With ANY pet store it all boils down to the people they hire. Unfortunately most chain pet stores will hire just about anyone to work in their store. Mom and pop stores too! I don't think the problem is the store itself. Its the lack of training.

I worked at a Petsmart for a year and a half. My co-workers knew little about reptiles and they asked me a lot of questions regarding care and such. The store used to get in lot of weak bearded dragons. As it turns out they were not getting the proper amount of food (the policy of Petsmart is to feed small lizards around 6 small crickets a day) or UVB. This was quickly fixed with a new light bulb and the department manager giving us the okay to feed the bearded dragons as needed.

The problems didn't start until we got a new department manager who knew next to NOTHING about reptiles. Actually I'm pretty sure the only animal she knew anything about was horses. When we got in some mite infested ball pythons (it happens from time to time) she only allowed us to use some natural mite spray we had on the shelf. It helped but with the stress of mites and being treated, the snakes would not eat. They grew horribly thin and I had to resort to assist feeding them (which is against the policy of the store. Only a trained veterinarian is allowed to do it and we had no vets in the area that I would consider to have a working knowledge of reptiles) just to keep them alive.

Eventually I quit to move onto a call center job (really really really wish I hadn't. I hate not working with animals for a living) and per a friend who still works there the snakes in the store still have mites and the manager is still refusing to treat them properly. The old department manager would not have stood for that. Under his management, the animals in that department NEVER went without vet care. Under this new department manager, a rat died because it took her two weeks to call the vet to set up an appointment.

So it really does depend on who works there. When I worked there with the good manager, the animals in that section were rarely sick. We had maybe a max of 2-5 animals in the sick room and some of them were in there for long term illnesses that had to be on constant treatment (hamster with immune system deficiency, bird with unexplained feather loss. It was later adopted and is doing well) It was the change of management that turned the department into Hell. Apparently the store has hired a new girl that knows NOTHING about animals and she does such a piss poor job with the animals two of my co-workers from that store have told me to come back. I'm tempted, but the only way I'd come back to that store is if they gave me control over reptile care.