#33 - USA VS. EUROPE

In past blog entries I mentioned that I would cover the differences between the invertebrate hobby in America and that of Europe. I feel I am qualified to tackle this topic as I have imported from Europe over the years, am North American Coordinator of the British Tarantula Society and have attended the BTS Exhibition in the UK five times over the past ten years. The Exhibition vendors come from all over Europe and I spend time chatting with all of them. I haven't been fortunate to attend the expos in Marbach or Hamm (both in Germany) or elsewhere in Europe, but I have many European friends that I have discussed this show with many times. As you've read, I travel with a British team and many of my best mates are Brits. I have seen the hobby overseas firsthand.

I believe my retirement from the world of tarantula sales is timely. The US hobby has grown, but become stagnant and saturated. To quote a friend and colleague "... I guess (I) am not the only one that thinks this hobby went to shit". Is this a fair assessment? It certainly seems to be the opinion shared by many who sell tarantulas. Is it the fault of "cheap imports"? Is it the fault of hobbyists hatching something and selling the spiderlings cheaper than the wholesale market price? Yes and yes, but it is the combination of many factors. Many of those factors have nothing to do with commerce. We have the problem I covered early on in #3 - INFORMATION IS NOT KNOWLEDGE. And the primary villain here is the Internet. It has changed everything. It has changed the invertebrate hobby by making factual information from people with knowledge and experience diluted and posts from "newbies" who have only assorted bits of information prevalent. The Internet has connected hobbyists, but the abundance of inexperienced and unknowledgeable people overwhelms the number of experienced and knowledgeable. Misinformation is spread, flame wars and infantile nonsense muddies up the forums and the forums have been left behind in favor of the monster of gibberish called Facebook.

But before we lay blame or cast aspersions let us look at the fundamental differences between the U.S. and Europe and find a few other villains along the way. I - sometimes unjustly - always focus on the hobbyist and compare those I meet in Europe to those I meet in America. I'll come back to this. First, I will mention the hobby differences themselves. Two "villains" that affect the invertebrate hobby in the United States are the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service and the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Although both have villainous actions, at the core they are doing an important job. However, the result of their safeguarding of wildlife and agriculture results in stringent regulations that affect the invertebrate enthusiast's access to species. The U.S. invertebrate (arthropod) hobby has become largely focused on tarantulas and scorpions and, to a lesser extent, centipedes. USDA prohibits interstate commerce and even intrastate possession of things like phasmids and mantids and beetles. We have a huge farming industry and agriculture fears anything that might eat the crops or eat the bugs that are beneficial to crops. USFW is a whole different story. They want to control every living creature that enters America. In Europe a breeder from Denmark can ship to a hobbyist in France and a dealer in the UK can ship to another dealer in Germany. A dealer in Hungary can drive all the way to UK with hundreds of tarantulas. They are largely unrestricted in how they move arthropods around Europe. They are small countries close to each other. A trip from Hungary to the UK is like a drive from Chicago to San Antonio. They're a close knit group based on their geography. And they don't have a USDA. They have small countries that don't fear mantids eating beneficial insects or exotic phasmids taking over Florida and eating every plant in the state. A European show has many vendors of mantids and leaf insects and other phasmids and beetles and even giant African land snails, which is the one animal that will get you in the most trouble here in the U.S.

The BTS Exhibition I worked in May was the size of a medium-large reptile show here in the US and vertebrates are prohibited. It was half tarantulas, plus scorpions, centipedes, millipedes, stick insects, leaf insects, phasmid eggs, mantids, mantid eggs, beetles and their larvae, and, yes, giant African land snails. I invite you all to come over next May and see the variety of amazing invertebrates on display. You would also notice good books, innovative supplies, clothing, art and other dry goods. And you would notice them selling. Here in America selling a book is hard work. There's this ignorant "I can get free info on the Internet" attitude that you wouldn't encounter in Europe. And this leads us back to the hobbyists.

People are diverse and unique and I am only generalizing here. There is crossover and some Europeans are like Americans in their approach to the hobby and some Americans are very European. But what do I mean by my admittedly broad defining characteristics of each? And what specific generalizations am I making. This is controversial and some will be offended. But my impression, based on my personal experiences and my observations at five BTS Exhibitions which bring in hobbyists from all over Europe, especially France and Germany. At this BTS Exhibition you had the U.K. biggest dealer (The Spider Shop in Wales), you had the two German dealers best known by Americans because they supply Ken the Bug Guy and Paul Becker (Michael Scheller and Olaf Hopp, respectively), other well known German dealers like Sven Koppler who was busted in the infamous American sting that I promised not to rehash in my blog (search Arachnoboards and you'll find plenty of "inside" info). You also will find German centipede specialist Thorsten Trapp, Hungary's macilacispider run by my friends Maria and Laszlo, a number of French dealers many who specialize in phasmids and/or mantids, and German Peter Grabowitz who has everything from a large variety of exotic true spiders to African land snails. This is just to name a few. Their sales are brisk. They don't travel the distance for nothing and they have many shows in Germany and France and eastern Europe too. As I mentioned, the hobby is so big that they have shows that are invertebrate only. That could never happen here in America. The closest we've come is the ArachnoExpo day of ArachnoCon that in 2006 and 2007 and the small and poorly attended "spider mall" at ATS conferences.

But let's digress a bit to look into one of the reasons the European became so big and the invertebrates sold are more reasonably priced than here in America. Just as they have few or no restrictions on shipping between EU countries, they also don't have wildlife policing what they bring into the country. The European hobby - and in turn the American hobby - has acquired species because of Europeans traveling to countries where desirable tarantulas are found and collecting them. Some are brought back legally, but a much larger number are "smuggled". In many cases, the alleged illegal act is leaving the home country as returning home presents them with no problems. That is why almost everything is first bred in Europe. Another factor is the travel itself. Europeans typically have three or four weeks of vacation time, something that only the best jobs offer in America. They are travelers. I am one of the few Americans who has been fortunate enough to travel overseas in search of tarantulas. I know Tom Patterson has traveled some, I know Eric Reynolds has made several trips to the Caribbean and Panama, Jason Newland has made a couple trips to Peru, but it would be hard work for me to compile a list of many more. All my European friends and colleagues have toured the world. They have time that the average American does not. And they also have the money. My impression of the average European hobbyist is an educated individual with a good career job and salary. My impression of the average American hobbyist is that many are uneducated and are working poorly paid jobs. The European hobbyists (again, on average, and admittedly generalizing) have a scientific approach and a thirst for knowledge. They buy books and there are a number of excellent books in Europe. On the other hand, Americans (on average and generalizing) do not buy books and have mostly shit books to choose from anyway. They don't approach the hobby in a scientific manner and their "thirst for knowledge" is really just an obsession with posting on Arachnoboards and Faffbook. If I wanted to delve into this even deeper we could compare the educational systems of Europe and Americans. But all of these differences are definitely leading to what my colleague called "this hobby went to shit". I will remind you that this was stated with a breeder/dealer's mindset. The same individual commented further: "(I'm) thinking seriously quit breeding, I just see no sense anymore." The reason: "spiders are cheap (and) the time and work I put into it is astronomical".

This is fact. I know it better than anyone. H. pulchripes were being offered at $275-350, even $400 (lol). I produced the first U.S. sac and dropped the price to $200, with quantity breaks, and later put on sale for $170. I still have some for sale. There are few American hobbyists who can and will spend this on a spider. So forget about the ridiculous $520 price for T. psychedlicus and fuck the greedy asses trying to get it. Our hobby is filled with people working minimum wage jobs and living paycheck to paycheck that are out there looking for the person who is selling what should be a $40 spider for $20. They're looking for the law-breaker who will ship via USPS Priority Mail for $10, because they can't afford to pay for safe legal shipping that may be $40-50. They aren't buying $100 spiders much less $200 or $500. They're looking for "freebies". They want common shit for free.

In contrast, you could sell an expensive spider in Europe. The breeder buying it might be a doctor or engineer by day. He probably doesn't work at Jiffy Lube. But there are few truly expensive spiders there because they were bred there and distributed with minimal additional costs. My Blog #15 on BROWN BOXING CRIMINALS detailed my expenses with legal imports. To acquire new species LEGALLY that are only in Germany costs a great deal of money and, of course, they are going to be much more expensive here than in Germany. Once they begin to be bred in American the price comes down. As they are frequently bred it comes down further. But there are people who want a price from two or three years ago to still be the price today. And they will have difficulty against someone who has more realistically followed the old supply and demand formula for pricing and gradually decreased the price.

So are the American dealers that everyone considers expensive out of line? I've admittedly said that some people's prices are "too high". Was I correct? In many cases, no. Remember I am not someone who came into being a dealer two, four, six, eight, ten years ago. I started selling tarantulas professionally in 1982. I've held many other pet industry jobs simultaneously. There is a rule in the pet industry: you don't make money off of animals, you make money off of their supplies, especially the supplies that are needed regularly like food, bedding, grooming supplies, etc. You can't make money off of animals because of the labor involved. It takes time and probably takes paying employees. And the food, bedding and grooming supplies they need cost money too! And in higher animals, you are facing vet bills. And that's if everyone stays alive. That doesn't happen. "Shrinkage", as it is called, is a fact of selling any live animals. You will lose some. You will lose many over time. So if you have a pet store you must realize that the animals bring the people in, but they don't generate significant profit. Sure if you buy a snake for $200 and sell it that week for $600 you probably earned a good profit. But, over time, across all the animals you sell, if you look at a full year you will break even if you are lucky on livestock sales, but probably lose money. When I was General Manager of Northwest Zoological or back in the late 80's when I was an outside salesman for a pet supply wholesaler I had hundreds and hundreds of pet store clients. I have had this discussion a million times. Any pet shop proprietor knows animals bring in customers, but you need to sell them set-ups and, more importantly, things that keep them coming back regularly. And you hope that on a return trip for some rawhide and a bag of dog food that they buy a toy or maybe get the kid a hamster and all the profitable cages, food and toys that go with it. I had 75 Petco stores in the Pacific Northwest as clients. Believe me, they know the "pet store rule" very well. They operate at a loss on livestock. But they make a killing on the dry goods in the store even at the slim margins they may make in their world conquest to put mom and pop shops out of business.

Back to tarantulas, John Hoke and I used to discuss our prices and decided that true professional dealers like us - meaning that we earned our living, but also rented space and paid for business licenses, taxes, maybe attorney or accountant fees, etc. All the bullshit you need to operate a legitimate business would always struggle against those operating "under the table" out of their homes like all of the pseudo dealers and weekend warriors. Since we had few supplies to offer (and few that we did offer actually sold) we were forced to earn a profit from our animals. This required a minimum of a 3X markup. That means that if we paid $10 for a spider including freight and any other fees, we had to sell it for a minimum of $30. But that was borderline. We would have to find some deals to where we could have a markup of 4-6X on some species. And we knew that the really high end stuff would never sell at 3X so we would have to consider 2-2.5X and hope for the best. In the meantime, we had thousands of spiderlings to care for. No matter how well you care for them and how much time you spend you will lose some. And that is why it becomes bleaker and bleaker.

So are high prices out of line? I've heard one friend call one dealer's prices "astronomical". But they are probably not greedy. They are a reflection of the amount of work put in and the desire to operate a profit-making business that pays the bills. The pseudo dealers and weekend warriors don't have this problem. They don't have the same overhead, usually aren't paying taxes, don't have the expenses, have fewer animals and perhaps fewer losses because they can devote more time to each individual spider. And then there are the hobbyist breeders. They have no desire to earn even a part-time living selling tarantulas. They are happy if their collection is self-sustaining, meaning that the money they get for spiderlings they breed pays for their crickets and roaches and supplies and cages and can also be reinvested to acquire more spiders. They also may be working more than 40 hours a week and don't have time to care for hundreds of spiderlings. So they sell them cheap and the professional dealers can't compete. Our American hobby is definitely reaching the point where there will be no professional dealers and that will make it weaker.

I hope I've given you some insight into the huge differences between the American hobby and the European hobby. Don't misunderstand - the Europeans have their own problems. Their market has become saturated in the same ways it has in America. Things are getting tougher there too. The dealers I spoke to in May said that there were now too many dealers, which is the exact situation in America except that it has reached choking off the market completely here. The Germans admit that their American import partners are very important to their business survival. But from what I see that only is going to dry up. They will lose American sales and many of them will go away to. You can't make money selling animals. You need to earn profit from selling their enclosures and supplies and diversifying in that direction.

I will close with my original premise that the American hobby is weaker than its European counterpart. Just look at the BTS and DeArGe (Germany). The British and German tarantula societies are going strong and both produce stellar journals. They have high-quality articles in high-quality publications. They have an active membership and the organizational leadership is devoted and good at the roles they play. People find positions that are suited to their skill set. Then look at the ATS. I've been involved since its beginning, although I am no more. It has always been an amateurish club. It's publication has always been shit. Just a photocopied irregularly self-published newsletter of sorts with some good content, but much just hobbyist filler. Oh, my Lasiodora parahybana molted and her name is Elvira and here are photos type of crap. The only thing the ATS has really ever succeeded at was having an annual conference and for the first time in 16 years there isn't one this year. Ken & Georgi have put together a "placeholder event" and mean well and will try to raise money for the ATS, but money isn't the problem. It is direction and leadership. It is volunteers who have skills to take on a certain job. It is volunteers who actually will work after their initial "I'll help" quickly fades. I believe I have the right to comment on this. My first ArachnoGathering raised $1000 for the ATS, which allegedly was going to cover a shortfall they would have with the 2014 conference. I barely got a thank you except for from my friend Christian. I didn't do it for glory, but someone at the conference actually personally thanking me would have been polite. Perhaps even a public announcement before my lecture. I was invited to speak and I will tell you that I was surprised at how well the conference ran. It was at a great facility and it was a great time. Annette and Wade and Jen and the Foss auctioneers and whomever else did a good job. But it wasn't enough and attendance was disappointing. The spider mall was barren and seems like something they should have discontinued long ago. But why no event this year, when last year's was very good? Same old story. Volunteers who aren't really committed and people holding positions they aren't good at. My experiences before the show with Ollie who was handling the advertising/sponsorship type of stuff were disappointing. A very nice guy who was a pleasure to meet once I arrived, but he was sending out old documents that were now inaccurate and communicating poorly and it was so obvious that any warm body that was willing became committee, whereas on the BTS each committee member excels at their position. Our treasurer is capable of doing proper accounting and is helped by his father who actually is an accountant. It's not enough to be willing, and if you are willing at the beginning and then your interest wanes you are a liability.

Well, this might just be the most rambling entry yet. Excuse my meandering. I'm out of coffee and am actually drinking tea. I'm still half asleep. I am off to Starbucks in search of a proper drink. I just hope that in these paragraphs you have learned how different the hobbies are on each side of the Atlantic and why the American hobby pales in comparison to the European hobby, especially in the UK, France and Germany. I hope you realize now the impact that our regulations have on our invertebrate market. I hope you realize how hard it is to make a living - or even a profit - selling tarantulas, which is why so few stick around for more than a year or two. I hope you have discovered that "cheap prices" and cheapskate buyers will contribute to the death of this hobby. Professional dealers are needed, but sadly they have little chance of surviving. In short, the American hobby has become very unpleasant. To end by paraphrasing something another colleague said to me yesterday so you don't think this is all my opinion: I really would not miss all the cutthroat practices, back-stabbing and shit- talking that are part of this hobby. Sad, but true. And it's not going to get better.

MJ