i find it funny that he praises the way the marine ornamentals trade works. he praises the efficiency of the whole process, but then mentions how little the collectors get paid.
IMO the process in many areas is very flawed. There is little respect for the organisms that are collected or the areas they are collected from (Not all areas of course). The reason it is so "efficient" is that there is so much livestock shipped it makes up for the high mortality rate of marine livestock.
I'm not going to pretend to know the ins and outs of the collection buisness, I only know what happens from LA to my store, so I can't even attempt to say it can be better. I'm just here to be critical
As someone who sells marine livestock, I'm just want to say I will sell my livestock for what I can get for it. If someone was willing to pay me $100 for a percula clown, I would sell it for $100. Greedy or not, that's what pays my bills. I'm not in buisness to sell stuff for cheap or give it all away to my buddies.
Also FWIW, coral prices almost always come down at some point in time, as most corals grow and are propogated and traded amongst collectors. when stuff is hard to get it is expensive, when it is easy to get it is much cheaper.
Pretty simple, don't get mad at the process. It isn't difficult now to trade for lords, you don't need to dish out $600 anymore. You don't need to wait 5 years to get an oregon tort anymore. It all goes in cycles. This hobby is all about patience.