Price of ESS

[vicky payne]

The ESS puppy market seems very depressed at the moment. Well bred pus are being 'given away' for £300! No-one wants to be seen as 'in it for the money' but surely any reasonably well bred pup has to be worth £400-500? I paid £350 nearly 10years ago....has the value of ESS really gone down since then?

That said the odd litter sells for £600 a pop (and not from FTW's/health tested dogs either).

Has the market gone crazy? Are ESS just oversupplied or out of fashion?

[PERCE]

I don't think it's just ESS, a friend has bought a very well bred labrador dog by a ftch ex a ftch/ftw bitch, full health tests for under £400.

[Steepness]

We have just bred a litter of ESS well bred from FTW to health tested FTCH. We could of sold bitch pups many times however had very little interest in dog puppies, with one left that we will train on ourselves. Had one person 'make an offer' for him but we decided not to take offers and stick to our original price. After speaking to friends with litters they have had the same with Labs but can all sell Cockers.

[romanriver]

Theres lots out there at the moment and its a buyers market!
Theres litters all over the place for around the £400 mark that breeders still have at 12 weeks. Unfortunately health tests seem to have no bearing on sales.
If people don't want to be stuck with pups at 12 weeks, the price needs to be dropped or don't breed from bitches that are unknown and unproven.

[086*downey]

Prices even lower here in ROI - can pick up really nice well bred pups over here for very cheap. Very frustrating to see people would rather buy crap for €150 than buy quality for €250 makes no sense noting could be a decade of work.
For info I had real nice quality ESS pups this year and 1 bitch sold for £260stg and dogs went for £215stg -- now I priced them at that and they sold quick as they were real nice and great working stock but I know if advertised them for £50 higher the number of calls would have been well down -- £50 can make that much of a difference its crazy -- also could have sold a ten bitches but only 1 in litter

I have only ever bred 3 litters and sold them due to pricing them well and I know deep down they were worth more than what I sold them for but I am happy to break even on a litter – over here need to think hard before breeding and best to have couple of buyers lined up.

I put a lot of it over here down to recession – people cutting down on all expenditure and where sometimes lads would have had 3 or 4 dogs they are now happy to have 1 or 2 and if buying want to get them as cheap as possible.
Common place now to see trained or part trained dogs for sale due to Emigration(I know sometimes that might be excuse to offload a dog but a lot of people leaving these shores and leaving very good dogs behind)
On a slightly different note speaking to local gun shop he has his strong room full of bargains left behind by guys who have headed for the boat or plane to emigrate and real nice guns for very cheap.

[manorfarm]

Lets hope the price stays down and this makes Gundogs less attractive the theves

[vicky payne]

Lets hope the price stays down and this makes Gundogs less attractive the theves

There is that I suppose, but the cost of producing a good litter has gone up and up (just dog food, docking and registration fees not to mention any health testing done)....are people covering their costs at these prices? And how come some people can sell litters at the much higher price (with nothing special to commend them, no FT awards, no health tests).

[086*downey]

And how come some people can sell litters at the much higher price (with nothing special to commend them, no FT awards, no health tests).

Alot to do with location I think

[shootingstu]

It always amazes me that people wont think twice about spending hundreds of pounds on a pair of wellies, but will scrimp over a living thing, companion, etc

[alpha]

My neighbour keeps getting £400 + for ess x labs but when he mated his springers he struggled to sell them ....

Another one of our friends had the full litter sister to Tearsol Flash and has had alitter of 9 with Dawsonlee Chance land is getting £400 no bother and has most already sold not even KC registered

Both the same geographic location so don't know what it is all are selling to the same people pet and rough shooting no trialling homes at all so there seems to be no rhyme or reason to it anymore