Jump to content

Where the money's at in our hobby


Celcuis

Recommended Posts

I think one of my serpae tetras are pregnant if she is I'll start breeding those I might also try a nice sword tail if I can find one...

Btw (non fish related)  recently I invested in a greenhouse I'm going to grow speciality crops and sell them on trade me, I'm sure I can make some money with that. I'll find a easily propagated plant ie hedge plant, grow them out and sell them for cheaper than other people like $2 each and I can fit like 1000 plants in there.

anyway thanks for all the attention and answering my question it  really helps 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 4/4/2017 at 8:02 PM, alanmin4304 said:

It is a bit of a "catch 22". If you sell "at the back door" (which includes trademe) retailers will not buy off you unless they are so cheap and so good that they cannot resist. At that stage there is not much in it for you.

I know this sounds negative but have been there and done that too.  Often once you start to supply a retailer your wings are clipped so you can not sell to the general public and in the cases of more difficult to breed/grow out fish you end up with a glut that the store doesn't want due to low demand in the stores at the time.  It really is a catch 22 situation.  If you want to build a relationship with the stores you need to do it months and months before you approach the 'would you be interested question'.  They are more likely to approach you themselves if they see what you have available is top quality and then they will push for the absolute cheapest.  The bread and butter fish are cheap as chips to purchase from the main wholesalers and the likes of Animates now have their own import facilities.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

^^^ What Adrienne said. You have to give them a good reason to buy from you instead of the importers. Two main options: sell at such a low price that they can increase profits more (obviously this means you don't get much), or, provide stock that has a difference, e.g. a hard to find/new colour variant etc.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

I have literally made $1,000s over the years with Africans. It wasn't a business, I simply set up with the fish I liked at the time but that also had a high retail price due to their availability or desirability.  I just gave them a good environment and feed and they took care of the rest. It was as much work as stripping a female,  placing the fry in a fry tank and feeding them until they were a saleable size. Learnt how to ship and was as easy as watching them breed then grow. It took some coin to setup,  when I bought tropheus they were about $50 a 2cm fry but a year or do down the track they easily paid for themselves plus plenty but I didn't buy tripwire to make money, they are by far the bossest fish to keep :) I think it just comes down to the species, species of fish do come into and go out of demand. I bred hundreds of red empress back in the day. They were a desirable fish initially but in the end I couldn't get $2 a fish. From memory I sent kiwiplymouth about 60 juvies for just the coat of the freight in the end. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...
  • 2 months later...

You know how to make a small fortune with breeding fish? You start with a large fortune!

Sorry, I could not resist :smiley_wink_ani:  I've heard that joke a gazillion times when living in the US. I think Africans would be pretty good.  Like P. demasoni still sell for crazy money in NZ, and they are easy to breed.  I think there would also be a market for good quality L. caeruleus, but the breeding stock for those in NZ is appalling. Whenever I look at them in a store, it brings tears to my eyes.  You would have to get some decent ones imported first.  As others have said, once you really get the ball rolling, the market will quickly be saturated. NZ is just too small, and I have seen how difficult it is even in the US or Germany.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
×
×
  • Create New...