Pet Products Host Cocktail Party
This sounds like fun! Have any Dogsters gone to one of these? Bark in!
This article comes from Monsters and Critics.com.
BOSTON – At Mickey’s first evening at a nightclub he listened to loud music, scarfed down appetizers and lapped up cocktails of chicken soup and beet juice instead of gin or vodka.
A 13-year-old Boston terrier, Mickey was among 50 dogs — and 250 humans — at a party in Boston by SkyBark, which began in Los Angeles. The gathering was aimed at marketing canine products while raising money for charity and is part of a new trend toward nightlife where humans are encouraged to bring their dogs.
Such parties are sponsored by companies marketing extravagant dog products, including all-natural, wheat-free dog treats at $11 a pound, synthetic-grass covered indoor porta-potties for $280 and leather jackets for $540.
Such goods are helping fuel growth in sales of pet products, which the American Pet Products Manufacturers Association estimates will rise 6 percent to a record $38.4 billion in 2006, including about $7 billion on dogs.
Canine cocktail parties give entrepreneurs a chance to push their high-priced wares to consumers who are drawn in by the chance to socialize with other dog lovers.
‘Dogs provide a way for people to get to know each other a little deeper than they ordinarily would. They serve as social facilitators,’ says Leslie Irvine, a University of Colorado at Boulder sociologist who studies human-animal behavior.
