ATTN: LFS employees

[israelnajar]

Customer comes in and wants to set up a new tank. 250 gallon to be exact, and he wants to set it up quick as in the next few days. He wants to know how much everything will cost, all he has is the tank and stand and hood and 80 gallon refuge. So we talk to him for a bit and figure what he needs, getting 9 bags of sand 3 buckets of salt ballasts, bulbs, test kits RO/DI(well water), everything. All this stuff is ready to go and we say okay that is 800 something dollars or whatever it came out to. He had the gall to say okay I just wanted to know, thanks. I will just get it online it is cheaper. We asked him how much cheaper is it?


20 dollars. And then he walked out.

That made everyone soo mad. Especially the owner.

[melev]

Understandably. $20? Your store has great pricing.

[mitchellmoto]

Not as funny as some of these and not a LFS story but I always keep an eye out for whole tank setups sales in the local papers and thriftynickel. 125gal aquarium for sale comes with tank, stand lights, fish, coral and misc. food ect.. I of course called and talked to this guy who wouldn't let me get a word in to ask any questions. He said he had lots of coral. When he finaly shut up and started asking about the live stock. Tangs, clowns, dottyback. I started to ask about the coral which was what I was most interestedin. I said how many corals do you have and what kind.
He reponded with well around 50 pounds and it is the crushed stuff but was selling because he couldn't keep it clean it always turned green and brown.
What a waist of my 15 min.

Also how big do your freinds eyes get when the see your tank, have to have one of there own and then ask how much it would cost to replicate

[littlefish72]

Got two more stories:

Sold a lady a magdrive return pump and went to her house to set it up....well the pump didn't really fit that well in the sump and made some noise so she and I talked and we decided to exchange the magdrive for a Quiet one.......she came to the store and i told her how to hook it up which was very easy and she went home happy.......well about an hour later i get a message that the woman i sold a quiet one pump to called and said it wasn't working.......well now i feel like crap because she was really nice and new to the hobby and we just kept having these problems with her return pump........bout a half hour later she calls and i talk to her and ask her what the problem is.....she says "Oh the pump is working fine now...I plugged in the heater instead of the pump." Siiiiiigh. It's a good thing she is pretty...

Story two: Guy walks in and want's some funky pump and we get to talking and he starts telling me about his 855 gallon tank...well when you say 855 gallons it draws attention and another guy jumps in the conversation and starts asking questions, which is pretty normal...the second guy asks how it's set up and the first guy tells us about his sump that's like 125 gallon sump with like three protein skimmers and a 55 set up as a refugium full of calurpa allergy.......you know that noise when a the needle slips off a record? well that's what my mind did.....and not 30 seconds later he says he only harvests about a third of the allergy from his refugium at a time........my mind starts screaming: YOU HAVE A 855 GALLON TANK AND YOU SAY ALLERGY INSTEAD OF ALGAE?!?!?!?!? WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU!?!?!?!? THAT IS WORSE THAN SAYING THE WORD "CHICK-LID" WHEN TALKING ABOUT AFRICAN "SICK-LIDS"

uggh

[Monti]

Yeah, that's always a fav of mine too: "Where's your allergy eaters." Its amazing how many times a day you could hear that. And about every mispronunciation of African cichlid too, kich-lid, chiklid, chicklets, and my favorite, African chinchillas (actually heard that last one more than a few times). Another great one was when a lady came in asking which fish were "progressive" and which ones were "communion." Seriously. After trying not to die laughing I pointed out which side was "aggressive" and which side was more "community."

[ACBlinky]

Customer -
I want to re-create the tank from Finding Nemo for my neice's birthday, can you help me?

Me -
That's so sweet! How old is she?

Customer -
She's turning four

Me -
Wow, this is some birthday present for a four year old! Lucky girl. Let's talk about the tank you'd like first, okay?

Customer -
What size was the one in the movie?

Me -
Well... I don't know exactly, but how about this - which of the fish or invertebrates did you want to keep, let's build around that.

Customer -
All of them. I want the exact same tank.

Me -
That might not work... some of them may not get along, and the puffer fish will probably eat the shrimp...

At which point my manager pipes up and says 'well... not right away, and he can always get a new one...'

Customer -
They got along in the movie!

Me -
Sir, that was a cartoon. They could talk in the movie, they don't do that in real life either.

Customer -
Well, she loves Dori, so we have to have that one

Dori wasn't one of the fish in the dentist's tank...

Me -
Okay, that's going to be a BIG fish and that particular fish really needs room to swim, so you'll want a large tank.

Customer -
Fine. I'll take that one (points to a 100g tank)

Me -
That's actually a pretty good choice. I think we can make that work nicely for you.

Hey, he could have chosen a 20g, right?

Customer -
You guys do tank setup and maintenance, right? Can we get this thing up and running by four o'clock? Her birthday party is today (this was around noon)

Me -
Uh... actually, starting up a saltwater tank isn't a quick process, it's not something that's really plug and play; there are steps you'll need to follow and it could be months before all the fish are in...

Customer -
Seriously? *Sigh* well, she wants it, so whatever. How much will this cost?

Me -
*adding everything up* it can be pricey, but I can tell you from experience it's worth it. Your whole family will love it, not just your neice.

Customer -
Where are the rocks?

Me -
Live rock is here, it's...

Customer -
No, the ones for the bottom

Me -
Oh, sorry! It's actually preferable to use this aragonite sand; the coloured gravel is more for freshwater tanks

Customer -
I told you, it has to be the SAME as in the movie!!

The kid is four - is she really going to notice the difference?

Me -
Well, okay, it's not ideal but I don't see that it would really hurt anything, it's over here...

Customer -
Oh, and that laser beam cleaning thing. She has to have that. Also that means I don't have to hire someone to clean the tank, right?

Is this guy SERIOUS?!?

Me -
Sir, to my knowledge there's no such thing. There is no machine that will fire a laser beam through your fish tank and clean it for you - maintenance isn't hard, I can show you what needs to be done, or we can arrange for services from one of our employees.

Customer -
Okay... I have to go and pick things up for the party, so I can't really do this right now. Can you hold everything for me until tomorrow? I'll have to think about it.

I Got permission, put everything on hold, never heard from the guy again. Despite losing the chance at a big commission cheque, I was really glad he didn't call back.

[JamesJR]

You guys haven't heard anything yet.
I worked at a fish store a while back and had been at the same place for years. We were a great shop, clean tanks knowledgable staff. The problem with this hobby is that some people just really shouldn't keep fish despite their best intentions. Anyways, I had a very nice lady come in and wanted a nice easy tank. I recommend freshwater to her and so I showed her a 10 gallon starter kit that we carried. I sat down for about a half hour showing her in detail how to set the tank up, wrote down specifically what to do and even drew her a couple of sketches. It was basically all done to where all she did was had to put in the gravel, fill it with water and plug it all in. Then I asked her to repeat exactly what to do when she got home. When I thought she understood everything I sold it to her loaded it up in her care and sent her on her way.
About an hour later I get a phone call from her. She is really upset. I say "well what was the matter with it?" She says "the tank blew up!" I was really taken a step back and said "blew up?" and she goes "yeah, the minute I plug it all in the whole things just exploded!" So I try and calm her down and convince her just to come back to the shop with the tank. And low and behold she brings in big mess, the top and gravel filled bottom frames of what appears to be a tank that has had all four sides blown out from some form of underwater explosion. After trying to figure out what she had done, I figured out that after she had filled up the tank with water she put the air pump inside the tank and submerged it before she plugged it in. I asked her, "how is the air pump going to pump air when it is underwater?" she then get really embarassed and leaves.

[melev]

Originally posted by ACBlinky

Is this guy SERIOUS?!?

That was definitely a crank bit for Talking Reef.

[38bill]

This just happened to a friend that owns a LFS. Women buys like a dozen Koi for her pond. A couple days later she came back complaining the all the fish were dead and she demanded that they be replaced immediately at no charge. When the store owner asked what she thought killed the fish the customer explained that a Great Blue Heron had come and eaten them all. "How do you know it was a Heron the store owner asked?" Customer: "Well I watched it catch and eat the fish." Owner: "What??? Why didn't you scare it away?".
Customer: Well it was kind of interesting to watch. So when are you going to replace them?"
Thank goodness for caller ID because she is still calling looking for her replacement Koi. LOL.

[Serioussnaps]

Originally posted by 38bill
This just happened to a friend that owns a LFS. Women buys like a dozen Koi for her pond. A couple days later she came back complaining the all the fish were dead and she demanded that they be replaced immediately at no charge. When the store owner asked what she thought killed the fish the customer explained that a Great Blue Heron had come and eaten them all. "How do you know it was a Heron the store owner asked?" Customer: "Well I watched it catch and eat the fish." Owner: "What??? Why didn't you scare it away?".
Customer: Well it was kind of interesting to watch. So when are you going to replace them?"
Thank goodness for caller ID because she is still calling looking for her replacement Koi. LOL.

c word c word...bad thoughts bad thoughts .....

[ralphie16]

what?

[FEEDERFISH]

My light is a blue Power Glo will this be ok for these corals?
How much for that yellow fish?
Are those real shrimp?
That fish is not moving.....is it dead?
Does that water taste like salt?
$20 for a fish is to much
I am running a skilter for filtration
How do you mix in the salt?
Are these corals real....where do they come from?
Is this price right......if it is thats expensive?
Can I open this pellet food and see if fish eat it?
Can I use the phone to call home quick?
I want that one......(there are only 60 neon tetras in the tank)

[fishyz]

There was this lady and her father who walked into the store, and were looking at some of our saltwater fish. I walk by and ask if I could help them in any way. The lady begins to explain that she has 2 eels and she needs a tank. Confused and scared, I ask "what are they in now?" She replies "a bucket." I slowly took a deep breath, knowing that it was going to be a long day. She then explained that her boyfriend thought it would be a cool idea to bring home 2 eels from their vacation in Vancouver. I told her that she doesn't know what she was getting herself into. We happened to have a few used tanks in the back, so I brought one out and began to explain how everything worked and that setting up a saltwater tank is a slow process. When I began explaining to her part about the hydrometer and measuring the salinity, I showed her using one of our stores. The whole time I was explaining and showing her about the salinity, she was turned around, looking at our african cichlid display tank as if I wasn't even there! I then knew that this was not going to work. I told her that if she truly cared about the eels, that she would give them to someone with a tank that was already established and could properly care for them. She then asked if we would take them. I knew that my boss isn't to keen about taking fish from customers(unless we know the fish we properly taken care of). So, I sent them to another lfs, who I know wouldn't send the eels away.

That saturday, I spent about an hour and a half explaining how to set up a tank to a lady who wasn't even listening. I later found out that she had a fw 10g, with an oscar, 2 african cichlids, and an angel. She was woundering why all of her community fish died.

Well, I hope the eels are okay.

[Kannin]

Ok... so I don't work at a lfs but there is this store in my area. It is staffed with young kids that probably don't know too much. It is the biggest and closest to my home so I go there but I certainly don't ever ask for their advice anymore.

Story #1. I'm looking at livestock and I hear this guy ask one of the young employees, "what does that mandarin eats? He says, "They'll eat anything as long as it sinks... cuz they're bottom feeders, see".

Story #2. I'm behind this nice family in line and I get the impression that their tank in not huge... maybe a 60 gallon or so. In one bag they have the biggest dogface puffer I've ever seen and in the other bag are three cleaner shrimp. The sad part is... is the owner of the store is the one selling them the giant puffer in one bag and $60 worth of "puffer food" in the other.

[random_ryan]

I don't work for an LFS. but we have friends and newbies come over.
one stands out alot more than the rest.

So a newbie desides to ask if he can see someones tank. I pipe up and say sure. tell him where I live and give him me #. so he comes over and checks my main display tank out. hes standing there and swear to god he said so how much for the live rock? is it really live? how about your sand bed is it for sale? and is it live? I am thinkin wait a **)(&*) . I explain to him dude you asked to see my tank. I never said I have anything forsale in my main system. He looks at me as if I killed his dog. And boldly says What the F***. you told me I could come look at your tank. I said yupp sure did. But I never said I was selling it off. the he says then why the he ll did you invite me over. I just smacked my head and asked him to leave explaining to him that I am not a store and if wants rock and sand there are several stores I would be happy to refer him to. well he got in his car and peeled out. needless to say I never heard or saw him again.

now when I newbie asks if he or she comes to see my tank , I tell them that I am only letting them see the tank. and that I am not selling anything. but if I do have newbie freebies and frags forsale that they would be welcome to those.

my g/f still brings up that guy. gezzzz

[SWSaltwater]

your lucky he was not a mass murderer, he sounded like a real stupid guy Ryan. I have never let anyone I don't know in my house. Sad at it is there are people that burglarize homes and shops for coral and equipment.


This one is from today..........

Customer bought a fire shrimp.

Customer: Calls 40 min's later and says the shrimp is dicing,

I had that shrimp for weeks.

Me: OK, you left he just a bit ago how long did you acclimate for.

Customer: 30 min's

Me: Ok so you live close by, please take the shrimp and bring him back with a water sample. (We guarantee livestock)

Customer: No it's too late and I am leaving in awhile.

Me: You only live a few min's away and I don't want the shrimp to die.

Customer: Gets irate and explains everything he bought has died and he spends hundreds a month and hangs up. (Me thinking If I had a 0% success rate in a hobby I would quit I think)

Me: I call the guy back and offer to drive since he lives so close to
pick up the shrimp and refund his money.

Customer: forget about it.


Needless to say he is banned from any purchased, he did not live close by he simply drove home and dumped it in. I refuse to sell to people with such reckless regard for life. Then on top of it to call back to assign blame and lie about acclimating. People often wonder why LFS's do not offer a guarantee......

[smatter]

We had all of our books displayed near the front counter, one of which was a large book titled "Cichlids" with a picture of a large Oscar on the cover. I was ringing up a guy and I could see him looking over my shoulder at the book. As he handed me a $20 he pointed to the book and said, "Them are chinchillas?"

[littlefish72]

^^ it is amazing how quickly people can kill fish.

Here's a story relating to that. My old fish store used to get on thursdays. well one monday while i was doing a dead fish run i looked at one of the bottom tanks and there was a bag floating at the back of the tank. It was a coral beauty still bagged from thursday still alive (there is no telling how long he had been prior to shipping). I told the owner what i had found and the only thing he said was "Now isn't it amazing people can kill them in less than 24 hours?" Ever since that day I think about this story when ever some one comes in and tells me they killed their fish they bought yesterday.

[Sarcophyton874]

Originally posted by smatter
We had all of our books displayed near the front counter, one of which was a large book titled "Cichlids" with a picture of a large Oscar on the cover. I was ringing up a guy and I could see him looking over my shoulder at the book. As he handed me a $20 he pointed to the book and said, "Them are chinchillas?"

[Musho3210]

not exactly at the petstore but at shedd aquarium

5 year old girl or something;

Look mommy, its nemo, and bubbles, hey look its a black nemo

Mom:
Yeah its nemo but hes black

An african american:
She called that fish a black nemo.....

I caught the thing on tape so you can hear her voice but i didnt get there faces and stuff, but you can see "black nemo" in the video



Another shedd story

Wow look at that stingray, is that the same stingray that killed steve urwin? (freshwater ray)


And i was sick of the word nemo after that day.....

Funny how people want to know if nemo is fresh or salt, did they even watch the movie, did they notice that the movie took place in the OCEAN???

[littlefish72]

BTTT

[kimm]

Too flippin funny....I am not a LFS employee but I did overhear this lady come into a store I go to a lot and say that she set up her tank and now wants to buy some "fish and stuff" for it. The employee ask's how long since it cycled? She replies "what's that?" Almost dropped my bagged fish!

[MarineGirl411]

LOL! WOW! Are there really this many people in the world that are....well not too smart? I do not understand people. Esp the lady that asked if she had to feed the fish. LOL! These are just classic. Snaps, I agree with you though.....you probably know what I mean.

[Labman48076]

why does every parent every kid have to point at every fish that is blue or orange and say look there is nemo and dori! I heard Flame Angels,every variety of clowns and a White Barred Boxfish. and blue devil damsels called dori.. try hearing it 10-20 times a day and then at least once or twice they want to buy a fish bowl to get a nemo and a dori.. and then trying to enplane saltwater tanks to them. other lfs people know what I am talking about Grrrrrrrrrr

[JJ21]

PLEASE!!!! keep these stories coming!