- Joined
- Jan 5, 2005
- Messages
- 8,325
another huge difference between non-biological products versus living animals: your entire stock of hairbrushes won't get tweaked from a power outage killing your heating in the middle of a bad winter storm... not to mention motor oil can't get sick and die =PIf all you're doing is quoting the markup, you are being incredibly mislead, Fran. 4 x markup is pretty high, but unlike most consumer goods (where the markup at the store is between 40-200%) the overhead (import permits, shipping, care) are vastly higher. If I had to hazard a guess, bigger importers are spending a very significant percentage, if not the majority, on overhead rather than the actual price of the animals. The markup is that high because that is what is required to stay in business. That is why everyone else sells them for the same price. It's standard market equilibrium.
Nobody is in this hobby because they are greedy. Your statement is probably the most ridiculous accusation yet.
also, all the $$'s-in-their-eyes hobbyists just don't seem to last long. check out how many ppl start "what is the most valuable spider to breed and sell" threads and how many of those ppl either A) are not still in the hobby or B) realized, surprisingly enough, bugs really aren't that great of a get rich quick scheme... but are pretty cool in their own right and became a "normal" hobbyist. this is a great hobby that i love a lot, but for 95% of the ppl it is just a money hole (maybe not just in dollars, but in dollars + time it almost certainly will be)
my local group has looked into importing... we think we maybe can do it for just north of $1000, but it looks like it will be closer to $2000. in order to reduce that overhead to a small % of your shipment you are forced to bring in $10,000 or $20,000 of bugs at a time, AT LEAST! that would be just to keep basic shipping costs down to ~10% of total dollar costs. not to mention you have to get your shipment inspected at one of only three entry ports in the USA... and other hoops that you have to jump through. it is utterly non-trivial to legally import!