Pets@home- you'll never guess!

[pugsandseals]

Bored in my lunchbreak today so walked into Pets@home to see what fish they had. Overheard lady telling the sales assistant that she had 2 dead fish which she wanted to replace. Shop assistant asked many questions about the dead fish to find out what was wrong with them. Ok so I'm now impressed, but that's not the best bit. Shop assistant goes on to ask about the size of tank, what kind of filter, what other fish are in the tank. Ok, I'm now more impressed. She then refuses to sell them more than 2 new fish. And lastly asks them to sign a form with all of the above information to prove what the lady had told her !!!

I may be getting ahead of myself but [whispers] have Pets@Home finally learnt their lesson and are now only selling appropriate fish and tanks?????

They have always done that with us since we have been keeping fish, which is quite a while. Except the signing to say we were told bit.

I think they are definitely trying to improve things, although because they are not a specialist retailer they tend to attract fewer geeks to work there. I know when they were called 'Petsmart' they were referred to as 'Pet Semetary' on a lot of fish forums so the fact that they are asking questions and refusing to sell fish is a vast improvement. I think if they stick to the basic 'bread and butter' type fish (neons, guppies etc) then they could do well.

The problem is that a lot of manufacturers make silly little tanks that look very pretty but are crap for keeping fish in, but they sell really well so every shop stocks them. As long as they are selling well then the manufacturers will keep making them. Also there is a lot of disagreement about what is a suitable tank, the RSPCA have recommended a minimum tank size (45 litres) but not much has been publicised about it because compared to some of the titchy tanks on sale, 45 litres is massive and I think shops are worried about putting people off altogether.

Add to that the attitude of the general public- "it's just a fish" and therefore not worth bothering if they die because you can just replace it- and things are pretty tough for the poor old fish. It's something I've been mulling over for years and I still can't think of a solution!

And that is my cheerful post for today

The lady in the shop did actually mention the 45 litres rule too! I am just in shock

Sadly - this might only be your local P@H.. the one here has just sold two baby fancy goldfish to a colleague of mine.. destination a 15l tank