From Puppy Rush to Puppy Glut

Have you noticed that there’s a lot of leftover puppy listings popping up on places like PuppySpot, PuppyFind, and other online puppy directories.

What we’re seeing now are puppies for sale that have gone past their eight-week “use by” date and are now 11 weeks old, 12 weeks old, and so on.

Why is this happening?

It’s happening because the puppy market has changed.

The last 12 – 18 COVID months got people really, really interested in owning a puppy. Why not?  They couldn’t travel and a lot of them were having to work from home or even homeschool their children.

So getting a puppy seemed like a really good idea for a lot of people. And it was a really good idea! A lot of people had been wanting a puppy for ages.  But their desire to travel and their need to go to work every day and leave that puppy alone put them off.

COVID was their opportunity to have the perfect circumstances for getting a new puppy in their lives.

But guess what? It’s all over. It’s finished. And you can see that when you’re looking at the listings online.

Puppies are not only starting to get leftover, prices are starting to drop.

The other thing that happened during the COVID puppy rush is, of course, prices went through the roof and anyone could sell pretty much anything for pretty much any money because the demand was so much higher than the supply.

That had a follow-on effect: a lot of people who weren’t breeding before started breeding.

And established breeders have bred more puppies to meet the demand, thinking that it was going to stay strong.

Unfortunately, this is not the case.

What this means now if you’re a dog breeder, is that competition is going to be fierce from here on.

You can see the drop in demand quite clearly by checking the number of Google searches for “puppies for sale”.

Have a look at the number of searches being done right now in USA, for example.  You will notice that it has gone down to the pre-COVID levels.

And this is the same across the board in Australia, and Canada, and in most Western countries.

So the demand’s gone back down to pre-COVID, basically “normal” demand.

But unfortunately, the supply has gone up because breeders have bred more puppies thinking that the market wouldn’t change and it has suddenly changed.

Those puppies are now leftover. And you might be wondering, “Is it wise to breed at all if I can’t sell them?”

Obviously at the moment it isn’t.  But oops…  given lots of matings would have already happened, and it could take a few months for breeders to realize what’s happening, there is bound to be another 6 or more months of excess babies coming through before the glut starts to wane.

So, what can you do?

The thing is… there’s always going to be demand at the top of the market for exceptional puppies, and there always will be.

Where the market is hugely crowded, is where there are “mediocre” breeders (that is, not them but their marketing is mediocre).

The fact is that the majority of breeders haven’t already – and don’t know how to – take care of the business side of their breeding.

And they’re all now in competition with each other on crowded puppy websites at the bottom and middle of the market.

Compare that to the top of the market where top-end buyers are looking for exceptional canine companions – It is still going to be a fairly easy and exclusive market to attract if you know what you’re doing online.

Breeders who know what they’re doing in their business will rise above the competition and snag the best owners and prices for their puppies.

Don’t want to be crushed under the competition?  Want to actually make your breeding business work for you?  Want to get paid what you’re worth for turning out fabulous canine companions to grateful owners who are willing to wait for the privilege of owning one of your puppies?

Then you really need to hop on to the masterclass for some FREE training, and learn about the three steps that will make that happen for you.

If you’re really interested in being viable as a breeder then you owe it to yourself to at least watch the free masterclass.

And if you’re serious, then after watching the webinar, get on a free mentoring call with me. I’d love to talk to you and I don’t bite!   So I hope to speak to some of you soon.   Enjoy the webinar and good luck with your dog breeding.