Great response,I recently closed my Amazon account.
Big Al’s USA is shutting down - where else to order???
- Thread starter HarleyK
- Start date
Makes sense if you live in a place where the people who own the small businesses actually live in your community and care about the costumers. Unfortunately I don't the mom and pop fish stores are owned by people who live in the surrounding suburbs and could care less about the customers. Their prices are extremely high and not because they have to be. They will give someone $15 for a trade in fish and then try and sell it for over $100 dollars. We don't really have any small groceries stores owned by people in the community anymore. I'm not going to pay extra money to keep someone in business that's doesn't care or do anything for the community. It's very expensive to live where I live no way I'm throwing money down the drain to people who don't live in or do anything for the communities that their businesses are in. To be honest the only thing we have like that left are mom and pop food stores/dinners/restaurants. So I definitely use Walmart and Amazon. As a person who has been running almost 20 tanks for the last few years it makes no sense for me to buy certain things from the lfs when I have three kids. I do understand your point it used to be like that when I was a kid the mom who owned the corner store across the street from me lived upstairs over the store. My friends family owned businesses that we all used to go to but those days are long gone where I'm from.
I shopped online at Bigals when I first started out and bought filters, equipment and parts so it's definitely a shame that they won't be servicing the U.S. market any longer. They were great for having items in stock, great prices and quick shipping.
lol, they bought Maine Depot … another store that I used to buy from.
I’ll have to give it another look.
good answers everyone, thank you, keep them coming, please.
I liked big als. Best customer service department but the shipping service they used was awful throwing packaging around UPS (the brown trucks) in my area. Caught on video camera tossing a big box of driftwood branches broken. Even the card board was kicked in and NLS thera A pellets ofc it shattered in the box. Tiny pellets dropping out of the box like it was having a rodent turd party inside. Big als sent a replacement food with no issues! That was way before covid kicked in. I didnt care about the dude dropping it as he probably knew it was SOL by the time he brought it out of the truck lol. The video feed showed it was already damaged before he walked up. He was cool with other packages every other orders were awesome. Massive quantities of water treatments, filter parts etc loved them but amazon definitely got better edge in the price, availability. I have checked big als like 6 times during the pandemic including medications and they were either out of stock or amazon had them price matched and was going to get to me sooner than big als of 2 weeks. (Medications were time of essence issue)
Over the past 20 years I have spent $1,000s at BigAls. I accumulated the points and got lots of free stuff as well. My most recent order from there arrived last week.
*SIGH*
I have bought Eheim parts on Ebay UK. For the not too heavy things the shipping is cheap enough.
I used to buy at FosterSmith a lot until they were bought by Live Aquaria where i never have nor will I shop for anything live. While they still sell some hard goods they gutted FosterSmith as a supplier.
I have bought from kensfish for as long as BigAls. I will not buy shipping supplies from kens but anything else I will consider.I still shop there but they have too many things out of stock these days. I understand its the pandemic.
I also shop with Jehmco. But they are a more specialized vendor and they are more oriented to folks with a lot of tanks. I get frozen food, air and shipping supplies from them almost exclusively.
I almost never shop local brick and mortar stores. I have too many tanks not to be budget conscious.
But lets also remember that local stores also sell/sold fish. How many of the members here have been buying their fish fish online and not from retail stores which also sell that way? How many of us sell fish that way?
As Bob Dylan said, "The times they are a changing."
*SIGH*
I have bought Eheim parts on Ebay UK. For the not too heavy things the shipping is cheap enough.
I used to buy at FosterSmith a lot until they were bought by Live Aquaria where i never have nor will I shop for anything live. While they still sell some hard goods they gutted FosterSmith as a supplier.
I have bought from kensfish for as long as BigAls. I will not buy shipping supplies from kens but anything else I will consider.I still shop there but they have too many things out of stock these days. I understand its the pandemic.
I also shop with Jehmco. But they are a more specialized vendor and they are more oriented to folks with a lot of tanks. I get frozen food, air and shipping supplies from them almost exclusively.
I almost never shop local brick and mortar stores. I have too many tanks not to be budget conscious.
But lets also remember that local stores also sell/sold fish. How many of the members here have been buying their fish fish online and not from retail stores which also sell that way? How many of us sell fish that way?
As Bob Dylan said, "The times they are a changing."
