ATTN: LFS employees

[A.T.T.R]

ill tell you
ppl who work in combo stores have a harder time
i worked in a fish/ pet store for two years and alot of times ppl would question me and think i was an idiot when i told them somthing other then what the smart people at the manufacturing compnay of productblablabla said
( like skimmer ratings for expl or powerheads or corals or anyhting)

working at a REAL lfs now ( actualy has less fish and less coral then the store i worked at before) ppl will hang on your every work .
i was so used to having to SELL products now its like " this vortec would work alot better then that pump" customer " ok bag it up"

 

[D to the P]

It's extremely difficult to get people to take my word sometimes. It doesn't help when there are so many RC threads about how LFS screw people over and how you should never listen to them...

 

[miniwhinny]

here's my customer side...

went to Animal Land in Redmond Oregon - into their saltwater department - they had a shark egg (this is when I was a real newb) the store owner totally assured me that it could hatch and live in a 10 gallon for at least a year when it would need to be moved to a 50 gallon tank where the shark could spend its entire life as they will only grow to fit the size on the tank they are put into.

Amazing !!!!!!!

Gonna go fishing...put me an orca in a 20...whoa, mini orcas...cool.

 

[jefnalyssa]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13879241#post13879241 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by atwinparadox2
Ok this is no joke and just adds insult to injury on who local fish stores hire as there employees.

New local fish store. Have a little of everything pet. Small selection of SW, but really nice stuff.

Me going in to just check it out, the usual, prices, stock, health of corals...fish...etc...

Owner...very knowledgeable in the SW hobby, fortunately for me and the post to this forum, he was helping another customer and i got to experience his employee.

To set this up, I am creating a Zoa garden on one section of my tank.

I proceed to ask this employee if they have selections of Zoanthids. He says yes they have a lot of them in 2 or 3 tanks for relatively cheap.

Me: Cool show me.
Him: Ok here you go.
Me: Uh, those aren't Zoos they are star polyps.
Him: No those are Zoos, I assure you.
Me: No disrespect but I would bet my life they are star polyps. ( I proceed to show him the actual Zoanthinds in the other tanks.)
Him: I have been working with salt water tanks for 2 months now, and I know what zoanthids look like.
Me: I have been keeping tanks for years now and those aren't Zoos. Those there are Zoos.( I am starting to chuckle at this point)
Him: No those are button polyps.
Me: Yeah Zoos.
Him: Listen, if you are going to come in here and tell me how to do my job then maybe you shouldn't come in here anymore.
Me: Ok buddy, you obviously know waaaaaaaay more than me about this stuff.

Here is the kicker and the icing on the cake. As I was walking away, there was a sign above the one tank that said, and I quote..." Selected star polyp frags, 15$" HA!

Owner approaches me as I am leaving.

Him: Did you find everything you were looking for.
Me: Yeah thanks, you have a great selection of Zoos in your star polyp tank!

Moral of this story...if you own a local fish store, be sure your employees can identify the stock before you throw him to the wolves...so to speak.

Great thread, all the stories were great and I am sure we all can add plenty of more!

It could of been the icing on the cake if you would of bought some "star polyp frags, 15$"

 

[Laurier]

Oh god i worked at a LFS about 6 years ago and some of the people i worked with were retarded. Since the store ran on a bonus system and if you sold a certain amount you would get a bonus on your paycheck. Well some of the guys i worked with would sell a brand new tank with fish and let the customer walk out. since i worked full time and the night shift during the weekdays i never saw what was happening on the weekends and neither did my buddy, another experienced employee. Day after day people would come in with dead fish and water samples and i would realize that the tank was never cycled. After telling the customer what cycling was they were shocked that the info give was wrong. Most of the other guys would just sell them aqua plus and tell them to mix it with tap water and your tank is ready for fish.

Now i worked there during the finding nemo ordeal. Honestly all i head was "NEMO" as a kid pointed out the goldfish. i swear i had nightmares of kids yelling that for weeks

 

[RandomHero426]

Ive just spent the past three nights reading this...Im sad now thats there is no more....

 

[thecichlidpleco]

I sold a relative of mine an acrylic tank that leaked. Didnt rip him off or anything, he knew it leaked and thought about converting for a snake or african cichlids. When we moved the tank to his car he gives me a bag with silicone sealant in it from AGA. I tell him that this is acrylic and not glass and therefore this sealant wont work. Then he relpies with, so you think it would work right, the guy at the store said it should work to seal it. People just dont listen, they hear what they want to hear whether you tell them that 4 tangs in a 40 gallon wont work, or (my cousin for example) that buying 2 baby alligators and a tank is never a deal no matter what the price.

 

[Wondereef]

Ok here's one. I worked in a store a few years back that did reptiles and F/W fish. We had a bit 400g display that had a 3.5ft swamp eel and a 3.5ft aust. arrowana. Well there were a couple kids that came in a few times a week when I worked to hang out. I had heard that they nabbed stuff from the store but I never found him doing that while I worked. Well one day I was tending to the tanks, doing water changes and filling up other tanks when I hear a loud splash and a yell. It was one of the kids, he was on the other side of the store and apparently messing with arrow and got bit. Not bad, it didn't even draw blood. He definitely learned his lesson though, he and I always had a bit of a running joke from there that I would let him have a chat with the arrow if he mouthed off :lol

Tom

 

[JamesJR]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=14097296#post14097296 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Wondereef
Ok here's one. I worked in a store a few years back that did reptiles and F/W fish. We had a bit 400g display that had a 3.5ft swamp eel and a 3.5ft aust. arrowana. Well there were a couple kids that came in a few times a week when I worked to hang out. I had heard that they nabbed stuff from the store but I never found him doing that while I worked. Well one day I was tending to the tanks, doing water changes and filling up other tanks when I hear a loud splash and a yell. It was one of the kids, he was on the other side of the store and apparently messing with arrow and got bit. Not bad, it didn't even draw blood. He definitely learned his lesson though, he and I always had a bit of a running joke from there that I would let him have a chat with the arrow if he mouthed off :lol

Tom

Got to be careful with situations like that. Could have been a lawsuit just waiting to happen.

 

[NCSUsalt]

few weeks ago a mother with her two daughters comes in asking about seahorses.... conversation goes a little something like this,

mother: "do you have any seahorses"
me: "not at the moment"
mother: "are they saltwater"
me: "yes, everything here is saltwater"
mother: "so you have to keep them in saltwater? I didn't know they were saltwater"

I'm thinking, they have freaking SEA right in the name... but on to the funny part

her: " so what do they eat"
me: "well we feed them frozen mysis shrimp here"
her: "whats that"
so I show her.....

anyways, they look around and I hear the daughter ask if she can get one and the mother says,

"no, did you hear him? he said you have to feed them frozen mice tails"

I guess its good we don't have to feed them live mice tails.

 

[redfishsc]

This thread would make the BEST LFS EMPLOYEE MANUAL EVER.

If you manage an LFS, make this thread part of the training!!!! This is great!

 

[m8j4c]

I was at my lfs and some guy in front of me brings up a powerhead to the front counter (koralia 3 i think..) and said he bought it 2 or 3 days ago and that it stopped working after the first night.. He then said he opened it up and cleaned it out and still it didn't work... So the guy helping him right away opens it up and pulls out a small serpent star almost the size of his palm and it was still alive and moving! The worker helping him just gave him this weird look and the guy asked "is that thing bad?" the worker tells him no, plugs the powerhead in it fires right up. puts it back together and hands it back to the guy. The guy says " Ohhh................................................Thanks." and walks out with the ph in 1 hand and the star in the other.
I looked at the worker and he looked at me and smirked and said I was atleast gonna put the starfish in a bag for him! ( the guy seemed to be in a hurry due to embarassment!)

 

[plyr58]

I wanted to share another kind of story. Today at work, a kid (proabbly 10 or 11) came in with his mother and was looking at fish. He told me (in minute specifics) everything about his setup. He had a FOWLER 38 that had just finished cycling. We discussed different types of fish, how hardy one species was compared to another, and what would be the best choice for him since he was size limited. We discussed the fact that he would like to turn his tank into a reef one day and therefore wanted to pick fish that would be compatible with this possibility. I recommended the Marine Fishes book by Michael as something he could use as a starting off point for selecting future fish for his tank, and I suggested several sites which would be beneficial to him (including this one). His mom told me that he had only asked for books on keeping saltwater aquariums for Christmas and had already read the 4 she had bought him, plus 3 more from the local library. Since Christmas! He selected the beginnings of a clean up crew and two ocellaris clowns to put into his tank. I reminded him to take things slowly and he was more than happy to hang on every word I told him as we walked around the store. All in all, it may have been my best moment while working in a LFS part time while going to school. I told him and his mom when they left that the future of the hobby depended on young people like him that were interested in keeping fish, but also responsible in doing so. It just truly made me feel good to help this kid who had obviously spent hours reading and learning and was so excited to be getting into the hobby. It was great.

Sorry for the diverison.

 

[Wondereef]

Thats not a diversion at all. I can't say i've had an experience just like that but I can imagine how something like that would feel. must have been great.

Tom

 

[plyr58]

When they walked out the door I was feeling all warm inside. I then turned around and a lady immediately asked me if we could get her a komodo dragon.

Facepalm


(and no, I'm not kidding.)

 

[cable guy 805]

gal walks in to the store and asks if her seahorses maybe could have died when she turned off the whole system for two weeks. Come to find out another LFS told her that she needed to cycle her tank, I guess that is what she thought she was doing.

 

[cable guy 805]

I walked in to a competing LFS in a neighboring town they had two of the biggest RK2 Skimmers I mean 8-10 feet tall. One for their salt system and one for their freshwater system

 

[A.T.T.R]

skimmers work for freshwater. just not very well ( ponds mostly )


as for the young kid.
i had two kid customers for the longest time ( bout 10) that were just like that. they had to be one of my fav customers.

 

[D to the P]

Yeah it depends on what the Rk2 was hooked up to. It'd work in freshwater, but the bubbles wouldn't be as small. I've only ever seen skimmers used in ponds when it comes to freshwater, but I guess if their freshwater system had enough gunk in it that they could use it. Just sounds like a waste of money to me though.

 

[D to the P]

I have a story about an...inexperienced...co-worker of mine. It's almost too embarrassing to tell but,

Guy walks up and says he's having a problem with snails, and ends up describing Stomatella snails. Convo goes like this

Guy: There's so many of them is there any way to get rid of them without hurting my other snails or coral

Smart Co Worker: Can't really think of anything aside from just pulling them out by hand. I mean, they're good snails to have so I wouldn't get rid of too many.

Guy: Yeah, it's just that they're all over the place and I don't think it looks good

Inexperienced Co Worker: What about a frog or a lizard, they eat snails don't they...?

...silence...

Everyone looks at her with a blank stare.

Guy: Yeah, they got frogs in the middle of the ocean now...

He looks at the Smart Co Worker and says thanks, and then leaves.

On a positive note though I had one of the best experiences a LFS employee can have while working. A customer came in, with KNOWLEDGE of what he wanted to do, questions to ask, a notebook for answers, and he already researched keeping salt water tanks. So, after I helped him spend almost $2000 on a whole tank set up (ie tank, stand, sump, pump, skimmer, heaters, RO/DI unit, etc.) he proceeded to compliment my work, and (and this is the good part) wrote an email to my work so all my bosses could hear about it. It doesn't get much better than that :lol: