Howdy Dog Pack! Welcome to Dogonomist, what discerning dogs like to read.

🐾 Did someone forward this to you? Subscribe here. 🐾

Follow us on Twitter 

THIS WEEK'S TOPICS:

• Turning your dog into Benjamin Button: the anti-aging movement

• What do M&Ms and Vet Clinics have in common?

• Yup, 1/3 of us have bought props for our dogs

• I see your Exploding Kittens, and raise you a Dodgy Dogs

DOGGYDEX™

Proudly introducing the DoggyDex™, an index comprised of 10 publicly traded companies whose primary focus is the dog/pet industry. List of tickers used:

The yellow line-plot in the chart represents these companies above (DoggyDex™) and their combined performance against both the S&P 500 and Bitcoin on a weekly basis.

Pawformance is measured by % gains & losses.

TURNING YOUR DOG INTO BENJAMIN BUTTON: THE ANTI-AGING MOVEMENT

The prospect of finding a fountain of youth for humans is a tale old as time. Although, we've come to know it more as science fiction, than reality.

However in recent years, scientists have been testing ways to reverse or slow down the aging process biologically. For the most part, this has been done on mice but now we're bringing the science into our homes, but not for us just yet, but for man's best friend.

Sign me up

Our dogs are the perfect models to test true anti-aging efforts. They're exposed to the same environments as us, sometimes foods, and are valued as family members. If we can be successful in reversing the aging process with dogs, then perhaps we could also do it with humans.

One group tackling this at scale is the The Dog Aging Project.

• They've managed to obtain +40,000 dogs of many shapes and sizes for their comprehensive research into their genes, lifestyle, and environments.

• Having such a large sample set should really help them best understand which diets, exercise regimes, etc. will likely lead to longer lives.

They will also be trialing a drug called, rapamycin, which is designed to act on a set of genes that play the role of regulating metabolisms of cells.

Essentially this drug is looking to push the cells into a life-extending survival mode. This drug has shown to be successful in flies, worms, and mice. Many scientists believe that if something like this can work on mice, it most certainly can do the same for dogs.

Please let it work, pleeeaaasseee

Betting Big:

A company by the name of Loyal, based out of SF is banking on producing the magical pill that will prove to keep our pups around a little while longer. Their goal is to create an affordable prescription pill for canines, but that's some years off. There are two drugs in trial at the moment, one is for big dogs and one is generally for all other sizes.

Of the two trials, one is aimed at decelerating the onset of dementia and kidney disease, while the other is looking to alter the cellular processes that reduce lifespans in big dogs. Much of the giant or large breeds have the shortest lifespans. This pill would hopefully extend that span to be on par with their medium-sized counterparts.

Although many large dogs think they're small enough for our laps.

Loyal's timeline goal is to receive the FDA's blessing by 2024.

So far Loyal has raised $60M since its' inception in 2019.

Some numbers:

• The average lifespan of a dog is 10-13yrs.

• The average lifespan of a Giant breed is 8-10yrs.

• The average lifespan of a smaller (<20lbs) dog is 10-15yrs.

• Oldest dog in the world right now is 30yrs, congrats to Bobi!

  • Bobi was discovered 2 weeks after Spike was awarded the honors at 23yrs old.

• Cancer is the #1 disease threat to dogs.

WHAT DO M&Ms AND VET CLINICS HAVE IN COMMON?

Cute, but not exactly what we're referring to...

Do you ever think about who owns your vet?

We typically don't. I mean it's enough to try not to think about the bill we are about to get, let alone worrying about who runs the place. However, this article we came across prompted us to take some time to understand the ownership trends of the vet industry.

To get the full picture, let's provide some context:

• There are roughly 30,000 veterinary practices in the US

• The article focuses on ownership by large groups (those that own more than 10 practices)

• One of these "large groups" would be the Mars Company (yeah, the M&M people)

  • They also own Royal Canin, Pedigree, and Petfoods.

• There are typically 4 categories of large groups:

  • Wealthy families

  • Private equity backed groups

  • Specialty groups w/ investment backing

  • Vet groups who grew via natural growth

• They estimate large groups own approximately 13.5% of practices

• This data is from 2019 so it has changed, but some of our sources have recently said, that rolling up vet practices is still happening quite aggressively.

So what do we think?

Well, there are pros and cons to larger companies owning practices. On one hand, you're most likely going to have access to new tech and more resources available with the economies of scale coming from a large company. However, you likely are given a more one-size-fits-all approach to your dog's health, and you may miss out on the more personal touch with a local practice.

A BTS look at how these corporations run

However not to be fooled because some of the local vet practices are backed by other big pet companies (e.g. Purina, Iams, etc.) which can lead to unwanted product placement for the patient or getting fed pet food propaganda.

While we initially were uneasy about the idea of large companies with interests in their own brands of pet food, medicine, etc, in reality it's still a small segment of the market that is owned by them.

A lot of these vet practices are fairly transparent about their corporate backing. But some are not, and try to keep it hidden so that they come across as a Mom-and-Pop shop. If you're unsure about if your vet practice is playing ball with the big guys or not - a good rule of thumb is if there are more than 4-5 vets practicing under that clinic than chances are they belong to a corporation.

YUP, 1/3 OF US HAVE BOUGHT PROPS FOR OUR DOGS

There's no denying it, dogs look cute with clothes or accessories on.

we like our cuteness dark and twisted

And why not share the cuteness with the internet? Turns out about 30% of dog owners do just that, by spending money on dog gear specifically for social media posts (via a LendingTree survey of 1,425 dog owners).

Gen Z and Millenials lead the way with the largest portion of owners who shell out for bowties, hats, and other pup fashion items. Heck, there are even boutique pet clothing brands popping up to support the habit.

We guess none of this is surprising, as 84% of respondents said they treat their pet as if they were their child. And to be honest, we've bought accessories for our dogs as well, so count us in the mix of canine crazies.

I SEE YOUR EXPLODING KITTENS, AND RAISE YOU A DODGY DOGS

If you haven't had the pleasure of playing Exploding Kittens (chill, chill...it's a card game) let us give you the skinny...

It began as a Kickstarter project back in 2015 seeking $10k, hit its goal within 8 minutes and ultimately raised +$8m 🤯 (#1 most-backed Kickstarter of all-time). As the game states, "it's a highly strategic kitty-powered version of Russian Roulette."

A big part of the game's appeal is the unique creative direction of the cards themselves. They were designed by Matthew Inman from The Oatmeal webcomic. His distinct 2D, subtly demented, yet colorful illustrations from The Oatmeal are immediately recognizable in this game.

They have both family friendly versions and NSFW expansion packs as well, so choose your own adventure if you care to play!

However if you just can't bare to play a game that's full of kittens, then we present to you Dodgy Dogs. This was created as an alternative of sorts to Exploding Kittens, but of course with dogs, who misbehave.

The game was created by Yolky Games and world-famous illustrator Jean Jullien. We would deck out our office exclusively in Jean Jullien's work if we could.

Similarly to Exploding Kittens, Dodgy Dogs turned to Kickstarter to bootstrap their game. Initially looking to raise £10k, which they later pushed to £50k. They ended up raising a total of £87k. So nowhere near the numbers the kittens put up, but a success nonetheless.

The premise of the game is more akin to style of Uno. So in each round of play the aim is to get rid of your Dodgy Dogs before everyone else. You discard the pesky hounds by matching them by size or behavior.

If card games aren't really your thing, they also have a jigsaw puzzle.

KIBBLE BITS:

• Dog festival season: The people of Nepal gave the dog its' day, by honoring them on day 2 of a 5-day festival, highlighting the loyalty of dogs to humans.

• SBF's attack dog: Former FTX brain-child turned mega fraudster, Sam Bankman-Fried, has a German Shepherd that can attack on command using a secret word.

• Rescue dog reunited: A rescue dog, Hades, from Las Vegas was reunited with his family after being spotted living amongst a pack of coyotes.

• Ballet director smears dog 💩 in critic's face: A German ballet director had a bag of his dachshund's business on-hand during a live performance and at intermission smeared it in a critics face due to a review she wrote.

• Tik Tok + Dogs: 8 funny dog Tik Tok accounts to follow if you're in need of some laughter.

Every week we love to shoutout a pooch that has made another trip around the sun. Look at Romeo Maurice hitting his sweet 16, good luck on that driver's test buddy!

That's a wrap for this week. Be sure to stay tuned for next week, where we bark about the business of cloning your dog. 😲

If you want more, be sure to follow our Twitter (@dogonomist).