Showsight - June 2018

The Seven Secrets to Show Success Have a Lot of Money or Know Where to Find It BY MICHAEL AND CATHY DUGAN

with Milan Lint and Peggy Helming, Digit’s owners and dined with them in New York at Westminster laughing about how hard we tried to beat each other. Ladybug had a great year we thought with 88 Best of Breeds, 41 group wins, a Best in Show and Best of Opposite at Westminster. The price tag for this fun? Only eighty grand for the year. THAT YEAR REALLY WAS “CHEAP” By now we were still relative rookies at this level of show- ing but we were learning from our mistakes. Now we knew it was going to take a much more detailed and comprehensive campaign that would include the professional handler, bet- ter bonuses, entries, photos, vet expenses, travel and lodg- ing, postage and most important advertising. We’ll talk about each of these areas. ADVERTISING? FOR WHAT? In Ladybug’s first year, we spent $17,000 for 19 ads in major dog publications only to discover we were just learning about how important this program was for successful dog careers. There are national dog magazines, group publications and breed magazines. All of these are focused on different mar- kets and you need to be in all of them to market your dog. The national magazines include ShowSight, Dogs in Review, Dog News, and the Canine Chronicle. For the Working Group we worked with The Working Dog Digest and for our breed, we looked to The Courier. We also learned how important it is to find a really creative ad designer who can create a theme and build a brand around your dog. We found Derek Glas after the first year and our ads really stood out in the magazines as he developed the Ladybug theme. Many of these magazines are distributed at dog shows around the country, mailed to subscribers and, most impor- tant, mailed to AKC judges. At the average dog show, it’s near- ly impossible for dog judges to know which dogs belong to what owner or kennel, nor are they supposed to think about that. Over the course of several years, we tracked 350 judges who judged PWDs and found to our relief that AKC judges are generally competent, fair-minded and impartial. Are there some who have some bias about curly versus wavy hair or lion cut versus retriever cut? Sure, but very few. FINDING A GOOD DOG To campaign a dog, however, requires that you create a “buzz” among judges and the fancy. In sports of all kinds, including pooches, everyone likes to root for a winner (your direct competition excluded). We discovered that the more Ladybug won, the better known she became and judges and show participants looked for her in the ring. Judges talk to each other (no surprise there), and when they find an out- standing example of a breed they often pass that informa- tion along. By the time Ladybug finished her career with 20 BIS, 88 group ones, 170 groups placements, 300 Best of Breeds and multiple wins at big shows and specialties, there were few judges who had not seen her in the ring. In addi- tion to that, we ramped up our advertising to well over $70,000 a year. Finally, it’s important to meet and build a relationship with editors. They have incredible experience and judgment about the dog world and can be invaluable with generous advice. In almost every case, these editors have been in the dog fancy for

I remember a few years ago watching a cute dog win his group at Westminster and was particularly interested because I admired the Hollywood celebrity who owned the handsome gent. I casually asked, “What does it cost to show a dog and win that many Best in Shows?” The reply stunned me. The answer was a reputed three-quarters of a million dollars. “How could that be?” I continued. The old hand, a long time friend of Cathy’s, looked at me with kind- ness as though I was his somewhat dim-witted nephew and explained to me about shows attended across the country every weekend, huge handler contracts, advertising and inci- dentals including photos, entries and bonuses. But then a dog named “Ladybug” came along and we pon- dered the unthinkable: campaigning Ladybug to go to the next level. We had watched our dogs compete at Westminster and the AKC Nationals, not to mention our breed Regional’s and Nationals and we had always done well; sometimes win- ning major prizes. We also watched dogs actually win Groups and Best in Shows and realized we weren’t quite there yet. We talked about what it meant to make a large financial and time commitment and explored what it really takes to compete at a whole different level. We knew enough success- ful owners and professional handlers to develop a plan and goals for Ladybug and decided to try it for a year. After all, it was only money; a lot of money. Fellow fanciers finished a dog with over 100 Best in Shows and intimated that he only spent about half a million for that result. We knew we were not in that league and decided to campaign on the “cheap”. “CHEAP” IS A RELATIVE TERM Ladybug’s first year was on the east coast with a compe- tent breeder/handler and she started winning group place- ments almost immediately. Within six months she was grab- bing group ones and then finally popped a “Best in Show” under Judge Ken McDermott in Chester Valley, PA. We read the email from the handler and Cathy cried in joy at Lady- bug’s first BIS. Cathy had won a Best in Show with a Dalma- tian in Alaska several years before but this was a real BIS at a big show on the east coast. The hook had been set and off we went. In her first year of major competition, Ladybug finished as the number two Portuguese Water Dog in the country. The number one PWD, CH Pouchcove’s Monkey See Monkey Do, “Digit”, beat Ladybug on the last day of the year at the last show of the year, winning by only 24 breed points for the number one spot. We had also enjoyed a friendly competition

38 • S how S ight M agazine , J une 2018

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