[Angiebeast]

I don't think haggling necessarily means you don't value the snake that much; for some people, those extra dollars might be a serious monetary strain. Obviously if you're too poor to actually care for an animal, you shouldn't purchase it at all, but snakes and the like tend to be much more expensive up front than they are to maintain. Plenty of breeders understand this.

Technically, I haggled my own BP down to free =P I work at a major pet retailer, and at the time I was looking to get a snake, the ones we had were new and had come in with various issues due to botched shipping. They were on the mend with our treatments, but I wanted to get a problem-free snake if I could. So I went to a local reptile shop that was having a deal where, if you essentially purchased the entire setup for an animal--terrarium, bedding, hides, etc--you could get a reptile worth $50 or less for free. Their normal BPs were $55, and when I first called them and asked if they'd still be willing to let them be a part of the deal, they said that the owner was likely to be very firm with the price.

I went there anyway and found a little stunner of a normal (stunning to me, at least =P). We talked for a bit and I mentioned that I'd love to buy all my stuff from them, as this was my first snake and I needed a setup anyway, but if the BP couldn't be a part of the setup deal then I'd likely purchase one from my place of work. Buying the snake and everything with my employee discount would have beat buying full-price from their shop, but if the BP was free then the total cost would beat both of the former. I'll admit, I felt like a jerk when I presented my case, but as a college student it's practically law for me to be cheap, haha. However, they seemed perfectly happy to let my snake be part of the deal when I explained all this, and I didn't get any feeling of resentment or offense from them. So I bought all my stuff there and my little girl was free (Though I've looked at their website, and the deal is still going on, but their BPs have gone from 55 bucks to 45 . . . so if I'd bought from them now this wouldn't have been an issue. Ah well!)