© Mike SiegelPants for Dogs are "panties with panache" developed by Neena Pellegrini of Seattle. They come in many sizes for all breeeds. The pants for English bulldogs and French bulldogs have no tail hole, because a tail hole is irrelevent for that breed.
Dog lovers are a resolute lot when it comes to solving their pets' problems.
Pants for Dogs: For protective purposes
Sounds crazy to anyone who hasn't had a dog with a bit of an incontinence/dribbling problem, or a female dog that hasn't been fixed. But those of us who have owned and loved such a dog have spent more than a few minutes wishing Depends came in canine configurations.
Neena Pellegrini to the rescue.
She's the founder of Pants for Dogs (pantsfordogs.com), a little Seattle-based cottage industry filling hundreds of orders for tiny- to massive-sized panties for female dogs, and, for male dogs, items she calls cummerbunds (although the waist isn't, in a precise sense, the true target, of course). Each garment in its own way protects rugs, floors and whatever else needs protecting from the drips and streams we'd rather not contemplate (and certainly not discuss).
The business started four years ago when Pellegrini's little male dog kept marking her little female dogs. A training issue, most would say. But improvement doesn't happen overnight. How do you protect the girls?
She found some canine "belly bands" marketed for more or less that purpose, but the fit wasn't great, the elastic chafed, and the durability was less than ideal. So Pellegrini re-thought the concept, came up with some design specifications and found a seamstress willing to stitch some up.
Folks started asking about them, and Pellegrini, a journalist by trade, decided to perfect the cummerbund design even further, get a few dozen made "more as an amusement, really, just to see what might happen," and came up with a design for girl dogs. Pretty soon she was plying her attractively patterned creations - into which a sanitary napkin is slipped - online.
Many of her customers are owners of female purebreds that need a little something when they come into season. So in recent days, during Westminster, Pellegrini has set up a booth in the dog-friendly hotel across from Madison Square Garden, joining a handful of other dog-products vendors.
Pellegrini recently applied for a patent and began selling "thongs," little wisps of protection for female dogs inspired by the need of poodle owners to obtain panties that don't crush those hip poms called "rosettes."
You might imagine only owners of froufrou dogs have interest in these things. You would be wrong. There's big demand for her products - offered in a colorful array of patterns, including dragonfly, flags and bones - in sizes intended for Great Danes and bull mastiffs.
Show dog owners are only half her clientele. The rest are owners of "pets with medical or age problems who are desperate" to find something with the right fit and functionality, she says. "They've seen those pet diapers in pet stores, maybe tried them, and they're just not right."
© unknownFor female poodles, the Pants for Dogs line has "thongs," inspired by the need of poodle owners to obtain panties that don't crush those hip poms called rosettes.
The cummerbunds go for $20 to $25, depending on whether you're attiring a terrier or a Saint Bernard; the female ones go for $25 to $35 (and you can get panties with ruffles for a little more if you think your dog would enjoy something more obviously girlie).
Some owners buy them in several colors.
Pellegrini regularly tweaks something here and there to fine-tune her offerings. She devised panties minus tail hole, for example, for English bulldogs and French bulldogs, breeds that, well, have no need for such an opening.
"My basement is filled with pants for dogs," she says with a laugh. Something she never anticipated when she set about solving a personal pet problem.
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