family owned pet store vs petco

[littleindiangirl]

The small stores around here are terrible. I can think of 3 off the top of my head that do well in fish sales, but everything else suffers terribly and should be reported. I much prefer going to petsmart and petco. At least there, corporate DOES have a hand in discipline, made all the more easier by reporting it to corporate. They do check up on those things!

[Mochelem]

It's never really about chain vs private - it's about quality of care they provide.

Butters, if you are close with the owners and treated like family there then why not have a sit down and talk with them. People seem to have lost the skill of simple and direct conversations in today's world! Explain to them without being confrontational or accusatory that you are concerned about what you see, offer some of your time to help them bring their husbandry up to a reasonable level (remember it's a business so yes it's going to be different than a private person with a few pet snakes). Offer to help educate their employees or whatever you can do to help first.

If they aren't receptive, if they don't care - then maybe you need to report them but again, since you said you are close with them, why not treat them like friends and see if you can help them do better by these creatures.

Dont get authorities involved until you have tried to do somthing for them... You say they are nice people, so be a nice person and try to help them... Remember they are just trying to make a living like everyone in this world...

[Mochelem]

Also you can lead them in the right direction on where to get reptiles that are healthy with no kinks.... Ive seen baby normal bp's for sale for $20 each, even cheaper if you buy a lot of 10 or somthing

[Sonya610]

Personally I would call the authorities.

This is their BUSINESS, if they do not "know" it is because they do not care. In this day and age there is NO reason for a business owner operating in the US to remain so ignorant, there is too much information out there and if they wanted to, they WOULD know better.

You yourself have mentioned numerous incidents, yet apparently that didn't help. If this was a daycare operation treating children badly I doubt if people would say "well just give them more time and try to educate them, there is no urgency".

Besides it will probably take the authorities ages to even look into the matter. Honestly I doubt if it will make a difference, but it is important to try when sick animals are not being cared for properly.

[blackcrystal22]

Luckily I have a VERY nice family owned petstore 10 minutes away and a Petco and Petsmart that are both pretty good stores.

Sonya, there is a difference between ignorance and uneducated. These people running the petstore could have their animals dying and they don't know why. They have their guidelines like any petstore but may not understand the huge amount of fault in their system and just think it's unlucky. Don't be so quick to judge.

Talk with them right away, and if they do not show any incentive to change, then contact the authorities.

[Sonya610]

Blackcrystal perhaps I read the story differently. Dead animals rotting in tanks, intestines coming out back ends, and baby bp's being stapled in paper bags with baby mice for days on end.

That is not ignorance; obviously the management simply does not care. Removing the rotting corpses that are falling to pieces is about as basic as it gets.

[bigballs]

there is a difference between ignorance and uneducated.

Yes there is, and these business people are both ignorant and uneducated. It is not our responsibility as the customer to teach the business person. they should have a little more respect for what they do and be able to tell the customer a thing or two. at least if not for themselves then for the animals because no living thing deserves to be put through that type of uneducated ignorance.

there is no need to speak with them. it isnt hard to tell when animals are sick and dying. they know whats going on and it seems they dont care especially if paying customers like the OP keep giving them business. i would report them asap and never go back again.

[Mike Schultz]

Sounds like you know them well... you should give them a talking-to. Sometimes these issues are just down to lack of knowledge... These mom-and-pop pet shops often know a good deal about fish or dogs or something and then as a side thought get a few reptiles to cater to that niche as well...

I know of one near me where only one guy in the shop knows much about the reptiles, where the owner and the rest of the employees seem pretty much clueless from what i could tell.

[nchapa]

Still doesnt explain the dead reptiles that are left in the tank to rot for who knows how long.

Plain and simple these people dont care. How long would one have to search the internet to find this website. With the fountain of knowledge overflowing from this message board one could run a reptile empire, and I'm sure there are registered users who are experts on other animal besides reptiles here. Or would be pointed in the right direction.

If these people cared, even a little bit, they would have sought advice a long time ago.

[icygirl]

The way I see it, you've got two realms here: The chain stores that go by mediocre but usually enforced guidelines set by a large corporate office, OR a free-for-all world where where some small pet stores take excellent care of their animals... but most others screw up horribly. I'm not sure what's worse.

Wouldn't it be nice if more people cared more than two cents worth about herps? Then maybe we wouldn't have this problem.