After having a wonderful lunch in Boulder Saturday, we visited Aqua Imports. It’s one of the more popular LFS’s in the region and I sort of understand this, yet not really. Here’s the thing, I just don’t like the physical space this store is located in. It is old and dirty looking. I saw three fish in two different tanks which were either dead or dying. (Last pic in the gallery below) The staff here is very nice and yet this to me is deceptive. Let me share a story here of what happened today, just within the front door they had 3 tubs of stuff which were marked 50% off. I thought great, let me see what I can find. I found 3 items; one was filter sponge for an Oase canister filter - $13 after the discount. The second item was a gallon jug of kH buffer which was $50 after the discount and the last item was a Saltwater Master Testing kit which was $25 after the discount. I purchased the last item and after returning home I found it on Amazon for $19. I will let you make your own conclusions about this.
So, this sets us up for the biggest change around the store and this would be the room to the right of the entrance. They split it up by creating a hallway of sorts with all the aquarium supplies on either side of the aisle. Behind the new “staff only” door is a space filled with tanks to hold online items and quarantine new arrivals. Apparently, they had a warehouse space they were using for that, and now everything is consolidated to one place. This saves them both time and money. Kudos to them for making a very practical change. They actually do as good or better with their online sales than in store. This speaks volumes to me about where the hobby store world is going.
The rest of the store is basically the same. The terrarium products are now in the front room, back in the right corner behind the 300g display tank. The front entry space contains large aquarium supplies like driftwood, rock, and tanks. The other change is back in the Cichlids room. One rack of tanks has been removed and replaced with acrylic low boy tanks apparently for axolotls. I did not ask for more info on those tanks. The pics below will give you some idea of all the changes. For the most part my review of the store is the same. The staff is friendly and helpful, the livestock both common and rare, and the store along with the tanks are not very well kept. I just don’t get good vibes in this LFS. Fortunately, I live an hour away and only come over here a few times a year. Mainly, so I can do this blog.
Sequoia Elisabeth
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