If you could ask a breeder anything.. what would it be?

[Paco]

No matt , I want one from someone else:main_laugh: Right back atcha my friend.

What are you looking for Paul??? I am allways open to discussion!!!:main_thumbsup:

 

[Paco]

Matt... Very cool of you to write such in detph stuff!!! Thanks for the little stories. It's very interesting to hear things like this!!!

 

[SaSobek]

thank you every one and i think this is a good idea though too. thats what this forum should be for people shareing info on the geckos that we love so much :main_thumbsup:

 

[gothra]

Matt, thanks for sharing the stories! Very interesting read for me!

 

[acpart]

I would want to know how you manage to sell all those geckos and to whom are you selling them?

Aliza

 

[cheeseball705]

matt thanks to pat, you, and alberto i have learned alot. sitting next to ryan and val at hamburg i often learn alot myself to. and occasionally even a tidbit from paul haha.

 

[kenske]

Great storytelling SaSobek. Very entertaining to read.

 

[Select Gex]

Feel free to carry on, I did not mean to stop it. I am sorry if I hurt any feelings.

 

[LZRDGRL]

Matt, you should become a writer

Those were the most interesting stories I've read on here so far :main_yes:

English professor

 

[snared99]

I would want to know how you manage to sell all those geckos and to whom are you selling them?

Aliza

There is a lot of work that goes into selling geckos, not as much as breeding/raising but alot. One must be able to do shows and also online sales help to supplement you sales. So not only must you prepare for shows which involoves:
-booking a table(sometimes more then one table)
-staying up to mark/label all cups
-price all leos going to the show(not always easy, and can change depending on whats at the show)
-wake up early to travel/pack all show supplies and animals
-sit at the show and talk to individuals about everything leo(this is the fun part)
-And then of course the packing up to leave and cleaning and putting everyone back into their cages.
It doesnt seem like alot, but shows present a long day. But shows are where we have the best movement of animals. You also have to have animals at the shows that will be marketable to the niche presented there.(example-not too many 1000-2000 dollar geckos sell at shows)
The more higher priced stuff is reserved for private sales/internet sales. And there is also alot of work that goes into websites.

And then of course there are some that sell to wholesalers, but these geckos sold are generally lower priced animals moved for petstores or resale.

Of course there is always a balance between when to sell the animals too. Like should you wait til they are of adult size and color for when you should be able to gecko a higher price. There are slot of aspect to selling, and the timing of selling. And of course room avaible to house is a factor

So in the end selling geckos is fun yet can be alot of work/time.

 

[Greyscale_Geckos]

I think my questions would be: Do you ever pick favorites that you name? ((assuming that your collection is very large))... and also:

"Do you have a passion for the animal itself, its morphs, or something else entirely?"

"What are the highlights in your day as a breeder/What things do you enjoy the most about your day?"

 

[Franks_Geckos]

I would love to add to some of the stuff already posted, and I may later, but I just wanted to complement Matt on his honest post and also on the great story about his becoming a leo breeder. It was a good read.

 

[paulnj]

I breed geckos for the enjoyment of hatching them, making cool crosses, seeing if I can beat the odds and most of all.... to send an animal that made me smile to a person who hopefully smiles just as much.

I can honestly say I sold 300+ geckos this year without a updated website and only 40 or so at shows. Word of mouth is the key to any successful venture That isn't including trades :main_laugh:

As for the recieving a loaner who produces.....:main_rolleyes:

 

[snared99]

Yes word of mouth in this hobby is pivitol. And being mature and contacting individuals when you have a issue, is always a responsible thing to do.

 

[geckoqueen]

I would ask

I am wondering... there are many amazing people who breed amazing geckos around.

My question to you is.. What do you want to know from them? What do you want to see?

If you had the opportunity to ask a large gecko breeder that has been around for years and highly respect, what question would you ask them?

So lets here it! :main_thumbsup:

I would ask them what sex are my gecko's? :main_laugh: Cause I need to know right now.

 

[SaSobek]

Feel free to carry on, I did not mean to stop it. I am sorry if I hurt any feelings.

No Feelings hurt at all. Sorry it took so long to get back to everyone this time. Long day of cleaning gecko poop. Hahah and if you are a bigger breeder you better love doing that. But any way back to answering your questions. :main_thumbsup:

I would want to know how you manage to sell all those geckos and to whom are you selling them?

Aliza

I think what pat said is very good and very true.

There is a lot of work that goes into selling geckos, not as much as breeding/raising but alot. One must be able to do shows and also online sales help to supplement you sales. So not only must you prepare for shows which involoves:
-booking a table(sometimes more then one table)
-staying up to mark/label all cups
-price all leos going to the show(not always easy, and can change depending on whats at the show)
-wake up early to travel/pack all show supplies and animals
-sit at the show and talk to individuals about everything leo(this is the fun part)
-And then of course the packing up to leave and cleaning and putting everyone back into their cages.
It doesnt seem like alot, but shows present a long day. But shows are where we have the best movement of animals. You also have to have animals at the shows that will be marketable to the niche presented there.(example-not too many 1000-2000 dollar geckos sell at shows)
The more higher priced stuff is reserved for private sales/internet sales. And there is also alot of work that goes into websites.

And then of course there are some that sell to wholesalers, but these geckos sold are generally lower priced animals moved for petstores or resale.

Of course there is always a balance between when to sell the animals too. Like should you wait til they are of adult size and color for when you should be able to gecko a higher price. There are slot of aspect to selling, and the timing of selling. And of course room avaible to house is a factor

So in the end selling geckos is fun yet can be alot of work/time.

I would like to add to this that at times of the year you just simply run out of rack space :main_thumbsdown: and you have to move some of the “lower end” geckos. Some people don’t realize the amount of geckos that are produced that are “by products” of big projects . When you are looking at odds that are 1:16 or 1:32 or even 1:64 for every one that you get what you want there are all of the others that you don’t . They are the kind of animals that get sold very cheep. To make room for the things that you were shooting for. That why some geckos that are sold at some pet store might be a genetic soup of different things. But to look at them you would never know. To be honist we have a term for this. We call it “losing them in the market” when there is a normal looking gecko that is actually genetically very special from a project that we don’t want any one to know about or have even if it’s a low chance we whole sale them out so no one knows and probably wont find out. I know that personally all of the geckos that I hatch are het for something it might be a low % but they all have something in them. It might be one genetic or more then one. :main_lipsrsealed:

Another thing that I have the benefit of is to send some geckos over seas. Which is another good way to get higher end geckos sold . Because to be honist again the US leopard gecko market can’t support the sales of hundreds of high high end geckos that are produced every year by all of the US breeders.
Also pat makes a good point at what is the best age/size to sell. In my experience whole sale places want smaller leopard geckos. So for us only the projects that we know get better looking with age and high end projects we hold back. Stuff that is going to look the same or stuff that what we consider normal we try to sell at a younger age. Because that is what people want there is a fine line in what should be grow up and what to hold on to for a few months. The other thing that has a big effect is the time of year. Full blown hatching season for me is about may- Aug. so during this time I have to sell some stuff earlier then I would like to but this time of year stuff slows down and I can do more of what I want with holding things back. But it seams like every year my season starts earlier like some of my stuff is ovulating now. so my early season is starting to turn into a late start of the year before. :main_thumbsup:

matt thanks to pat, you, and alberto i have learned alot. sitting next to ryan and val at hamburg i often learn alot myself to. and occasionally even a tidbit from paul haha.

that’s why this is a great community of people that help each other. Sometimes you just have to ask breeders most of them are very open and tell you what they are doing how they do it and so on.

Plus always good to have a fellow Penn State lover at the table. :main_thumbsup:

And well Paul wow he is just well Paul and every time I see he him makes me laugh the stories this guy tells omg so funny and he is great to have in the community. brown crayon was priceless:main_laugh:

I think my questions would be: Do you ever pick favorites that you name? ((assuming that your collection is very large))... and also:

"Do you have a passion for the animal itself, its morphs, or something else entirely?"

"What are the highlights in your day as a breeder/What things do you enjoy the most about your day?"

Great questions First there are a few geckos that do have names. Its usually geckos that are very very different. Some are dumb names some are names that other people have given to them (girlfriends gave) to be honest, I suck at names and coming up with cool ones. I know a lot of Alberto’s geckos that have names were named by his wife (Mary the M in A&M) It dose seem that the more geckos that I get its harder to name them and I just go by the genetics of them. But some of the names are

Mammoth he is my super giant that was moose ‘s full brother
Uni the gecko that I hatched with one band on his back and a weird white head
Phoenix my pure eclipse male that survived the fire and is the male that made my line of Radars and the soon to be “typhoon project
Mr. Dreamy is the corny name I gave to my first Dreamsickle

that’s just some and no need to bore every one with more hahahh :main_lipsrsealed:

"Do you have a passion for the animal itself, its morphs, or something else entirely?"

I love the genetic part of it and watching some thing new and never seen before hatch. That is my goal and I love it when that happens. I also love when something just totally weird pops out. Also another cool part is watching the color come in on some of the lines that I work with. Some of the lines work with you will open the tub and be like where the heck did you come from. Like the green project that is going on right now is one of my favorites.:main_thumbsup:

"What are the highlights in your day as a breeder/What things do you enjoy the most about your day?"

I love cleaning poop :toilet: :main_yes: :help: hahah no not really hahahah I do like working on the geckos . Making sure they are all doing well and when they look up at you with that permanent smile that have on there face saying feed me . It is cute and is my escape because no matter what is going on in my life at the time when I am working on the geckos it all fades away. Also a big part of my enjoyment is checking the incubators to see what new hatched out or finding eggs from my special projects that I am working on thinking this could be the egg. Another cool part of my day is talking to people about geckos. :gossip:

It is kind of funny being a single guy and the question comes up well what do you do. I’m like ummmm :main_huh: :main_cool3: :main_rolleyes: ummmm well I breed geckos:main_thumbsup: . It’s a priceless sight to see what the say and do:wideeyed: :stop: :stupid: :sick2: :rifle: :knife: :iloveyou: :hanged: :help: :behead: :afro: . Some take it well and some well I get to see there butt as they walk away hahahah just kidding. :main_thumbsup:

I would ask them what sex are my gecko's? :main_laugh: Cause I need to know right now.

Try this.
http://www.repticzone.com/articles/sexingleopardgeckos.html


Well guys I think that is all of them for now please feel free to ask more

 

[MSMD]

Wow. I'd just like to thank everyone that has chimed in here. And Matt, I have thoroughly enjoyed your stories, thoughts, and input. I can't tell you how much I appreciate your honesty. This thread has been a wonderful, enlightening read. This is why I am glad to call this community 'home'.

You guys rock! :2thumbsup:

 

[paulnj]

I do my best to be the best human I can, but sometimes we all do or say things that we shouldn't. I can't think of any breeder who hasn't taught me something or helped me in some way, and I try to do the same.

That's my story and I am sticking to it:main_laugh:

Matt, I too enjoy seeing you, Alberto, Pat, Shaun, Val, Ryan, Kirk, Russ, Frank, Nevin....... We all something to add to the days at shows that makes it fun.

 

[paulnj]

Matt, I too enjoy seeing you, Alberto, Pat, Shaun, Val, Ryan, Kirk, Russ, Frank, Nevin....... We all have something to add to the days at shows that makes it fun.

bad me forgot a word.

 

[Golden Gate Geckos]

Hmmmmm. If I was to ask a big breeder a question it would be what they think of another certain big breeder. (hehehe)