Sniffspot: The App Connecting Dog Owners to Private Dog Parks

Sniffspot is an app/website that connects dog owners to private dog parks for rent by the hour. It came to my attention by way of an article on CNBC that you can read here that discusses how a land owner was able to make $8,400 a month just by renting out some of their land as private dog parks. The company began in 2016 when the founder was looking for a solution to letting their dog out in high population areas and struggled to find a safe place to do so. If you’re a dog owner in DC, NY, CA, or any of the high population areas in the US, you’ve probably struggled with the same things, and with a growing population of both dogs and humans worldwide, solutions like Sniffspot will become more essential.

More information about the company:

The company has a presence in 3,600 cities and more than 20,000 hosts
It appears to have 11 employees on Linkedin so very small company
The company website is very simple and only lists the dog park booking feature and a handful of resources for dog owners (most of which look well put together)

Benefits of using Sniffspot:

Enrichment – taking your dog to a new area with new sites, sounds, and smells will provide enrichment in a safe (usually fenced) environment
Privacy – you are paying to have exclusive use of the rental space so no need to worry about who may show up at the park and whether your dogs will get along
Price – the fees tend to be between $5-15/hr. While that may sound like a lot, consider that you won’t be doing this daily and your dog probably won’t want to play for more than an hour so this is generally going to be a good value. This is also much less expensive than dog gyms or dog sporting companies that will charge a fortune for a very limited amount of playtime

Additional thoughts:

This is a great side hustle for anyone with a lot of land and a few hours of time to keep up with maintenance. Just from glancing through reviews of parks in various cities, the main issues that customers raise are fencing not being in place (even if it’s advertised that way), lack of places to sit, and lack of cleanliness, so you can’t just have land and rent it expecting people to pay you – it needs to be an experience and preferably better than an average backyard. Sniffspot is definitely a smart idea and I expect it to grow exponentially over the next few years.