Westminster, 'Dog Whisperer,' and doggy yoga. KATHRYN WILLIAMS looks at how the big business of dogs has changed our best friendship.
Want a lapdog to lavish? A Yorkshire Terrier is a good bet. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer)
Merry is a six year-old model.
She's on a very strict diet. Every meal is organic, probiotic and includes fresh vegetables. She drinks only bottled water. She has more clothes than her mother, three bins of toys and her own bedroom, though she doesn't sleep in it.
Merry has even been called the Kate Moss -- of the dog world.
She's a pug, the apple of Angie McKaig's eye and a fitting poster girl for a growing industry fueled by a mixture of love, delusion and guilt that has pet lovers dropping big bucks on their small friends.
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ALL ABOUT THE BENJI-MINS
More than just the mother of Merry, McKaig is also the CEO of PamperedPuppy.com, an online magazine and shopping portal she started in 2002. When the Web site went live, McKaig estimated there were maybe a couple thousand high-end pet products on the market.
Today, she'd put that number above 40,000.
Americans spend almost $40 billion a year on their pets, more than twice the estimated $17 billion they spent annually in 1994, according to the American Pet Products Manufacturers Association.
And a good portion of that supports the estimated 74 million dogs in the U.S.
From miniature moccasins to Swarovski-collars, aromatherapy sessions to boutique puppy resorts, doggy yoga to "Baby Einstein"-esque DVDs, retailers are more than happy to step in and supply the demand.
And pets influence spending even beyond their own care. The American Kennel Club's 21st Century Dog Owners Study, released to coincide with this week's Westminster dog show in New York, found that almost half of dog owners consider Fido when buying a car.
With the growing popularity of dog shows, dog trainers, even dog whisperers -- dogs are becoming big business. And that's changing our relationships with them.
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FUR BABIES
"Oscar gets whatever he wants and whatever I think he wants," says Talia Silver, the owner of a two year-old toy poodle in Altamonte Springs, Fla.
Silver is a 26 year-old behavior analyst willing to spend upwards of $1,000 annually in support of her 'nothing is too good for my pooch' attitude.
Why?
It's easy to anthropomorphize animals, especially domesticated ones. According to Dr. Stanley Coren, a dual-trained animal and human psychologist, a dog can have the mental capacity of a 2 to 2 1/2 year-old human and the social consciousness of a teenager.
And we respond to them as such.
When owners are missing an extended social network, "dogs tend to become surrogates," says Coren. "They're stand-ins for other family members or friends."
Ninety-seven percent of visitors to PamperedPuppy.com are female, mostly women between the ages of 20 and 35 without children, or empty nesters.
"They don't need children anymore," McKaig explains, "but they'd still like someone in their life to spoil, take care of and nurture."
When you see a cocker spaniel being pushed around in a Jeep brand pet stroller, you have to wonder whether that assessment isn't right on the money. Literally.
Peg Claghorn will tell you it is.
"She's like one of my children, but she's better than any of them," Claghorn says of Miss Zoula, the five year-old Westie who lives with her and her husband in their Upper East Side apartment in New York.
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CITY DOG, COUNTRY DOG
Having a dog in the city presents somewhat of a common moral dilemma. Many city dwellers work away from home, leaving their canine friends in sometimes shoebox-sized apartments or with sitters.
This all seems to breed a unique sense of guilt, with sometimes strange expressions.
Witness the story of Molly Bennett, a film production secretary who lives in Brooklyn, N.Y. Her boss's bichon frise was so emotionally fragile, she wasn't allowed out of human sight. Ever.
"Say she wanted to run down the hall to get a cup of tea, and I was in the bathroom? She would wait for me to be back in the room before she'd leave," says Bennett, 26.
Many companies cater to this guilt. It's no accident that doggy day care centers got their foothold in major American cities like New York and Los Angeles first.
But a lot of trainers say urban pet owners can let go of the guilt (and the price tag of day care) as long as they walk the dog once or twice a day, set boundaries and make sure their pet's home life is enriching.
That can be as simple as an $8 rubber chew toy. Andrea Arden, one of New York City's most sought-after dog experts, recommends simple toys, like Busy Buddy's Twist 'n Treat, that make the animals work for their food, just as they would have in the wild.
"We buy them all these toys, but we don't take them for a walk," says a bemused Mark German, the man who calls himself "Arizona's 'Dog Whisperer.'" Meet the dog's needs as a dog first, he says -- then you can dress him up.
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TAIL AS OLD AS TIME
Despite the boom in luxe pet products, puppy pampering is not a modern invention.
Frederick the Great of Prussia had an entire wing of his palace dedicated to his dogs; the playwright Eugene O'Neill reportedly had a four-poster bed and an Hermès coat for his Dalmation; and you can bet the 130 to-date winners of the Westminster dog show were in for some serious coddling. ("Best in Show's" Busy Bee, anyone?)
But if guilt is the great motivator, disposable income is the enabler; and Americans, especially urban professionals, have more of that now than they have for much of history -- or at least they live like they do.
That's not to say what started as a trend of the rich and famous won't trickle down. It's already started.
"Most of the trainers I've talked to in other parts of the country, their owners don't seem to have the same sense of guilt," says Arden. "But that's changing. I think because of the Internet. People who live, say, in Wyoming, are starting to think, 'Oh, my dog needs to go get a spa rubdown.'"
Cyndy Douan is the owner of Kingston Kennels and a doggy gym in Rome, Ga., and the president of the International Association of Canine Professionals. She's been training dogs for sixteen years. Some of her most enthusiastic and indulgent clients live out in the country.
"I tell people, 'If you build it, they will come,'" says Douan.
Bet they'll come with their pups in a stroller and their wallets wide open.
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asap contributor Kathryn Williams is a freelancer based in New York. She dedicates this piece to her dearly departed Pekeapoo, Lucy.
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