Scott J. Michaels of SerpentCity poor business ethics and just plain rude ~ AVOID

[MGReptiles]

Well I got this lovely email out of the blue from this person. Just wanted to give everyone a heads up on this super nice person.. He had emailed me about 9 months ago asking me to raise my prices on flexwatt and I POLITELY told him that my prices were fair to the customer and I would not be raising them. I know he sells on Kingsnake but haven't seen him here. He is supposed to be a Vet but the Vets I have spoken with and delt with don't talk and act that unprofessionally. Again just a heads up on how you may be treated if you deal with this person.. All this rudeness and unprofessionalism over a heating element.. Imagine if you had a snake die or an order lost.. Would you get the same reply from him..

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Date: Thu, 17 Nov 2005 23:44:41 -0600 (CST)
To: [email protected]
Subject: Message about: 3" FLEXWATT ON SALE
From: [email protected] Add to Address Book Add Mobile Alert


Hey GO **** YOURSELF you little worm
Scott J. Michaels DVM RPh the "supposed" doctor
God Bless my ass
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Isint that nice..lol

 

[TomO]

Matt,
Did you inform him of this thread?

 

[gmherps]

Scott did this?
My dealings and or conversations with him have been nothing but professional. He does come off as a very durect guy, but this is out of character for him to do this.

Did he ever respond to you about your response in regards to your flexwatt prices?

 

[Reptile Basics]

Got the same

I no longer have the email but got a similar one while I was at the Tampa show a month or two back. He was pretty sarcastic but not quite as bad as above. He didnt seem to like the fact I dont charge for making connections on heat tape. I guess his sole source of income is heat tape connections or something. I expect he will get over it, or maybe not. Could care less and dont have time for him and such B.S. anyhow.

 

[Jim O]

He had emailed me about 9 months ago asking me to raise my prices on flexwatt and I POLITELY told him that my prices were fair to the customer and I would not be raising them.

Do you still have the original e-mail Matt? It sounds illegal to me, to ask one's competitor to raise his price.

 

[Karen Hulvey]

He had emailed me about 9 months ago asking me to raise my prices on flexwatt

What balls he has to tell someone they have to raise their prices on something. It's really none of his business. If Matt wants to give his flexwatt away, it's still Matt's business and no one else's.

 

[Bill & Amy]

Fair Market Value

fair market value
Definition

The price that an interested but not desperate buyer would be willing to pay and an interested but not desperate seller would be willing to accept on the open market assuming a reasonable period of time for an agreement to arise.



Matt you sell your items at a price that you feel you can make an adequate number of sales and make an adequate profit. That is what FMV is all about!

 

[Junkyard]

Well, that was not very nice.

 

[Cat_72]

Well, that was not very nice.

LOL, that's putting it mildly.

Personally, I don't think a person that is capable of sending a message like that, especially for no apparant reason, doesn't belong in business in the first place.

 

[Clay Davenport]

I find this humorous for a couple of reasons.
It's not funny at all that he treated Matt or Richard that way. There is absolutely no excuse for that sort of unwarranted behavior.

It's humorous though that he apparently takes the selling of flexwatt so seriously. He is a DVM. Now I don't know about in Chicago, but I live in a small town in the mountains of NC and the vets here live pretty well. If he has a working practice I would think that whether he makes a few bucks off flexwatt on the side or not would be irrelevant. In fact in the past I have wondered why he bothered to sell stuff like that at all. After all he does breed higher end pythons and is a DVM, just always looked to me like selling dry goods would be a waste of time financially. This is why I don't sell a bunch of supplies myself, it's not an economically productive use of my time. Why spend time with the emails then time to package and ship the order to make $20 or so profit when I could spend that same time in the snake room taking care of animals that will generate far more income than any dry goods business I could gain ever would.

I also find it funny that he would even ask a competitor to raise his prices. You can only assume that he actually thought they would do it, although I can think of no viable reason why they would. It just amazes me that rather than attempting to be competetive or giving it up that this would even be considered.
As an aside I would think that would be considered price fixing and to my knowledge is illegal.
You see it in the high end morph business too. One breeder drops his prices and some of the other breeders get mad and talk trash about him. I can at least see their point if one person drops the price 5 grand, but the reaction still isn't justified. In this case though such a big to do over what, a nickel a foot on heat tape, that's just sad really.

 

[Clay Davenport]

One other thing I forgot to cover. In reading his ad I saw this comment:

1) I do NOT carry the 3"/10 watt material because it's too
dangerous in the vast majority of reptile applications.
If you have a dimmer/thermostat failure with 10 watt
material, plastic tub meltdowns/fires and toxic fume
production is a distinct reality. This is quite rare with
6 watt material as it doesn't get nearly as hot (6w: 100-
120 F; 10w: 140-160 F).

Now I've been using the regular 10 watt per foot 3" flexwatt for years and years with absolutely no problem with it at all. In fact until I read his entire ad today I didn't actually realize that a 6 watt version even existed.
His wording stating "this is quite rare with the 6 watt" seems to suggest that it is somewhat common with the 10 watt. I can see where it would be possible, but the wording borders on being scare tactics in my opinion.
I wouldn't mind trying the 6 watt just for the power savings, but there' sno reason to fear the 10 watt.
For that matter, he also sells the 20 watt per foot 11" width and I have personally seen a piece of that reach a surface temp in excess of 190 degrees. In this instance it charred the melamine floor of the cage.
It just seems odd to me that he would use this as a reason to buy one of his products and not a competitors, while another he carries has the same danger, however remote.

 

[MGReptiles]

Do you still have the original e-mail Matt? It sounds illegal to me, to ask one's competitor to raise his price.

Why yes, yes I do.. I save everything

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Date: Sat, 15 Jan 2005 19:56:40 -0600 (CST)
To: [email protected]
Subject: Message about: THE BIGGEST SALE IN HISTORY ~ Ends @ MIDNIGHT ~
From: [email protected] Add to Address Book Add Mobile Alert


Greetings Matt:
Just a bit curious, do you like working for free? Do you not value
your time? Seriously. I sell plenty of flex-watt at my listed prices,
although a bit less lately since you started working for free. But knock
yourself out if you wish. Flexwatt sales are a fun side business for me
but I do it to MAKE $$, not waste my time.
Scott J. Michaels DVM
Serpent City

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[MGReptiles]

Here are the newest love notes
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Date: Fri, 18 Nov 2005 09:26:31 -0600 (CST)
To: [email protected]
Subject: Message about: 3" FLEXWATT ON SALE
From: [email protected] Add to Address Book Add Mobile Alert


your Fauna Classifieds rag means nothing to me...people already know
what a God blessing crybaby you are...I'll be updating my FW ad
permanently when it expires tonite...watch for it...glad to see I've gotten
under your skin...I crush scum like you like bugs!!
Scott J. Michaels DVM RPh (the supposed doctor)

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Sent 09:26 AM, Nov 18th, 2005 from I.P. Address 24.15.215.180

And this one

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From: [email protected] Add to Address Book Add Mobile Alert
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Message about: 3" FLEXWATT ON SALE
Date: Fri, 18 Nov 2005 07:09:49 +0000


In fact, I'm going to add the "supposed doctor" to my ad when I update it just to show what a true jerk you are...watch for it, and...God Bless!

-------------- Original message --------------

Point proven
God Bless,
-Matt

[email protected] wrote:
Hey GO **** YOURSELF you little worm
Scott J. Michaels DVM RPh the "supposed" doctor
God Bless my ass

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Sent 11:44 PM, Nov 17th, 2005 from I.P. Address 24.15.215.180



Thank you for considering MG Reptiles for your reptile needs. Your
business is truly appricated! Please feel free to call Matt @
304-836-5147. Thank you and God Bless,
-MG

 

[Lucille]

I hope Matt is making something off all this especially since I peeked at his site and there is a flexwatt sale going on on the size I wanted, fortuitously at the time I decided I needed more than the one rack I have for the new geckos and wanted to try to make another myself. Matt, I like your prices and do not let other people tell you what to do.....

 

[MGReptiles]

I reckon I am a crybaby now because I am a Christian..lol.. Your right Clay is is amazing what a nickel will do in this hobby. Maybe Ill start selling it a nickel over cost and see if he tries to have me wacked..lol

 

[MGReptiles]

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From: [email protected] Add to Address Book Add Mobile Alert
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Message about: 3" FLEXWATT ON SALE
Date: Fri, 18 Nov 2005 07:07:47 +0000


Yeah, proven that you're a whore who needs to work for free to make sales and that you have no class!

 

[Jim O]

This guy is about as professional as a pile of horse manure.

 

[Cat_72]

Uh, not that I would have any experience with this.....but I've never known a wroking whore that doesn't get paid.

This guys seems obviously unbalanced.....the thought that he might actually be a vet scares the heck outta me.

 

[Cat_72]

*working.........not wroking........hehe.

 

[Jim O]

Well, well, well. I found out some interesting information about Scott J. Michaels, DVM, RPh:

He was licensed as a veterinarian in Illinois from 6/7/1988-1/31/1991. It's not clear why he no longer has a license. There is no Scott Michaels licensed as a veterinarian in either Indiana or Wisconsin either (nearby states).

More interesting still is that he his pharmacy license has been twice suspended, and remains so now for having "VIOLATED THE TERMS OF A PREVIOUS PROBATION BY TESTING POSITIVE FOR VICODIN, A SCHEDULE III CONTROLLED SUBSTANCE." Seems he may have a more problems than simply being obnoxious.