Online services marketplace, Bark.com, has revealed that UK pet owners spend £57bn on their dogs every year, excluding pet food and medical costs.
On average, pet owners spend more than £3,000 a year on dog walking services, grooming, training and pet sitting, which amounts to more than 10 percent of the average UK salary.
It also revealed that UK pet owners spend a total of £57bn on their pets every year, excluding food and medical costs.
Bark.com has analysed its internal data and discovered that on average a UK pet owner spends £3,304.12 on dog walking, training, pet sitting and grooming every year.
There are 66.5 million people in the UK and 26 percent own a dog, meaning that 17 million people in the UK are dog owners. With the average salary in the UK being £27,271 per annum, it works out that on average UK pet owners spend 12.11 percent of their salaries on these services every year.
On average, pet owners spend £2,702.40 on dog walking, £273.28 on grooming their dogs, £328.44 on pet sitting and £594 on dog training. Dog training is the second most popular searched for service on Bark.com’s website.
Prices differ depending on location. Dog walking is the most expensive in London at £12.32 an hour, with Wales coming in cheapest at £10.19 an hour.
London is also the most expensive for pet sitting, with an average day cost of £27.61, closely followed by the South West at £23.23 per day. The cheapest place for pet sitting in the UK is the North East at £19.08 per day.
The South East is the most expensive for dog grooming, with an average cost of £38.60 and the cheapest is Wales again at £15 per session.
London is the most expensive region for dog training with an average cost of £109 per class, whereas the North East is cheapest at £74.
Kai Feller, co-founder of Bark.com, said: “Pet services are extremely popular on our site. There’s always a lot of traffic around the services, which shows just how much this country loves their dogs!
“It’s quite surprising when you see the percentage of the average salary that is spent on pet services, but this is also dependant on location and salary, so you might spend less or even more than the national average dog owner.”
