The Ruby Reese Dog Survey 2024
RESULTS
About the Ruby Reese Dog Survey 2024
The Cork-based dog brand Ruby Reese organised this survey to help us all better understand the dog community in Ireland. In total we had 1041 participants living on the island of Ireland complete the full survey - incomplete survey responses as well as those submitted by residents of other countries are not included here. The survey was promoted at markets and dog events around the country as well as on ruby-reese.com, Instagram, Facebook and TikTok between 19th of May and 9th of August 2024.
About Ruby Reese
Ruby Reese is a Cork-based dog brand that was originally inspired by Ruby, the founder's French Bulldog and her sensitive skin and food allergies. This has led to a focus on short ingredients lists of high-quality ingredients for our pets. In the first two years since launching the small company, Ruby Reese has brought out a range of nutritional supplements, a brilliantly sensitive dog shampoo and natural grain-free treats to delight the dog-lovers of Ireland.
Dog friendly Ireland
Opportunities for improvement exist in many areas of public life
The dog lovers of Ireland have spoken and have been very clear with 96.6% agreeing that Ireland still has quite some way to go with regards dog friendliness. With most recent estimates accounting for around half a million dogs in Ireland, it is a sizeable population that feels underserved. There are many indications that businesses from the hospitality sector could do well by increasing their dog-friendliness with 97.5% of respondents saying they go out of their way to support dog-friendly businesses at least some of the time and an incredible 59% going out of their way all of the time.
Cafes and bars lead the pack in 1st and 2nd place when it comes to dog friendliness. For hotels and restaurants the effort towards dog friendliness may be higher, but the large and growing dog-loving community clearly see lots of room for more dog-friendly establishments in these areas and with this level of interest comes so much potential for efforts to be rewarded.
Public transport was the area that surveyed with the most potential for improvement overall, which is not surprising given the rules (or lack thereof) that do not allow dogs on the majority of trains and buses in the country with the notable exception of the DART in Dublin. These critical services would be of incredible value to many households with dogs, not only for living comfortable lifestyles and visiting the amenities above but also for travelling to veterinary appointments, trainers and groomers.
Dogs have well and truly taken to their role as human’s best friend,
at least among the dog-loving community with 99.7% of respondents saying they consider their dogs important members of the family. 77.7% treat their dog as if they were human and 92.2% allow dogs on their sofa, solidifying their place as part of the family. For anyone that thinks most dogs in Ireland are still working dogs out on farming duty day and night, they might be surprised to hear that the majority of dogs in this country actually sleep in their human’s bed at 54.4%. We at Ruby Reese welcome the level of care and attention many Irish dogs are receiving because when we ensure their welfare, comfort and wellbeing needs are met, dogs can give so much back to their humans.
It is no surprise that the discerning dog-loving community of Ireland is moving towards high-quality ingredients (81.8%) and natural ingredients (67.4%) with both classified as very important factors affecting shopping decisions for our dogs. We at Ruby Reese fully identify with these sentiments and are delighted to see so many people are on the same page - our business was created around these values and we are focused entirely on providing a top quality and natural range that do our dogs good.
In the Ruby Reese Dog Survey 2024 we asked who in the household is mainly responsible for walking dogs, their shopping decisions and their veterinary decisions and across the board it is clear that women are in charge when it comes to dogs in Ireland. We of course received plenty of answers that explained a clear 50:50 share in responsibility, others where men are clearly in charge and also those from non-binary respondents, but the overall numbers are very clear and females have absolute majorities over 70% in all three areas of responsibility.
Know your Fashion?
Guess the % of dogs with the following items and click each to reveal the right answers.
Name Tag
73.3% have a name tag, even though this is a legal requirement and should contain the name and address of the legal owner. With all the great designs out there, we also think this could be a case for the fashion police
Necklace
5.9% of dogs in Ireland are the height of fashion and have a necklace. What we want to know is are they gold chains, shiny pearls or colourful pom-poms?
Hoodie
27.1% have a hoodie and be it for style or function, we are living for it!
Bandana
53% of dogs in Ireland have a bandana - we are unsure if it’s just for looks or if they are the markings of an underground garden-digging gang?!
Onesie
15.9% are creatures of comfort like ourselves and have invested in a onesie
Bow
30.3% are dapper dogs and have a bow to wear on occasion
An incredible 1 in every 3 dogs (33.5%) reported having allergies, so people should not feel alone when catering to dogs with sensitivities. Broken down further, this 33.5% is made up of 22.7% that knew what their dog has allergies to and 11.8% not knowing the exact allergens. Where the allergens are known, chicken comes in as a clear number one at 44%, followed by grains 25.8%, dust mites 20.3%, beef 12.3%, dairy 11.4%, lamb 7.2% and soy at 5.1%.
It seems that most of our dogs have human company most of the time according to our survey respondents. 1 in 5 dogs are never left alone (20.5%) with a further 27.5% only left alone once a week. 38.7% are home alone several times a week and 13.4% most days. The majority of dogs are left alone for a maximum of 3-5 hours at a time with the most frequently answered hours broken down:
2 hours 12%, 3 hours 16.3%, 4 hours 25.5%, 5 hours 15.9%, 6 hours 10.7%, 7 hours 4% and 8 hours 7.9%.
Sharing and building the future
Please feel free to share our results along with your own thoughts, just remember to reference or tag Ruby Reese so that we can all continue the conversation. We at Ruby Reese are excited about the direction our dog community is heading and the opportunities the lie ahead of us collectively.
Please share with us on social media which of the results stood out to you most and what you would you like to see changing.
