Survey: What equipment brands do you look for in a store?

[Flame_Angel]

The title is pretty explanatory, but let me go a little more in-depth. I've been tasked with redoing the marine/reef equipment and dry goods in my store. The section is currently pretty sad; no powerheads or other important pieces of gear, the only protein skimmers are Lee airstone-powered units and Nautilus humongoginormous units, poor heater brands, etc. We sell quite a bit of salt fish and corals, but if someone comes in and needs, say...a protein skimmer, or a powerhead, or lights, I can't sell them anything. The problem is...there's a lot of gear out there, and it's hard to tell exactly what people want.

That's where you all come in! Who better to ask which brands to keep than the people who buy them? When you go into a store looking for something, which brand do you look for on the shelves, or which brands are you happy to see even when you're not looking for that particular item?

1) Protein skimmer, nano/HOB/in-sump ones, if you please
2) Heaters
3) Powerheads (wave controllers would be nice as well)
4) Lighting, both units and bulbs
5) Supplements and dosing chemicals
6) Salt
7) Medications
8) Test kits
9) Which brand of AIO tanks do you prefer? Currently we carry the Biocube in all three flavors, and we can order in the Red Sea aquariums for customers at their request.
10) Water conditioner
11) Refractometer/hydrometer
12) RO units
13) Any monitoring/control units you can think of

Feel free to answer as many or as few of those as you'd like; your answers will help to shape what our marine section looks like. Thank you greatly in advance for taking the time to read this and reply.

[James404]

My suggestions would be:

1. Protein skimmers - Reef Octopus by Coralvue - Great value for the money. Perhaps the Tunze 9002, that people love for the biocubes.
2. Heaters - Eheim Jager - Most of us use them.
3. Powerheads - Hydor Koralia - Affordable for most people, Tunze and/or vortech are nice but pricey for most people
4. Lighting - Some T5 fixtures perhaps? Tek,CurrentUSA. Maybe stock some MH bulbs?
5. Supplements and dosing chemicals - For stuff like cal,alk and mag, GFO etc. I would inquire with BulkReefSupply, I know a store in my area started carrying their stuff.
6. Salt - Instant Ocean/Reef Crystals - I personally use Oceanic but there are so many people that use IO/RC.
7. Medications - Cupramine, Prazipro, FormalinMS, Malachite Green
8. Test Kits - Salifert, API
9. Biocube or JBJ NanoCube
10. Water Conditioner - Seachem Prime or Amquel+
11. Any good refractometer that ATC
12. RO unit - BulkReefSupply carries a full line
13. Reefkeeper controllers

[Flame_Angel]

Thanks for the reply, James. Bumping this back to the top before I head off to work for the evening.

[phenom5]

Here's my thing, if you're just a local shop, there are plenty of items that probably just don't make sense to carry. Small B&M shops can't sit on a huge inventory. The key thing is to make sure your customers know that you can get those things, you just can't afford to keep them on the shelf. Assuming you can special order skimmers, lights, vortechs, etc, and do it for a fair price, you'll be good. Then focus on the useful smaller items.

Test Kits-API & Salifert or Elos
Heaters-Jager
Powerheads-Koralia, Maxi jets, Aqualifter, maybe some smaller Tunze
Food-A wide variety Coral & Invertebrate Foods, Fish Food, Vitamins & Supplements for Fish, Refridgerated Foods
Supplements-Ca, Alk, MG (although it's tough to beat BRS), AAs, MB7, K, etc
Salt-IO/ RC and another quality brand
Tools-Scrappers, frag cutters, tongs, quality refractometer
Medications - Cupramine, Prazipro, FormalinMS, Malachite Green
Bulbs-T5 & MH, good variety of quality brands & temps
RO/DI-Pre filters, membranes, resin, and parts
Plumbing-Specialty parts, bulkheads, gate valves, uniseals-stuff that you can't find @ Home Depot.

To me, that should be the bread & butter of a LFS's drygoods. Then make the big ticket items available through special order, at a good price.

Edit-Forgot...I guess it'd be considered medications...Reviv, Flatworm Exit, Joe's Juice/ Aiptasia X, Lugols

[Flame_Angel]

That's the plan. Stuff like expensive lights, skimmers, RO units, etc. we'll likely order for people, instead of keeping stock on the shelves.

[Maivortex]

dont carry any Coralife, its all garbage. Red sea salt, hagen powerheads, eheim pumps and filters, mag drive pumps are good and cheaper alternative. Current fixtures, cheap alternative for lights, JBJ stuff also affordable

[OregonReefer]

I think what you really need to do first is think about your clients and what kind of establishment you want to run. What are your clients going to buy?... and buy often

As you said, you sell quite a few fish and corals. People buying those are going to need food and supplements. So, a good selection of those products are something that's going to move and offer a decent margin. I would suggest a "good", "better", "best" for each product line.... you'll find the "better" moves faster than "good" and "best" so you'll want a deeper inventory of "better" stuff. To use salt as an example... IO, RC and ESV. The RC salt will probably be your best seller but there will be some people on a budget buying IO and others willing to spend more for top end... again you have to look at your client base

For equipment you'll want to look at it in a different way... And get your hands on inventory with as little investment as possible. Things like controllers and upper end skimmers are a one time purchase. You might get the same markup but this kind of stuff can sit on the shelf forever... Things moving off the shelf are where you make your money

Here's where you leverage your buying power (and hopefully good credit rating) You go to your distributors and say "hey, I'm moving all this stuff for you. We pay our bills on time. Maybe you could give me a few "for sale-display" T5 fixtures, skimmers, powerheads on the premise that if you sell them you pay the vendor. Follow the Good, better, best thing...

But, when someone grabs that RO skimmer you go into consult mode... Is that really the skimmer they need? If it is great, sell it... If not, steer them in the right direction and offer to order what they really need (with pre-payment, remember as little investment as possible). Become a trusted consultant and you'll build a solid client base.

Do NOT be the "you need this custom acrylic sump that doesn't really fit your needs but will work for $250.00" guy

Be the "This 40g breeder will be perfect for you... you'll need some baffels... Here's a drawing on how to put them in and here's the phone number to a glass shop that made mine"

Edit/side note: As a professional sales, image and advertising consultant the advise above would have been very expensive if not my love of the hobby and desire to see successful and profitable LFSs that weren't out to screw everyone for a buck

[InsaneClownFish]

If I could walk into a store and see Sfilgoli, Elos, Giesmann, and ATI fixtures I'd be happy as a clam. Yup doesn't happen.

[evsalty]

There are some solid suggestions above so I will just give a somewhat big ticket shopping expirience I had that relates perfectly to this subject.

When I set up my frag tank I wanted to use a single 250w halide pendant. I did my research online to come up with a few that fit the bill and then went to all my LFS's to see what they had. I already had my TOP prefered choice in mind and knew the price I could order it for but I was hoping that I could get it or something similar to it locally. Not one had any type of pendants at that time. They all said that they could order almost any one out there. So I asked each one what the price would be for the one I really liked and none could even get close and they all would have been ordering it from the same people I would be. i looked at it as if they were atleast close in price I would let them get it for me and keep my money local but since they would have to order it from the same place as me but wanted to charge a very big difference in price (33% more then the online price from the manufacturer was the lowest offer) I just ordered it myself.

My point to this is that if you atleast have something decent to offer that is comparable to what the customer wants, that customer may buy your item right then and there. This does not mean you have to stock one of everything but just have atleast an option as many people will favor the now factor vs waiting for something and will even be willing to pay more for said item again for that NOW factor. The other thing is that for the items that you will have to special order, keep the price comparable to online pricing. It's not like you will have the sitting on the shelf factor on these items.

[Flame_Angel]

Thanks for the input, guys. The plan is to have the more expensive, one-time purchase items available for order at competitive prices (we can't meet online prices exactly, because that'd kill our bottom line, but when you want something NOW you want it NOW and you're typically willing to pay a few extra bucks to get it), and to have the staples on hand at all times. I was just curious what brands people prefer; I don't want to get weird offbrands or crap brands if I can avoid it.

[Haplochromine]

I buy powerheads, heaters, cleaning supplies, bulbs, salt and livestock from my LFS.

Go with koralia, maxijet, tunze pumps
Heaters - go with marineland and eheim jager
Bulbs - MH ushio, phoenix, xm, reeflux, radium. T5 - ATI, UVL, Giessemann
Salt - Instant ocean, whatever else
Cleaning supplies - Syphons, mag floats, easy blade attachment/replacements
Get some frag plugs as well as coral putty and superglue.

[joe90usa]

If you have the room, have the livestock area set up a couple of show tanks featuring the equipment that you'll be selling. Set up a reef tank with MH lighting and another with T5. Use different skimmers on each and try to feature other equipment you have available as well. Make sure both ends of the store are working together so that customers can see and touch before buying. That will also help greatly with customers walking in to the store with nothing and looking to leave with an entire system. Having printed revues to back up the quality of the product you are offering is a good idea as well. Take away reasons why the client can leave the store without the product s/he is interested in.

Make sure that you post clearly and conspicuously in multiple places that you can order equipment and supplies that aren't on display. Many people will not ask and if they don't see it on your shelves, they don't know that you can get it in for them and will leave to look elsewhere.

I also agree that a knowledgeable staff is key in this hobby. If that means training time for the staff, then that investment of time makes sense.

[olemiss reb]

Seachem

[Flame_Angel]

Thanks for the input, guys. This is really helping.

[moondoggy4]

Nice pictures of skimmers and lights, and state that you can order them with a 50% deposit.