paul joseph (above) march 2015 BCBusiness 19
last November. "The dog busi-
ness is booming in Vancouver,
and Vancouver is a very dog-
friendly city," notes Thomas,
who counts more than 80 inde-
pendent dog daycares in Van-
couver. "It means that there's a
huge business out there."
His goal is to establish 40
Dogtopia locations across
Canada within a decade, with
stores already in the works for
Victoria, Calgary and Winnipeg.
The franchise fee is $42,500, but
the total investment is closer to
$400,000 to $500,000 depend-
ing on the location. Finding a
building that will allow dogs
can be a challenge, according
to Chris Aconley, Dogtopia's
regional manager for West-
ern Canada and owner of the
Coquitlam store, but "when
we talk to the landlord and we
say we've got Peter
Thomas behind
us, that helps them
accept us as a busi-
ness. His connec-
tions are opening so
many doors."
Franchisees
receive training in
marketing, brand-
ing, customer
service and espe-
cially dog behaviour.
"The spending we
as a culture have on
our pets is crazy,
and we want to be a
part of that, but we
want to do it in a way that we're
taking care of the dogs properly,"
says Aconley. He adds that the
company is encouraging local
and provincial governments
to develop standards for how
dogs are cared for. "Any kind of
service where you are in the care
of someone else's animal, it's like
being in the care of their child.
There should be some rules and
regulations around that."
•
Let's Get Together
Hot dogs!
total canadian
retail sales of
pet products and
services*
N u m e r o l o g y
25,000 t H e r o u g H n u m b e r
of hotel rooms in the city of vancouver. "Day-
to-day travellers may not come to vancouver
[during a big conference] but might come
before or after," says Gazley. "it extends the demand."
48,000
t H e n u m b e r a n t i C i pat e d to arrive for
the alcoholics anonymous convention coming
to vancouver in july 2025–now the largest
conference in vancouver's history or horizon
(if you don't count the olympics).
By Melissa Edwards
canadian retail
sales of non-med-
ical pet services
(grooming, board-
ing, training)
The estimated number of
attendees and support staff
arriving this month for Vancou-
ver's second run at hosting the
annual
TED Talks. While TED swings above its weight in terms
of PR for Vancouver, like last year, it's not going to swamp the
streets. "But
TED has so
many intangible benefits to
Vancouver's reputation,"
says Dave Gazley, VP of
meetings and conventions
for Tourism Vancouver.
"Others say, 'If you're cool
enough for
TED, you might
be cool enough for us.'"
*source: canadian pet market outlook 2014, packaged Facts, a division of marketresearch.com
15,300 t H e n u m b e r o f
attendees expected at this summer's World
congress of Dermatology–larger than last year's
siGGraph computer graphics convention, which
was, to date, vancouver's biggest professional conference.
1,800
2012 $6.3 b
2013 $6.58 b
(up 4.4%)
spent on dogs
66%
2012 $900 m
2013 $959 m
(up 6.5%)
spent on dogs
90%
TED star
Bill Gates.
