Adventures with Corndog: Corndog's Fish Store

Awesome keep me posted

Still alive. Today I'm doing end of the year inventory. Might kill me. But then I can see how much money I made/lost etc. I'd of made money if I didn't have building costs $150k in sales in the 8 months I was open this year.

So in years past at another store. December was terrible. It's so bad industry wide that the fish wholesalers basically don't order fish and aren't open. This was the opposite of my experience this year. I was crazy busy. I had to go pick up fish in another state/struggle to get fish to keep my tanks full. The next time fish will be shipped is still 4 days away. They stopped shipping fish Christmas Week. The week before that it was in the teens here so they wouldn't ship fish either.

Going into this month I was hoping I could make 10k and break even. I ended up doing 18.8k.

The marketing I did for this holiday season was a mailer through a value pack type of deal. The last one did well and brought me new customers. This time It only redeemed 1 coupon from it, it had different offers. And the person was already a customer. However we've been putting money into adwords which has been working out well it seems.

The shop is keeping me busy. Definitely growing. Still doing construction... 340 gallon display tank split a seam and flooded the whole store and shut me down for 3 days. Now a new tank is ready to be installed tomorrow and the front half of the store is being setup for more sales tanks.

January was at about 22k. February was 30k or so. The flood set me back about 15k.

I've heard numbers from the reps saying the industry as a whole is down 30% right now. A competitor store said they were down 22%. I am growing each month at this point still. So far this month looks like it won't be as good as Feb, but still be decent. I attribute Feb to tax returns?

I may be taking on a second unit for storage of livestock/dry goods. I get to look inside it soon. It's been locked up rented forever, so hopefully I can get in this week and get it hammered out.

Other then that it's just grinding away. Unlimited things to do each day. I can expand in 5 different directions, if I can free up the time. It's hard to expand the business WHILE the demand is inflating at the same time. I spend my time keeping up with the customers as opposed to finishing projects etc. I do have 2 employees now. But most days require 2 employees in the shops at all times. We also opened to 7 days a week to help ease some of the traffic on other days. Trying to get some time away from the store to get deals and projects done. It's just all the current projects require me to be there. Had a hot water heater with mixing valve put in and plumbed to a sink and spigot for my water change system this week. The stand for the new tank was delivered and setup on Monday. The tank will be going in Tomorrow. Also last week new racks were put in and crown moulding and a loft put in, in front of the shop. Also had new shirts designed and printed. Proofed them this morning.

So yeah, mostly I've just gotten so busy, it's hard to find time to post on here. I still read here each day to decompress, but if I'm working at the computer, there's 10 things on the list to get done before the next day lol. Also hired an accountant to free up that time at least as well.

I'll Grab some pics soon for an update.

Worked for 7 hours today on plumbing this tank, getting it setup with water, and starting to plant it.




It's 72x48x24 tall. New show tank for the store mascot since the last tank flooded the store.