FlexPetz turns a market dynamic upside down

The most interesting thing (in marketing terms) about FLEXPETZ, a company that lets customers rent a dog for a day, is how it turns a market on its head.

The market for pet services in the US is enormous, and all over the country, dog owners (including me) pay people to take care of their pets: boarding when you’re away, pet sitting, mid-day dog-walking, dog “day care” where the dog spends the day playing with other pups, and so on. All the companies providing these services have to hire people to do these things.

FlexPetz, on the the other hand, gets people to pay them for the privilege of taking care of a dog for a day. In business terms, that’s kind of brilliant.

Some people are horrified by the idea, not surprisingly. The New York Times wrote about FlexPetz recently. Some of the customers seem like nice people who really enjoy their rental dogs:

Stacy Faulkner, 39, is a Flexpetz client in San Diego. She has been married for 10 years and does not have children, she said, so “renting a dog can really fill a void.”

Two years ago, her 10 ½-year-old Rottweiler, Kaya, died.

“When you don’t have kids,” Mrs. Faulkner explained, “your animals are like your own children, or a new best friend.”

“Kaya was a great dog, and I really miss her,” she said. “I’m not ready yet to get another full-time dog — I can’t make that kind of emotional commitment.”

Others seem to have bought into the dog-as-accessory mindset that this business inevitably suggests:

Ms. Stevenson explained why she was a customer: “I’m single and moved here from Scotland two years ago, and it’s been difficult to meet people because everyone in New York just kind of goes about their business. But when I’m walking around with Oliver, I seem to get into so many conversations about him. It becomes a nice way to meet people.”

I really, really hope that there’s more to it than that.

I don’t have as strong a negative reaction as some, but as a dog lover, I have my share of concerns about the whole thing. First of all - dogs need homes. Dogs need some consistency and familiar faces. I think I would be more comfortable with FlexPetz if they made their customers (”members”) commit to some kind of regular schedule with the dogs. Their web site goes to great lengths to reassure you that the dogs are living good lives - it says that when they’re not being rented out, they live in a “home environment” with a primary caregiver - and that they screen the customers carefully to make sure they’re not getting someone who does not know how to handle a dog or is outright abusive to a dog.

And of course there’s the argument that becoming a FlexPetz dog is a better fate for a pup than winding up in a shelter and being euthanized if no one comes forward to adopt. Which is true, except… in order to be a rental dog, it seems to me that these dogs must be the more attractive and well trained dogs without homes out there. You can’t charge people money to spend a day with a dog with aggression issues or who is unfriendly to humans or who growls at every passerby. So these dogs would be, by the standards of shelter and rescue dogs out there, the most adoptable of the bunch. I’m not sure they are saving any canine lives here.

And what happens when one of these dogs gets old or sick? Are they sent out to the happy puppy farm in the country to live out their days? Or something less warm and fuzzy?

Then on a very personal note: bringing a puppy home can be hell; you have to have time and energy to teach him how to live among humans. It’s not like getting a cat, where you point out the litterbox, shoo him off the couch, give him a scratching post, and you’re set. (I’ve had plenty of cats in my life and love them, but this is reality: they’re easy. I can understand someone being intimidated by the idea of bringing a little bundle of pee- and poo-generating entropy into their home. But having done this in the past year, I can also say that when you get through that - and you do - you’ve got a bond with that animal. You’ve found reserves of patience you didn’t know you had. That dog is your companion forever, and for me at least that’s the best part of having a dog - more important than the walks in the park and the runs on the beach, as great as all that is.

Finally, what happens when someone wants to adopt a dog - say, one of the utterly appealing pups features on their web site? My guess is that for FlexPetz to give us a revenue-generating resource, some serious money has to change hands. Which makes me think of all those dogs in shelters, who are either already good dogs or with a bit of patient training and word will become awesome dogs, who aren’t getting homes.

I don’t know the answers to these questions. I certainly hope that the FlexPetz folks are as careful and ethical as the web site suggests. But I do have this comment for anybody ponying up $280 a month to take a dog home four days a month: Don’t you have any friends with dogs?

Seriously. Most of us with dogs wish we could spend more time with them, but we have those things like work and life that get in the way. We love having friends who are happy to take the pup to the park for an afternoon when we’ve got some commitment, or for an overnight when we’re out of town.

If you really don’t, put an ad on Craigslist offering free dog walks. You’ll find takers. You will have to prove that you know what you’re doing, but lots of us who spend money on these things would love to have someone we trust doing it for free. Win-win!

If anybody in Houston is thinking they’d spend $280 a month to rent a dog, please, come talk to me; I have a great dog who would love to go romp with a trusted friend while I’m busy with work some afternoon. And I won’t charge you anything. And no, you can never adopt him, but if you’re good with dogs, he’ll grow to love you like family - and if you want one of your own I’ll point you at the local rescue organization, where tons of dogs are looking for homes.

And that’s the marketing lesson here. If you have people paying for dog care, and people paying to care for dogs, then there’s a market disconnect. I can’t help but think that there’s an even better opportunity here: creating the marketplace to link those people together, so the dog lovers with no dogs and the dog lovers with dogs can connect with each other - for a lot less than $280 a month.

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