We went to the Global Pet Expo!

Hey everyone, we are often requested to share a little bit more of our day-to-day lives in the position that we have, you know, running a business. So when we are not filming videos, or working with staff, or behind-the-scenes things, or taking care of our personal reptiles, we are trying to find ways to improve our business and introduce new products and basically just make it the best it can be. So today, Ed and I are at the Global Pet Expo in Orlando, Florida, which is the largest trade show in the U.S. for pet products. So let's see what's new in the reptile world. Alright, there, I mean, the biggest room in this building is the trade show room. And there are hundreds, if not thousands, of booths of vendors that have some sort of product or service relating to animals and animal care. So it's a lot of dogs and cats, but there's also a good amount of exotic pet vendors here and brands. So, oh my gosh, there's even more than I remember. We're just gonna start meandering, I guess, see what's new. So at this show, you get a badge that states your name, your business, and your role with the business. So, I've got owner. I registered us here, so. Ed, why don't you show off your name? I'm good. Let's see your badge. Nah. Yeah, let's see your role. We don't need to. Ed Roberts, Snake Discovery. Yeah. Husband. Treats. For birds. What was that? Stuffed treats for birds? So like, uh, the cereal that had other cereal inside of it, they now have it for birds. Cool! Like banana. Oh my gosh, is that Cheyenne? Oh my goodness. No way! That's us! We're making people watch the video that nobody watched. That's crazy! Yeah, that is the worst performing video on our channel in a while, but you know what? We had fun. Oh my gosh. Our bird is at the show. That's awesome. We just got done talking to Dean, who's director of marketing and sales for Higgins, including the treats that Ed pointed out. Turns out these treats aren't even on shelves yet, so we really get a sneak peek. It's like a crunchy outside, soft inside, really tasty treat for birds. So they gave us some samples for us to try with Cheyenne. Yeah, so at the end of this, we'll see how Cheyenne likes them. Whoa! Bobby Flay is doing pet food? No way! That's so strange! What a... You can have healthy poops. Aw, nice! Alright, this is a cool new product. It's not reptile related. It's cat related. It's called Enabot, I believe, and basically you use an app on your phone to control this robot at home, and it can dispense treats, it can record your cat, you can talk to your cat through the little robot, and it's a toy. That's really cool! And this part comes off, and you can put it into a treat dispenser. Yeah, you just swap them out. So that's really neat. It's not on shelves yet, but in like two-ish months, you might see this guy available soon. Are you going to sing the Choo-Roo Choo-Roo song? I was going to, but they don't have it playing. Oh no! Aw, this brand, Choo-Roo, has the best slogan. It's like a song that gets stuck in your head. Choo-Roo, Choo-Roo, something Choo-Roo, yeah. Whoa, is this a new locking mechanism? Yeah, I think it's so the animal can't open it, but you don't really need a locking key for most humans to be able to open it. That's really cool. Yeah, I kind of like it. It just goes in and slides. Huh, that's new. So one of my favorite things about Global is that they have seminars throughout the entire event, like on the hour, every hour, about various things about, I guess, running a business. So, for example, how to use Instagram to promote sales, how to retain your staff, how to run a sale in a retail environment. So we're going to hit up a couple of these seminars, the first of which is how to design a successful end cap. Well, we found the stage. Do you want to explain what happened? We finally found the stage where the seminar was going to be as he was wrapping up the seminar. Yeah. This place is so big, we couldn't find the stage. Take a look. This show is so huge, you need to use the app and Google Maps kind of combined, it shows you where you're at in the trade show. Yeah, so the stage was in where we're at, that blue dot. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it doesn't show that it's the Starlight or whatever stage. Spotlight Lounge or stage, I don't know. So yeah, change of plans. Our first seminar will now be Instagram marketing tactics and strategies to implement in 2024. Also, I'm not opposed to screenshots. You know, you can screenshot things like, for instance, reviews from customers that they're leaving on your Google profile or your Yelp profile. But just having these categories can help make it more efficient when you're trying to come up for what to post. So I hope everyone is posting cute customers. What did you think of the Instagram talk? I thought it was actually pretty interesting. We learned some things about reels and posts and how you can utilize that for your business. And I think the first thing we have to do is make sure our bio is up to date. Why? What's ours say? Ours just says Snake Discovery Digital Creator. And you're supposed to then have a line that says, like, what you do, what your business has to offer. And ours is a joke. Always measure snakes in inches because they don't have any feet. Perfect. We have nothing about the business on our Instagram bio. You know what? It's fine. That's why people like us, right? We're going to have to change this, I think. The coffee guy is here, guys. Look! Okay, so this guy is amazing. He will take a photo of your pet and turn it into a latte. So I think he's used to getting mostly dogs and cats. I wonder if he'll do Rex. I'm going to see if he can do Rex. The Rex latte is completed. And as you probably saw in the hyperlapse, it turned out even better than I thought it would. Look at that! Oh my gosh! That is so cool! Alright, go check him out, guys. Have a restart. Okay, next up, we have another seminar. And this one's about, I guess... My mom just ducked out of frame. Ed's parents are with us on this trip. You can be a part of the video. It's okay. Anyway, our next... I do not interrupt. Our next seminar is about starting a podcast in the reptile or in the animal industry. I don't know if we're going to do it, but you know, we might learn something. Alright, so podcast seminar is done. Well, they weren't answering questions, so we left. Yeah, yeah. She was done with the presentation. It was actually pretty good. It was interesting. I learned a couple things. I still don't know if there'd be, like, enough demand for a snake discovery podcast, so I don't think we have to pursue it, but it was good to attend just to kind of learn some more about how they work. To see another section of entertainment. Yeah, exactly. Another platform that's out there. Yep. Fun to learn. This is Steve with ExoTerra. We've known him for a little while now, and Steve, what's new with reptile products? A little bit of everything. I think when we're looking at what we're trying to advance and move the industry along, it's all in technology, and I think we've been living this world now for the last couple years where adaptability, making things easier for the consumer, and also letting the science catch up with the actual product development side. I think we're there where there's a sweet spot in the manufacturer on doing something creative and brand new. For ExoTerra in particular, I think we've finally dipped our toes into UVB LED lighting. That's very exciting. Yeah, it's a lot of work. It's stuff that we could have launched many years ago, and I think we decided to take a step back, look at where the industry shook out, and then come up with something new. Some of the problems we have on the reptile side, we have to find creative solutions, and I think where we found is basically our new baby is the TerraSky UV and the linear fixture, so it's fully controllable UVB and UVA. So instead of just having multiple fixtures for, let's say, desert and tropical, it's one fixture and you can control with the remote all of your settings there. So UVA down, turn it off, it's got timer settings on it and then presets, so if you want to have it over, let's say, a red-eyed tree frog versus a chameleon versus a bearded dragon, you can do that. But yeah, I think that's it. It's the responsibility of the manufacturing side to keep the reptile industry going. It's not just the animal. Some of it's just like we have to innovate, right? We have to innovate and move and keep things fresh, and I think that we find ourselves in a pretty good driver's seat to make something like that happen. Hey guys, this is another new product that we're launching probably in the next week or so, starting to ship ASAP, but it's our BioActive Advanced Starter Kit. Something a little different, we've got our BioActive substrate drainage layer. It does come with a fully controllable LED plant fixture, but the biggest difference on this kit is it comes with a sump and a drain at the bottom, so anytime you have excess water that fills up the bottom, it's got a check valve here, you could drain it, or if you have a waterfall or a pond in there, instead of sucking it out through the top, all of your water changes are done through the bottom. So just some really cool innovation. We've got a frog top, so it has a glass panel there, so it keeps the humidity in. Oh yeah, sure enough. It's not just a completely open screen lid. Absolutely, yeah. So something a little different than your normal exoterra terrariums, we wanted to fit that niche, that BioActive niche, and we had a solution for it. What's new with Josh's Frogs? Well, we've got a lot of cool things that you can see around behind me. Some of the most exciting stuff, especially for our mom and pop partner stores and everything, isopod and springtail hangers, we've got a bunch back here, designed them to hang out on a clip strip. They come with substrate and food, they've got a shelf life, you know, for a number of weeks, you can just hang them and do them. Cool thing, springtails, currently only one species, the only legal species to ship across state lines, but that's changing this year. Okay. And then with springtails, we're using about 15 different species or morphs to fill them, so each one comes with a little picture. Oh, the isopods, yeah. Yep, the isopods, a little picture, and then a scientific and common name. I love the packaging. It's a five count, there's some extras in there, and a lot of times there's also babies in there too, so it's kind of a great, inexpensive way to get started and then also just to introduce your customers to just like a, you know, a really cool aspect of bioactive keeping. Also, a lot of people collect them like Pokemon, so they're great pets too. Oh yeah, we collect them too, yeah, absolutely. How long do the isopods last in the packaging? Depends on temperature and such, but 8 to 12 weeks is pretty typical. Oh, they last quite a while, that's awesome. Yeah, it's pretty awesome. Thank you. Yeah, no worries. Alright, we're hanging out at the Zoo Med booth with Jessica from Xtreme Exotics, and we have some Xtreme Exotics here to play with today. What do we have here? So, this is Bam Bam. Bam Bam is a tamandua, also known as a lesser anteater. There's four species of anteater in the world. There's the giant anteater, the southern, the northern, and the silky anteater. He is a southern, and they do call him the lesser anteater because they stay relatively smaller than the giant anteater. Giant anteater is 7 feet. These guys will only get 3 feet from the tip of his nose to the tip of his tail, and they are from South America. Wow, and how old is he? He's 8 months old, so he's still considered of 8 feet. He is going to town on that food. Yeah, what does he have here? So that is just baby beef food, which I use as an enrichment thing, because he really enjoys it, so in a setting that's not in his home, we use things that he really enjoys so that he associates that with, you know, something positive and enjoys coming out and hanging out with people. Gosh, and you brought multiple friends with you, right? We did, yep. Next up we have a caracal. I have never seen one of these in person. He is gorgeous. What's his name? So this is Moose. So caracals are from Africa and parts of Turkey. They actually got their name from the Turkish word caracal, which means black-eared, and since they have black ears, that's how they got their name. Very fitting name. Yeah. They also call them the desert lynx because they have these little tufts and they resemble the lynx, but they're actually not related to lynxes at all. They actually classify under their own species. Is he fully grown? Nope. So he's a baby. He's only four months old. He is my day one baby, so I've raised him from less than an hour old, a tiny, tiny little kitten. Oh my gosh. He was one of three, and mom sadly ate the other ones, which happens a lot in captivity, so we were able to rescue him, so he's our little miracle baby. So that's why you have him. Oh my gosh. What's his diet like then? So they're straight carnivores, so he eats a lot of chicken, just like in the wild. Their main diet is small birds, so they have very strong hindquarters, so they're able to jump 12 feet vertically, and actually one of the ways that they hunt in the wild is they'll hide in the bushes, use these little ear tufts to lure birds in, because it looks like little insects, so when the birds fly down, they jump up and catch them in mid-flight. Oh my gosh. And last but not least, we are now hanging out with a serval at Global. Oh my gosh, Jessica. Oh, I'm sorry to even scare you. Can you teach us about servals? Yeah, so this little guy right here is Simba, and servals are also from Africa. They are a really cool cat, so they kind of look like a mini cheetah, and they also have the largest ear-to-body ratio of any of the cats, also the longest leg-to-body ratio of any of the cats. So they have very long legs, and just like the caracals, they are very good jumpers and eat lots of small birds, so they can jump 12 feet vertically as well. 12 feet? Really? Oh my gosh. And I think I can see in the face, we're a kitten, right? We're getting a lot bigger. Yeah, a lot bigger. So full-grown, he will be anywhere between 35 and 50 pounds. The males tend to be a little bit larger than the females, so a pretty decent-sized cat. He's only 8 weeks old. So I think I've heard of some people having these as pets, but would you recommend that everyday person have a serval as a pet? So definitely not. They are very high-maintenance, and you can have one as long as you have the proper training and do your research. They are not like your typical domestic cat, they will always be a wild cat, so they do have wild tendencies. Very hissy animals, very special needs, they eat lots of raw meat, so if you're not equipped to handle raw meat, then probably not the best idea. That's a very specialized animal to keep in captivity. Definitely. So definitely do your research and research their behavior and animal behavior so that you're meeting all their needs and stuff. Now you're based out of Florida, right? Do you have a facility that's open to the public? We do. So we're open to the public for private tours. We're in St. Augustine, Florida. Our facility is called Extreme Exotics Wildlife Foundation, and that's extreme without the E, just the X. Got it. Well, thank you so much for teaching us about these fun animals today. Anytime, yeah. Okay, so we've had fun playing with the cats and the anteater we got to play with. Oh yeah, nice. Yes, so now we're back here, back to work, learning about new products. So Shane, you all know Shane, Shane came in third place in the build-off. Third place. So close. I felt good about it. Yeah, yeah. That was good. So now we're learning about new products with Zoo Med. So what's new? So one of our newest items that's coming out officially this week is our new BioBlend substrate. So great for bioactive tanks, what we've done is we've actually combined Reptisoil, Reptibark, and Sphagnum Moss all in one bag to make it nice and easy so you don't have to go around picking out all the things. We can get you that nice bioactive substrate right in one bag. All right, so the BioBlend is new, and it looks like we have a new light with Zoo Med as well. Yeah, to go hand-in-hand with the BioBlend substrate for your bioactive tank, we've got our new Reptisun LED, so great for growing the plants in your bioactive tank, but also it's a crisp white light, as you can see on the tank behind us. Oh, this one has it? Yeah, that one's got it on there. This is actually the combo, the LED with the T5 UVB built into it, so we're going to have both options available coming out here soon. Bright white light, but it's also dimmable, so you can match whatever needs you have in your tank. And we're going to give you a ramp-up and ramp-down sunrise, sunset feature. Gosh, that's awesome. When does this one come out? So this one's going to be a couple more months out before we get these out, so early summer we'll have them. Ooh, they're not out yet, are they? Not yet, not yet. We're just giving a taste of them here. Get the sneak peek. Well, that was the Global Pet Expo of 2024. We had a great time. Yeah, we did. That was a lot of fun. We learned a lot. We learned about new products. We got to hang out with some friends who, you know, represent various companies. We got to attend some seminars. That was really cool, too. Bought some stuff. Let us know, by the way, if you like this kind of video. Like, this is the stuff Ed and I enjoy doing, but we're not sure if you enjoy watching about it. If you do like it, I don't know, do you like the, should we focus on seminars at these types of events? Should we focus more on the new products? And if so, should we focus on new products to the pet world that are just about reptiles? Or should we also include cat and dog new products to the market? Because 80% of this show is cat and dog products, to be completely honest. Like, it's a very small minority that actually represents exotic pets. Like 2% reptiles and then bird and small animals take up the rest. Yes, it really does. So we kind of had to hone in on the reptile vendors here for this video, but if you're interested in other new products to the market that involve cats and dogs, let us know. Maybe when we go to Superzoo this August, we can do a similar video based on what you guys want to learn about. So let us know your thoughts in the comments below. Thank you for watching. Thank you Patreon backers for your amazing support as always, and we'll see you next time. Look, there's a baby macaw behind you. It's so cute. He's giant. Yeah, he's got baby eyes still. Yes, he does. Okay, we're back home. Cheyenne's very excited. And we have these new treats from Higgins that we got samples of at the show. And sure enough, yep, they look like that. They're like the soft interior things. Oh, ow. Get it. Get one. Get it, Cheyenne. Yay. Okay, now try it. Oh, they're a little crunchy. Oh. Mmm. Oh, she pinned. She likes it.