There’s something almost magical about watching graceful angelfish glide through the clear water of an aquarium and colorful tetras dance side-to-side. Remember the relaxation of staring into your aquarium, realizing your shoulders dropped, your muscles relaxed, and your breathing deepened? You can almost hear the sound of the bubbles moving through those filters and the hypnotic sway of aquatic plants decorating your set up. In Central Illinois, customers are making the drive to J Squared Aquatics in the town of Clinton for their expertise with these underwater worlds.

“J Squared. It has sort of two meanings here for us. So, my name is Jessica. My husband’s name is Jamie. So, there’s the J part,” said Jessica Allhands, who owns this brick-and-mortar with her husband. “We are also located on the square in Clinton. So, it’s sort of a double-double meaning for us. We’ve always done this as a partnership. And so, we want to make sure that people were aware that it was both of us.”

Jessica says the attraction of owning an aquarium is that it is a more than a hobby, because it is living, breathing part of someone’s life.

“I know several of our customers, they don’t even have televisions in their house. They just have their aquarium in their living room, commented Jessica. “That’s what they watch in the evening.”

For other enthusiasts, fish are the perfect pet.

“So, fish are really great. They’re not going to mess up your house,” observed Jessica. “You can leave on vacation, and you don’t have to really worry about them, whereas dogs and cats, you got to find somebody to take care of them.”

A passion becomes a business

Jessica’s love for animals began at a young age. Her father was a veterinarian. She recalled having animals in her life since she was a child.

“I’ve always constantly had multiple fish tanks, multiple reptiles. And this just sort of expanded,” recalled Jessica. “Once I met my husband, he was also into the hobby.”

Jessica and Jamie started J Squared Aquatics by selling fish out of their basement and online in 2019 prior to the COVID pandemic. They ran their business out their house until they started a family.

“When we had our twins in 2021, we decided that it was probably not the best idea to have people coming to our house,” explained Jessica. “The building on the square (in downtown Clinton) popped up for sale. So, this is sort of an extension of our hobby. We still breed and produce fish at home, and we bring them up here for sale, and they’re ready to go.”

A different kind of fish store

One question Jessica often hears is why put a tropical fish store in Clinton, because it is a rural farming community? Jessica explained to us that that the town is their home and that their store is strategically located no more than a half hour drive from Decatur, Bloomington, Springfield, and Champaign, and roughly an hour and a half from Peoria, which gives the store an edge of attracting customers from a wide area.

“Being able to be within close proximity to those larger towns, we’re able to bring those customers in,” noted Jessica. “We’ve had customers come as far as 3.5 hours to come see us, because we are different.”

Jessica says J Squared Aquatics distinguishes itself from the big box stores that sell fish, by focusing on the health of their animals. Jessica said she limits the number of aquariums in the store to ensure they can provide individual attention to each one in comparison to the large chains where one filtration system runs all the aquariums, meaning if a fish in one tank gets sick, the illness can easily spread to fish in other tanks.

“We quarantine all of our fish and reptiles. We are one of the only downstate shops, if not the only store in the state of Illinois that does a quarantine process for our fish before we put them up for sale,” said Jessica. “Same thing with reptiles. We make sure that those fish and reptiles are doing everything that they’re supposed to be doing, and not showing any kind of signs of illness. We want to set our customers up for success and make sure that they stay in the hobby for years to come.”

Jessica explained their tanks are all individually filtered and have auto water changes, with no shared water. She noted that this prevents the introduction of new stressors, new pathogens, and new illnesses that can happen when new fish are co-mingled with species already living in an aquarium.

The heart of the hobby

A big smile emerged as Jessica shared what truly gets people hooked, and what got her hooked as a child: the feeling watching when a guppy or a goldfish has babies.

“I’m a fish grandparent,” said Jessica with a giggle “I want to have more! I want to continue to do this. The other thing that really got me into it was that the variety. There are all these different species of fish!”

While the hobby is rewarding for Jessica, she conceded that running a small business is not as easy as it looks.

“It’s not just the fish. It’s the accounting. It’s the building, it’s the upkeep and it’s the cleaning,” explained Jessica about how she and her husband run the store. “We’re available just about 24-7 for customer concerns. We do house calls. We do video calls. So, if anybody’s having any issues, we’re able to be available for them at those points. That’s definitely been something that we’ve enjoyed, and that is having that retail partnership with our community.”

After recently celebrating the one-year anniversary of J Squared Aquatics, Jessica said they still have a good deal of their vision yet to achieve. But that she is thrilled that the store has earned a positive reputation.

“We are constantly drawing in people from further outside of our circle, who are making that trip to Clinton to come see our fish and see what we have to offer,” said Jessica with pride. “The other thing that’s been really great, too, is the word of mouth. It’s getting around. There are local fish clubs. There are even social media groups. The positive word is getting out there is that J Squared Aquatics has something to come see.”

While making sure her aquarium business thrives, both Jessica and Jamie still keep their full-time jobs. But that does not mean their enthusiastic J Squared customers are ever neglected.

“We are able to assist customers, after hours by appointments and we have regular store hours on the weekends, explained Jessica. “So being able to accomplish this while still having family life, a 40 hour a week job and then doing this, I’m very proud of that.”

Jessica does believe that starting a retail business comes with a lot of preparation and homework.

“Don’t just jump right into it,” advised Jessica to others considering opening a retail business. “We researched for over a year and a half before we even purchased a building. Then we had another year in addition to that, where we were rehabbing, and were really focused in on our actual business that we were going to be doing out of that building.”

For Jessica, her life as a retailer is a source of pure enjoyment.

“I love being a retailer, because I get to meet all the different people. The fish hobby is no different than any other hobby,” shared Jessica with a smile. “You’re going to have a plethora of personalities and being able to meet them, being able to talk about a subject that I enjoy, I will never get tired of doing that.
“I love being able to share my passion with others and being able to make a dollar talking about a hobby that I love.”