Hello reptile community!! I am a young (19) bird enthusiast that has that has desires to own an exotic pet shop dynasty. I have been keeping all types of bird for more than 10 years. I specify in 3 small parrot species, Cockatiels, Lovebirds, and parakeets. I have kept snakes/geckos for at least 5 years now. I’m well aware that breeding is a non profit until mass scaled and I do not want to just limit myself to just birds. In this Bird/reptile business i also plan to have a rehabilitation clinic and Veterinary services. I plan for this to be the most ethical, safe, and the exotic shop.
Should I get into lizards/geckos before snakes?
What school/college degrees will help my idea?
What would be my biggest challenge to face?
Are reptiles harder to sell?
Any advice would help, Thank you!!
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The only answer I can definitively give you is to this question:
Get a business degree. If you do not know how to run a business then every other factor is moot
All of your other questions are entirely too subjective to give you any kind of solid answer
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Going to be real here, it sounds like you’re getting into this for entirely the wrong reasons. Breeding involves living creatures, you need to really think about and consider the lives you’ll be creating and the long term impacts before anything like a “dynasty”. There are already several overbred species with lots of poor quality animals available due to upstarts coming in wanting to make a quick buck and a name for themselves, not realizing this is more than just a business. Most pet shops that made a name for themselves did so by starting small and building their reputations over a long period of time. In this industry it’s not just about numbers and profit.
Depending on where you’re located (especially if in the United States), this may be incredibly difficult without a veterinary degree. Some places require you be a DVM to own a clinic, and it’s prohibitively costly to set one up. There’s also going to be all the permits, paperwork, insurance, and so on.
In my opinion, you can’t have your focus be profitability and be the most ethical, it’s not possible. You can still strive for a certain level of ethics, but it won’t be the same as can be provided by a smaller level operation. Breeding large scale requires you take shortcuts in enclosure size, enrichment, handling, etc. Any time you have employees there is the potential for problems.
You shouldn’t get into anything until you heavily research it. Inside out, back to front. You need to know genetics, how to identify what you have, what you’re looking for in a quality specimen, what the market is like for that species, the proper care parameters, the laws surrounding those animals in your area, if anything requires permits, and much more. You’re also going to need a significant amount of money before you start to cover costs and an emergency fund for anything unforeseen.
As Travis said, start with a business degree and go from there.
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I don’t know much about the bird breeding and selling business but as a small hobbyist snake breeder I can tell you it takes a while to find interested customers on MM. Those who do make frequent sales are either really lucky, know what is in demand, good at advertising and have advertising everywhere, and/or have good ties with people that are helping them with their “business”. Its definitely not something you can expect profit from unfortunately, especially with your ambitions in mind. A lot of breeders dig into their own funds and what money they do make off of breeding goes right back into the animals. But back on topic, you also have to consider how you’re going to get your reptiles to your customers which is a costly by itself with buying shipping supplies and the cost of shipping overnight. You’ll see most people charging $50 (just an example) to ship, in reality that price can be $110 and the breeder will be taking money out of their pocket to reduce the price the customer has to pay (I had to start doing this as I was losing potential customers to the shipping cost alone to ship out of Texas).
So if you do want to start with something, do your research first. Pay attention to what people have interests in and plan out what it will cost you (financially, emotionally and physically) to breed whatever reptile you choose before you ever make that purchase. Have the proper enclosures/racks you’ll need to house the reptiles and more for when you’ll have to hold some of the offspring because they aren’t selling. Most importantly, take this slow. I’ve been keeping reptiles for almost 16 years now and didn’t consider breeding until 2018, my first clutch of snakes weren’t laid until 2020 and I made my first sale from that clutch in 2022. I still have one of the offspring from that clutch too (but I’ve decided to keep him anyway)… The others who commented made good points as well so I’d definitely listen to them.
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Also with this I’d do Business as @t_h_wyman said along with a Veterinary degree of some kind. There are breeders out there who do it without any college education but it definitely helps to have some sort of higher education.
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