ReefEngineer
Active Member
- Joined
- Apr 23, 2020
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- 491
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Hey so sorry for the delayed reply - we hope you didn't feel we missed your comment. We see them all and look forward to responding to you all, in between getting new FishScooper orders out to many amazing Reef2Reef members who’ve already started supporting our small business.
So what's our story? Well...we're from sunny South Florida and really just started off as curious hobbyists. Whenever we had to move fish from our QT tank system to perform inspections, we would literally dread it, as the thought of spending hours chasing around a fish as soon as we put the net into the tank was not motivating to say the least. Then, when the fish is in our actual tank, if we ever had to catch a fish, the whole dreadful scenario plays out again, as they now would hide underneath the rocks and dart around the tank. It was frustrating and honestly disheartening. We then moved to specimen containers which was better, but then became to dread the fact that now our whole arm is in the tank, and the fish would still freak out. We wanted to come up with a way that not only caused less stress for the fish but was an all-around more convenient way to be able to carry out the hobby, and actually experience the hobby.
We’ve personally experienced the heartbreak of losing fish due to stress during transfers and acclimation. It’s not something that's talked about often, but it’s incredibly important. This is what ultimately sprung the idea of the FishScooper. While there’s widespread advocacy for animal welfare when it comes to cats and dogs, we didn't really see that same level of advocacy in the aquarium/fishkeeping hobby (excluding sea aquariums of course).The FishScooper is not the only way to catch fish, but we felt there had to be an alternate method.
You're absolutely correct, it's so difficult and costly to get a mold made, but even more challenging is getting a manufacturer to take you on because their one and only concern is how much volume they'll be producing. This is how they decide whether or not they will agree to produce your product. We had countless manufacturers laugh and reject the product. Not to mention the mass confusion as they couldn't understand why we cared about how we caught our fish - as they assumed, the fish we were catching were for consumption...smh. Of course it was a huge risk to invest this type of money into this product, but we truly believe through community and awareness that this will bring not only a more humane and innovative way to handle fish (catching, inspecting, feeding, observing, medically treating) but also will be a more enjoyable and convenient way moving forward as hobbyists.
Regarding the reviews, we just started officially selling a few weeks ago and are still optimizing our website and getting the word out as we are a VERY small team of just two hobbyists, wearing many, many, hats. So all who have purchased a FishScooper thus far, you have no idea how much we appreciate your reviews and feedback. They mean the world to us.
Thanks for your curiosity on our story and let us know if you have any other questions.
