Too much Love... not enough Roaches

Well, we have a bit of a unique problem here at Luna Roaches.

You guys are buying roaches faster than our roaches can make more roaches.

It's honestly a pretty amazing problem for a small business to have, but it's also one we need to take seriously.

So, for the next few weeks, we're temporarily pausing all new roach orders and new subscriptions. During this time, we'll only be filling orders for our existing subscribers. And before anyone worries, nothing is wrong with our colonies.

They just need some time to catch up.

Turns out, Roaches have their own schedule

The funny thing about running a business where your inventory is alive is that you can't just order more when you start running low. There isn't a discoid warehouse we can call and say, "Hey, can you send us another few thousand Smalls by Friday?"

Every roach we sell is produced by the colonies we maintain right here at Luna Roaches. That means we're constantly balancing the roaches going out the door with the roaches that need to stay here and become the next generation.

And lately, the "going out the door" side of that equation has gotten pretty busy.

We've reached the point where we need to slow things down and let more of our younger roaches stay here and grow.

So why stop sales completely?

We thought about this quite a bit. We could keep accepting orders and continue pulling from the colonies as long as possible.

But eventually, we'd just be creating a bigger problem for ourselves. The more young roaches we sell today, the fewer we have growing into the sizes we'll need a few weeks or months from now. And if we pull too heavily from certain sizes, we can create gaps in the colony that take time to correct. Basically, we'd be borrowing roaches from our future inventory.

That's not something we want to do. We'd rather temporarily close regular ordering, give the colonies a chance to rebuild, and reopen when we know we're in a good position again.

Existing Subscribers are still covered

If you already have an active Luna Roaches subscription, your orders will continue as usual. We repeat, there will be no change for you and you can totally ignore our communication about this!

We're setting aside our available inventory specifically so we can continue taking care of those existing commitments. That's also why we won't be accepting new subscriptions during the pause. It wouldn't make much sense for us to stop taking regular orders and then add more recurring orders at the same time.

Our current subscribers trusted us to provide feeders on a regular schedule, so they're our priority while we rebuild.

What does "Letting the Colonies catch up" actually mean?

Mostly, it means waiting.... Lots and lots of waiting for tiny roaches to become slightly less tiny roaches. We have plenty of babies growing right now. They just aren't magically going to become feeder-sized overnight.

During this pause, more of those babies will have time to grow into Minis, more Minis will become Smalls, larger nymphs will continue maturing, and more adults will remain in our breeding colonies producing the generations that come next.

And that's really what we need right now.

It's not simply about having a lot of roaches. We need the right balance of roaches at different ages and sizes.

You can look into a bin and see thousands of roaches, but that doesn't necessarily mean you have thousands that are ready to sell. Some are tiny babies. Some need to stay as future breeders. Some are growing into the sizes we'll need later.

Everything is connected.

Why not just make the Roaches breed faster?

Trust us, if we could sit them down for a little motivational meeting, we would.

But biology doesn't really care about our order volume. We can give our colonies the right temperatures, good nutrition, proper hydration, plenty of hiding space, and the conditions they need to thrive. We can manage our breeding populations and do everything possible to keep production strong. But at the end of the day, they still have to grow and reproduce on their own timeline.

We've always said that Luna Roaches is built on biology, and this is one of those times when that actually means making a business decision based on what the biology is telling us.

Right now, it's telling us to slow down. So we're listening.

It's actually a pretty cool problem to have

We're not going to pretend that temporarily shutting off sales is something we ever expected to be excited about. Businesses are generally supposed to want more orders, not fewer. But when we really stop and think about why we're doing this, it's pretty incredible...

Luna Roaches has grown.

A lot.

Many of you have been ordering from us for years. You've signed up for subscriptions, told your friends about us, recommended us in reptile groups, started your own colonies with our roaches, and followed along while we've shared an almost ridiculous amount of information about discoid roaches.

And because of all of that support, we've reached a point where demand has temporarily outgrown what our colonies can sustainably produce. That's something we're incredibly grateful for.

When will we reopen?

We expect the pause to last a few weeks, but we're not putting an exact reopening date on the calendar just yet. And there's a reason for that.

We don't want to say, "We'll reopen on this date," and then get there and realize the colonies could really use another week.

Instead, we're going to watch the numbers. We'll keep an eye on the different sizes, our breeding populations, how quickly the younger generations are growing, and how the colonies are looking overall. When we're comfortable with the numbers again, we'll reopen.

The roaches get the final vote on this one.

What are we doing until then?

Pretty much what we always do.

Feeding roaches, watering roaches, checking roaches, sorting roaches, talking about roaches, probably dreaming about roaches. And, of course, packing and shipping the subscription orders that are still going out.

But roaches aren't the only thing keeping us busy around here. We're also using some of this time to work on and develop new products and ideas for Luna Roaches, including a few things we've been wanting to bring to life for quite a while.

And then there's the Homestead.

We're active Homesteaders, so when we're not elbow-deep in roach bins, there's usually something else that needs feeding, planting, harvesting, building, fixing, preserving, or taking care of. There's never really a shortage of things to do around here, and honestly, that's exactly how we like it.

We'll continue sharing educational content, behind-the-scenes updates, and probably a little more of what's happening around the Homestead while the colonies rebuild.

The website isn't disappearing, and neither are we. We're simply hitting pause on new roach sales for a little while and using that time to keep building, growing, and working on what's next.

Thank You

Seriously.

The reason we're writing this post isn't because something went wrong.

It's because you guys have supported Luna Roaches enough that our colonies need a chance to catch up with you.

That's a pretty great problem for a small family-run business to have. We could keep selling until the bins forced us to stop, but that's never been how we wanted to run Luna Roaches.

We'd rather stop a little early, protect our breeding populations, let the babies grow, and come back with stronger numbers than push things too far just to squeeze in a few more orders. So that's exactly what we're going to do.

For the next few weeks, the babies get to grow, the breeders get to breed, and hopefully our roaches can finally start catching up with all of you.

Thank you for every order, every subscription, every recommendation, and every bit of support you've given Luna Roaches.

We'll let everyone know when the doors are open again and until then, we're going to go stare into some roach bins and politely ask them to pick up the pace.

Mel & Chris

Luna Roaches

Small-batch discoids. Built on biology. Raised with intention.