When the pets took over
There have always been people who spoil their dogs, but it’s only now that they’re the normal ones
Jesse Kinos-Goodin
When I purchased Agnes seven months ago, I resolved to treat her like a dog. That meant Milk-Bones and belly scratches when she was good, scolding when she was bad and plenty of love and exercise. I also set one steadfast rule: Under no circumstance would anything marketed as “designer” touch her fur.
When she was just over two months old, my wife and I brought her to Toronto’s Woofstock, touted as the “largest festival for dogs in North America.” There, I was shoulder-to-shoulder with thousands of enthusiastic dog owners, at one point getting rammed out of the way by a woman in pumps pushing a baby carriage, only to notice that peering up at me from that carriage was a set of big brown eyes, whiskers, a wet nose and a mouth full of drool.
Looking down at my dog, wearing nothing but her black spots and standing next to the assortment of canine ballerinas, Elvis impersonators and leather-clad bikers, I almost felt shamed for having her so underdressed. Almost.
After crouching down to pet a chihuahua in a sundress who casually blew me off as if it were a typical night at a club, we headed over to a dog sports-drink stand where the server enthusiastically talked about how it contained “electrolytes that help with dehydration. Plus, it’s chicken liver flavoured.” When did urban dogs become such snobs?
In the last decade, the cost of pet ownership has more than quintupled. (Statistics Canada put the 1999 total household expense at $277; a 2008 Ipsos Reid market research report put the annual cost for a dog at $1,482.) Louis McCann, the executive director of the Canadian Pet Industry Joint Advisory Council (PIJAC), pegs the worth of the recession-proof industry at nearly $5-billion a year.
“We have seen an incredible growth in services that 10 years ago you would never have dreamed of,” he said. “There is doggy day care, doggy kindergarten, all kinds of services for promoting exercise and interaction with other pets and, of course, the whole side of apparel — clothing, footwear, and if I can use the term, bling. Earrings, necklaces, you name it.”
It’s a trend not lost on Michael Schaffer, an American dog owner and author of the book One Nation Under Dog.
“When I got a dog, we simply did all the things our dog-owning friends and vets recommended,” he said. “Then our friends and families started rolling their eyes at the things we were doing, yet it seemed perfectly normal to us. That’s when I realized that the definition of normal had changed.”
In his book, Schaffer looks at the similarly growing pet industry in the U.S. and how what is referred to as the “boutique sector” is the driving force.
The trend is much the same in many parts of Canada, with cleverly named dog boutiques springing up in newly gentrified neighbourhoods, selling pet clothing lines from respected fashion designers, not to mention pun-ridden fads like dog yoga (doga) or doggie day spas (spaws).
While looking for a place to board Agnes over the holidays, I stumbled across one such spa in Toronto. In addition to supervised dog sitting, they also offer mani/pedi services, with the option to have your dogs’ nails filed and painted. Of the owners who choose the nail service, I was told about half opt for the paint.