Your LFS location

[Gtinnel]

There is a little mom and pop pet store about 30 minutes away that will sometimes have a few fish but no corals, inverts, or equipment. There are no other saltwater stores in my state that aren’t a PetCo (afaik).
My favorite lfs is about a 8 hour round trip. I go once every couple of months.
My wife and I like to travel so I will often plan trips around places that have stores I want to visit.

 

[Opus]

Which Fort Worth stores do you like? Fish paradise is my favorite.

I usually hit Coral-Vault and Robert's Reef. I like Fish Paradise but haven't been in a couple of years. That is another 30 minutes added to my drive to get there since I'm coming from the Frisco area. I also try and go to Texas Aquatics but that is a freshwater only store. I recently went to Absolute Salinity but wasn't really impressed. The lady said they were in the middle of moving a lot of stuff to the store so I may try and go back in a month or two. If I have time, I will take the long long way home and swing by Oceans Avenue.

 

[Sump Crab]

They SUUUUCKKK

But they are my team and I love them

What are you talking about lol? The suck is over! We are legit good now!

 

[C4ctus99]

What are you talking about lol? The suck is over! We are legit good now!

I’ll believe it when we go to the Super Bowl I guess

Lived all of my 24 years in Jax and the jags have had 1 good season to my memory and that got screwed up by bortles… so just assume they suck until they are harder to be disappointed that way

 

[Joe31415]

Best fish in Milwaukee .aquatics unlimited all 30 minutes or less from me

Those are my two main stores as well. From time to time I'll go to The Fish Factory, but out of the dozen or so times I've been in there, I've never bought anything. There's nothing wrong with the place, but for some reason it doesn't 'click' with me the way the others do.
Also, IME, Best Fish has much better corals, Aquatics Unlimited has better (healthier) fish.

Both of those stores are about a 10 minute drive from my house and a 10 minute drive from each other. I usually find myself hitting both of them at least once a week.

We also have, and I hate this name, Wet Dreams, but for a handful of reasons, I really only go there if there's something I can't find anywhere else.

Now, when I had freshwater fish, and before I knew of the existence of Best Fish and Aquatics Unlimited, THE place to go was Hoffers. Plus it was lot easier to drag a friend or child, uninterested in the hobby, to Hoffers than anywhere else.

And has anyone been in Pet World Warehouse in the last few years? Their fish rooms are absolutely disgusting. Tanks not running properly, dead fish, like 3 random corals under standard fluorescent lights (like you'd use for freshwater fish). I saw one tank that they were clearly just chucking all the dead snails in. The bottom 2 inches or so was just shells.

 

[doubleshot00]

I got one thats 15 minutes away but my favorite is an hour away. Always worth the trip.

But i order all of my fish online now per-QTed. Saves my time and money.

 

[Joe31415]

I never find what I'm looking for as far as livestock goes so it's usually a wasted trip. They all have the typical selection of fish.

One thing I really like about the 2 (or 3) stores in my area is that they put some effort into keeping their stock kinda updated on the internet.
One store has a Google Docs spreadsheet with a stock list, as well as the date any given stock arrived at the store. It's nice to be able to skim it every few days to see if they have anything new.
Another one does a 20-30 minute Facebook Live video every Saturday talking a walk around the store and talking about all the new stuff.
The third one puts an inventory list, with pictures, on facebook every Friday.

 

[Atherial]

Blue Line in Naperville. Great selection most of the time.

Thanks! I'll have to check it out.

 

[Atherial]

What kind of QT is it? Separate system all by itself, or just separate tank on store multi tank system?

Once the fish is reserved they put it in a smaller set of tanks in a back room. That also helps with them not accidentally selling the fish to someone else.

 

[Sump Crab]

I’ll believe it when we go to the Super Bowl I guess

Lived all of my 24 years in Jax and the jags have had 1 good season to my memory and that got screwed up by bortles… so just assume they suck until they are harder to be disappointed that way

Bortles didn’t screw us the refs did!

 

[C4ctus99]

Bortles didn’t screw us the refs did!

True that… he was crazy inconsistent through and I don’t think we would have won that Super Bowl, but at least we would’ve been their!

 

[albano]

Once the fish is reserved they put it in a smaller set of tanks in a back room. That also helps with them not accidentally selling the fish to someone else.

Well, if those tanks are connected, then that sounds like they are constantly adding new ‘reserved’ fish to the system, so it is useless as a QT…
Best to do your own QT

 

[Mschmidt]

petco is 15 minutes, or a left turn on my commute home.
regular lfs is 30ish minutes. That is part of the reason I have an RO system now. I used $6 in gas to get $5 in water.
When I'm out for blood I will drive an hour and a half for a great deal.

There's one 10 minutes away but the owner is an a so I don't go there.

 

[Sump Crab]

True that… he was crazy inconsistent through and I don’t think we would have won that Super Bowl, but at least we would’ve been their!

#mylesjackwasntdown

Bortles was playing his best ball in that run so you never know. I have a hard time believing that marrone could have beat pederson though.

anyways if you aren’t on the Jacksonville coral trading band app you are missing out.

 

[NkSde]

Maybe a hour to my preferred store for dry goods
Or a half hour to my livestock store if traffic isn’t bad

20 minutes to my emergency need store
And
10 from a petsmart if its the apocalypse.

 

[rhitee93]

They SUUUUCKKK

But they are my team and I love them

Could be worse, I'm a Colts fan

There is only one LFS near me, and it is struggling. My best option is about 75 miles away, but as I'm in the midwest, that is only a little over an hour one way.

 

[vetteguy53081]

One thing I really like about the 2 (or 3) stores in my area is that they put some effort into keeping their stock kinda updated on the internet.
One store has a Google Docs spreadsheet with a stock list, as well as the date any given stock arrived at the store. It's nice to be able to skim it every few days to see if they have anything new.
Another one does a 20-30 minute Facebook Live video every Saturday talking a walk around the store and talking about all the new stuff.
The third one puts an inventory list, with pictures, on facebook every Friday.

I know of best's google docs. Who are the other two?

 

[C4ctus99]

#mylesjackwasntdown

Bortles was playing his best ball in that run so you never know. I have a hard time believing that marrone could have beat pederson though.

anyways if you aren’t on the Jacksonville coral trading band app you are missing out.

I’m on
Jacksonville reef junkies
North fl reef lounge
N fl/Duval frag swap
Gainsville frag trade

don’t think Jax coral trading yet

 

[fodsod]

I'm fortunate enough to have Living Reef Orlando under 15 mins away, and Top Shelf Aquatics about 20 mins. I visit both of those often. Wide Wide Corals is more like an hour away so I've only made it out there twice in the past year.

If I lived an hour from WWC I'd be homeless due to my inability to not buy all the things.

 

[|Frank|]

One hour is the closest, not that good though. The ones I prefer are probably 1.5-2 hours.