Pets at Home

I bought a fish tank back in February, and had a number of difficulties and problems with fish dying for unknown reasons. I returned to the store fortnightly with water for testing, and every time I visited the staff were only too pleased to offer advice, help and recomendations, including personal tips they had tried themselves.
Almost all the staff seemed knowledgable about keeping fish, although much of the advice was contradictory. Eventually we found a combination of tips which worked well, and all our fish are now very happy.
Certainly I have never seen a single dead fish in any of their tanks, and I have been fortnightly for around four months, which is a fairly good indication of how things are.
I’ve never experienced pushy sales approaches, and have even been advised not to make a purchase in some cases if it wouldn’t be suitable or recommended.
Admittedly the rabbits seem a little gloomy, but then to my eyes, most bunnies seem morose most of the time anyway.

I was shocked when we visited this Pets at Home to get a present for my dog. Compared to the excelelnt branches where i live, i was appalled at the way the animals were kept in this store. The staff seemed unwilling, or uninterested in helping, and everything was very sales orientated. We were only looking at the degu’s and 2 memebers of staff independently tried to sell us a cae and animal package with no care of the fact we said we lived 200 miles away!
More worrying was seeing the two 10 yr olds walk in and buy a hamster on their own, with no adults around, and from what we heard no questions being asked. I can only worry about what hapened to that poor animal.
The fish section was awful and there were dead fish in almost every tank.
Despite the toys being a lot cheaper at this tore than some of the others we left empty handed as we couldnt bring ourselves to put any money into a store this bad.

While this place still sells animals they will not be getting our custom. Cramped conditions for animals, under bright lights, they know little about animal care or welfare.
The ‘pets’ at Pets at home come from rodent farms, similar to puppy mills, where animals are simply bred for profit, regardless of whether they end up in a tiny cage for their lives or as food for reptiles.