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re:Size of Market



On Wed, 20 Sep 2000 21:08:35 -0600  gomckenz at geosql_com in APD #557 wrote:

>First, I live in Calgary where the trading population of the area for LFS
>might be 1 million people.

>Are you telling me that in the Calgary area there is a population of 1
million
>possible consumers (ie. total population for the region), or that the
specific
>cross-section of the population interested in frequenting the LFS is 1
million?

I could have been more specific here.  That is total possible consumers.

>There are several vendors who carry Tropica plants

>Tropica plants in the Toronto area are very common and you have a vast
selection
>of places from which to obtain them.

>I'll admit to not knowing the shelf life of these
>plants but it would seem to indicate a sales rate of dozens a year.

>I have been to a few places that get very busy when the plants have first
>arrived.  Some plants more than likely die off before they are sold, but
good
>stores will sell dozens of plants a month, not per year.

I just took a conservative sales figure which I was confident would be
accurate based just on simple observation to illustrate why I felt the
numbers for Tropica in the US would very likely be higher than Dave had
suggested they might be.

>Second, a rule of thumb is that the Canadian market for product sales is
>1/10th that of the US based on population and similar spending habits.

>Too general for the aquaria hobby.  You have to discount a large population
in
>the US, and obviously a large population in Canada.  But the percentages by
>which you are reducing your sample size will put the ratio at greater than
1:10.

>Unless planted aquariums are much more prevelant in Canada,

>I don't doubt this either.  In larger metropolitan areas you will find many
>specialty LFS or general LFS with a good concentration on specialty
products.
>There are still a lot of potential gold-fish bowl buyers, but I'd say
Toronto
>itself has a disproportionate number of serious aquarists.

I cannot disagree with your conclusions above but would be interested to
know if this is just what you feel is the case or do you know this for a
fact about the Canadian and/or Toronto market.

>I personally have purchased at least 6 Tropica plants in the past year.

>Good place to start figuring out numbers.  That's half a dozen from one
>purchaser alone.  Not everyone involved in aquaria has access (nor wants
access)
>to the internet either (in reference to AGA membership, APD membership,
etc..)

>Bruno