Why My Puppies are Free (Also known as “What Puppy Buyers Should Be Able to Expect from Breeders”)

irejectyour-reality:

And so, again fol­low­ing the advice of a far wiser breeder than I, when peo­ple ask me how much my pup­pies are, I tell them “They’re free. Or, if it makes you feel more com­fort­able, they’re what­ever the price of an aver­age shel­ter adop­tion is in your neigh­bor­hood. When and if we decide that this is a good match and you decide to get a puppy from me, you’ll be writ­ing me a check for [what­ever it is], but that check is actu­ally buy­ing ME. You are pay­ing for the right to call me, any time of the day or night, for the life of this dog. You’re pay­ing for me to be your train­ing assis­tant, your ded­i­cated board­ing ken­nel, your vet advo­cate, and your nutri­tional con­sul­tant. You are pay­ing me a research fee for mak­ing an edu­cated and smart deci­sion about which dog to breed to which dog. And you’re pay­ing me a retainer so that at any time in your dog’s life I will take back that dog, no ques­tions asked, no mat­ter the sit­u­a­tion, and you’re pay­ing me to take some very dif­fi­cult deci­sions off your hands.”

Really good read.

Seriously people, there ARE quality, responsible breeders out there.