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Re: ?'s about the growth of hobby in North America



Michael <mbp at cyberis_net> writes:
> I am a student writing a sample proposal which will try to explain the
> benefits of a North American petstore chain paying more attention to the
> hobbyists interested in planted aquariums.  In doing so I have to convince
> them that the market is there.  I was going to do this by explaining how
> much the hobby has grown.

Another way to proceed would be to survey some aquarium stores which
carry aquatic plants to see if they can provide retail figures which
show the growth of the market over the last 5 years or so. You can then
help those stores to analyze how much of their sales volume and profits
are aquarium related in general and aquatic plant related specifically.
You can use the argument that potential customers for aquarium products
are attracted to the store by the possibility of acquiring new aquatic
plants and by being able to trade their excess for store credit. If
current growth rates continue, the market will get a lot more
attractive.

There is also a big potential market of folks already into aquatic
plants who are not being tapped into by the retailers.

I would say the #1 problem that prevents more people from getting into
the hobby is the expense and difficulty of building or purchasing
sufficient lighting for planted tanks. Custom made hoods are way
expensive unless you build yer own. The plastic mass produced jobs would
be much cheaper if the manufacturers would build them to use standard
T-8s in racks of 4 or more. The metal halide kits are expensive but a
mass production approach would bring the price down below the purchase
pain threshold of the average aquaria consumer.

Steve P in Vancouver where the weather is sunny!