Tibetan mastiff puppies for sale sit on a car covered by a
red blanket during the annual China Tibetan Mastiff Expo.
China's latest must-have luxury for the ultra-rich, to go
with mansions and sports cars, is a large, slobbery dog with
massive amounts of hair best known for herding sheep in Tibet.
Once banned by the Communist Party as bourgeois, pet
ownership is booming in China, and the Tibetan mastiff is the
dog of the moment for those who want to spread their wealth
beyond stocks and real estate.
"I used to invest in German shepherds, but Tibetan mastiffs
are what's hot right now," said Sui Huizheng, a business
owner who has about 20 of the dogs and attended the 6th
annual China Tibetan Mastiff Expo this past weekend.
Hundreds of the hairy dogs were on hand, and owners and
handlers marched the most expensive ones down catwalks as
though they were fashion models. Some carried the names of
wealthy Americans like "Warren Buffett," while others were
called "God" and "Prince." Among the owners was a
controversial running coach who trained world track champions
in the 1980s.
Their hoped-for prize: breeders willing to pay tens of
thousands of dollars for a mate for their mastiff. Sui spent
$43,000 for a large platform and a poster-plastered booth to
show off his dogs. One breeding session with Sui's top
mastiff King goes for $40,000.
The craze seems to defy sales patterns and common sense
elsewhere, especially for a dog that is common, has thick,
lion-mane-like hair, grows to 180 pounds (80 kilograms) and
is known for being fierce.
"I can understand racehorses and diamonds, but I don't
understand why someone would want to pay half a million
dollars for a dog," said Martha Feltenstein, president of the
American Tibetan Mastiff Association. "They have a relatively
short life expectancy and are not especially rare, so it's
quite puzzling why they are fetching such a high price in
China."
In the U.S., Tibetan mastiff pups can be bought for as little
as several hundred dollars, Feltenstein said.
Breeders in China say adult Tibetan mastiffs sell for tens of
thousands of dollars, and can even go for more than $100,000.
One of them sold for more than half a million dollars last
year to a woman in northern China who then sent 30 black
Mercedes-Benz and other luxury cars to fetch the dog from the
airport, according to a report in the state-run China
Daily.
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