We take the life of each puppy we breed very seriously. When we sell them, we’re looking to find each puppy the best possible home.
When the puppies from a litter are whelped, we open Expressions of Interest (EoI). We encourage potential buyers to openly share their plans and ideas in a written submission.
We typically get up to 100 Expressions of Interest for each litter we breed, so in a way we are “spoiled for choice” in this – but the process is by no means easy for us. Every EoI gets thoroughly reviewed.
We ask a range of questions, and we assess each answer on criteria graded to a 1-to-5 scale, then make an assessment of the family overall, considering “How good will the home be for this dog?”. We work had to be objective. All we go on are the Submissions received, so everyone is on an equal footing.
The process we use is not infallible (arguably, it benefits people who write well, and relies on people being truthful), but over time we’ve found it to be a reasonably good indicator. People who have thought deeply about what it will mean to have a dog share their life for the next 12 years tend to do better than people who express interest on a whim.
The assessments process can mean, people who seem like they’d provide a very good home do not get a puppy, because someone else can provide an excellent home (and our goal is to find the best possible home for each puppy).
The higher-assessed a family is, the higher the chance they’ll be invited to the second round process. We make a shortlist of the best-home-for-a-dog people, and let everyone else know they have been unsuccessful. We may also notify some standbys – in case someone drops out, we have one or two families on “standby”.
If you made an EoI, you missed out, and you express interest in the next litter we have, expressing interest previously will not place you at an advantage: we do not believe that applying twice has any bearing on the quality of home you’ll provide for a new puppy. It’s no problem to apply again, however – we’ll assess your new application against the others we received for that litter.
