i dont shop there very much. At most i stop 2 times a year just to see if its still open. If i buy fish they are the ones the other chain petstores dont have. all the good fish stores closed years ago and the others are way overpriced or junk
I don't understand why LFS sets up the tanks like they do?
- Thread starter dbcb314
- Start date
I recently bought a cichilad from a private pet store. When I got home, I started questioning the type cause it didnt seem right. I called the store to double check, and the response was that he didnt keep up with labeling the tanks, wasnt sure what kind it was, and told me to look online to find out. This notion that small private stores are some how more knowlegdable than the chains is crap. A guy works at a chain so he automatically doesnt know anything?
Og all the petsmart's I have been to do NOT do that maby there are bad ones out there. MIne Local petsmarts are really nice.
not all chains are bad, I work at Pets At Home and we care a great deal for our fish- don't overstock, perform regular filter maintenance etc. We have a good collective knowledge and give our customers the best advice possible. Unfortunately although we try this hard, because some chains aren't so good we get judged from how Petsmart operated. Like some other guys have said, even the seemingly knowledgable small stores have tanks of dead fish 
I wasn't bashing all chain stores. I just see this every once in a while and I was just curious. The petsmart int he town I live in is pretty good actually. The petsmart in the town I am from which is brand new is meh.
My petSmart just went down hill overnight. They got a new manager that is a know it all dick. Most of the employees quit and then he fired most of those who remained. The place is now staffed by noobs that don't know anything and seem like they don't care. 
There were only two people in the fish section that knew anything and now both are gone.
Two weeks ago I went in and the tanks had floaters everywhere. The girl said she didn't like taking out the dead ones. One tank of koi were infected with advanced ulcerating septicemia. Unfortunately, that tank is plumbed into half the tanks in the store. I grabbed a net and the trash can and did the deed myself.
There were only two people in the fish section that knew anything and now both are gone. Two weeks ago I went in and the tanks had floaters everywhere. The girl said she didn't like taking out the dead ones. One tank of koi were infected with advanced ulcerating septicemia. Unfortunately, that tank is plumbed into half the tanks in the store. I grabbed a net and the trash can and did the deed myself.
yep, i got mad at our petsmart because we were there for 30 minutes.. we looked at some fish, and some hiding places for crayfish and talked about getting one or two jewel cichlids and/or some black mystery snails because the new tanks we set up have no snails yet..
we stood there for 15 minutes waiting for an employee to come, another couple wanted to buy fish too.. we talked to them for awhile. And then a younger couple came in and were asking questions about fish..
i was ready to plunk down $50 - $100 in tank decor, hiding places and fish and i made it clear to the manager that we had been there for far too long for the entire department to be unmanned.. and we left, with my money in my wallet.
And thinking i could just pop right over to petco and get basically the same thing was my big mistake. we went to the fish section, looked in the tanks, the ENTIRE system was infested with ick. and they had almost no cave effect tank decorations for crayfish hiding places.
needless to say, we didn't get the jewel cichlids or the mystery snails. Or the hydro foam filters.. we did get a couple cave effects but not the ones i wanted.. i'm getting ready to take a hint from the folks here and just use terra cotta flower pots, they are ugly, but cheap and easy to find and they do the job.
we stood there for 15 minutes waiting for an employee to come, another couple wanted to buy fish too.. we talked to them for awhile. And then a younger couple came in and were asking questions about fish..
i was ready to plunk down $50 - $100 in tank decor, hiding places and fish and i made it clear to the manager that we had been there for far too long for the entire department to be unmanned.. and we left, with my money in my wallet.
And thinking i could just pop right over to petco and get basically the same thing was my big mistake. we went to the fish section, looked in the tanks, the ENTIRE system was infested with ick. and they had almost no cave effect tank decorations for crayfish hiding places.
needless to say, we didn't get the jewel cichlids or the mystery snails. Or the hydro foam filters.. we did get a couple cave effects but not the ones i wanted.. i'm getting ready to take a hint from the folks here and just use terra cotta flower pots, they are ugly, but cheap and easy to find and they do the job.
