LFS in Riverside?
- Thread starter PatientZero
- Start date
crazy stories here. jesh. i hope everyone finds there store of choice and do not baise it one our experiences or others. go check for yourself.
another favorite store of mine.. it is a drive is Ali @ amazing reef and aquariums.
this is the one place where i may buy a colony instead of a frag=). i guess i am just picky in what i put in my tank these days.
... but for being a local store.. mystic reef has a lot to offer. and there frag selection and customer service is outstanding. they seem like they are making other lfs in the area raise the bar.. great job guys.=)
another favorite store of mine.. it is a drive is Ali @ amazing reef and aquariums.
this is the one place where i may buy a colony instead of a frag=). i guess i am just picky in what i put in my tank these days.
... but for being a local store.. mystic reef has a lot to offer. and there frag selection and customer service is outstanding. they seem like they are making other lfs in the area raise the bar.. great job guys.=)
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IME
Good for corals and frags (ORA): Mystic Reef..thumbs up, way up. Always hooking up a customer. Okay fish selection. I go here exclusively for corals and frags.
Good for fish: Fish Fantasy...cheap to avg price fish. They do run copper in the middle tanks where there are no inverts. I go here exclusively for fish.
Avg to poor for fish and inverts: Coral Seas Tropical Fish. Little expensive and fishes aren't that great. Corals are poor too.
Poor for fish and corals: PetWorld. Has piss poor fishes in bad health and expensive corals. I only buy food and meds that I can't find at other stores.
Good for corals and frags (ORA): Mystic Reef..thumbs up, way up. Always hooking up a customer. Okay fish selection. I go here exclusively for corals and frags.
Good for fish: Fish Fantasy...cheap to avg price fish. They do run copper in the middle tanks where there are no inverts. I go here exclusively for fish.
Avg to poor for fish and inverts: Coral Seas Tropical Fish. Little expensive and fishes aren't that great. Corals are poor too.
Poor for fish and corals: PetWorld. Has piss poor fishes in bad health and expensive corals. I only buy food and meds that I can't find at other stores.
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-1 for Mystic Reefs. I visited so-cal and Mystic Reefs had the best reviews so I decided to pay them a visit Saturday afternoon. My first impression was that it is a nice, clean and well kept shop. With nice variety of fish and corals. But thats where "nice" stops. I was the only customer and it took the kid several minutes before greeting us and asking if we needed something. After viewing the tanks in the front of the store I asked the guy if I can view the frag tanks that were visible at the back of the store. The kid said, "NO!, those tanks are for are special customers that spend alot of money here". This was very rude when a simple NO would have fine. I tried to make sense of this and I figured that they probably get tons of people who just walk in and have no intensions of buying something since this shop is in a busy shopping center. Well I started asking questions about some of the coral in the front and when this kid realized I knew what I was talking about he changed his attitude. He took me to the back to view all the frag tanks and started throwing prices out. I told him I was leaving so-cal on Sunday and needed to come back right before I left. He told me to "bring cash" and he would "hook me up". The prices were appealing but I couldn't get over how rude this guy was at first so I never went back. Anyway, this is my review of this shop. It has the potential to be a Quality fish store but they need a little training in customer service. Or maybe this guy was just having a bad day.
+ 1 DodgerBlue
Mystic reef is probably the best lfs store I have been to for corals in the riverside area, yes it is true that there coral tanks are nice and clean and they have a big selection, there fish section is not clean and they have a small selection. As for the service, its alright, probably having someone in there that is a little older and has good customer service skills would be better. The little guy (don't know his name) is the one who is always helping people (in between (like ten minutes in between) other duties of the store (ie:cleaning tanks and other things that can wait till no customers are in the store), the other guy (the bigger one, older brother I guess) seems to always be on the side doing nothing, the last 3 times I've been in there he just seems to hang around, even after waiting the 15 min for 10gals of water with no other customers, (i can see that if you take a longer time to get water maybe a customer will see something he likes and buy it while he waits) but hell I don't want to wait that long to get water everytime i go there. And then when you do want to buy something and you ask a price its always different even though you asked about the same frag last week, "Do you have cash, do you have cash", thats all I here, "I can make you a deal", it like going to a used car salesman. After a while you get tired of it.
Maybe it just me, but i don't like going into a fish store and have someone try to sell me something I don't want just because they can cut me a deal on it, if I liked a certain coral and it was at a decent price i will purchase it on my own. Corals sell themselves, if i like it I will buy it.
If the guy would cut back a little on his aggressive sales techniques I guarantee he would sell more corals. even if he can "cut you a deal" or not
Mystic reef is probably the best lfs store I have been to for corals in the riverside area, yes it is true that there coral tanks are nice and clean and they have a big selection, there fish section is not clean and they have a small selection. As for the service, its alright, probably having someone in there that is a little older and has good customer service skills would be better. The little guy (don't know his name) is the one who is always helping people (in between (like ten minutes in between) other duties of the store (ie:cleaning tanks and other things that can wait till no customers are in the store), the other guy (the bigger one, older brother I guess) seems to always be on the side doing nothing, the last 3 times I've been in there he just seems to hang around, even after waiting the 15 min for 10gals of water with no other customers, (i can see that if you take a longer time to get water maybe a customer will see something he likes and buy it while he waits) but hell I don't want to wait that long to get water everytime i go there. And then when you do want to buy something and you ask a price its always different even though you asked about the same frag last week, "Do you have cash, do you have cash", thats all I here, "I can make you a deal", it like going to a used car salesman. After a while you get tired of it.
Maybe it just me, but i don't like going into a fish store and have someone try to sell me something I don't want just because they can cut me a deal on it, if I liked a certain coral and it was at a decent price i will purchase it on my own. Corals sell themselves, if i like it I will buy it.
If the guy would cut back a little on his aggressive sales techniques I guarantee he would sell more corals. even if he can "cut you a deal" or not
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I used to go to Mystic Reef all the time. Then I don't know what happen but one of the guys got really rude and mad at me for not buying coral when I said I didn't want it. They seemed to serve other people better than me IDK maybe more money. Right now I found Shillingtons in Calimesa its Ok. We need some more out this way though.
I have been purchasing a lot of dry goods from Mystic Reef recently, ie test kits, saltmix, additives etc. They are pretty good at meeting online pricing on most items. Sometimes they even beat it and other times they are a litte higher. It all averages out. I do believe they are the best all around LFS in the Riverside area.
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