Changing of the Guard

Winner for 2007-2008, Paul Knutson

Winner for 2008-2009, Bonnie Martineck

Hey Everyone!

As you know, we had our second birthday party on Saturday. Each year at our birthday party we give away a year worth of free treats to one lucky winner. Our new winner, Bonnie Martineck of Bella Vista, came in to claim her prize today. Bonnie seems like a great lady. She told me she used to be a vet tech, which I know is a job that requires a lot of work and gets little recognition, so I'm glad she could be our winner. I look forward to seeing her each month as she comes into pick up her free treats.



As fate would have it, last year's winner, Paul Knutson, came in to claim his last month of free treats today as well. The coincidence of both of them coming in on the same day made me reflective of the experience of giving away a year of free treats and how Paul has become part of the Bigwag family over the past year.

Let me tell you a little about Paul - he is one of the kindest, most generous people I have ever met. He quietly gives to the animal community of Northwest Arkansas and never asks anything in return. He has several dogs, each of them rescues, and let me tell you, these dogs are fortunate to have found a home with Paul and his wife.

He has taken in dogs that no one else gave a chance - one was showing signs of aggression to the point that a trainer recommended that the dog be put down. But Paul never considered this option. Instead, he patiently searched for the cause of the aggression. What he came to find out was that the dog was born without hip sockets, which you can imagine caused him immense pain. That dog is now receiving medication to ease his pain, and because of Paul's patience and care, people don't even recognize him as the same animal. Paul also adopted one of the dogs from a raid made in Rogers earlier this year. The dog that was infested with ticks and fleas and had been eating bark from trees because it was so hungry. Paul has nursed this dog back to health and taught him that people can be good and kind. Paul also continues to foster dogs in need, even though he has gone far beyond the call of duty. But perhaps the most remarkable thing about Paul is that he believes he is the lucky one in all of this - lucky to have found such loving dogs, lucky to share his life with such amazing animals.

For me, the remarkable thing about this whole situation is that when we gave away a year of free treats, I thought that the winner would be the lucky one. But the truth is, we were the lucky ones to have gotten the chance to know Paul. I hope he will continue to come in each month so that we can get updates on his furry clan. And I hope that Bonnie will become as much a member of our family in the year to come.

Lots of Love,
Erin

I'd like to thank the Academy...

Okay, so maybe there was no academy involved in making our birthday party happen Saturday, but there were a lot of great folks who worked really hard to make everything turn out just right. We had a fabulous birthday party - hot dogs and cake got eaten, dog treats got gobbled up and prizes were given away! We had a wonderful turn out, even though it was so hot. And because it was such a fantastic day, I really do feel the need to thank all the people who made it happen... (And fortunately for me, no music is going to start playing after a minute, so that means I actually get to thank the people who made it possible.)

First, I would like to thank everyone who made it out! Thanks also to all of you who dropped by Friday or sent wishes via MySpace or e-mail.

I would like to send an especially big thank you out to all the wonderful vendors who came out and supported us Saturday. These folks spent hours out in the heat so that our birthday party would be a great one. Many thanks to Angel Pet Sitters, Camp Bow Wow , the Bentonville Bark Park , Murphy Dog Park and the Humane Society for the Animals, the Dog Scouts, American K-9 Academy, Pets Rock Photography, New Hope Animal Hospital, Northwest Arkansas Animal Rescue, and Pug Rescue of Northwest Arkansas.

We were also fortunate to have great support from Taste of the Wild. We love this dog food, it's an entirely grain free food that Hannah and Sam love (and one that doesn't give Sam gas, which is REALLY good news) The folks from Taste of the Wild sent out 5 pound bags of food to give away as prizes and samples for everyone else. I know their donation was greatly appreciated. We were also given 15 pound bags of Canidae to give away as prizes. Both of these companies produce high quality foods that you can feel confident feeding to your dog.

I'd be remiss if I didn't say thank you to Anna and Teressa, our employees, who put in a lot of hours before the event getting everything spic and span and stocked and who also got the joyous job of cleaning everything again afterward. These ladies are like family to us. We are very fortunte to have such caring employees.

And last, but not least, I have to say thank you to my in-laws (Cary and Toby's Mom and Stepdad) They were awesome enough to come out and cook hot dogs for everyone, which you can imagine was not an enviable job on a day as hot as Saturday. It was great to be surrounded by family on a day so important to all of us.

Seriously, we had a great time Saturday, and it made us feel great to know that Northwest Arkansas has embraced us so completely. We're looking forward to a great third year!

Lots of Love,
Erin

P.S. When I get pictures, I'll post them here too!

2007 - The Year in Review

As we ramp up to our 2 year birthday and the ensuing party, I would like to look back at the year and contemplate where we are at and what the pet community looks like to us. Our year ends and begins in the middle of summer , since we opened in July, so this might appear to be a weird time to look back, but it makes sense to us... Besides we are usually so busy during December that we have little time to think about anything.

First off, our blog (www.blog.bigwag.com) changed this year. We went from a post a month (if we were lucky) to multiple posts a week. We decided to change the format to embrace the community to which we belong. We moved away from quite so many educational articles to a this is who we are, these are our friends, this is your pet community approach. The response was overwhelming. Thank you for reading this corner of our world. This was a learning experience for us and we have enjoyed making this a publication that people come back to and learn from, not just about us, but about the pet community and its events as well.

As indicated by the image above, this year we have changed our logo. Many things predicated this change - mostly my reading about effective marketing, good logo design, plus many other things. I think the new logo looks good, and I hope you do too. I'd love to hear some feedback from you guys.

More important than that though, I think what Bigwag is all about is starting to catch on. The pet food recall of last year helped because it brought to light how important it is that you pay attention to what is in your pets' food and where it is made.

Next, we have broken out of Rogers. We now sell wholesale in Pea Ridge, Bentonville, and Fayetteville. We'd love to be in Springdale too, but there just isn't any place that this works well at the moment. If someone knows of a place, please us know. We haven't worked out all of the kinks yet, but we are hoping to move to an online replenishment system in the near future.

This time last year we hired our very first employee - Jennifer. You may know her from Cho Blu Studios. She got to showcase some of her art at our first birthday party, and was the feature artist of this months ArkanPaws magazine. She has since moved on to bigger and better things, and the sarcasm meeter has since dropped in our store. We'll always be glad Jennifer joined our little family - and we're still waiting on our portrait of Sam and Hannah!! It was quite the ordeal - trying to decide if we'd grown to the point of needing an employee. We debated and debated, and almost hired someone before Christmas in 2006, but chose to wait until July. I hope all of our employees stay in touch once they move on. We enjoy everyone who has worked or is working with with us - Anna, Brandi, and our newest addition - Terresa.

Pet businesses have also come and gone. Camp Bow Wow is having their grand opening the Saturday after our birthday party. A Petsmart has also opened at the Rogers Promenade. I have also heard the Jennifer is trying to sell Woof! Woof! at the Tuscany Square, and that her Little Rock location has been closed. Nancy has retired from New Hope Animal Hospital, and Dog Days Doggie Day Care came under new ownership this year. The building at Dog Watch in Bentonville partially melted in a fire. Bow Wow Pet Styling opened in a new location in Rogers this year also. You may also have noticed that we haven''t gotten any new Ceramatherapy dog dishes and treat jars in a LONG time. Thats because they have closed up shop. I don't know if they have sold it yet or not, but cited the demands of owning your own business as too much for them. I completely understand. I am sure there was other news, but my mind is overflowing, so you'll have to forgive my forgetfulness.

We also didn't get to have a Mardi Paws or a full-blown Halloween Carnival this last year either. If anyone would like to help plan or take the leads on these projects, let me know. I know some people ;) RDOD, the Easter Egg Hunt, Photos with Santa, Springfest, the Dogwood Walk - were all bigger and stronger this year. We love to see these events grow each year, and the new fresh faces and tails that find them for the first time. If you haven't seen "The Biggest Wag" contest at any of these events yet, you just haven't lived! This was also the first year for our Paws-n-Spas dog wash fund raiser, which we hope to repeat several more times, based on the excitement, fun, and bubbles of the first one.

As we round out the end of our second year, and enter into our third, I almost can't wait to roll out the new plans we have for Bigwag. This year we added some great products, like our all natural butcher shop chews, Lupine Collars, Red Dingo tags, Solid Gold and Taste Of The Wild dog foods, and Happy Tails/Spot Organics shampoos, conditioners, and aromatherapy sprays. We added some great toys, like Toughies, West Paw Designs, and Canine Genius'. We're going to be further expanding our toy section and you'll get a preview of that at our birthday party on Saturday. We're also going to be adding more shampoos, birthday party supplies, more supplements to compliment our Solid Gold Sea meal, treat jars, greeting cards, books and videos, gifts, and hopefully a whole slew of new and innovative products you haven't seen before.

Thank you for being our customer and accepting us into your pet community. We enjoy being here, answering your ingredient and diet questions, exploring the new products you ask for and being a hub for some of the great rescues and organizations out there. We also love to see all of those wagging tails come into our store.

A final thought - I subscribe to a blog that examines different brands weekly with the question - "If company XXX were to go away tomorrow, would anyone miss them...". I hope that the answer to that is yes, that folks out there that would miss us if we went away. I hear stories every day about how their dogs love us, love to come to our store, won't eat other brands of treats. I hope we can continue to help your dogs live a longer, fuller, more rewarding life for years to come! We would surely miss all of you!

What is really in dog food?

There is a very interesting article from the Animal Protection Institute, "Whats Really in Pet Food"

"Plump whole chickens, choice cuts of beef, fresh grains, and all the wholesome nutrition your dog or cat will ever need.

These are the images pet food manufacturers promulgate through the media and advertising. This is what the $15 billion per year U.S. pet food industry wants consumers to believe they are buying when they purchase their products.

This report explores the differences between what consumers think they are buying and what they are actually getting. It focuses in very general terms on the most visible name brands — the pet food labels that are mass-distributed to supermarkets and discount stores — but there are many highly respected brands that may be guilty of the same offenses."

Not all commercial pet foods fall into these categories, but it is important to do your research. While Science Diet and Hills Diet are often touted as high end foods, they contain some of the worst ingredients - including corn. Solid Gold, Taste Of The Wild, and Canidae are all high quality foods with quality ingredients.

Even though this article busts out companies that claim to use "human grade ingredients" as mostly marketing hype, I would like to go on the record and say that for us this simply is not true. We don't use vegetable scraps from human food processing...we have to buy it canned from Wal-Mart, and we buy our flour and yeast from Sams - just like you would for yourself. It's too bad big companies have watered down the meaning of this term. How else do you put in your advertising that you don't use sawdust in your dog treats? How about "Our treats are real food"????

Dog Parks Petition Available Online

The Walt Eilers for Mayor Campaign kicked off a collaborative push for additional dog parks July 5th by holding a short dog parade at the Fayetteville Farmers' Market. More than twenty local people and their pets participated. The campaign passed out gourmet treats contributed by BigWag. The campaign also used the event to collect information from dog owners through a simple survey it distributed. That same survey and a petition can now be found at walteilers.com.

The city has tried twice before to add additional parks, but its efforts have been defeated both times by citizens opposed to the idea. Committed pet owners must come together to convince the city that these dog parks will benefit the community. They will provide dogs and their owners a safe place to exercise and socialize. The Walt Eilers for Mayor Campaign wants to see a proper dog park in each of the Parks and Recreation Department's four quadrants, but making those parks a reality will take a collaborative effort.

The city currently offers one dog park next to the newly renovated animal shelter. The Parks and Rec Department hopes to make Lake Wilson Park an off-leash facility. While we welcome the move, Lake Wilson is located east of the airport in Fayetteville, making it somewhat inconvenient to most. That said, should the park be made an off-leash site, dog owners should make frequent use of the facility to demonstrate their support.

We encourage everyone to complete the (very) short survey at to sign the petition, both of which can be found at walteilers.com. (And for those concerned about politics, doing either in no way represents an endorsement.) The campaign plans to present the information and signatures gathered to the city as proof that citizens are committed to making additional dog parks a reality.

Feel free to email concerns, questions, or ideas to eilersformayor@gmail.com.

Submitted by guest blogger Greg Leding - campaign manager for Walt Eilers.

Irresponsible Companies - Post Cereals

I had a revelation last night at the grocery store. I was buying cereal, and decided I would just check the price per ounce while I was standing there after my wife asked which brand was cheaper, and surprisingly noticed that the price per ounce for the small boxes of almost all Post cereals was cheaper per ounce than it's larger cousin, the "Family Size".

Doesn't this go against the grain (no pun intended), in that the larger, economy size should be cheaper? Less packaging, not to mention greener for the environment? That was how I always understood the value of larger bulk purchases. So, is this a family penalty now? If you want to buy less packaging and be "greener", then it costs you more money?

I compared other brands - Kellogg's cereals behaved exactly as I would expect them to. The bigger the box, the cheaper per ounce it was. So, is this just a cheap trick to try and make more money during the recession? How many people "assume" the larger economy size is the better deal? I hate to think how long Post may have been trying to pull this off. It would appear to be a sneaky attempt to trick the populace. I know that during tough times earlier, rather than raising the price of good, companies started shrinking the packaging size, so they could maintain the same price.

That was a big shock to everyone, and caused outrage - several decades ago. They are doing the same thing this time, but it seems almost normal, and it doesn't appear anyone is trying to be sneaky about it - as everyone has seen that game before. But, this is a new game - and I was a little surprised. Does this make Post Cereals irresponsible? Is this worse that shrinking the packaging? It seems a little deceptive to me.

I understand prices go up, when oil goes up, because energy costs go up, transportation costs go up, and therefore your cereal in the morning goes up. I would rather just see a price increase than all of this smoke and mirrors to make me think the price isn't going up. I understand - costs are costs. If you aren't making money, then you are losing money, and nobody can do that forever. One of the hardest things that I do is set prices for the bakery. It's hard to put a value on what we do, keeping track of all of the ingredients, shipping costs, calculating price per batch, price per pound, price per treat. It's always a moving target. Plus, we have to pay rent and electricity in there too, not to mention the labor it takes to make a batch of cookies.

I guess that is just my opinion. If my cost of goods goes up to the point I need to raise prices, would you rather see me raise prices, or shrink packaging, or charge more for economy sizes?

Click Here to take survey for a free $5 off coupon from our store.

Bigwag Dog Bakery Press Release

Hey Everyone!

I just sent off the official press release about our birthday party, but as a perk of being a reador of our blog, you get it here first! Hope you enjoy it, and even more, I hope we see you on July 26th :D

Lots of Love,
Erin


For immediate release

No Worries for Party Animals

Rogers, AR… July 10, 2008

Recession. Rising food costs. Gasoline supply shortages. While these may be concerns for humans in Northwest Arkansas, their dogs have a completely different concern: “How am I going to get to Bigwag Dog Bakery's birthday party?” Dogs are right to worry about missing this party. After all, it is going to be the canine social event of the season. For four glorious hours, from noon to 4pm, on Saturday, July 26th, barkday cake will be served with gusto and canine wine will flow. There will be contests including “Biggest Wag” and prizes ranging from bags of premium dog food to a year's supply of free treats. And just in case people feel left out, there will be food, drinks, vendors and demonstrations for them as well. For children, there will even be a free bounce house. So why all the fuss? Well, it isn't every day that a small business gets to celebrate it's 2nd anniversary. And that's exactly what Bigwag Dog Bakery is doing - celebrating two years of bringing healthy, handmade treats, unique toys and American-made chews to the dogs of Northwest Arkansas.

About Bigwag Dog Bakery
BigWag is located at 2301 W. Walnut, Suite 23, Rogers, AR in Turtle Creek Plaza. The store is owned by brothers Cary and Toby Hague. It opened July 29, 2006.

Media Contacts
For Bigwag:
Store Manager: Erin Hague, 479-631-2WAG

Further Information:
What: Food and treats, fun and prizes, vendors and demonstrations
Where: Bigwag Dog Bakery
2301 W. Walnut Suite 23
Rogers, AR 72756
(Behind Popeye's Chicken)
When: Saturday, July 26, 2008 12pm-4pm
Why: Bigwag is celebrating it's 2 year anniversary
Who: Anyone can come
Cost: Free