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What's with the price crashing?

I agree with much of what was being said. However my good people.
THIS IS A BUSINESS FIRST! Hobby second. This is the pet TRADE folks.
Once you put a tag on it, it no longer becomes just a hobby. The two may coincide, but everytime you price it, it becomes a business first. And everyone becomes a potential customer.

Our economy is not something to ignore, people are not 100% recovered, natural disasters, oil spill f*** ups, unstable markets, throw things up and down.

So the ball python market being the example used, has to stablize itself somehow as it grows to the masses.

One who loves the hobby,culture,etc. Consider it a good thing. You bring new breeders, forcing old over pricers out, you bring new technology, new information, new eras of breeding, more knowledge, higher demands for better and greater morphs. If the market stayed the same how would morphs advance, how would punnet squares look like a simple game of tic tac toe? Before you shoot me down thinkof this. If the great PKs, Sharps, Wilbanks, NERDs,Grazianis,Bells,Russos,Stone,Ronne,etc... had to fund ALL of their projects without a growing market. Where would the hobby be?

**push the negative aside and look for the bright, if you are a passionate hobbyist who just so happens to breed.**

Now breeders and those passionate enough to take their time have to reinvent themselves must adapt as all things. And if you can't do it now, you never will. Not in this lifetime at least.

A growing unstable market = a stable market in a capitialist world.
 
Also about the whole quality issue people talk about. I've noticed a lot of the big well-known breeders have a "brand name" of sorts on their snakes and are able to sell it for a higher price than a smaller breeder who purchased snakes from the same big breeder and is selling the same snakes.
Quality in both snakes should be the same, provided the smaller breeder known a thing or two about proper husbandry which is we're talking about costly morphs should be a given.
I think the only way to make good money consistently is to:
a: Have a large operation with lots of breeders
b: Attempt to create new crosses of morphs (lots of snakes required)
c: Be on the lookout for new morphs (big breeders having an eye on africa all the time)

Eventually all the morph crossing will make ball pythons more like cornsnakes, they'll always be a bit more valuable because they're a more desirable snakes in general, but mostly morphs except for a few newer ones will be relatively cheap, much like corns today.
 
Speak for yourself Ramiro.... Balls will never attain the colorations that you can find in corns... and that alone makes them more desirable to me. Show me a fire engine red BP... and you'll have something. :thumbsup:

The rest of what you posted I do agree with. As to the brand name... chances are those breeders either got very lucky and stumbled on something new..... or they spent years improving on existing morphs. Take Alby... he turned a $75 tangerine leo into a $800 leo... and he sells out! That is what sets breeders appart.
 
I think most would be surprised at what animals actually sell for by these big name breeders and whether or not they were actually produced by them. Just because something is listed for a certain price doesn't mean it sells for that price.
 
Well Steph, at PrehistoricPets, what's listed is what you pay. I've heard stories of Jay rather not making a sale then pay shipping on their medlow-med end animals. Now this is just an example, and some* personal expierence from being around him etc. He told me one of his employees would give give me a better deal the he would.
 
I consider Jay & Tim big names, at least in the retic world.

But they both are breeders, and both rather large names. Just because one isn't as big in one area (BPs) that makes the other one a simple "pet store"?
 
I'm really not following what you're attempting to argue with me about?

Bob Clark and NERD are also known for Retics in addition to what they have done with Ball Pythons, so I'm afraid I don't understand what you're getting at or what that has to do with anything I said.
 
Utta said:
I'm just saying that sometimes you pay the price listed.
Click to expand...

Yes, that's obviously very true for a lot of people. But that doesn't negate that behind the scenes wheeling and dealing goes on that most aren't aware of how low some of these animals are actually going for. Some of the pricing I'm aware of gives me a stomach ache.
 
Prehistoric Pets does breed and produce a large number of retic morphs. I've never bought from them myself, but they're most certainly a big name for the retic market.
As far as wheeling and dealing...*shrug* hey, if you can why not? I don't mind saving some money on an animal if I can. Negotiations over a 50 dollar BP are kinda chintzy, but asking about discounts on pairs or groups of higher end animals can save non trivial amounts of money, particularly if you've bought from someone before.
 
RidgeTop Reptiles said:
Speak for yourself Ramiro.... Balls will never attain the colorations that you can find in corns... and that alone makes them more desirable to me. Show me a fire engine red BP... and you'll have something. :thumbsup:

The rest of what you posted I do agree with. As to the brand name... chances are those breeders either got very lucky and stumbled on something new..... or they spent years improving on existing morphs. Take Alby... he turned a $75 tangerine leo into a $800 leo... and he sells out! That is what sets breeders appart.
Click to expand...

I don't think it's out of the realm of possibility that balls eventually have just as many color variations, it would just take longer than corns seeing how balls aren't as variable as corns are in their native ranges, takes longer for them to mature, and have smaller clutches. Eventually the morphs we see today will sell for the price of a pastel.
 
Well it may increase or decrease depending upon the availability and needs in certain geographical area.
 
I find this thread, or rather the fact that this thread was started by Donna, complaining 6 months ago that Lessers were down to $400 each rather ironic, in light of the fact that I was so shocked at the time, when she placed this ad last month.

When I first saw the ad posted I was shaking my head at the price for a PAIR of lessers, and then today I happened upon this thread here in the General Business Discussions and actually chuckled.

http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showthread.php?131706-Halloween-Special!-Lesser-Platinum-Pair!
 
It seems like today the only balls that are still worth some money are morphs crosses seeing how there haven't been many new morphs recently. I suspect someday if we have very pretty line-bred morphs of ball pythons they'll be worth quite a bit.
 
There are 99 low ballers out there trying to rake breeders over the coals on a daily basis for every one buyer who wants to buy a quality animal and is willing to pay what the animal is worth.

I just saw someone offer $175 for a 16' albino green burm. Its insulting offers like that, that are ruining the hobby.

People are forced to sell animals for way less than they are worth because the economy has been hard on most of us. In fact, I have gotten out of selling reptiles altogether and have focused exclusively on producing rodents. I produce a few clutches of animals every year as a hobby, but in no way am I trying to run it as a business anymore. The market is a tricky hooker and I just can't keep up with it. I still laugh when people try to lowball me on a $2 rat. "Will you take $0.75 for it mister?"

There are a few people that will make money in the current state of the reptile trade. The guy who makes the first morph will make money because he can name his price and people will pay it. On the other end of the spectrum the intensive farming breeder will make his money too. He will produce hundreds and hundreds or maybe thousands of something counting on only getting paid the bare minimum, and he will survive on that slim margin by operating on such a large scale.

Other than that, the guys like most of us, who produce between 20 and 200 snakes a year are pretty much just in this to watch our wallets get thinner.

My advice is to look at this as a hobby. Don't mind losing money and have fun with it. If you make a dollar every once in a while be happy about it LOL.
 
price hip and drop is related with demand and supply, more demand less supply raise in prices, more supply less demand decrease in price, simple.................
 
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