How Much ???

[Whippets4eva]

Join our free community today.

Connect with other like-minded dog lovers!

Login or Register

I'm putting vixen to a standard poodle in the spring to develope a new designer working dog i'm going to call the pups a whippypoo. They will be fantastic working pups and a snip at £999. A full handwritten pedigree will be available as well as a puppy pack. :sweating: :sweating: .
On a more serous note. You see adverts for whippet pups for silly prices and when you contact them for the pedigree details they have to look them up!!!. I've recently been looking for a well bred fawn bitch but i've given up due to lack of litters or the breeders refusing point blank on there pups going to working homes (they would sooner them go to pet homes). I find this very selfish as i look after my dogs, they are exercised twice a day and are kept in tip top FIT condition. You can't say that with all pet homes.

I don't mind paying for a well bred whippet pup but £800 thats a bit over the top. £400-£550 is what i'd expect to pay and i think thats reasonable when you take into account stud fees, rearing etc. Plus if you work it out over the life of the whippet it will work out less than a pound a week..

pmsl :lol: :lol: (w00t) (w00t)

 

[AnnSa]

I've recently been looking for a well bred fawn bitch but i've given up due to lack of litters or the breeders refusing point blank on there pups going to working homes (they would sooner them go to pet homes). I find this very selfish as i look after my dogs, they are exercised twice a day and are kept in tip top FIT condition. You can't say that with all pet homes.
I don't mind paying for a well bred whippet pup but £800 thats a bit over the top. £400-£550 is what i'd expect to pay and i think thats reasonable when you take into account stud fees, rearing etc. Plus if you work it out over the life of the whippet it will work out less than a pound a week..

I was lucky i found my well bred fawn bitch and got her at a fair price

 

But i don't understand the problem anyone had when you told them you

were going to work your's.

Do they not understand the amount of training that goes into a true

working dog, the bond that builds up between you and your dog. It's

hard to imagine what they are objecting to.........

 

[Esty]

He is a stunning dog, I'm not disputing that, and maybe she was doing it to ensure good homes (though it doesn't always follow that the poeple with the most money offer the best homes.) But she could have sold him for, say 600 and still got all her expenses and time reimbursed. Perhaps she's trying to compensate for you possibly breeding from him and bringing more ridgebacks to the market? I don't know the answer, but I still think that's an awful lot of money. And the best pedigree in the world doesn't insure you against illnesses that develop later on - it doesn't make him more healthy than other dogs. I can see your point - if you respected this woman and her relationship with the pups then obviously you would rather go to her than someone you weren't so sure of.

 

[~Annie~]

This notion that any dog is worth more on the basis of pedigree is surely fundamentally flawed. Few dogs are fault free and even dogs with multiple CC's won't be perfect so what matters is the good match of (appropriately healthchecked) sire and dam. I have a dachsie with a wonderful pedigree but sire and dam share a very minor fault that is a major fault in him, where in them the "very slightly turned out" front feet of the breed standard is a smidgen exaggerated he has a dual angular limb deformity that will need surgery but that only became evident as he grew.

Surely the cost of a puppy should reflect the costs to the breeder both material and in terms of time and effort and perhaps take account of supply and demand - I don't have a problem with someone charging more for a rare breed pup - but £800 for a whippet pup is just plain greedy.

Annie

 

[Seraphina]

Surely the cost of a puppy should reflect the costs to the breeder both material and in terms of time and effort
Annie

Absolutely, and somebody just looking at puppy ads cannot judge the cost of the litter. The costs may vary enormously from one litter to another and it has nothing to do with pedigrees.

*One breeder may use their own dog, that means no stud fee, feed reasonably priced kibble, keep the litter in a kennel pen, which they clean 2x a day. All acceptable practice.

*On the other hand I look for the best dog for my bitch and more often than not find one some distance away; that means not just stud fee and airfares, but also progesterone testing (usually 4-5 blood tests) besides the usual swab for infection. That all means that by the time the bitch comes back mated I have already outlaid about the asking price of 2 pups. From about the 4th week after mating the bitch starts to eat more, and by the time she has her pups she is getting about 3x her normal ration, considering that i feed only human consumption grade meat, the cost is noticeable. When the pups are born there is the vet fee for him coming here for check-up. Then few days later he comes to do the dewclaws. I wean my pups on goats milk, which costs more than double that of other milks, and then they start getting top quality meat - skinless chicken fillets or lean beef, human consumption grade. By the time they are 9 weeks I am spending couple of hundreds of dollars a week feeding them. Then they are microchipped, vaccinated and registered. And then there are those hidden costs; their bedding is washed at least 2 loads a day, there is extra heating, and i go through several bottles of bleach and disinfectant a week. It is normal for my electricity bill for the time I have pups to be some $500 -$600 higher than is normal for that time of the year. As the pups are kept inside I also clean continuously, and when they start going outside to the garden i also have to clean continuously the patio. If I need to go out for more than the normal quick trip to the shops I pay puppy sitter to look after them. For me it is a full time job and in the end of it, when the pups are sold I am just glad if I broke even and hope the puppy i kept is the right one

And that is just when nothing goes wrong. If the bitch need help whelping Sunday 1am, the trip to emergency vet clinic will add considerable amount on the costs. Or if the pups get sick... i have had litters where i did not re-coup even half of the costs.

 

[Hula]

I really don't see anyones problem with £800 for a whippet pup .

I have had whippets for a very long time now and I know exactly the sort of whippet pup I will be buying hopefully later this year from a breeder I have bought pups from before and they were fantastic . If that is the price of the pup I want then that's fine . I expect to have the pup for around 14 years it will be a huge part of my life and money doesn't come into it .

 

[~Annie~]

I don't have a problem with paying £800 for any pup per se, and accept that sometimes, particularly if vets bills etc. were high and a litter small you could be selling pups at that price at a considerable loss. But I have shopped twice in the last two years or so for whippet pups and found some very special, very well bred, well cared for dogs at much less than that ... those charging more were generally selling less well bred puppies but were out to make money. One local chap was selling blue KC reg pups from coursing lines but parents unproven for £650 even though they were raised in a stable and never socialised and were not particularly well fed. He was breeding for profit and again although I don't have a problem per se with breeders making a profit I do if that is their reason for breeding in the first place. The third time I went whippy puppy shopping I wasn't really intending to buy but was adopted by Tyg who wouldn't leave my side and has rarely done so since ... don't tell his breeder I said this but it was so clear that Tyg was meant to be my and my OH's dog that I would have paid somewhat more than he was asking even though conformationally speaking Tyg is far from perfect. My point being that at the end of the day the price people are prepared to pay is as much about perception and personal circumstance as it is supply and demand but that if the going rate for a KC reg whippet is £400-£500 and even well respected breeders are only charging those kind of sums then paying significantly more is more likely to mean that you are being fleeced than that you are geting a better 'product'.

Annie

 

[affieluver]

I really don't see anyones problem with £800 for a whippet pup .I have had whippets for a very long time now and I know exactly the sort of whippet pup I will be buying hopefully later this year from a breeder I have bought pups from before and they were fantastic . If that is the price of the pup I want then that's fine . I expect to have the pup for around 14 years it will be a huge part of my life and money doesn't come into it .

well i certainly would never pay £800 for a whippet when i know i could buy one that has been reared with just as much love care and devotion and the mother has been heart tested for a lot less but each to their own i guess :thumbsup:

 

[rls22]

I completely agree Annie.

For our last litter, both parents have proved to be very successful in the ring, the sire has produced some lovely quality pups, both parents underwent extensive heart testing. Our pups are raised in the home with children from day one, handled on daily basis and socialised with the other whippets. Weaned on to high quality raw diet, as well as all the other expenses associated with raising a litter - removal of dew claws, vet checks before leaving us, worming, vet bedding, registration etc etc. We still would not charge anything near the sum of money I see on some websites and well £800 is just disgusting and anyone asking that for a whippet puppy is purely driven by greed.

I must add that even if Ruby had only had two in the litter, the price for the pup we sold would have remained the same.

 

[Dar Khan]

Just recently returned from a six week stay in France ,bringing with me my new pack member . Wont say how much was paid but you would be suprised and not shocked .

 

[Suerose]

Just recently returned from a six week stay in France ,bringing with me my new pack member . Wont say how much was paid but you would be suprised and not shocked .

Would love to see a picture of him/her

 

[Hula]

I have honestly no idea how much the pup I will be buying will be since it's 14 years since I bought one . However the point I am making is that when you want to buy from a specific breeder and you have had one of their pups live to be 15 and another live to be 14 and they have both been fantastic then money is irrelevant .

I would not be going to a different breeder just because they were cheaper .

 

[quintessence]

I don't have a problem with paying £800 for any pup per se, and accept that sometimes, particularly if vets bills etc. were high and a litter small you could be selling pups at that price at a considerable loss. But I have shopped twice in the last two years or so for whippet pups and found some very special, very well bred, well cared for dogs at much less than that ... those charging more were generally selling less well bred puppies but were out to make money. One local chap was selling blue KC reg pups from coursing lines but parents unproven for £650 even though they were raised in a stable and never socialised and were not particularly well fed. He was breeding for profit and again although I don't have a problem per se with breeders making a profit I do if that is their reason for breeding in the first place. The third time I went whippy puppy shopping I wasn't really intending to buy but was adopted by Tyg who wouldn't leave my side and has rarely done so since ... don't tell his breeder I said this but it was so clear that Tyg was meant to be my and my OH's dog that I would have paid somewhat more than he was asking even though conformationally speaking Tyg is far from perfect. My point being that at the end of the day the price people are prepared to pay is as much about perception and personal circumstance as it is supply and demand but that if the going rate for a KC reg whippet is £400-£500 and even well respected breeders are only charging those kind of sums then paying significantly more is more likely to mean that you are being fleeced than that you are geting a better 'product'.Annie

I agree so much with your last sentence Annie, these breeders have put so much time and effort into planning these puppies, they do not breed on a whim they breed when the time is right for the bitch, themselves and the breed. I would imagine not many of these breeders make very much out of a litter of puppies carefully reared, but this is where we have the difference because good breeders reap their reward in seeing their puppies go on to do well in their chosen discipline, safely settled in their homes, content that they have given their puppies the very best start in life.

Jenny

 

[k4tie-d]

i have a question a,

lets say you have a bitch with the best breeding who has proven herself in the ring/field and you put her to a stud with the best breeding who is also proven in the ring/field, (this is their first litter)

you put the price on the pups as you think is fair, and a few years down the line the pups are all doing amazing in the ring/field.

you then decided you want to repeat that litter as the last did so well, would the price of the pups go up due to the succsess of the last litter? or does it stay the same as technically the costs are still the same?

just reading through this thread has got me thinking about alot of things and as we will probabily be looking for a pup next year its a good thing to think about ie, the price we would be happy to pay and what actually makes up that price :b

 

[rls22]

For us it would remain the same.

 

[~Annie~]

I bought a pup from a repeat mating such as you describe and didn't pay any more for it than the going price.

Annie

 

[Seraphina]

But who determines "the going price"? And I just wonder how do people set their puppy prices?

I have to admit, in the past, I have never bothered to add all the costs, I sold my pups for about the same i saw others advertising them. Then about 25 years ago I was involved in breeding a Borzoi litter with my friend - my dog, her bitch, i whelped them and reared them, we split the costs. So i kept record, and was totally floored how much it cost. There was not much demand for Borzois, and pups were often run on for many months, and placed to loving homes for fraction of the cost of producing them. But I often wonder why people pay small fortune for some breeds, and in others they expect the breeder to give them in fact a present of several hundreds of dollars.

Nowadays, I do keep records of the costs, and aim for breaking even. With my last litter of only 5 pups I ended up to be out of pocket few hundreds of dollars - and that is not counting such things like dry beds, which i get new for each of my litters. You'd think that by now i have enough of puppy pens etc. but every litter there is something else i need.

I cannot judge if 800 pounds for pup in UK is too much or not, but from what I read here on k9 the price of meat and veterinary care varies enormously; for instance people in UK pay anything from couple of pounds to 35 pounds per puppy for dewclaws removal.

I am sure that there are people who do everything on cheap, and try to get top price, but I think that you will find that they will most likely not get what they are asking.

 

[Seraphina]

By the way; as far as i know, I sell my pups for pretty much what other breeders from our club are selling theirs.

 

[JAX]

God end of post Anne as Raclhel pointed out

Im sure whippets still have a `flat cap`image with some folk , hense , believe it or not , we are one of the cheapest pedigree dogs to buy

We have clients come to work with their new puppies,having paid £1300.00 for a Pug ( not show bred either ) £1000 for a cocker spaniel , £900.00! for a `tea` cup chi , not registered although she thought it would be and then of course you get £700.00 for F2 Labradoodles £650 for cockerpoos and the list goes on

So why should whippets be `so cheap ?

My first whippet Simon I paid £85.00 for. from one of the top kennels in the country if not the world ( at the time )

I think the average weekly wage at that time was about £80.00 if my memory serves me right

 

[rls22]

Off topic Jax, but what the hell is a tea cup chi?!! :lol: