Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I was just wondering, and i know many of the people on these forums are involved, how is business w/ leos? Do you make a large profit by breeding and selling them? Thanks
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~3 Baby Leopard Geckos~
~1 Miniature long-haired dachsund~

I'm in the business, and I breed ony leopard geckos. When you are in the business there are other things you have to keep in mind instead of having this cash flow come in and use it just for spending money.

Some of us do it just for the pure fun of it. Some do it for a business. But when you run a business the money you make you have to turn around and put right back into your business. You need to buy x amount of crickets for x amount of geckos you own. Crickets can get very pricey. Think of your bill to heat your racks with? Calicum. Paper towels. Plastic shoe boxes. Then there is all the packaging supplies when you ship a gecko. Having your website hosted. I could go on and on, but I think you get the point.

You have to put so much back into your business so it thrives before you do anything else. Thats the smartest way of doing it, anyone can tell you that.

Also if you want to run a business are you going to have the time to care for x amount of geckos a day? Are you going to be able to afford a vet bill if something happened to one of your geckos down the road? These are just some things to think of. Garrick DeMeyer produces many reptiles. He gets up at 7 am and he is out in his "reptile shed" until about 3 or 4 pm when he is finished feeding, watering, cleaning, etc...etc... Yes it can turn into a full 8 hour or more day, depending on how many reptiles you breed/keep.

I'm not trying to sound harsh, but it really bothers me when some "kid" thinks he/she can "get rich quick" by breeding geckos and using that money for something he/she wants. It is not a get rich quick business. After all your bills are paid and if you have a little money left over, well then, hey, thats great! Use it on another gecko, or whatever you want!

I'm sure alot of other people will agree with me. But I'm just telling you that way it is.

Again dont take this as me attacking you. I'm not. I'm just trying to make you see what its all going to involve if you get into the business.
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Shayna
www.LeoLoversLizardLounge.com

N/P

Listen, I wasn't saying i want to use them as a get rich quick plan, I was simply wondering what kind of business they create. I figured it would be the kind of thing you wrote about, using most of the money to turn around and reinvest in the business. However, when I was looking at some geckos and saw the prices on some ($600-$1000), I was astounded at how much people could sell them for. I know a lot about business, and I'm not interested in doing it myself. I'm not some "kid" trying to "get rich quick". Personally, I would never be able to take care of a ton of animals like that, even if i were to get money out of it. I was simply asking a question about it. It just seemed like:

Buy 2 Expensive geckos: $1600
They breed many geckos that you can turn around and sell for $800, which I would think greatly exceeds the price of buying crickets and paying for some heat pads. It may not bring in a lot of profit, but if one did it on a larger scale, it would carry in much more. Just curious.
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~3 Baby Leopard Geckos~
~1 Miniature long-haired dachsund~

I agree with leo lover.

in reply, even if you're selling a beautiful "popular" morph gecko at like $1000 being a new breeder you may never sell it. Unless you have a good reputation, some fancy website many people won't trust you and you'll have to charge much less. Its the whole supply and demand thing. Some breeders can charge a lot of money for nice geckos it that that particular morph is hugely popular. Once enough ppl have that morph and are breeding it themselves the price just drops. About 4 years ago Albinos used to be huge $1000 gecko now i can get one for the same price as a normal morph.
Also it really depends on where you live. Im in BC and very few ppl have reptiles let alone an unique morph of gecko.

I feel what fade is saying. I posted trying to get the same info a while ago and instead of answering the question I got a lot of this is not for you if you want to get rich, you should do it for the love of the animal replys. I was just trying to learn and wanted to know what the business was like its not like all the big breeders with $500-$1000 animals are not doing it for the money as well as the love, Whats better than earning a living doing something you love. Now I do understand what some of you are saying when I see some of the post maybe by some young kid or something. I look for a reply like hmmm i forgot your name but the person im posting under. You might be right about website and all so how did Kelly from HISS do it because I been here off and on for some yrs and back then I dont remember a Kelly or HISS and not long ago, she seems to have a good rep I should email her and ask I love the sites when breeders tell thier experiences and how they came up in the business I end up reading they whole site.

i have been doing this for a few years now and compared to what i have put into my animals i haven not made one cent, in fact i have lost a few thousand (i am not a rich person i work 40 hrs a week for crappy hourly pay).. getting my breeding stock together.... buying food and supplies and having them housed correctly... i woprk with my geckos on average about 20 hours a week (and alot of times stay up til the wee hours of the moring finishing feeding and cleaning cages) and i still hold a full time job....... i currently have 24 hatchlings and are hatching more everyday and still have eggs coming and thats not to mention my females which havent ovulated yet and my females that will be breeding this summer. it's alot of work, work i do love.. i sit in here on my days off with music playing just working the geckos.... i tell everyone its my peaceful time its what i do to relieve stress (my job can be quite stressfeul)
why do i do it?? it's fun the geckos are cool and the people you meet (most of them) are great.. hopefully one day it will pay off but if it doesnt oh well.. all i hope is that i can make enough tocall it even so i can continue to do it
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-robin struck
R2 Reptiles

Hmmm I see you even have a website. LOL you sound like you dont like your job, what do you do? So like the hatchlings you have and have coming I wondered what people did with the hatchlings if the market is like that, the more breeding the more racks and room.

dont get me wrong. i love my job and what i doi but its very stressful and i do not get paid well. I work hard (usually) very hard, i am in retail. my geckos are an outlet. i built that website myself (if you cant tell LOL) but not only do we have geckos we keep, boa constrictos, bearded dragons a few colubrids and green tree pythons.
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-robin struck
R2 Reptiles

...don't quit your day job!
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Marcia McGuiness
Golden Gate Geckos
www.goldengategeckos.com

Let's take the pair of geckos for $1600. Next year they breed and luckily you have twelve healthy babies. Maybe you get lucky and have one or two as good as the parents. But now there are many geckos that good out there, so now they're worth $400. Some may be worth 300 , 200, 100. Do the math. I had a fairly successful reptile business for seven years and was able to support my habit AND make a few bucks extra. It can be done, but the hours needed really add up. I spent big the last two years on breeders and have more bad eggs than I'd planned on this year. Next year my offspring have to be that much better to keep up. Now the good part - If you get lucky you may hatch something that is better than both parents. That's the objective in any breeding program, right? If you want to give it a try, go for it but don't count on anything. Do it for the enjoyment of being the first one to see what you get.