I was just PMing with another member here about the desirability of establishing a cooperative to sell our fish. We would need someone with connections and marketing skills to promote the idea, and another person who could coordinate who has which fish and how much of each kind, and who would keep track of what was sold by whom to whom, prices, compensation for the breeders, etc., a bookkeeper of sorts.  And we would need your fish, preferably something in addition to ocellaris. Shipping could be coordinated by geographic area, and overnight shipping would be desirable. Recently I've learned of a very reasonably priced shipping company in the midwest, that could handle a restricted midwest area, but I'll bet there are other ways to ship as well for the areas outside the midwest. We will have to restrict it to USA only, I am afraid.  What do you all think? Would you be interested in joining such a co-op, if it could be put together?

check out Kathy's Clowns, llc website:
http://kathysclowns.com
Captive bred clownfish and more
(Wholesale to the trade.)

While I think this is a great idea overall, I answered "not sure" from a personal perspective. 
 
Personally, I produce enough fish to distribute locally and I enjoy being able to deliver them to local stores that I am confident selling to. If I was producing a lot more I would definitely need another outlet.
 
The Co-Op idea has been tossed around for a while and it would take a lot of logistical work to make it efficient. If someone could do that it would be great.  

http://www.fishtalpropagations.com/#!home/mainPage
"Making captive breeding easier."

same here, I am only at a local level, and would need a lot more space to work with before I could manage something on a shipment based level. But love the idea! 

You know my feelings on this issue.  I think it's a great idea.  But logistics are going to be hard, especially because of distances between breeders.

I wonder if we could arrange a website that would accept orders and contact the breeders needed to fill the orders.  Seems like something that technology should be able to do.  
 

check out Kathy's Clowns, llc website:
http://kathysclowns.com
Captive bred clownfish and more
(Wholesale to the trade.)

This is a great idea!  Obviously I would not be able to participate though.

Don't let fear and common sense stop you! =]

Ooh, I always wanted to be part of a Guild (probably cause of all the video games I've played
 
Anything that works with other people that have the same interests as me always interests me, but I don't know if I understand what this would do or how it would work.
 
Can you describe more the process as you see it?  Is it just a way to get breeders' fish out to more distant markets or is there something more?
 
From the idea I got from reading the description, I think the easiest way to do it would be to do a website/database that is constantly updated and used to direct shipments/purchases, etc.  Or am I thinking of a different idea?

I think you have the gist of it.
 
I am wondering if we can develop software that inputs from the breeders the kind and numbers of fish they have for sale, and their location, email, preferred shipping company, etc. It would post information of what is available from which the buyers may select according to their needs. 
Then it would match up the nearest breeder or breeders to the buyer in question, and send information to each, including the shipping cost.  Buyers can decide if they like the deal, and if so, the fish are shipped, and the breeders paid.
 
Advantages for the buyer are that he can select from a larger more diverse pool of captive bred fish. A potential disadvantage to the buyer is that he might have to pay multiple shipping costs, which can nix the deal.  However, if, as an organization, we bargain with FEDEX, and other shippers, we can negotiate better rates, if the co-op has  one account from each vendor for shipping rather than each breeder having a different shipping account. Advantages for the breeder is that he sells more fish than he could without the co-op.

check out Kathy's Clowns, llc website:
http://kathysclowns.com
Captive bred clownfish and more
(Wholesale to the trade.)

Another advantage for the breeders is that everyone doesn't have to grow ocellaris.  We might be able to make money specializing in something else, rather than having to raise ocellaris to get ones foot in the door, and then something else in addition.  It would also allow some of us to try something new and different, and increase the number of marine species in captive production.
 

check out Kathy's Clowns, llc website:
http://kathysclowns.com
Captive bred clownfish and more
(Wholesale to the trade.)

It would require something of a sea change in how buyers get their fish, though.  Most store owners/buyers call or fax orders, they don't shop online.  We would need someone who knows how to market stuff online.

check out Kathy's Clowns, llc website:
http://kathysclowns.com
Captive bred clownfish and more
(Wholesale to the trade.)

I see the multiple shipping costs are going to being a big stopping point for many buyers. 

I like the idea, as do several others, but I feel something like this would have to be better organized. LiveAquaria and Diver's Den come to mind, their products are under one company name but when you look at it different items ship from different areas (Marine fish from LA are shipped from CA, Diver's Den items shipped from WI, etc.). I have a feeling it could be easier to work out if there were a centralized shipping point for each region, or if it was really big enough one large point. I feel like there could be something there if we could truly organize it, maybe something should be set up for a specific area and see how it works out? I'm just thinking aloud right now...
 
If something like this did start I'd be more than happy to do bookkeeping if I have time between work, school, and fish. 

I'm just thinking (bouncing off of what kt said)... what if there was a couple different regional warehouses that had a 'fleet of breeders' as their suppliers who were simply compensated per fish and housed at one of the central warehouses once they reach resale size. Then major corporations could simply order from one of those warehouses. 
 
problems:
-breeders fish would have to bought at a low enough cost that the actual warehouse could be not only operational but profitable. this may not actually be enough in the long run to support both breeder and business when you start adding up costs like shipping, feed, housing and QT systems. 
 
-Are breeders being compensated for their shipping to one of these facilities? Minimum quantity the warehouse needs to received? 
 
-QT systems... with so many different systems these fish are coming from, you would have to have extensive QT systems. Although most of us breeders tend to have pretty nice water quality your bound to run into trouble without. 
 
A lot of logistics either way you do this... just bouncing ideas out there too..... 
 
 

I was contacted by a local wholesale company and they only wanted to pay a fraction of what I sell fish for at my LFS's and they wanted them larger and delivered to them at my expense.
 
I've also talked with Kevin at DD and there is quite an extensive process to go through to sell fish through them.

http://www.fishtalpropagations.com/#!home/mainPage
"Making captive breeding easier."

I like where this is heading, logistics could still be an issue...
 
Problems (addressed, at least in my head lol):
1. My thinking is that the fish not be purchased from the warehouse, that would put the breeders as more of a "fish farm" type of thing. Something that I don't see being extremely beneficial unless the fish are sold in high numbers and breeders can keep up. I was thinking more of it being that each breeder that provides fish is paying a "fair" share of the expenses... Or that a certain percentage made off of each sale would be taken and used to pay expenses. Either way that would add to some already serious bookkeeping I think, and something that would have to be thought about more thoroughly with real-life numbers.
 
2. Something I will have to sit down and think about while everyone is partying at MACNA.
 
3. The easiest way, from the POV of the warehouse, would be that each breeder meet and follow through with certain QT procedures/standards. Otherwise it wouldn't be "extensive" per say, but a normal hobbyist QT with many more fish, tanks, and much more water and meds (if needed) involved. 
 
I do see some problems from where I sit outside of what has been mentioned. Whether we do it in a way as I brought up, or had a catalog of fish for sale through various parties, there would have to be a way to ensure the highest possible quality fish make it to the buyers. I haven't seen what every hobbyist level breeder has, but I've seen some scary things as far as quality goes coming from ORA. I feel that making sure the quality is high would be extremely difficult to do with a group of breeders (would all depend on how many breeders are involved, as well as how many fish are being moved). This aspect, IMO, is extremely vital, even more so in the beginning. Another problem I see is production. You don't make money when you over produce because you have to keep the excess fish in the tanks and keep them fed. Money isn't made when the demand isn't met either (again, I've heard ORA has "batches" of species outside of their clowns). Don't produce enough and if the demand isn't met soon enough people are likely to move to another source of captive bred specimens or just go with wild caught. Thought I might have had another issue or two, but they wondered off for right now.

There are 2 types of agricultural co-0ps, or in this case aquacultural co-ops:
 
1) Purchasing co-op: this is where we/they band together to increase their purchase power.  This type of co-op is much easier to accomplish, but would really help the individual members to reduced costs and become more competitive based upon cutting costs of producing fish.
 
2) Marketing co-op: with this type of co-op we/they have an opportunity to offer more consistent supply and greater variety to the market.  The marketing part is not difficult, so long as you (the members) produce a superior product that sells itself.   The difficult part is having a regional collection facility that is owned by the members that would send out availability sheets, and fill orders, and ship.  It would be like a member owned and operated wholesale facility.  Because it is owned by the members and operated by them, we would essentially become our own wholesalers, thereby increasing profit for the member producers.

 
Exactly what I would fear.... 

Don't get me wrong. I think the concept is great for CB fish but the logistics involved are beyond my scope at this time.

http://www.fishtalpropagations.com/#!home/mainPage
"Making captive breeding easier."

What if you didn't do warehouses but did a standard ship rate and made like a "shipping pool" resource? Charge a flat rate that covers the median but sometimes is more than what it actuall cost to ship, and sometimes less.  The idea would be that only the exact ammount is used for shipping and any extra would be added to the pool while if a package cost more than the flat rate, it could be taken from the pool?

Most retail shops prefer to have fish shipped to the nearest airport for pick up.  For this you need to be a known shipper.  I already have known shipper status with the airlines, and that's something that only works easily with a central facility.  The cost to ship 1 box is the same as it is to ship 4 boxes.  That's why you need a central shipping facility.

If you ship FEDEX, and when I shipped out of town, that is the way we did it, and your organization ships a lot, you can get a rate that is 1/3 of or even less than the normal shipping cost. There is a volume that must be charged to your account to get that rate. It doesn't matter whether you are shipping from home or half way across the country.  An MBI Co-op could generate enough shipping to have such an account.  
 
I don't think a warehouse is a good idea, because of the expense, the need to staff it, and the risks of caring for someone else's fish.  People are the most expensive thing.  Plus, you would not save any money on shipping since the fish have to get to the warehouse somehow. 
 
My thought was that the website would catalog the fish that are for sale from a variety of breeders, the buyer would select fish and numbers desired, and either a human  or the software itself would contact the breeders to ship the fish, generate the shipping label(s) to send to the breeders, collect the money, pay the shipping company and pay the breeder.  The breeder ships the fish to the buyer, and gets paid.  There would be intermediate steps in there to confirm that the buyer accepts the charges, the breeder still has the fish to sell and can ship on a specified date, etc.
 
Each breeder can name his price, which will be posted on the website, but he is in competition with the other breeders also posting their prices. Each breeder has to pay a little into the fund, perhaps as a yearly admission fee to cover the website and server charges, and the website developer for his or her time. But they should more than make up for that charge with increased sales.

check out Kathy's Clowns, llc website:
http://kathysclowns.com
Captive bred clownfish and more
(Wholesale to the trade.)

I like most of your idea Kathy....all with the exception of individual breeders setting the price.  I don't want to start an internal bidding war within the co-op.  I really like the idea of attaching it to the MBI, that would give us immediate credibility.  I think prices should be set by the co-op and if there are excesses of some species on hand, we could ask those breeders about the possibility of running a weekly special on that species.  We should probably have MBI boxes made so that everyone uses the same boxes for shipping.  I would really make it look uniform.  We would have to alternate orders between breeders with the same species or if different sizes, break them down by size/price.  This could work nicely.

I'm only glancing at this but "price fixing" stands out to me. It's highly illegal to even discuss that. I understand the idea but... 

http://www.fishtalpropagations.com/#!home/mainPage
"Making captive breeding easier."

yeah, I don't think price fixings the answer here at all. Plus, a little healthy competition never hurt anyone!  

How do we pay for matching boxes?  Ordering boxes, having them distributed, is remarkably expensive. Particularly, when we all live near LFS, that will give perfectly good boxes to us for free.   Perhaps we could afford to have an MBI sticker to put on the free boxes….

check out Kathy's Clowns, llc website:
http://kathysclowns.com
Captive bred clownfish and more
(Wholesale to the trade.)

One thing that has become clear to me in the years that I have bred fish, is that different parts of the country will accept different prices for the same fish.  What the software can do, is limit the choices of the buyer to those breeders who are near enough to him or her to allow shipping to make sense.  A buyer can ask to see a broader selection of breeders' fish if the first selection is not enough, but first choice would be those breeders nearest to him.  This would allow for diverse pricing, depending on the market, rather than competing against each other on price.  As an example, for years I've gotten a dollar or more per fish more than anyone I've heard of, because no one else was breeding in my area.  Now there are more fish breeders locally, and my price has to come way down.  I would not like to lower the prices for those who can command higher ones because of a geographical advantage. I believe in keeping prices as high as possible because what we do as breeders is skillful, special, and uncommon.  We should be compensated for that. But we live in a market economy, and that is a fact that I've had to grapple with.
 
I would not want the coop to make the prices drop for anyone. But the reality is that one way to sell more fish is to drop the price.  There comes a point,however, where it is not worth it to produce fish, if the price is too low.  The right price is the price that the seller and the buyer agree on, and that can vary.
 
One thing that the software can be made to do as we go along, is keep track of how many fish are sold and at what price for various regions in the US.  That can give a breeder guidance as to how to price his or her fish.  Information is powerful.

 

check out Kathy's Clowns, llc website:
http://kathysclowns.com
Captive bred clownfish and more
(Wholesale to the trade.)

I see our competitors as being the BIG fish breeders that we all know of.  Those are the wholesale prices we need to beat (along with quality), not each other's.  They do not adjust there price by region.  And we all know that captive bred fish are much better than wild caught for various reasons, so you can't compare these to wild caught on price.  But here again, variety is going to be the key.  This isn't going to work any better for any of us in our local markets if everyone is just producing designer clowns.

I do think the prices of the fish will be one of the hardest things to work with.  Some breeders probably rely more on their fish sales than others so they need to charge more to make it work, etc.  Is it price setting when its a single organization that sets the policies for its products?

Just to chime in, I've always loved the idea and see a huge need for it. It hardly even makes sense here to breed any Os any more, as there are just too many breeders, but there's not enough demand to keep you going for exotic fish. There is really a need to find a way to get buyers together with breeders from all over.
 
Good luck!

--Andy, the bucket man.
"Not to know the mandolin is to argue oneself unknown...." --Clara Lanza, 1886

I have a better time writing my ideas down and then re-reading them or as people talk about them make corrections/changes to make them more clear.  So sorry if this doesn't make much sense or just seems like fragmented thoughts lol.
 
It could be one website where the LFS doesn't have to know anything about the specific breeder (unless they wanted the information of course).  All the processing/notifications could be done behind the scenes and then the LFS would be notified that their order has been verified and that they should pay now.  The payment would include shipping calculations already.  Once payment is recieved, the person(s) filling the order would be notified to ship the fish.
 
While thinking about that, the first problem I think of is what if they are cherry picking fish, WYSIWYG style, or if they order such a large quantity that multiple breeders have to fill.  The problem with that would be they would be increase the shipping more for each separate breeder that their order comes from.
 
 

 
But then how does each breeder fulfill the order?  Do the fish get sent twice; first to an aggregator and then out to the customer; or are there multiple independent shipments from breeders to final buyer?

Coop sets the price because you're buying through the coop, not directly with the breeder.  Basically, as I'm skimming this, it's really just a bunch of breeders drop shipping on behalf of the coop.  Shipping kills this, even with the inexpensive option Kathy talked about.  Too many individual shipments..

Sorry for the triple posts...just multiple things going on tonight.  Everytime I see this idea come up, I keep finding myself insisting that a "coop" while a noble concept, is simply not the right model.  Coops work where everyone is raising the same commodity to the same level of quality all within a local market.  

I'll simply interject this again - the way this really works is for someone to simply decide they are going to be a wholesaler and for breeders to be willing to service that wholesaler with farm prices.  You take the hit on price because you're moving a large volume of fish in one shot, and you're not the one doing the marketing and breaking up of those lots to the retailers.  ORA, SA sell directly to retailers because they've built up enough offerings to be standalone...hobby breeders don't generally have that to offer.

I'll add this - I recently talked with a fellow LOCAL breeder about placing his fish on my list and taking maybe only 20-25%, rather than what I usually do with fellow breeders (which is look at what the fish has to sell for, and then offer 50% landed at my door). Because he is local, I don't have to hold the fish or touch the fish, he just needs to bring them so I can bag them and ship them out.  He probably will have to stand behind the DOAs.  He's not providing bags, boxes, oxygent, or clients....that's where my cut comes in.  THIS is how a coop really works in my opinion.

I have to agree. The Co-op idea has been suggested before, and while it's a great idea to pool efforts and production, with the logistics of shipping live fish, I don't see how it could provide an attractive offering to the retailer unless a larger entity becomes involved to handle the animals themselves as a consolidator as well as marketing, sales, shipping, etc. There are businesses willing to do this already (quite a few wholesalers are willing to purchase tank-bred animals and market them as such).
 
Having said that, Sustainable Aquatics is happy to purchase tank-bred fish/inverts and market them alongside our own offerings. We do this already with fish and corals (we have even traded animals with other commercial hatcheries), as there's no way we can breed/propagate everything   These could be unusual or extra animals that a local market where the breeder is located can't absorb. Two keys for SA is that we can hold the animals safely long-term (we dedicate systems in our Sustainable Islands facility for incoming cultured animals), and we are willing to market them as what they are -- "Kathy's Krazy Kaudern's Kardinal," or "Welsh's Wild Blue Pipes," or "Fishtal's Festive Flavivertex" -- or whatever. Both of these preserve and build the breeder's/producer's "brand." Of course as Matt points-out, there has to be a price-point that can accommodate the breeder and the "consolidator" for what they jointly contribute to making an attractive offering to the retailer that will in-turn sell the fish to the hobbyist--and this is where the problem sometimes comes-in, as there has to be enough margin to ship the fish to the consolidator and again to the retailer and still keep the price competitive, but it can be done!
 
Anyway, just my $.02
 
Matt C.

I'll get to work on those Festive Flavivertex right away.

http://www.fishtalpropagations.com/#!home/mainPage
"Making captive breeding easier."

Always a pleasure to hear from you, Matt. In your example, there is a cost to ship to you, a cost to ship to the retailer, and both the breeder and you want to make some money, but the price per fish must stay competitive. Four entities must be paid, and Matt, one of them is you.  This is reasonable because you are doing all the marketing, holding, heating and cooling, packaging, etc. But with two shipments, and a consolidator that must be paid, it leaves the breeder, the one who did all the magic, with very little of the money that was paid for the fish.
 
With the coop, the website doesn't need to make money, it just has to cover costs, which is really going to be less than you would make as a consolidator.  The fish would only have to be shipped once from the breeder to the retailer.  If there were two breeders involved, it would be two shipping costs, but it wouldn't be consolidator costs. So the cost of each fish would be spread out over only 2  entities: the breeder, and the shipper.  Guaranteed, the breeders would make out better with a coop than a consolidator. No offense, Matt, my friend.  It's a nice offer, I just don't see how, if I were to take you up on it, I would get paid for the work of breeding and raising the fish.

check out Kathy's Clowns, llc website:
http://kathysclowns.com
Captive bred clownfish and more
(Wholesale to the trade.)

Wholesale or co-op, it really doesn't matter.  With a co-op the co-op effectively becomes the wholesaler.  The difference is that the co-op members would have to buy in to the co-op so as to build the wholesale facility, and then be expected to put in some time to work at the co-op, so that is why they would get more per fish than with a wholesaler.  I have thought about what you have said Kathy with using Fed-Ex and that is just not going to work.  When a LFS orders fish, they want more that just 2 kinds of clowns.  They are going to want a few of everything that you have to order.  The more expensive the fish the fewer they will want of that type.  That is just going to require airport to airport shipping and a central collection location.  As in the example that Matt P. gave, that one person lives close to him, so he can bring over fish as needed to Matt's house and that will work.  Now if Matt wanted to expand his draw area, then he could also draw from breeders from the twin cities.  Someone could collect the fish from the Twin Cities and bring them up to Matt's, but then Matt would need to build a holding facility for them, in which case he would become a wholesaler.  But if some of the breeders in the Twin Cities "bought in" for the build out and maintainence and put in time at Matt's facility doing work (cleaning tanks, boxing fish for shipping, transporting fish, etc) then you have a co-op.  I don't see how setting up a website to take orders is going to work.  I don't know what you have for sale right now Kathy, but what if 10 other breeders also have that  variety for sale.  If an order comes in for 10 of those, who gets that order?  How do we decide who gets the order (rotation, ability to fill other species on the order, other?).

How do we pay for the lease, the equipment, utilities, the staff, insurance in order to have a warehouse?  Where does that money come from?  How can we "put in some time" if we live distant to the warehouse?  Who is organizing that schedule? A seperate facility justs sounds very expensive and risky to me.
 
If you have a warehouse, you still have the issue of whose fish to sell first.  If the coop is to buy all the fish from the breeders, what happens to fish that don't sell? Where does the coop get the money to purchase the fish in the first place?

check out Kathy's Clowns, llc website:
http://kathysclowns.com
Captive bred clownfish and more
(Wholesale to the trade.)

Simple answer is, the capital comes from the member buying shares in the co-op, and then the coop running it profitably like any other wholesaler.  Like SA, the co-op can elect to purchase additional fish from non-member breeders on an as needed basis, but those non-member don't share in the profits of the co-op.  As you note, some of the problem is because of the distances between us, so that some co-op members may not be able to put in equal time at working within the co-op, but there are ways to account for that as well.  Ideally we would need someone experienced at marine fish wholesaling to help or be part of the co-op.  I have some experience with this with koi and goldfish, but not marine fish.  Essentially what we would be doing with the co-op is to create and buy into our own wholesale facility, so that part of the profits would also belong to the members.  It doesn't have to be an expensive build, as a pole barn might even do.  It just has to be close to a good water supply and near a major metro airport.  Fish could be shipped to the facility by a converted truck with tanks for the purpose and have a route to pick of from various parts of the country at local collection points (if this turns out to be more cost effective than air shipment).   Based on sales through the co-op, we would be able to fine tune production to demand.  I never said it would be easy, but if it was say an MBI member co-op, I think that would carry a lot of weight.  Still we would have to have the right people in place for the directors to ensure success and a profitable operation.  I thinking with all the talent and connections among members of MBI, I would think we could make this happen if we really wanted it to work.

I don't think that a co-op with a "warehouse" or physical entity will work because of all the overhead.  I think the better idea is just a website with the programming to spread the shipping prices and stuff.   Unless everyone participating is already breeding fish as their main source of income, and then if so I'm in the wrong place lol.
 
Why not think of the website as a non physical "wholesaler" entity? I don't think I'm catching why it wouldn't work for breeders to hold and ship their own fish based of sales the website makes.