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Financial Crisis Dogs Pet Industry
Jacquelyn Martin / AP Photo
Canine mineral water! Parrot outerwear! Capitalism was running amok at this week’s Global Pet Expo. But look closely, and you could see that the sour economy was hounding even our four-legged friends.
Lehman Brothers may be dead and GM may be reeling, but the Global Pet Expo is going strong. On Friday, the second morning of the gargantuan trade show in Orlando, Florida, I was standing in the Parrot Wrapz booth listening to the brother-and-sister team of Jesse and Bonnie Scheflin explain how it was that they decided, in the maw of the great recession, to start manufacturing outerwear for parrots. “We were going to relocate to Colorado,” Bonnie says, “and all I cared about was, ‘Oh my God, how are we going to keep the parrots warm?’”
There’s a firm selling glow-in-the-dark mice—they’ve been implanted with a jellyfish protein—around the corner from the designer offering nickel-plated porcelain water bowls and the freeze-dried raw New Zealand lamb dinner brand.
Eureka! Forty seamstresses later the Scheflins settled on a parrot suit whose oblong holes fit over the bird’s wings and whose colorful designs include logos of football teams, camouflage, and tartan. The Global Pet Expo is their big debut. The chain-store buyers prowling the floor, Bonnie says, are interested. “You can dress your dog and you can dress your cat, but there’s nothing for parrots. Until now.” She pointed to the outfits emblazoned with avian-specific catch-phrases—i.e., Do These Feathers Make Me Look Fat? “This really reflects their personalities.”
Laugh if you will. But in this year of extreme hardship, someone has to have some faith. By the time you got to the obscure patches of the multi-acre Global Pet Expo show floor, you tended to have had a lot of such conversations: A bright idea, a lot of elbow grease, and a limitless belief in Americans’ willingness to buy for their animals even as they scrimped for themselves. The pet industry appears to be weathering the storm. Show organizers say prepaid attendance is actually up over previous years. “We’re as recession-resistant as any industry I can think of,” says Bob Vetere, whose American Pet Products Association hosts the annual show.
Thus, as if I’d stepped into a pre-crash time capsule, I can report that I have seen dog beds in the shape of giant Crocs clogs. I have examined toys that promise mental enrichment for fishes. I have listened to all sorts of promises about the organic, all-natural, holistic, and/or human-grade ingredients in a vast range of new pet foods. I have looked over high-tech dog collars loaded with a behavior-regulating pheromone. I have seen Chinese herbal veterinary medicines whose come-ons tout “ancient wisdom…proven results.” I have met a man who says he used to be the world’s biggest manufacturer of Glad-Bag cartons and watched him work the floor in the name of his new product: doggie smoothies.
And I found myself sufficiently sucked into the spectacle’s envelope-pushing technology that I really wanted to ask follow-up questions of the man carrying a box marked “URINE OFF: THE NAME SAYS IT ALL.”
I had, in other words, a very successful couple of days at the Global Pet Expo.
As measured by media attention, Global Pet Expo was only the second-biggest pet-oriented event of last week. But unlike the Westminster Dog Show, the trade fair allows us to accurately assess the state of our modern pet-crazed country. For years, the American pet industry has been growing like a six-month-old lab. Estimated at $23 billion a decade ago, it did $41 billion in business in 2007. The trade shows have grown with it. Two years ago, actors dressed as Roman centurions rolled out a new line of dog treats. Last year, in San Diego, the show filled 2,400 booths as visitors jostled for space in front of displays of canine mineral water.
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I'm continually amazed by how many Americans value their pets over people.
Definitely not just Americans...but it is rather tragicomedic, at times.
First of all, Americans aren't unique in loving their pets. If anything, it's a Western quality: the French, English, and many other Europeans demonstrate what could be called indulgent behavior toward pets.
I don't think it's a question of valuing pets "over" people, it's rather a demonstration that many people have esteem for their pets, who provide them with unconditional love. There are many, many lonely people in this society of alienation, and being able to emotionally connect with a pet is a mental salvation for many who otherwise would suffer greatly from loneliness.
But don't anyone let that stop you from sneering, and demanding that any resources at all directed toward pets be appropriated instead for people.
and what keeps parrots from ripping their pricey outerwear to shreds?
Sadly, the U.S. isn't the most humane country in the world. In most European countries, it's illegal to dock dogs' ears and tails as well as declaw cats--a nice way of saying multiple digital amputations.
Google my name, Scott Rose, along with words like diamond collars for dogs or Marilyn Monroe dog dress and you'll find the dozens of articles I've written involving this very phenomenon.
Does anyone believe that the lavish goodies owners bestow on their pets are actually for the pets?
I've yet to see a yorkie pining over a burberry jacket.
Rittrohs says "Sadly, the U.S. isn't the most humane country in the world. In most European countries, it's illegal to dock dogs' ears and tails as well as declaw cats--a nice way of saying multiple digital amputations."
Docking tails and dew claws is not evil, it just is made to seem so by the PETA People, who want to do away with pets entirely. Hunting and herding dogs in particular are docked and dew claws removed to prevent injuries to the dogs when they are working. A ripped dew claw on an adult dog is not only terribly painful, it also causes heavy bleeding and animal may bleed to death before he receives mediccal attention. Same goes for tails: If my Corgi is herding cattle, or clearing rats out of the barn, and his tail is injured, he then faces amputation as an adult.
Tails and dew claws are done before the pups are 5 days old, usually on the first or second day before their nervous systems are fully functional. I can band a tail, and the pup doesn't even fuss once it plugs back into his mothers teat.
Breeders are pretty damn careful when it comes to their puppies, whether they breed for Show, or commercially, the investment in a litter is too much to simply torture babies for fun! Have you ever priced Stud Fees, C-Sections, DNA testing for health clearances, or microchipping and registering half a dozed pups at one time? Then there are the shots and all the feed, plus the laundry and clean-up work. This is not a project that is based on poor or deficient care.
A pup that is mistreated grows into a shy, distrustful dog. He's not very people oriented, and may have an aggressive temperament from mishandling. Just like abused children, abused animals are often the ones who are abandoned or sent to the dog pound. Criminals like Vic who make money by torturing animals because they can, should be prosecuted and not allowed to own any animals. People who do everything possible to raise healthy, happy pets should be encouraged, not harassed.
Another factor to be considered is the cost of enforcing all these extreme Animal Control Laws. It is bad enough that you cannot drive into town without being under observation by the law, now they want to hire a bunch of neo-nazis to peek in windows and arrest people who dare to do something declared 'inhumane' by people who don't know what they are talking about.
I'd rather spend my Animal Control dollars an enforcing the leash laws, and making sure people aren't raising vicious animals or using them for fighting and other obscene practices.
Who knows, I might even give the Corgi Crew a bunch of new toys with the money I save on attorney fees!
Sadly, I just realized I will click on any story that has a photo of a Pug as a lead-in...
Thank you.
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