Reptile zoo, pet shop to open in Sioux Falls

Aug. 14, 2025

A business owner is making his dream come true this year when he brings a reptile-focused zoo and pet shop to Sioux Falls.

Andrew Adam plans to open Reptile Adventure Zoo at 2501 W. Russell St., which most recently was the South Dakota Motor Vehicle Division office.

The 4,700-square-foot building is planned to include an immersive zoo as well as a pet shop and home for Adam’s nonprofit, Sioux Falls Area Reptile Rescue & Rehoming, along with the Sioux Falls Herpetological Society.

“When I’m 90, I hope I’m doing the exact same thing I am now,” said Adam, who had a passion for the idea beginning as a 10-year-old when he made a business plan for a pet shop.

He went to Augustana University with dreams of becoming a zookeeper. Then, reality set in: the limited job openings, the hours, the pay and the student loans he had to pay off.

“I ended up in real estate and always wanted to become a zookeeper or have a pet store, but real estate paid the bills,” he said.

Now, his day job is funding his dream one.

The multifaceted building will feature “a big wall with a cool mural” when visitors walk in and walk one way to shop the pet store and the other to visit the zoo.

“There will be three aisles with supplies for reptiles, and animals for sale and for adoption,” he said. “Axolotls, bearded dragons and baby snakes, with mice and roaches and crickets and fruit flies — all the feeder stuff for your reptile friends.”

He also plans to sell stuffed animals and other souvenirs.

On the zoo side, $10 admission will lead visitors through a large cave-like arch, with a miniature one for kids, where there will be a large water feature with a tank of swimming turtles that can be touched.

About five tortoises will roam the zoo openly, with a total of about 100 exhibits “with all kinds of reptiles,” Adam said. “My wife thinks I’m crazy, but I just got a huge T. rex head on the wall for a photo opportunity.”

Large cages will house a 15-foot Burmese python and a large iguana “that might be let out every once in awhile,” he said. “And I’m ordering a few baby alligators that people can hold as an add-on to get a picture.”

Twice a week, Adam goes to kids parties with his reptile collection. He plans to offer the zoo as a location for them as well as other special events and meetings.

“There will be a couple exhibits kids can walk into to pretend they’re in the exhibit,” he said, adding that a sandbox will include a projector for an interactive experience that looks like a mountain or water with animals.

Adam’s own family is entwined with his passion.

He named his son Henry after the Henry Doorly Zoo in Omaha — where he also proposed to his wife, Stacey. She has a CPA firm that will be located in the same building as the zoo — in the back, with a separate entrance.

“She said some of her clients don’t want to see a giant snake when they get their taxes done,” Adam said.

His family history even includes a tie to Reptile Gardens in the Black Hills — his aunt’s former husband was its founder.

“So I had some family ties and was obsessed with it as far as keeping and breeding my own reptiles growing up,” he said.

Much of the zoo’s future collection currently resides in his Brandon home, which has somewhere in the neighborhood of 100 reptiles in it, he said.

“I don’t really know,” he continued. “I rehomed two turtles yesterday, and last night at least one gecko hatched and someone dropped off a bearded dragon on Monday. It could be 115. I don’t know. They’re all over the house.”

He also is contacted regularly when reptiles arrive at the Sioux Falls Area Humane Society.

“Last year we rehomed 70 reptiles and amphibians, and this year it’s already 45,” he said. “It’s currently strangers in the Sioux Falls area stop by my house to pick up a reptile, so it’s going to be really cool to have people drop it off in a location that’s not my house.”

He’s confident there’s a market for the new business concept, he said. Last year, he organized the city’s first Sioux Falls Reptile Expo, “and 2,500 people showed up, so that was pretty cool, and we’ll do it again in September,” he said.

The next expo is Sept. 28 at the Sioux Falls Convention Center from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Adam plans to have the pet shop side of the business open by then but is waiting on his city permits before he can move in reptile enclosures and open the zoo. The hope is to have that ready by this fall.

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