Hey Reefers, I’ve been bouncing reefing related business ideas around in my head lately and wanted to test the waters a little bit.
Maybe this is just St. Louis, but we don’t really have any major aquarium/reefing equipment stores in the area. There are 3-4 places to buy fish and coral, and some of those places sell a limited amount of accessory equipment, but most of them have picked a brand and are loyal. Ex. If you are in the market for an ATO system, you could probably only find one to choose from. There is really no place to go look at new aquariums other than the aqueons at PetCo. So I’m wondering if there is an opportunity to open up a brick and mortar aquarium store that would sell everything from dosing pumps, roller mats, and skimmers, to large aquariums and AIO systems. I would probably stick to the equipment and leave the livestock to the already established LFS’s and maybe could convince some of them to advertise for me since they don’t sell the products I would stock.
Do other cities have stores like this already and are they generally successful businesses? If you don’t have this kind of store, do you wish you did or would you still default to ordering online from BRS, saltwateraquaria.com, topshelfaquatics.com, etc.
If you aren’t from the Midwest you may be questioning the viability of the St. Louis market, but believe it or not the metropolitan area is home to almost 3 million people and we are not all farmers
Maybe this is just St. Louis, but we don’t really have any major aquarium/reefing equipment stores in the area. There are 3-4 places to buy fish and coral, and some of those places sell a limited amount of accessory equipment, but most of them have picked a brand and are loyal. Ex. If you are in the market for an ATO system, you could probably only find one to choose from. There is really no place to go look at new aquariums other than the aqueons at PetCo. So I’m wondering if there is an opportunity to open up a brick and mortar aquarium store that would sell everything from dosing pumps, roller mats, and skimmers, to large aquariums and AIO systems. I would probably stick to the equipment and leave the livestock to the already established LFS’s and maybe could convince some of them to advertise for me since they don’t sell the products I would stock.
Do other cities have stores like this already and are they generally successful businesses? If you don’t have this kind of store, do you wish you did or would you still default to ordering online from BRS, saltwateraquaria.com, topshelfaquatics.com, etc.
If you aren’t from the Midwest you may be questioning the viability of the St. Louis market, but believe it or not the metropolitan area is home to almost 3 million people and we are not all farmers