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April 24, 2007
The puppy sale
I first saw this sign in my neighborhood pet store six months ago. It's still there today, now faded from months of exposure to sunlight.
Most sales are an inducement for bargain-hunters to buy inventory that didn't sell as well as buyers had hoped.
But when a sale is for your key product, the product that creates the strongest emotional bonds, or generates the greatest number of "where did you get that" questions, a puppy sale doesn't fool anyone. It devalues every other product, the store and the experience. It devalues social capital and word of mouth currency.
It says, "We don't understand loyalty because we're not loyal to our most valuable products. Buyer beware."
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I think it might be something different. There are a lot of people who are almost ready to buy a dog. Not necessarily smart people, people who might buy from a puppy mill without really thinking about it.
The word 'sale' has become a signal in American culture. It means, "suspend reason, hurry in, buy."
The combination of the two might actually be pretty potent.
Did you ask the proprietor what the reason was for having a season-long puppy sale? Did he have a valid reason for doing this?
It gives me the creeps, but not because it's necessarily bad marketing. I'm one of those people who thinks that if want a dog because you want a loyal furry friend, you go to an animal shelter and you take home a dog who otherwise is going to be put to sleep.
If you are a a serious enthusiast looking for some kind of purebred, sure, you buy a dog. But if you just want a pet, buying a dog feels like buying a child to me.
So the sign does tell me "These are not good people, don't go in there," but I think that has more to do with my feelings about pet ownership.
I have a different take on this situation. The puppies in this case are the "razors" from the "razor and razor blade" sales model. I would venture to guess that the pet store makes more revenue and margin from on-going sales of pet supplies and pet food than from the actual sale of the pets themselves. Therefore, the more pets they move the more product they will move over the next 10-15 years (or whatever the lifetime of the pet is).
Seth -- Entirely conceivable idea, especially for customers who haven't paid attention to the store's never-ending "sale." I fear that the type of customer you describe is probably also likely to dump the dog off at the pound a month later because they can't handle the commitment. The non-loyalists have a common bond.
Kevin -- No, I didn't get in to the investigative aspects of it. Just kept noticing the sign week after week, month after month.
John -- I'm totally with ya about strong feelings of pet ownership. It only takes a few minutes of Googling to discover the multitude of sins presented by puppy mills and the stores that cater to them.
Roark -- Interesting theory. The dogs may be an inducement for passersby to come in. It was for me. It only took a few minutes, though, to soak in the store environment and realize that it wasn't the type of place to which I'd want to return.
