(no subject)
I'll tell you what, there is one upside to working in a pet store - you get to find out what a weird, weird industry the pet trade is. And working in Florida - well, then you get to learn what a truly fucked up state Florida really is.
As I talk with more and more people in the pet industry here in Florida, I've come to realize two things.
First, everyone in the pet industry is / was a criminal.
Secondly, Florida's state motto should be "The Gateway to Crime."
Almost everyone in the pet industry down here (dogs, cats, reptiles, birds, you name it) came from New York, and they all came down here because they made money in New York and wanted to double or triple their money in quick fashion. There's really only a few ways to make money quickly, and they all revolve around illegal activity. Most illegal activity revolves around supplying people with things they want, but which they can't get - many of which come from out of the country. Where better to procure these things than one of the largest shipping hubs in America - Miami?
So you have reptile importers killing boa constrictors, shoving cocaine inside of them, and then declaring that they arrived dead on an import shipment. You have people taping up birds' beaks, talons, and wings, shoving them inside tennis ball containers, and bringing them over in duffel bags. You have people importing water dragon eggs and mixing (highly illegal) Komodo dragon eggs in with them. A few of the guys I work with know people who can, for the right price, get me a Komodo dragon egg to hatch.
One of the largest animal suppliers in Florida is owned by a guy who did time in jail for killing a Florida Fish and Wildlife agent. Yeah, apparently the agent got a bit too nosy into what was being smuggled into the country - his reward was to get chopped up and fed to alligators.
The worst part is that you can't talk about this shit with other pet store owners or anyone involved in the industry, because THEY ALL KNOW EACH OTHER. I am dead serious. 90% of everyone involved in the pet retail industry trade in Florida knows EVERYONE ELSE. There's a sixty year old lady who delivers fish to us from Tampa - she knows all of the sales reps from the pet distributors by name. Everyone down here knows that Nick up in West Palm is going to get arrested by Florida Fish and Wildlife and thrown in jail for 90 days because he's been importing some shady shit. AND I MEAN EVERYONE! Fuck, I can talk to a guy who worked at a FISH STORE and he knows that a reptile importer is about a hair's breadth away from getting locked away.
I was down in Miami buying fish the other day, and after I bought fish I drove 45 minutes north to go buy some baby turtles. The same goddamn woman who boxed up my fish in Miami works up at a reptile importer in Davie! It's a goddamn conspiracy, I tell you. A new wholesaler opens up in Miami - they own two warehouses adjacent to each other, and one is completely blocked off. Windows tinted, doors locked, but ventilation ducts leading out of the ceiling. SOMETHING is in there. What? I ask them, they laugh a bit and joke about their being a grow room back there. There's no damn grow room, but I'd kill to know exactly what they're bringing in that has to be hidden like that. I've come to learn that no one operates in the import / export industry for very long without becoming very dirty in the process.
And that's just it. It's not so much the pet industry that's so corrupt - it's the import / export industry. Which, of course, is intimately tied to the pet industry - where do you think all these exotic pets and birds first came from? The same places that supply this fine country with loads and loads of acapulco gold, china white, and colombian cocaine. Our manager loves to tell me about a guy who will openly admit to bringing in over $100 million dollars of cocaine into the country in the carcasses of snakes, monkeys, pigs, etc. He'll admit to it because the statute of limitations on his crimes has expired.
Since everyone down here is a New York transplant, half of them know each other from the "old country." I know three guys who went to school with each other in New York who all got involved in the pet industry. One owns the Pet Supermarket chain, one owns the Pet World chain (considerably less successful chain), and one owned a store in Bonita Beach that just went out of business. Each of them INCREDIBLY shady people. They all act like they're coked out of their minds - and maybe they are.
As I talk with more and more people in the pet industry here in Florida, I've come to realize two things.
First, everyone in the pet industry is / was a criminal.
Secondly, Florida's state motto should be "The Gateway to Crime."
Almost everyone in the pet industry down here (dogs, cats, reptiles, birds, you name it) came from New York, and they all came down here because they made money in New York and wanted to double or triple their money in quick fashion. There's really only a few ways to make money quickly, and they all revolve around illegal activity. Most illegal activity revolves around supplying people with things they want, but which they can't get - many of which come from out of the country. Where better to procure these things than one of the largest shipping hubs in America - Miami?
So you have reptile importers killing boa constrictors, shoving cocaine inside of them, and then declaring that they arrived dead on an import shipment. You have people taping up birds' beaks, talons, and wings, shoving them inside tennis ball containers, and bringing them over in duffel bags. You have people importing water dragon eggs and mixing (highly illegal) Komodo dragon eggs in with them. A few of the guys I work with know people who can, for the right price, get me a Komodo dragon egg to hatch.
One of the largest animal suppliers in Florida is owned by a guy who did time in jail for killing a Florida Fish and Wildlife agent. Yeah, apparently the agent got a bit too nosy into what was being smuggled into the country - his reward was to get chopped up and fed to alligators.
The worst part is that you can't talk about this shit with other pet store owners or anyone involved in the industry, because THEY ALL KNOW EACH OTHER. I am dead serious. 90% of everyone involved in the pet retail industry trade in Florida knows EVERYONE ELSE. There's a sixty year old lady who delivers fish to us from Tampa - she knows all of the sales reps from the pet distributors by name. Everyone down here knows that Nick up in West Palm is going to get arrested by Florida Fish and Wildlife and thrown in jail for 90 days because he's been importing some shady shit. AND I MEAN EVERYONE! Fuck, I can talk to a guy who worked at a FISH STORE and he knows that a reptile importer is about a hair's breadth away from getting locked away.
I was down in Miami buying fish the other day, and after I bought fish I drove 45 minutes north to go buy some baby turtles. The same goddamn woman who boxed up my fish in Miami works up at a reptile importer in Davie! It's a goddamn conspiracy, I tell you. A new wholesaler opens up in Miami - they own two warehouses adjacent to each other, and one is completely blocked off. Windows tinted, doors locked, but ventilation ducts leading out of the ceiling. SOMETHING is in there. What? I ask them, they laugh a bit and joke about their being a grow room back there. There's no damn grow room, but I'd kill to know exactly what they're bringing in that has to be hidden like that. I've come to learn that no one operates in the import / export industry for very long without becoming very dirty in the process.
And that's just it. It's not so much the pet industry that's so corrupt - it's the import / export industry. Which, of course, is intimately tied to the pet industry - where do you think all these exotic pets and birds first came from? The same places that supply this fine country with loads and loads of acapulco gold, china white, and colombian cocaine. Our manager loves to tell me about a guy who will openly admit to bringing in over $100 million dollars of cocaine into the country in the carcasses of snakes, monkeys, pigs, etc. He'll admit to it because the statute of limitations on his crimes has expired.
Since everyone down here is a New York transplant, half of them know each other from the "old country." I know three guys who went to school with each other in New York who all got involved in the pet industry. One owns the Pet Supermarket chain, one owns the Pet World chain (considerably less successful chain), and one owned a store in Bonita Beach that just went out of business. Each of them INCREDIBLY shady people. They all act like they're coked out of their minds - and maybe they are.