Coral Naming, Street Value, LE, Threats and Profit Margin Part 1
( I know it's long, no need to shoot it down for that though.)
I wrote this commentary, if you want to call it that, last week but chose not to post it. Last night I read Vangogh's thread/poll on naming and decided now was the time to post this. Most of what I'm speaking of is relative to the Zoanthid and Palythoa forum.
http://www.michiganreefers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=49818
I didn't want to take his thread off topic since it basically deals with naming, therefore I chose to share what I and others see and feel as it relates to the title above. I'm very concerned about pricing, naming, giving back, the threats, LE, new morphs that aren't new, not contributing and more. Just a commentary of which I felt was long overdue in discussing it.
It seems this hobby changes in leaps and bounds every year, but what I heard and saw last month simply blew me away, and I knew I had to say something. It was several weeks ago, while visiting a LFS. I saw about 5 teenage boys who were checking out the fish and stunning corals in the store. The curly haired kids, maybe 17 or so, was talking about getting a summer job to make some summer cash. Another one agreed, but the 3rd guy said, "Not me, I'm setting up a prop tank to sell me some zoas and Palys. Now that's where the bank is" he said. I knew in an instant what he meant. He began to rattle off name after name after name. Here in lies the problem.
Just 4 or 5 years ago when I joined MR, also earlier on RC, when reefing was about helping, ( as is the case in this thread by Pazaaz) and I still owe this young man a frag or two myself.
http://www.michiganreefers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=45266&highlight=Mucho+reef
NAMING, back then it was all about sharing, listening, learning, giving back and buying entire colonies locally, on line and in the selling forum for $ 30 or $ 60. The same was true of most mushrooms. And that was for an entire colony of any color zoanthid, palythoas or shrooms colony, even the blues and multi colored zoas and palys with the exception of those orange ricordea, remember? Now look where we are. I have heard every argument there is on naming, and I mean no attack or disrespect to anyone, but there is proof, more than enough in my opinion of what naming has done to hurt this hobby. There's one argument that naming helps to identify what you are buying when you can't see it. Sounds like a good argument if all Zoanthids and Palythoas had a name. It seems only the very colorful ones have names. Why is this? Are those the only ones that reefers want to buy? Are they the ones that will fetch the highest prices? In my years of reefing, I have own, grown, seen or sold well over 400 different polyps. Even if you choose not to believe it, it's true. I have own and sold polyps that I have never seen on any site or for sale anywhere. There are literally thousands, new polyps are being brought up and found all the time at new collection sites, most notably and recently from Australia. I did some checking recently and found that only 275 polyps have been identified and named from one site. Hundreds if not thousands more have been giving their own names but never submitted. I have had alone over 100 different types in my tank at one time, but of all the polyps on the market, only 275 are named? No, only 275 are officially named. It has come down to just making up a name that sounds cool, quick, flashy, marketable, catchy and one that will make it stick in your head and say, "I have to have it". When I see someone who doesn't know bubble algae from bubble gum or a cinnamon roll from Cyano, yet they can name every polyp that has one, I say that reefing is truly suffering and something is wrong. If you can't figure out why your corals and fish won't live, or why you have persistent film on your water surface or how to maintain your PH, but you can tell a Freak-a-eak from a Sneak-a-Peek, again, something is wrong. I find it sad when I see one polyp with 4 or 5 different pictures and none of them look the same and often with different names. Often, lighting plays a vital roll in what it will look like and many times they don't look that way at all. And finally, I heard last week that names are what give our zoas and palys their value. This is simply not true at all. Value is subjective; we are the ones who are responsible for placing value, not the name.
PRICING, I was shocked and down right angry when someone here sold frags to two of my friends whom I talked into the hobby, yes, they were newbie's. The problem was the way they took advantage of these young and inexperienced young people and financially raped them. There's nothing wrong with making a little money to support your expenses, we all do it. Sure you can make the argument that they should have known the price and value of what they were buying, but the seller(s) also knew the value and jacked it up and made a killing. This is but one of the very reasons we have so many new reefers leaving the hobby, they can't afford it. Not because they don't have enough money, but because of the skyrocketing prices for a single polyp, get rich people who are in this purely for profit and the lack of ethical fair play. Little do any of these new reefers know, but just 15 months ago, you could buy an entire 40 or 50 polyp colony of anything for $30 to $60 depending on the size of the rock. Now, you will pay that for 3 or 4 of those same polyps. Some never contribute one thing to any of the threads, they never give back, and they're not even concerned with helping. I sold some frags at rock bottom prices once, only to have them show up right here on MR or other sites within a week with the price doubled and tripled what I sold them for. I even gave some frags away, at no charge, and they showed up right here in the SELLING FORUM. Recently I grew out 72 zoanthid, palythoa and mushroom frags from hitchhikers and cuttings of some great colors over the past 90 days. I have sold all but 20 of them to newbie's and those who have had major problems. I have spent 2 weeks researching their Street Value, that's right, that's how I refer to them now. I found out what the frags that I sold were being sold for. The Street Value of what I have sold thus far is $ 3,250. I intentionally cut the prices down to little or nothing to help out my fellow reefers. So how much did I get, ……. $ 550. So I guess I lost $ 2,700, and most of these frags had 10 to 30 polyps on them. I even gave them all freebies, nice freebies. No, I'm not blowing my own horn, but I helped someone, I gave back and they will be inspired and hopefully do the same for others. This is reefing.
I'm growing a lot of very colorful and hard to find pieces to hopefully share someday, but I seriously doubt if I will. Why? I'm not going to sell crazy blues, rainbows, yellows and never before seen patterns and colors at $ 2 per polyp, only to have them chopped up the same day, given a great name, and sold for $ 10, $ 15 and $ 25 per polyp. The sad thing is if I'm ever going to sell my frags on line, I will have to do the same thing. No, I don't want to, but I'm not going to do all the work and allow someone else to make all the profit. I will have to sell them a bit higher but I can't in good faith go as high as the street value is demanding. No, I'm not contradicting myself at all. The prices are simply too high simply because of a name and not rarity. This being a free enterprise, if someone wants to pay it, then I say be my guess. The problem is this; many new and inexperienced reefers don't know what they're worth.
RARITY AND LE, I'm amazed when I see someone with 15 minutes in the hobby telling everyone else what is and isn't rare. Last year the big reason to use the RARE word was because something grew very slow. So if it grows slow, it's rare, NOT TRUE at all. LE, which means Limited Edition, thus, you better hurry up and buy them before they stop growing. LE means, give me your money now, not later. In my opinion, there's no such thing as LE. LE is a marketing tool and nothing more. Again, if one wants to feel that they indeed have something that is a Limited Edition, well, I say go for it. LE doesn't mean it's going to stop growing, it simply means buy it now before the price drops, Marketing 101.
THREATS, I have heard of many reefers receiving threats because they lowered their prices on their frags. Are you kidding me? Is this what we have become? This is how competitive this thing has become. I say, shame on you.
NEW MORPHS, if you have a colony of 40 polyps and suddenly 5 of them in the very center of the colony, all touching each other, and all of them have the same characteristics as the others, but it has a lime eye and not a purple eye, it's not a new found, newly created morph. I have seen this for more years than I can count. I sold two frags last week that had the exact same traits. It will either conform later or not reproduce anymore than 5 or 6. I have never, in 13 of 15 years seen a single frag or colony to cover an entire rock with all of these supposedly new morphs. We have become so full of zeal that we want to be the first one to say, "Look what I have". If anyone has a colony which has done so, and you have pictured proof, I would love to see it and I will be the first to come back to this thread and eat crow and sincerely apologize. I just wish we could go back to just reefing, helping, listening, sharing, learning and showing some common courtesy and respect for one another.
If you post something like this, you know the heat will follow. Heat also cleans and purifies. I didn't mention a single name; it's a commentary that I think is long overdue. I hope this thread sparks a long term discussion and debate. You know the mods will be watching, so lets keep it civil so it won't be locked. We can all agree to disagree and still be friend, friendly and civil.
Mucho Reef
( I know it's long, no need to shoot it down for that though.)
I wrote this commentary, if you want to call it that, last week but chose not to post it. Last night I read Vangogh's thread/poll on naming and decided now was the time to post this. Most of what I'm speaking of is relative to the Zoanthid and Palythoa forum.
http://www.michiganreefers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=49818
I didn't want to take his thread off topic since it basically deals with naming, therefore I chose to share what I and others see and feel as it relates to the title above. I'm very concerned about pricing, naming, giving back, the threats, LE, new morphs that aren't new, not contributing and more. Just a commentary of which I felt was long overdue in discussing it.
It seems this hobby changes in leaps and bounds every year, but what I heard and saw last month simply blew me away, and I knew I had to say something. It was several weeks ago, while visiting a LFS. I saw about 5 teenage boys who were checking out the fish and stunning corals in the store. The curly haired kids, maybe 17 or so, was talking about getting a summer job to make some summer cash. Another one agreed, but the 3rd guy said, "Not me, I'm setting up a prop tank to sell me some zoas and Palys. Now that's where the bank is" he said. I knew in an instant what he meant. He began to rattle off name after name after name. Here in lies the problem.
Just 4 or 5 years ago when I joined MR, also earlier on RC, when reefing was about helping, ( as is the case in this thread by Pazaaz) and I still owe this young man a frag or two myself.
http://www.michiganreefers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=45266&highlight=Mucho+reef
NAMING, back then it was all about sharing, listening, learning, giving back and buying entire colonies locally, on line and in the selling forum for $ 30 or $ 60. The same was true of most mushrooms. And that was for an entire colony of any color zoanthid, palythoas or shrooms colony, even the blues and multi colored zoas and palys with the exception of those orange ricordea, remember? Now look where we are. I have heard every argument there is on naming, and I mean no attack or disrespect to anyone, but there is proof, more than enough in my opinion of what naming has done to hurt this hobby. There's one argument that naming helps to identify what you are buying when you can't see it. Sounds like a good argument if all Zoanthids and Palythoas had a name. It seems only the very colorful ones have names. Why is this? Are those the only ones that reefers want to buy? Are they the ones that will fetch the highest prices? In my years of reefing, I have own, grown, seen or sold well over 400 different polyps. Even if you choose not to believe it, it's true. I have own and sold polyps that I have never seen on any site or for sale anywhere. There are literally thousands, new polyps are being brought up and found all the time at new collection sites, most notably and recently from Australia. I did some checking recently and found that only 275 polyps have been identified and named from one site. Hundreds if not thousands more have been giving their own names but never submitted. I have had alone over 100 different types in my tank at one time, but of all the polyps on the market, only 275 are named? No, only 275 are officially named. It has come down to just making up a name that sounds cool, quick, flashy, marketable, catchy and one that will make it stick in your head and say, "I have to have it". When I see someone who doesn't know bubble algae from bubble gum or a cinnamon roll from Cyano, yet they can name every polyp that has one, I say that reefing is truly suffering and something is wrong. If you can't figure out why your corals and fish won't live, or why you have persistent film on your water surface or how to maintain your PH, but you can tell a Freak-a-eak from a Sneak-a-Peek, again, something is wrong. I find it sad when I see one polyp with 4 or 5 different pictures and none of them look the same and often with different names. Often, lighting plays a vital roll in what it will look like and many times they don't look that way at all. And finally, I heard last week that names are what give our zoas and palys their value. This is simply not true at all. Value is subjective; we are the ones who are responsible for placing value, not the name.
PRICING, I was shocked and down right angry when someone here sold frags to two of my friends whom I talked into the hobby, yes, they were newbie's. The problem was the way they took advantage of these young and inexperienced young people and financially raped them. There's nothing wrong with making a little money to support your expenses, we all do it. Sure you can make the argument that they should have known the price and value of what they were buying, but the seller(s) also knew the value and jacked it up and made a killing. This is but one of the very reasons we have so many new reefers leaving the hobby, they can't afford it. Not because they don't have enough money, but because of the skyrocketing prices for a single polyp, get rich people who are in this purely for profit and the lack of ethical fair play. Little do any of these new reefers know, but just 15 months ago, you could buy an entire 40 or 50 polyp colony of anything for $30 to $60 depending on the size of the rock. Now, you will pay that for 3 or 4 of those same polyps. Some never contribute one thing to any of the threads, they never give back, and they're not even concerned with helping. I sold some frags at rock bottom prices once, only to have them show up right here on MR or other sites within a week with the price doubled and tripled what I sold them for. I even gave some frags away, at no charge, and they showed up right here in the SELLING FORUM. Recently I grew out 72 zoanthid, palythoa and mushroom frags from hitchhikers and cuttings of some great colors over the past 90 days. I have sold all but 20 of them to newbie's and those who have had major problems. I have spent 2 weeks researching their Street Value, that's right, that's how I refer to them now. I found out what the frags that I sold were being sold for. The Street Value of what I have sold thus far is $ 3,250. I intentionally cut the prices down to little or nothing to help out my fellow reefers. So how much did I get, ……. $ 550. So I guess I lost $ 2,700, and most of these frags had 10 to 30 polyps on them. I even gave them all freebies, nice freebies. No, I'm not blowing my own horn, but I helped someone, I gave back and they will be inspired and hopefully do the same for others. This is reefing.
I'm growing a lot of very colorful and hard to find pieces to hopefully share someday, but I seriously doubt if I will. Why? I'm not going to sell crazy blues, rainbows, yellows and never before seen patterns and colors at $ 2 per polyp, only to have them chopped up the same day, given a great name, and sold for $ 10, $ 15 and $ 25 per polyp. The sad thing is if I'm ever going to sell my frags on line, I will have to do the same thing. No, I don't want to, but I'm not going to do all the work and allow someone else to make all the profit. I will have to sell them a bit higher but I can't in good faith go as high as the street value is demanding. No, I'm not contradicting myself at all. The prices are simply too high simply because of a name and not rarity. This being a free enterprise, if someone wants to pay it, then I say be my guess. The problem is this; many new and inexperienced reefers don't know what they're worth.
RARITY AND LE, I'm amazed when I see someone with 15 minutes in the hobby telling everyone else what is and isn't rare. Last year the big reason to use the RARE word was because something grew very slow. So if it grows slow, it's rare, NOT TRUE at all. LE, which means Limited Edition, thus, you better hurry up and buy them before they stop growing. LE means, give me your money now, not later. In my opinion, there's no such thing as LE. LE is a marketing tool and nothing more. Again, if one wants to feel that they indeed have something that is a Limited Edition, well, I say go for it. LE doesn't mean it's going to stop growing, it simply means buy it now before the price drops, Marketing 101.
THREATS, I have heard of many reefers receiving threats because they lowered their prices on their frags. Are you kidding me? Is this what we have become? This is how competitive this thing has become. I say, shame on you.
NEW MORPHS, if you have a colony of 40 polyps and suddenly 5 of them in the very center of the colony, all touching each other, and all of them have the same characteristics as the others, but it has a lime eye and not a purple eye, it's not a new found, newly created morph. I have seen this for more years than I can count. I sold two frags last week that had the exact same traits. It will either conform later or not reproduce anymore than 5 or 6. I have never, in 13 of 15 years seen a single frag or colony to cover an entire rock with all of these supposedly new morphs. We have become so full of zeal that we want to be the first one to say, "Look what I have". If anyone has a colony which has done so, and you have pictured proof, I would love to see it and I will be the first to come back to this thread and eat crow and sincerely apologize. I just wish we could go back to just reefing, helping, listening, sharing, learning and showing some common courtesy and respect for one another.
If you post something like this, you know the heat will follow. Heat also cleans and purifies. I didn't mention a single name; it's a commentary that I think is long overdue. I hope this thread sparks a long term discussion and debate. You know the mods will be watching, so lets keep it civil so it won't be locked. We can all agree to disagree and still be friend, friendly and civil.
Mucho Reef
