We buy all of our fish exclusively from a MAC certified wholesaler. And yes, there is a huge price difference between transhipped fish and our particular wholesaler. We make very little on fish because we are competing with stores that buy from transships, but we are extremely satisfied with the quality.
I'm planning on starting a thread regarding our fish supplier, the quality, my experience in the industry, and our acclimation methods when we've gathered more detailed information. But in the meantime, here's some email correspondance between us and our supplier that you may find interesting:
Quote:
From: Sales@ProgressiveReef.com [mailto:sales@progressivereef.com]
Sent: Wednesday, December 10, 2008 11:30 AM
To: Eric
Subject: fish quality
Hey Eric,
I'd like some information to tell to my customers regarding the quality of our fish. Could you think me up some nice things to say about you guys?
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From: Eric
To: Sales@ProgressiveReef.com
Sent: Wednesday, December 10, 2008 12:35 PM
Subject: RE: fish quality
Happy to
You can start by saying that our fish are acclimated using the best electronic controlled ph system available. We also medicate and quarantine our fish during the acclimation process. Then, we aggressively feed our fish the day after arrival and on a day-to-day basis using our own live brine shrimp that is hatched and enriched right here at SDC.
We also feed daily, a plethora of foods all targeting each specific specie to ensure the healthiest quality of fish possible.
How’s that?
Eric
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From: Sales@ProgressiveReef.com [mailto:sales@progressivereef.com]
Sent: Wednesday, December 10, 2008 12:43 PM
To: Eric
Subject: Re: fish quality
That's good, but details are better.  What separates you from other wholesalers? How confident are you that your collectors aren't using cyanide? I noticed some markings on your boxes that I thought indicated you guys were concerned with sustainable collection practices...etc. Give me your best sales pitch, as much info as possible. 
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Well….those things I mentioned ARE what separate us from the other wholesalers. The other wholesalers don’t raise their own foods, or feed the fish like we do. They don’t acclimate their fish and quarantine them like we do. We are Mac Certified…not sure that means much….but most other wholesalers are not.
We can’t guarantee that our fish are not collected from the philipines or bali without drugs, but we can tell you that we use only the best suppliers that consistently ship fish to us with less than 5% mortality. We have visited our suppliers (others don’t do that) to make sure their facilities are clean and disease free….
We have participated in a three year study with Oregon State University and did a thorough study on shipping diseases, when no other company was interested. We sampled hundreds of fish during the study, and then traveled to Bali with the scientists from the University to further and complete the study.
Anything else specific you can think of?
Eric
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