For fun, lets start a fish store...

[Hybridfish7]

Staff hired based on knowledge and experience as opposed to "I need help so this random teenager with a bearded dragon and no fish experience will have to do"
Mostly common colorful fish, good selection of reasonably priced tetras, cyprinids and livebearers, mostly angels rams and discus for cichlids but some random cooler apistos or dwarf acaras
Honduran red points
Pure strains of amphilophus
Nothing that grows over 2 feet unless specifically ordered by someone who has adequate space
Same for sw stuff with the exception of nano fish
Aqueon tanks and aquaclears, spare parts for common filters, eheim heaters

 

[SourAngelfish]

This question ended up being extremely thought provoking for me. Having worked at a fish store for almost 6 years now, I have seen a lot of things come and go, lots of failures and successes with certain products.

I think my dream store would be split 25/75 with 25% salt mostly relying on special ordering with 75% focusing on naturalistic/biotope-esc freshwater tanks. I would like to make a point to bring in quality fish with their localities listed, possibly have tank systems seperated by the origin of the fish (i.e. a tank rack with only South American fish).

I would like to have a decent sized section with varying scaping materials+botanicals and a table where people can build/test their scaping ideas (something I had seen at another store). I feel like the hobby has been delineating from the ‘natural’ aspects of fishkeeping.

Must have products would be sera foods, repashy, seachem. A wide variety of frozen foods is also important in my eyes. A strong push for sumps and sponge filters would be included as well, I find them to be quite effective and easy to understand/operate. The #1 issue newcomers have with their setups are fooling with their canisters/HOBs.

Store display tanks? This might be over ambitious but I have a few in mind. I feel like a nice 180-300 gallon saltwater with large angels/tangs/wrasses/etc. is a must have. A smaller 40-75 gallon reef tank is another essential and can be useful in explaining reef tanks to new hobbyists. The real show stealers would be a 600+ gallon Asian monster tank with a giant gourami, chitala, and numerous larger Asian cyprinids (a dream of mine), and a 40 display rack showcasing biotope a from around the world (i.e lake Malawi, Indonesian peat swamp, Amazon basin, etc.)

Probably far from doable but if I had an infinite amount of money to get started with, this is the direction I’d go.

 

[Trouser Cough]

Were it my shop it would have some space allocated to feeders. What brings people back over and over? Expertise, cool stock, and the need to replenish consumables reliably. They'd be kept in large numbers, quarantined, medicated, and fattened.

For a display tank I'd try a large-ish tank w/ a ton of rummy nose in it and maybe one single pseudo predator that would keep the rummies in tight formation.

And yeah... no tank busters in inventory.

 

[DMD123]

Having Aquarium Co-Op about an hour and a half away from me and seeing how the business had its small beginnings has always been a bit of an inspiration. Having your own line of aquarium products made for you is pretty hard core. The aquarium sponge filter, pre-filters, pleco caves, fish nets are all custom made and private labeled with the stores name. Very cool, would love to have that in a store of my own. This would likely even include private label line of fish foods. Hey, I did say the sky the limit, its your store, so why not have a company make you your own line of foods to your specs with your label!

 

[esoxlucius]

One thing my observations have shown me over the years regarding fish stores is that stores that are hobby related single dimension only, don't do as well as stores that offer "other" products too. The struggles of the former would be in line with our hobby being a niche one.

If I was opening a store this would be at the front of my mind. And proof of this can be seen at my LFS which is also a huge garden centre. There's also a busy cafe which serves great home made fresh food and a play area for kids to go whilst the adults browse in peace. This place is packed, always. The owner has a great balance to his store.

It's a no brainer to me, given my love for gardening too, that his business model is one I would replicate if I was opening a store.

 

[tlindsey]

would have some space allocated to feeders.

Definitely great to have live feeders. I was thinking having live tiny fry foods available at all times would be awesome. Paramecium, BBS, Microworm, Daphnia cultures.

 

[tlindsey]

One thing my observations have shown me over the years regarding fish stores is that stores that are hobby related single dimension only, don't do as well as stores that offer "other" products too. The struggles of the former would be in line with our hobby being a niche one.

If I was opening a store this would be at the front of my mind. And proof of this can be seen at my LFS which is also a huge garden centre. There's also a busy cafe which serves great home made fresh food and a play area for kids to go whilst the adults browse in peace. This place is packed, always. The owner has a great balance to his store.

It's a no brainer to me, given my love for gardening too, that his business model is one I would replicate if I was opening a store.

I went into a grocery store with that concept but unfortunately the fish department was frowned on. Most of the fish were either infected with Ich, Fungus, or dying The employee at the time didn’t no anything about the fish.

 

[DMD123]

One thing my observations have shown me over the years regarding fish stores is that stores that are hobby related single dimension only, don't do as well as stores that offer "other" products too. The struggles of the former would be in line with our hobby being a niche one.

If I was opening a store this would be at the front of my mind. And proof of this can be seen at my LFS which is also a huge garden centre. There's also a busy cafe which serves great home made fresh food and a play area for kids to go whilst the adults browse in peace. This place is packed, always. The owner has a great balance to his store.

It's a no brainer to me, given my love for gardening too, that his business model is one I would replicate if I was opening a store.

Cool idea! I have a local store that is a full pet store that has things for every pet including a reptile and very impressive fish section. But the interesting thing is that they are also a gift shop. Kind of like a Hallmark store on steroids, with all kinds of things beyond just pets.

 

[DMD123]

Definitely great to have live feeders. I was thinking having live tiny fry foods available at all times would be awesome. Paramecium, BBS, Microworm, Daphnia cultures.

Im part of a local fish forum in my area and the topic of live tiny foods comes up quite frequently since many have fish breed on them, then they struggle for finding a way to feed them. Great idea! Nice offering besides the black worms or live brine shrimp that are usually the only offerings.

 

[DMD123]

Recent visit to a fish store had me thinking one of the most basic things... CLEAN THE GLASS! This would be a priority in a fish store I owned. I was happy that the store I visited had the fish I wanted in stock but it is nice to be able to see what you are buying, lol. Super easy to wipe up the algae off the inside front glass... Right there should be a clue as to maintenance and water changes. But another tell tale sign? The employee who causht the fish had popped off the airline off the sponge filter as he was catching the fish. Instead of putting it back on right then and there he walks away to bag the fish. While the fast customer service is appreciated the fact is he very unlikely will go back to hook up the filter. I know that because the sponge was so filthy Im not sure how it was even doing anything. Just a couple good squeeze outs and it would have been good.

So by my ranting, I guess general cleanliness of the tanks is where I would want to excel.