Re: NANFA-L-- OT: Sales of Males

Joshua L. Wiegert (JLW-in-dune.net)
Sun, 11 Dec 2005 17:04:09 -0500

While selling only males might be a strategy for high-end items like the
crawfish, or those funky zebra danios, it isn't the reason why many other
fish are sold as only males. Guppies, dwarf gouramies, Wonder Killies, etc
are often sold as males only for one simple reason: the females are ugly.
Customers don't gernerally want them. If you stock a 50% mix, you'll find
that all the males get sold, and the females left behind. No one buys them.
You can try selling them as pairs, but that has two big problems. One, the
price doubles on the fish. Customers don't care that they're getting TWO
fish for 9.99, you've made a fish twice as expensive as others in its range.
Secondly, you wind up with customers who want two males as a pair, or who
only want one fish, etc. etc. Logistically, its a pain.

JW.

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><,DARWIN,>
Joshua L. Wiegert
Native Fish Conservancy Lists Administrator                    JLW-in-dune.net
AIM UID: JoshuaWiegert                                                Yahoo: 
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Feel free to contact me by any of the above means for any reason.
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----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Hoover, Jan J ERDC-EL-MS" <Jan.J.Hoover-in-erdc.usace.army.mil>
To: <nanfa-l-in-nanfa.org>
Sent: Sunday, December 11, 2005 3:51 PM
Subject: NANFA-L-- OT: Sales of Males




>I am going to risk an off-topic post here because it concerns the aquarium
> hobby in general.
>
> Last night, while-in-one of the major pet retailers, I noticed that only
> males were available for most of the fancy guppy strains and for the dwarf
> gouramies.  When I asked an employee about females, I was shown a single 
> tank
> of cobra-like female guppies. If a customer wanted to breed guppies they
> would have to mix strains (and by the genes of their F1s).
>
> Why are only males being sold ?
> A.  Simple retailing strategy- most consumers only want a colorful fish 
> and
> have no interest in breeding
> B.  Advanced retailing strategy - unavailability of females means repeated
> sales of an "unbreedable" fish
> C.  Sense of property - breeders do not want hobbyists tampering with 
> their
> creations (and possibly underselling them)
>
> Try as I may - none of these seem to be realistic - but I have heard
> hobbyists say similar things about the unavailability of female cichlids 
> of
> some species.
>
> Does anyone know ?
> Do small independent fish stores offer females of the same 
> varieties/species
> not offered in the larger chain outlets?
> Don't most customers want to have male and female combinations when they 
> buy
> fish for their tanks ?
>
> - Jan Hoover
>  Vicksburg, MS
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