Dogs In The Office: The New Normal We Didn't Expect
How do you dog-proof an office? Can you even let dogs in without breaching your lease?
There was a time, not long ago, when such questions would have been absurd. But no longer.
The boom in lockdown puppy purchasing — at least a quarter of which was impulse buying, according to the Kennel Club — has left a legacy of as many as 3.2 million recently acquired dogs across the UK, and the big problem of what to do with the four-legged friends now that many owners have returned to work.
Pets at Home, the pet food and equipment retailer, has made some suggestions to help office occupiers, landlords and workers find a way to make the dog-meets-office situation a success.
Top tips included making sure every flea treatment is up to date, creating special feeding and drinking places in the workplace so that offices don’t turn into messy dog-controlled zones, and making sure that somewhere nearby — maybe in another office or outside — there is a suitable doggie washroom.
It also warns that care should be taken to inhibit the habit of walking off with “prizes” stolen from other members of staff, or generally causing canine mayhem.
So-called "petiquette" also involves having beds close to, or under, their owner's desks, and taking walk breaks so the staff member and their faithful hound don’t get bad-tempered, the Evening Standard reported.
Silent toys — perhaps in employer-provided communal bins, so all dogs can be equally amused — also get a big thumbs up from the pet retailer.
The build-to-rent residential sector long ago made the dog-friendly conceptual leap that office landlords are now contemplating. Dog showers and grooming rooms are now commonplace.
They have learned to deal with some practical problems of a delicate nature to overcome. The installation of “pee posts” encourages dogs to toilet and scent mark in the right places — Quintain has embraced them at its London BTR schemes — but nobody wants an office looking out on a pee post.
Designers who have worked in the BTR sector also warn about the dangers of plastic turf or concrete in dog toilet zones.
“We had a fake patch of grass in one scheme, and it just stank," Assael associate Anton Risan said at a recent event. "Things never soaked away. The lesson is never put plastic carpet next to dogs.”
Agents report greater interest from tenants in leasing agreements with dog access clauses, something the vast majority of landlords wouldn't have considered before the coronavirus pandemic.
However, landlords are beginning to insist on limiting the number of dogs in the building via the very same clauses, The Times reported. A building with too many dogs quickly stops being a workplace and becomes a kennel, those landlords said.
