Reptile & Amphibian Forums

hello
just woundering as i watch the prices fall each year, does any one believe the the prices will ever raise again? maybe not soon but in the future. i hope to see prices raise slightly in the future, such as the spiders and mojaves. i know the recessives are going to be the ticket with the steady prices, i believe they will not fall too much more. i know you can always hold on to the snakes till they sell for a higher price but was woundering if any one sees the prices could raise again? alot of the backyard breeders are just flooding the market and driving prices down, i found a pair of pinstripes for $1100 yesterday.
hope to here some of your thoughts.
thanks

No, prices will never go up again for a morph that is already out in the public market. Supply and demand. If supply is greater than the demand then the price drops. It is combo morphs that drive prices down as well as the people you mentioned. As 'new morphs' come out they tend to drive down the price for the 'ingredients' to make whatever that morph is. The demand is for the new morph. And time is off the essence in the ball python morph world and the only way to make real money at this is to buy that combo morph and to get a jump start on everyone else. For the most part, by the time a morph becomes affordable for most people it will be too late to make any real money with it. That's just life.

My prediction for the future is that prices are going to continue to fall consistantly, even for the combo morphs (co-dom/dom) because, except for the few that are just rich collectors that want that one awesome snake, people will have most of the ingredients to make whatever their hearts desire is.(and lets face it, it's way more fun to 'create' your own than buying one) However most people are not patient enough to work with recessives so their price will decline at a slower rate...

I personally like it as a hobby and if i can off set the cost of rodents and even have enough to buy a new snake the next year i am more than happy.

Tell me if i'm wrong? But that's been the pattern.

On one hand I understand the people who wish to make money off thier reptiles, but in my case, I am glad the Ball Python Market has come down, I have avoided Ball Pythons for years, but now am just starting to get into them, I had Ball Pythons back when the only morphs where the Albino, and a couple of others, now the amount of morphs is astonishing, and the coolest part, is it doesn't cost an arm and two legs to have fun with Ball Morphs anymore...its great

I respect those who try and make the most off thier offspring, and have a few freinds that breed reptiles for a living, thats totally cool. But for me...I am glad the prices have come down, as I don't do it for money, its totally a hobby, and a fun one at that, and after many years of oooohing and awwwwwing over the many morphs that have been produced over the years, its exciting to be able to dable here and there with a few morphs. And like one of the repsonses said...(And I agree) to make your own would be way more fun than just buying one.

I think the market is STRONG for the "Cheaper Stuff" lets face it, MANY of the potential purchasers are just like me, have a day job, and love snakes, and MANY people CAN justify spending $200-$500 on a snake, while not many people can/have $5000+ to drop on a snake, I think there are more people willing to get into Ball Pythons and are getting into them becuase of the price reduction over the last few years, its really opened up a whole new venue of people that wanted to get into Ball Morphs but just couldn't justify spending thousands of dollars on a snake, I am one of those people...

I think many breeders can still make good money off the "Cheaper Priced Morphs" as more people I think are willing to purchase that $400 snake, than a $4000 snake, if you had 10($400)snakes I know it would be easier to sell those 10 snakes than sell 1 ($4000)snake...see what I am saying, I am not poor by any means, I think anyone would feel the same way...$4000 is a bit of change to drop on a living creature....but most people wouldn't think twice to drop $400 on a nice Ball Python Morph...at least thats what I think.

PLUS....nobody really seems to talk about this much, but what about refined or selectively bred Ball Python Morphs, many of these morphs are still fairly new if you think about it, as more people start selectively breeding for color, reduced pattern, ect..ect...I think many people still have the opertunity to make great money off even morphs like Pastels, I think in time we will start seeing brighter, cleaner pastels, as more people start selectively breeding...I think many breeders objectives where to just reproduce the morphs, but now that prices have come down, people will start refining some of these morphs, to produce better and better ones.

This is all my personal opinion and should be take with a grain of salt..lol
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Executive Reptiles
Amanda Kingsbury & David Kendrick
www.executivereptiles.com

Once they fall, I do not see them rising again.

Dave

I hear that there is a television show that is being produced with a certain ball python breeder being featured. From what I have heard, it will be like American Choppers or Miami Ink but will deal with this hobby and passion of ours. I think I even saw some pictures somewhere of some UFC fighters at the booth of the person who is the star of this show at the NARBC show in Aneheim, CA recently that was part of the filming of the show. If this is in fact the case, imagine how many people will realize that snakes aren't "evil" and appreciate them for what they really are. If this happens and the demand goes up for our snakes, we could see a sharp rise in prices of the animals we love. I don't think anyone should be so adament about teh prices of the animals going up, as I don't think one person controls the market. I may be wrong, but i think my information came from a credible source. If this is in fact true, hold on to what you have because if no pastels were available and the market was hot, you could see $500-$1000 pastels again. I don't think we would hear any compalaints. Then again we might, cause some people will never be happy no matter what happens.
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Happy Herping,
Jody Barnes
Royal Kreationz

1.0 albino
1.2 het albino
1.0 het caramel
1.0 het pied
0.1 poss het. pied
0.4 normals (beautiful pastel sibs)

i understand all that has been said. and also i am one that would rather save my money and wait for that $1000 snake rather then be able to go to my local pet stores and be able to purchase a spider, pastel, mojave, and even albinos. even though the shops are higher priced the some breeders out there. i would still rather spend the money and get a quality animal from a good breeder, rather then try and find the cheepest snake and that snake is not as hardy as one you would have gotten from a breeder and put a bad reputation on the snakes.
if the prices do go up i would be alittle happier, currently i am not breeding but have the thoughs for it in the future. but i also dont want to be one to drive prices down.

Once the price drops... it drops... you can't get it back. But if from what you said is true it will only slow the decline of what is already out there at best case scenario. Because again... supply and demand. The demand will potentially go up but the supply is going to be increasing exponentially no matter what(for co-doms at least). With the new demand it will only slow the decline of prices not increase them. The only way for prices to go back up is for everyone to agree to pay more or to have a HUGE(very very very very large) influx of customers compared to what is already out there and then that would have to happen year after year to maintain prices.

If there are 100 pastels for sale in the classifieds, and 200 people want to buy them, then the price goes up. If i was one of 100 with the snake, I would raise the price. People would pay it. It is supply and demand. I don't think you understand that. Comapare it to gas prices. Supply is down, demand is up, and price is up. If you don't want to make more money on your animals, let us others that do set the price. I am not in this for the money by the way, I have bred normals for the last 15 years and just now had enough money to get the morphs. I don't care about money, but it is nice to pay for my hobby with offspring.
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Happy Herping,
Jody Barnes
Royal Kreationz

1.0 albino
1.2 het albino
1.0 het caramel
1.0 het pied
0.1 poss het. pied
0.4 normals (beautiful pastel sibs)

But that's it... the market is not just these classifieds. I do fully understand what you are saying. But i'm saying that the supply is too high right now and we would need a very large influx of 'demanders' to make prices go back up. If you want to use the classifieds as an example there are lots of codoms that aren't even selling... So you are right... in the perfect world prices would go back up but it is a very long shot. A lot of people paid the higher prices in hopes to make some money off of the snake... and if everyone is doing this - ex. male pastel to 4 females, 5 eggs a clutch even only 2 pastels from a clutch would provide 8 pastel. The supply is growing exponentially... there's no way that demand can keep up.

the difference is that all of those two hundred people who want to buy the one hundred snakes could live without the snakes if they thought they were being price gouged. how many of those two hundred people could go even a week or two without buying gasoline? gas and snakes: not a good comparison of situations. rusty

WHOA!! This TV show is going to be HUGE for the bp industy! Do you have anymore info by chance?

The number one rule is you MUST do this because you love the animals. Far too many individuals purchase these animals thinking they are going to make enough money to pay all their bills; and this is only true for a very select few. There is some money in it for most of us. However, this money is closer to the lines of paying for feeders, caging, possibly other animals, etc. The days of $25K+ balls are gone, but the “lower” end market ($300-$1200) is relatively solid. Some of us might not have a problem spending $3K+ on a morph, however the majority of buyers wouldn’t ever consider it. I personally don’t see prices on simple recessives dropping as fast as co-doms/doms in the next couple years solely based on the time it takes to produce them.

I’m crossing my fingers for the possible television show. It would be awesome to have an increase in potential buyers and also help educate the country. This show could help bring insight to all those who fear/hate snakes. I’m not saying this will cure the fear of snakes, but I think it could really help educate the general public. The surge of interest would very likely translate to a large demand for ball morphs as well. I’d imagine prices would go up a nice amount and no one would have any trouble selling quality animals. Only time will tell.

This is just my humble opinion. Take it for what you will……

n/p
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Cheers!
• Chelsea Lynn Gardiner
(and Frank M. Wood)