Will someone please explain?

[FishLipz]

It's no different than expensive, flashy cars, big jewelry, expensive art, etc. The true "collectors" do it for the personal satisfaction of having and enjoying a piece. Then there are the people who derive their self worth from the admiration of others. Kinda sad.

As far as vendors charging what they can get. I really don't hate on them at all. Today's $1k frag buys a bunch of common stuff I find much more interesting and satisfying to have. Besides, if I wanted a bowl full of colorful dots, I'll pour myself some fruity pebbles cereal for $3.00.

 

[Reef Pets]

...And your points are completely correct. I've been a round a long time, too- and I've seen the evolution of this whole thing. You're right that the "LE" stuff started some time ago, first with Chalices and then Acans, etc. We've seen crazy pricing and such before. I do feel it is a definite trend, now, however that we are seeing more and more of this stuff happening on Facebook and elsewhere, and look- I'm not against free commerce. I wonder when FB will try to get in on the action, however. There is a lot of money changing hands right under their noses...I am mainly concerned that we've created a level of expectation (high or low) among many newer hobbyists or coral enthusiasts who just assume that this is "the way" corals are sold. Now, most aren't this naive, but it's entirely possible that someone who has been "indoctrinated" into this game and will simply think that this is "they way" we do things..And maybe it is nowadays ..As you point out, things have evolved. We can't hold on to our pagers, typewriters, etc...It's just when it is such a strong change in a small market sector, it becomes, well- noticeable. Anyhow, it's fun to postulate...

I agree completely! LE, I completely forgot about that. I could not image the amount of money changing hands on facebook and I'm sure this hobby is a very small portion of it. When will facebook come up with their own check out system and take their portion in the same way Paypal has very many years.
But, I must say that I feel I have been cutting myself short by not getting in on the facebook action. More coral gets exchanged on Facebook each day than probably all forums combined. Should we as vendors embrace the change or get left in the dust? I hate the facebook process but I also like staying up with the selling trends. Rock and a hard spot!

 

[jedimaster1138]

This is why I shop at Unique Corals.

The practice of slapping a silly name on a coral and charging 500$ per 1/8" square is not likely to stop as long as people continue to patronize those vendors. Capitalism at work.

One of the things that bugs me though is not only are you spending a paycheck on a tiny hunk of coral because it has a silly name, but you are gambling with that paycheck. Mortality rates in corals that small must be dramatically higher than others. Like you said Scott, 1 polyp and maybe a little flesh? It's hard enough keeping acropora and SPS in general...starting with that small a "colony"... yeah no thanks. Then there's the fresh cuts. Ugh. Fresh cuts. I was a a local club meet up this past weekend, and I was on the prowl for a couple acropora. There were lots for sale, but most, if not all were fresh cuts. No encrustation, obviously fresh glue and a clean plug. I just won't risk it, especially those ultra-sensitive smooth skin acropora that dump their color if dKH moves 0.05 points.

And don't even get me started on shipping fresh cuts....

This is why I shop at Unique Corals.

 

[tripdad]

One other thought on your question as to "why is this happening". I think as markets mature that the average joe see's what others have and want a piece of it also. In my industry it is now cyclical in nature. Every few years we get a rash of shops opening up in shoddy buildings and doing work at low prices and causing market price problems. You know that a good brick and mortar store cost money, employees need some benefits, and customer service cost money and time. They can't get in the game doing it by those rules and survive so they invent new one's, no building, no employee's or very few, no taxes and perhaps bad or poor service. It seems they last a while then disappear. In the long run those that do business with them lose. People seem to accept poor survival rates and coral death as part of the hobby so don't go after bad vendors often enough. E-commerce is still evolving as evidenced daily, who knows where it will all shake out.

 

[uniquecorals]

One other thought on your question as to "why is this happening". I think as markets mature that the average joe see's what others have and want a piece of it also. In my industry it is now cyclical in nature. Every few years we get a rash of shops opening up in shoddy buildings and doing work at low prices and causing market price problems. You know that a good brick and mortar store cost money, employees need some benefits, and customer service cost money and time. They can't get in the game doing it by those rules and survive so they invent new one's, no building, no employee's or very few, no taxes and perhaps bad or poor service. It seems they last a while then disappear. In the long run those that do business with them lose. People seem to accept poor survival rates and coral death as part of the hobby so don't go after bad vendors often enough. E-commerce is still evolving as evidenced daily, who knows where it will all shake out.

Very interesting thoughts...I agree that change is constant, and perhaps this is "progress..?" I think that novel means of selling are great...Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, etc....It's interesting to see if these will "evolve" back to where we've been, or what kind of twists and turns the new models of coral distribution will take!

 

[TomatoSauceTy]

One other thought on your question as to "why is this happening". I think as markets mature that the average joe see's what others have and want a piece of it also. In my industry it is now cyclical in nature. Every few years we get a rash of shops opening up in shoddy buildings and doing work at low prices and causing market price problems. You know that a good brick and mortar store cost money, employees need some benefits, and customer service cost money and time. They can't get in the game doing it by those rules and survive so they invent new one's, no building, no employee's or very few, no taxes and perhaps bad or poor service. It seems they last a while then disappear. In the long run those that do business with them lose. People seem to accept poor survival rates and coral death as part of the hobby so don't go after bad vendors often enough. E-commerce is still evolving as evidenced daily, who knows where it will all shake out.

Maybe I'm reading this wrong, but do you mean "doing work at low prices" meaning they cut corners etc, or they are selling corals under their "normal" price? A guy selling out of his mothers basement is no different than a brick and mortar store; you can justify it all you want, but they are the same. Retail shops can't survive properly without a maintenance service which is why everyone tries to squeeze every penny out of the corals they buy.

You think that collectors even getting a 1/10th of what you are for selling that "rare" coral???

Come on, doesn't anyone find it hilarious that every other post in the for sale section is a jawbreaker priced at $200+?

does anyone find it more funny that people selling corals that cost 200+ can't afford a digital camera?

 

[swk]

Nice to see a vendor banging this drum. Thank you Scott! I recently ventured into a transaction on fb land as I found a piece that I wanted for a long time and couldn't resist. I added another piece so I wasn't paying to ship ONE frag...needless to say I should've kept my money..

All it did was reinforce the reasons why I will only buy coral online from Unique and one other r2r vendor that I won't mention just cause this is Scott's thread in the unique forum section....

 

[uniquecorals]

Nice to see a vendor banging this drum. Thank you Scott! I recently ventured into a transaction on fb land as I found a piece that I wanted for a long time and couldn't resist. I added another piece so I wasn't paying to ship ONE frag...needless to say I should've kept my money..

All it did was reinforce the reasons why I will only buy coral online from Unique and one other r2r vendor that I won't mention just cause this is Scott's thread in the unique forum section....

Please feel free mention any R2R vendor here. An honest, approachable vendor always deserves praise- it helps us all.The ones I know well are simply great people and do amazing work- a credit to our industry. Scumbags are generally not working on these forums...lol. As for the "Microfrag Culture Shift" thing, well- it's an interesting topic to me. And although I have a pretty strong opinion about it, I can see multiple viewpoints...Yet, I am always fascinated by how some people are able to simply "do whatever" and it just kind of "works.." Call it envy, jealousy...fascination, whatever...but it definitely keeps me interested. This little subculture of absurdly high microfrags that seems to be gaining momentum at the present time fascinates me. I somehow feel that as consumers we need to ask more...Again, just my opinion, based on my values and positions, which may be equally as distasteful to other people. Guess that's what keeps the world going round- all of these different mindsets and such...

 

[swk]

Please feel free mention any R2R vendor here. An honest, approachable vendor always deserves praise- it helps us all.The ones I know well are simply great people and do amazing work- a credit to our industry. Scumbags are generally not working on these forums...lol. As for the "Microfrag Culture Shift" thing, well- it's an interesting topic to me. And although I have a pretty strong opinion about it, I can see multiple viewpoints...Yet, I am always fascinated by how some people are able to simply "do whatever" and it just kind of "works.." Call it envy, jealousy...fascination, whatever...but it definitely keeps me interested. This little subculture of absurdly high microfrags that seems to be gaining momentum at the present time fascinates me. I somehow feel that as consumers we need to ask more...Again, just my opinion, based on my values and positions, which may be equally as distasteful to other people. Guess that's what keeps the world going round- all of these different mindsets and such...

Something for everyone indeed Scott!

The vendor I was referring to was Adam @Battlecorals. I bought a higher end coral from him once and he sent me a pic showing what he had cut and expressing some concern that it was small. I said no worries. A fellow club member of mine that is more involved in the fb scene came by to see the coral and was surprised at how HUGE the frag was lol...

I'm personally glad I made the fb purchase. It reinforced my opinions that I deal with the right people and can justify being somewhat aloof and unenthusiastic about the FB coral scene, rather than silently judging from a distance lol!

 

[uniquecorals]

LOL, I love Adam and he knows how I feel about Battlecorals...He walk the walk and is a great example of the high caliber of people who practice great things that make this business what it is! He walks the walk... And I'm sure there are plenty of good folks on FB (Joe's experimented with it, too), so it's not so much the "vehicle as it is the "methods" that I am a bit skeptical of...I just personally can't handle over-hype...I guess everyone has their definition of what this is...and it's not limited to FB...It just seems to have found some fertile ground there...It's everywhere, and the hobbyist has to judge for his-herself what's acceptable and what's absurd...part of the fun of the hobby, I suppose!

 

[Pete polyp]

To some this hobby is just a ticking contest to see who can spend the most money. What is funny to me is that one vendor can have a coral, name it something, post a super saturated pic and get $500 for a booger frag. While another vendor has the exact same coral (species and coloration) and sell it for $50. Let's get real for a minute.... one vendor doesn't have the only specimen of that coral on the planet. Even with the great lengths you guys had to go through to get that purple monster there's still lots of them out there. (Not taking a shot at you guys, just making that point)

 

[Pete polyp]

Tyree started all this micro frag junk with the PPE. Before that there was no such thing as "per polyp". Ahhh the good Ole days.... when a zoa frag covered the plug and an acro frag was at least 2".

 

[cbrennan4]

I'm really enjoying this thread as it's something that is always brought up when I get together with my reefing friends. The Facebook groups are a mess with the over saturated pictures and the hype. Honestly, I love it too when people call out a seller for an all blue pic of a coral. Constantly you see people trying to rename a known coral as a new LE/rare coral and charge an arm and a leg for it. Just the other day I saw someone post a gold maul zoa with a crazy new name and was able to get around $200 in an auction for it. That's just nuts and sad!
I feel these crazy prices and smaller frags are a result of an influx of new people into the hobby that see it as a way to make money instead of enjoying it as a hobby. It's seems like everyone is setting up a frag tank now-a-days with the intention of selling frags. Let me say though, that I see no problem with selling. I do it every now and then to get cash for new coral and as a way to hide new purchases from my wife haha. But this trend of buying the new "it" coral to later chop it up and sometimes sell it for a higher price than what they paid is just so sad and frustrating to see.
Did you guys read the thread that WWC posted regarding a new polyp they wanted to release? Someone chimed in that the name they were trying to debut it with was already established in the hobby for another zoa. He didn't knock the zoa, price(way to high IMO), or the vendor and people were all over him. I'm a taxonomist(I identify aquatic inverts and fish) by trade and I agree with the person letting the vendor know the name has been established for another zoa. This is a big issue I see in the hobby recently as well. People try to rename something that is already been around as something exciting and new and charge and outlandish price for it. New people coming into the hobby don't know any better and end up getting burned by paying a lot for an essentially common coral.

 

[reefwiser]

I started with SPS back in the day when would get full colonies. Not the little scraps that we see so commonly today. I find cuttings more challenging to grow as they can die soooooo fast. Especially the ones that are not fully encrusted. I see pieces of cutting selling for 3 times what fully colonies use to sell for.

 

[Battlecorals]

Eloquent as ever! And perfectly stated! FB is the wild west man! crazy city over there !

 

[tautog83]

I'm really enjoying this thread as it's something that is always brought up when I get together with my reefing friends. The Facebook groups are a mess with the over saturated pictures and the hype. Honestly, I love it too when people call out a seller for an all blue pic of a coral. Constantly you see people trying to rename a known coral as a new LE/rare coral and charge an arm and a leg for it. Just the other day I saw someone post a gold maul zoa with a crazy new name and was able to get around $200 in an auction for it. That's just nuts and sad!
I feel these crazy prices and smaller frags are a result of an influx of new people into the hobby that see it as a way to make money instead of enjoying it as a hobby. It's seems like everyone is setting up a frag tank now-a-days with the intention of selling frags. Let me say though, that I see no problem with selling. I do it every now and then to get cash for new coral and as a way to hide new purchases from my wife haha. But this trend of buying the new "it" coral to later chop it up and sometimes sell it for a higher price than what they paid is just so sad and frustrating to see.
Did you guys read the thread that WWC posted regarding a new polyp they wanted to release? Someone chimed in that the name they were trying to debut it with was already established in the hobby for another zoa. He didn't knock the zoa, price(way to high IMO), or the vendor and people were all over him. I'm a taxonomist(I identify aquatic inverts and fish) by trade and I agree with the person letting the vendor know the name has been established for another zoa. This is a big issue I see in the hobby recently as well. People try to rename something that is already been around as something exciting and new and charge and outlandish price for it. New people coming into the hobby don't know any better and end up getting burned by paying a lot for an essentially common coral.

its the truth, its like the commercial everything on the internet is true !! if it comes from a vendor then it has to be 100% accurate , right?. people are out to make money and thats their business its our part to make the better decision and do our own research . we just have to come to terms that some people have more money then knowledge .

 

[Sangheili]

As usual I fully agree with Scott. I hate small frags. They have much higher mortality rate, lose color much easier, ship poorly, and honestly just make customers disappointed in the end. (Mostly talking about Acros here but it applies to other corals also).

I really feel one of the key problems is "Hey that $300 frag I got 3 months ago has a new branch! I can cut it as soon as I can fit the clippers around it!" I think those doing this as a "business plan" will be shocked when in the long run they end up losing both the "mother colony (ha!)" and frag more often then it pays them to cut 1/3" nubs. Fragging is hard on corals and if you have any issue with the tank that may not be apparent, it will quickly become apparent after cutting your corals and exposing them to disease/infection/stress.

I'm still sitting on frags I purchased a year ago, refusing to cut them until they really are "critical mass". The extra sale isn't worth the risk to me. I'm in this for the long haul, and to please my customers.

 

[Rob Top1]

My favorite thing to do is buy LE corals, grow it out and when it's big enough to actually frag sell twice the size at half the price. I know that by myself I won't change this part of the hobby, but really the price of some of this is ridiculous. If I can get some LE in my friends hands and at not so LE of a price, then I did well

 

[TomatoSauceTy]

I'm really enjoying this thread as it's something that is always brought up when I get together with my reefing friends. The Facebook groups are a mess with the over saturated pictures and the hype. Honestly, I love it too when people call out a seller for an all blue pic of a coral. Constantly you see people trying to rename a known coral as a new LE/rare coral and charge an arm and a leg for it. Just the other day I saw someone post a gold maul zoa with a crazy new name and was able to get around $200 in an auction for it. That's just nuts and sad!
I feel these crazy prices and smaller frags are a result of an influx of new people into the hobby that see it as a way to make money instead of enjoying it as a hobby. It's seems like everyone is setting up a frag tank now-a-days with the intention of selling frags. Let me say though, that I see no problem with selling. I do it every now and then to get cash for new coral and as a way to hide new purchases from my wife haha. But this trend of buying the new "it" coral to later chop it up and sometimes sell it for a higher price than what they paid is just so sad and frustrating to see.
Did you guys read the thread that WWC posted regarding a new polyp they wanted to release? Someone chimed in that the name they were trying to debut it with was already established in the hobby for another zoa. He didn't knock the zoa, price(way to high IMO), or the vendor and people were all over him. I'm a taxonomist(I identify aquatic inverts and fish) by trade and I agree with the person letting the vendor know the name has been established for another zoa. This is a big issue I see in the hobby recently as well. People try to rename something that is already been around as something exciting and new and charge and outlandish price for it. New people coming into the hobby don't know any better and end up getting burned by paying a lot for an essentially common coral.

It's funny you say that. I was selling roughly 8 corals I wanted to get rid of from my tank, I spent hundreds of dollars for them...no luck on craigslist, I even joined a local reef club! I posted them at a price where I was LOSING money, nobody even wanted them even though they looked nice...I had to bite the bullet and sell them dirt cheap just because I wanted to move some corals out! I paid $75 for a sweet single head blasto, it had 8 heads+ and green/orange lobo sold together for $100...

I love growing corals and I always think it would be nice to grow them out and sell them, but after a brief experience of trying to move out some corals, there isn't a chance in hell I'm going down that path.

After I saw that post by WWC I have lost all respect for them and learned how this business really is! I know my comment means very little since everyone is buddy buddy, oh well. I find it ironic they had a plate coral that was 100% identical at MACNA that I previously bought from FragJunkies*worst experience* which I obviously never received...

 

[TomatoSauceTy]

I'm really enjoying this thread as it's something that is always brought up when I get together with my reefing friends. The Facebook groups are a mess with the over saturated pictures and the hype. Honestly, I love it too when people call out a seller for an all blue pic of a coral. Constantly you see people trying to rename a known coral as a new LE/rare coral and charge an arm and a leg for it. Just the other day I saw someone post a gold maul zoa with a crazy new name and was able to get around $200 in an auction for it. That's just nuts and sad!
I feel these crazy prices and smaller frags are a result of an influx of new people into the hobby that see it as a way to make money instead of enjoying it as a hobby. It's seems like everyone is setting up a frag tank now-a-days with the intention of selling frags. Let me say though, that I see no problem with selling. I do it every now and then to get cash for new coral and as a way to hide new purchases from my wife haha. But this trend of buying the new "it" coral to later chop it up and sometimes sell it for a higher price than what they paid is just so sad and frustrating to see.
Did you guys read the thread that WWC posted regarding a new polyp they wanted to release? Someone chimed in that the name they were trying to debut it with was already established in the hobby for another zoa. He didn't knock the zoa, price(way to high IMO), or the vendor and people were all over him. I'm a taxonomist(I identify aquatic inverts and fish) by trade and I agree with the person letting the vendor know the name has been established for another zoa. This is a big issue I see in the hobby recently as well. People try to rename something that is already been around as something exciting and new and charge and outlandish price for it. New people coming into the hobby don't know any better and end up getting burned by paying a lot for an essentially common coral.

I tried moving some corals out and I couldn't even get 1/4 of the price I paid for them even AFTER them growing! *neon green ring blasto, rainbow lobo, button scoly, acans etc...*

I think people care more how their corals look in pictures rather than how they look in their tanks and it's sad! There is no way in hell people receive corals from several of these sellers on these sites and it looks exactly like that in their tanks. It's a butt kiss butt world.

After I saw that post by WWC I have lost all respect for them and learned how this business really is! [HASHTAG]#lineage[/HASHTAG] LOL!!! I find it ironic they had a plate coral that was 100% identical at MACNA that I previously bought from FragJunkies*worst experience* which I obviously never received...


On the plus side, I have bought a small rainbow meat coral from Unique Corals that has grown and I'm extremely pleased with. It was expensive, but it had amazing color and I guarantee if any other vendor had that coral it would have been at least $200 more.