This is entertaining :)

I know who it is, I've talked to him about it and he won't do it again. But he's an active member that wanted to post an opinion without backlash.

the capitalist agenda..

you should see my P&L statement for this hobby. If I could register and consider corals as inventory and claim amortization based on coral loss and fish, plus the cost of supplies, I would be a laughing stock.

But hey, my corals are pretty.

FULLY AGREE!!!!!!!!
if you don't like the hobby and don't like the cost and certainly find yourself complaining alot.. then get out of it..


IMO

LOL BRAD, cmon, hang him out to dry !!!!
Lol ;) you better be coming to next swap.. we should all do a mod fund to get their a$$ out here haha

Wow
 

Wow.... The guys that buy huge colonies for say $100 and break it up into say 20 frags @ $10 a piece aren't making much of a profit AND it's the only way a lot of us get corals.... What's the problem?

1. Laissez-faire

2. The knowledge which is freely given on these boards is more valuable than the corals we try to charge each other for

3. I would be inclined to start a coral bank, ie. established hobbyists can have a frag of whatever coral for zero, in return if my tank crashes you give me a frag back to restock. Kind of like insurance

4. It is a collegial hobby until money gets involved

Incidentally I'm sitting near a tank with 6 BTA's, bought one BTA from Samw something like 8 or 10 years ago, if I sold 5 of them for the original purchase price I guess I earned 25 bucks per year. Woohoo!


Just my view.

Okay let me pose this question:

At which point does it become profiteering? Is it when the $$$ earned extends beyond the original value of the coral? Is it when the sale price is inflated to market value? Is it when a coral is parted out to recover costs? Etc, etc, etc... Seems pretty gray to me.

Come on, so now were able to have a big mouth and be a pussy? What is this world coming to. Id love to know who decided to hide there identity before making a post. Thats just a coward. Whoever it is should fess up so we can all tell him how we really feel. Just my opinion but thats about as pathetic as it gets

I would argue the line is crossed when you full well know your taking advantage of a fellow hobbyist.

Let me give you an example;

Seller A buys zoas that lack a specific trade name from LFS. They then proceed to name said coral themselves to improve its ability to sell (lets face it, named stuff goes for more EVERY time).

This seller then posts these zoas for sale, priced per polyp at $35 exclaiming what a major deal these are. He/she goes on to state that if you don't buy now the price will increase DOUBLE to $75 per polyp.

Seller A is pretty much saying these are 50% off at the moment indicating they are heavily reducing the price to be an AMAZING person and sell you some unreal coral a wicked deal!

Sadly Seller A probably bought that unnamed zoa rock from a local LFS at around $50, if all 10 polyps sell @ $35 then $300 profit has been made or 600% profit.

That is personally what I consider profiteering