Marketing Perceptions...

Marketing the fish to the pet shops, however, was pretty much old school: phone calls, and then the owners would go over to the fish breeders or distributors to look at the product. This could be a time-consuming process, often taking the better part of a week. This was further aggravated by the fact that the product is essentially livestock it had to move fast, otherwise there would be higher mortality rates. Business essentially became a race for time, for the breeders to pass the fish on to the distributors, who can then send it to the shops, and the the shops can finally sell the fish to customers and all this has to be done without the fish getting the worse for wear.

All that, however, has changed with the introduction of telephones with integrated cameras. Filipinos are practically symbiotic with their cellphones, so it’s no surprise that in an arcane business such as aquarium fish, technology has made the business cycle much faster (and therefor, there is a possibility of more profit with the increased number of business cycles).

Weapons of choice are either cellphones with digicams, megapixel digicams, and a PC with an Internet connection. Of course, there are some business compatibility issues: many of the fish breeders are looking for a cellphone with digicam that is waterproof, inasmuch as accidentally dunking a cellphone is a very real concern. But other than that, the business of aquarium fish breeding has become fast and sophisticated. Some fish businessmen keep whole photo galleries of fish in their cellphones, ready to sell at a moment’s notice.

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