If you heard about Sarah Wolfgang's plan to open up a dog cafe in Los Angeles and thought, "Blast! I don't live anywhere near the West Coast!", good news: A dog cafe might be coming to New York soon, too, if Maggie Chan and Mandy Chow have anything to say about it. There's just one catch: They need to raise $70,000 to do it. They're currently running an IndieGoGo campaign to make their dream a reality, though, so with luck and a little generosity from fellow dog lovers, we might be seeing it open as soon as this spring.
Similarly to how most cat cafes (or at least, those in the U.S.) operate, the idea for this particular dog cafe is for all of the pooches in it to be adoptable. Indeed, Chow and Chan first got the idea for their cafe from seeing so many stray dogs wandering the streets during a recent trip to Puerto Rico. Wrote the duo on their IndieGoGo page:
"We spent many days wandering different cities of the island, and everywhere we went, there were too many stray dogs. Many of them had obvious skin diseases and were severely malnourished. It was incredibly heartbreaking to see and to know there wasn’t much we could do to help them, except provide them with food. We fed one, we fed another, but there was no way we could possibly feed them all. And even if we managed to feed them... then what? Where would they go and what would they eat the next day? Or the day after that? It was then we realized, we want a bigger role in helping dogs towards a better future."
Such an undertaking is naturally going to require a good deal of funding; additionally, this is New York we're talking about here, hence the $70,000 IndieGoGo goal. The space Chow and Chan plan to build with the money, however, sounds like a dog- and coffee-lover's paradise — and, of course, a place that will make any pup jump for joy. The planned space includes not only table space, but also a 45-foot-by-14-foot "playground" area, which I would imagine will function a little like an indoor dog run. States the IndieGoGo page:
"The playground will be concealed in a glass room with a separate entrance as the seating area to meet the guidelines of the Department of Health and Inspection. Customers will be able to enjoy their coffee and quick bites while watching the dogs run around and play with each other in the playground, as well as join in on the fun themselves."
So far, the New York dog cafe has raised less than $1,000; there are still 34 days to go for the campaign, though, so there's still plenty of time left. Furthermore, like Sarah Wofgang's LA dog cafe, Chow and Chan's project is making use of IndieGogo's "flexible funding" option — meaning that even if they don't meet their goals, they'll still receive all of the funds they raise.
I'll admit that both dog cafes seem a little riskier than their feline counterparts to me. One of the nice things about cats is that they're largely self-sufficient; taking care of a cafe full of dogs who will all need to be, y'know, walked every few hours is likely going to be more difficult than taking care of a bunch of cats and scooping a slew of litter boxes. But hey, as long as they've got both the system and the personnel to care for the pups, then I say more power to them. It's a creative way to help pooches in need find their forever homes — and besides, who doesn't love the idea of a cute and cuddly puppy pile?
Head on over to the Dog Cafe in NYC IndieGoGo page to find out more and/or kick in a few bucks. Woof!
Images: Giphy (3)
