For years I have coveted the experience of animal cafés as something too magical to ever be part of my life. I saw these establishments as fairy tales people told to give hope to weary Americans like myself, tall tales aimed to fill me with wonder and debilitating envy.
These cafés are all too often opened up in the candy colored streets of Japan or Korea, and rarely make it to the dull, beige streets of America (thanks Obama ) with the exception of a few short-lived cat cafés that were shut down for being disgusting (or whatever).
I mean, cat cafés are all well and good as long as I take my allergy pill before BUT LET’S BE REAL: of all the animals I want to play with, cats are low on the list (largely because I want to put my face on their fluffy bellies and my aforementioned allergies aren’t cool with that).
America is clearly behind on this trend: Tokyo already has an Owl Cafe and a flipping HEDGEHOG CAFE ! And all we have are cats?! Well the world is good, my friends, because America finally has it’s first Dog Café. That’s right…DOGS!!!! DOGGGGGGGGSSS!!!!!
As an avid fantasizer of dog ownership and a frequent visitor of shelters and dog parks, I was more than excited. When my friend Laura sent me the article , we made reservations for opening weekend within 5 minutes. The dog café would be filled with adoptable dogs looking for furrrrrever homes. HAH! How am I the first one to make that joke!?
The cost is $10, includes a beverage, and lasts an hour. You can go without a reservation but there’s a word for those people and it’s “dummies.”
Opening weekend arrived and we pulled into the strange, nondescript strip mall in Silver Lake. The café/check in area is next door to the dog palace itself. You go in, admire the adorable swag, order your beverage, and sign a waiver that I hope doesn’t give away my constitutional rights, but your guess is as good as mine.
My lovely girlfriend ordered a coffee she said was “good” but the real hole-in-one order was made by me, with a half-lavender half-regular lemonade combo. I can’t recommend it enough.
Being a “café” I was surprised to find no food options and swiftly began to complain. My cohorts reminded me that having sandwiches around hoards of dogs wouldn’t be ideal. Sorry, Taste Talks readers, but this food fads article is light on actual food!
We waited for the previous reservation hour to end, and entered into our wildest dreams. If you want to feel the emotions of this entrance, the closest possible thing I can offer is Shakira’s theme song to Zootopia.
Being a faddist at heart, I took this opportunity to try out Facebook’s new Live Video feature, which is essentially long form Snapchat. Since my worst nightmare is a Snapchat that lasts more than 5 seconds and requires sound, I wasn’t convinced I would love it. Turns out it was kind of delightful, but I’ll let you be the judge:
The room was a brightly painted concrete dog playground, with a few chairs and tables lining the edge. There were about 10 dogs running around, ranging from very small to mid-sized at largest.
There were about 15 people in there at a time, including two employees (great job guys, so clean and smelled delightful!) and one guy from Snapchat who I tried to convince I was a real journalist.
Everyone started by trying to pet every dog at once, but it quickly became apparent that the dogs needed to choose you. We all settled and stayed completely still while we awaited a passing canine’s loving attention.
Some of the all stars we met were a giant mountain dog puppy named Biggie that was max-level fluffy. He was insanely cute but walked too much like Scar for me to trust him.
There was the aptly named Twinkie, who was surly at best yet so slow-moving that he became a favorite for our petting needs. There was blind 15-year-old little guy named Oreo who was certainly the friendliest of them all. He also wore a diaper to keep him from peeing wherever he thought a tree was (everywhere). There was a tiny short legged beagle puppy that I finally entrapped into sitting in my lap for three minutes until I tried to Snapchat him and all I caught was him frantically trying to escape my clutches. Lastly, there was a small Pomeranian mix hysterically named Chris who would bark every time this older gentleman tried to explain to us how to properly train dogs. Thanks for saving us from unsolicited mansplaining, Chris!
Largely these dogs wanted nothing to do with anyone who didn’t have treats to offer (sold for 25 cents each at the front of the store) and even then it was not the snuggly kind of love you’d be craving. Most of our time was spent patiently waiting for dogs to approach us, or staring with deep jealousy at those who had gotten a pup to settle down next to them. The person-to-puppy ratio was not ideal.
Many of the dogs were super skittish and over stimulated by all of the constant visitors; the back of the café served as a shelter for even more dogs, so they could cycle the dogs in and out of the front room to give them a break for all of the “AWWWWWWWW”ing.
When our hour was up, we attempted to say goodbye to some of our favs (none of them were having it) and then took advantage of the lint rollers and hand sanitizer near the exit.
I left feeling happy but a little underwhelmed. The dog café was more of a shelter playroom than a novel experience. Would I rather go to a café filled with cats who would sit still for more than two minutes and then knock my tea off of a table? I think the thing to focus on at the dog café was not the possibility of being the bottom of a dog pile, but instead the option to meet a bunch of adoptable pups in a low-pressure environment.
This place is probably best visited by those too nervous to go to a dog shelter for the fear of being pressured into taking some one home. Do I fit into that category? Yes! But I’m also cheap as hell, so volunteering to walk dogs on my lunch break is probably where my heart will go (did you know you can do this? See if there is a shelter near your work!).
A delightful experience? Yes. Worthy of the “fad” title? No. Let me know when they open up America’s first kangaroo café, and make sure it has cheese plates!
