I've purchased 2 female anerys from them, 1 baby and 1 adult. The baby did take a little while to get eating on a regular schedule but being that she was handled a bit at a show, that didn't surprise me. And Mark was more than helpful trying to offer suggestions to get her to eat and eventually she did and has been doing great ever since. The adult was given to SBM on a trade so he couldn't speak to its lineage other than to say he highly doubted she was het for anything.
I've personnaly watched Mark go above and beyond to help customers out at shows.
One customer had two normal babies that they had gotten from somewhere else but were looking for help. The babies looked like they were super dehydrated, the customer said they hadn't eaten in over a month, they were in very dry sand and both had shed still stuck on them. Mark told them if they were kept in there current conditions they probably wouldn't last much longer. But what really blew me away was that he offered to trade them for one of his Anerys that probably weighed more than both of the babies combined.
Another customer came by and was asking about the KSBs overbite. Mark picks up one of his snakes and shows her what it looks like and explains how its normal and such. And then she tells a story about how she got one at the last show and she had a problem getting it to eat so she took it to a Vet. The Vet told her the snake wouldnt eat because it had a really bad overbite and would have to force feed it. The Vet had the snake for over a month and after a while of force feeding it, it eventually died. Or rather, in my opinion, the Vet had no idea about KSBs and was too arrogant to do any kind of research and eventually killed it...very sad. And then Mark turns around and says here have one of these...and gives her a new KSB at no charge and tells her if she has any problems to call him first.
From a show/business perspective, they might not have 20 or 30 years experience but they are full-time breeders. Yes, they are sponsors of Repticon and I think they have certain stipulations in place with Repticon but I dont know specifically what they are. Personnaly I don't see anything wrong with any of that. Everyone has to start somewhere, remember at one point even the Bells and the Barkers had less than 10 years experience. And we do live in a capitalist society, so if they can get a cometitive advantage over the competition, although it might seem unfair, thats business. And if they have an agreement in place with Repticon to restrict other vendors from selling KSBs or how other vendors sell KSBs, I wouldn't fault SBM for this, I'd fault Repticon for agreeing to it. And also keep in mind they are not the only vendor that has certain stipulations in place, FeederSource is another sponsor and they have exclusive rights for selling frozen feeders at Repticon.
I can also say, that I've never gotten information from them that wasn't consistent with what any of the other experts have said. When I bought my first one from him, I asked about buying a second one and he talked me out of doing it. I've also been to their house and I've seen their setup and I can say 100% from what I've seen first-hand that they are commited to breeding quality animals.
And of course, when buying anything that is "het", there is the risk of the unknown, whether the breeder is well known or not. It just comes down to if you're willing to trust them and what you're basing that trust on. Is it on the word of others that have dealt with them personnaly? If they produced them, can they show you the parents of the animals that produced the hets? If they're selling something they got from another breeder, will that other breeder confirm it? Or...are you hearing he said she said second and third hand stories of how they did someone wrong.
All in all, I have had no problems with SBM, I will buy from them again and I have no problem trusting them.
