Some Business

94 – June, 2010

by Gay Dunlap

Photos by Lisa Croft-Elliott

Some business! But is it a business? Or a profession? Or is it a hobby? For many of us it is the latter although there are those who, by virtue of money earned and time spent, may consider it a business. Certainly it is business for AKC while the professional handler could easily call it a profession. Hobby breeders that consider their activity a business are generally hard pressed, however, to eak out a living, rarely making it out of the red. Then we have our judges, of which I am one. Exactly how are we defined?

We walk a rather narrow path, that’s for sure. We follow, to the letter, rules and regulations heaped upon us by the AKC. We invest incalculable dollars and jump through countless hoops in order to reach our goal of “approved” AKC judge. We travel the country, at our own expense, to attend judge’s institutes, breed seminars, and specialties. We are not allowed to advertise our services. We are instructed never to solicit judging assignments, no matter how badly we may need them to complete our provisional requirements. Through all of this, our expectation is to reach a point where we are no longer living a life of diminishing returns. We move forward hoping to eventually recoup the dollars invested. In my case, because I must board my dogs whenever I am called upon to judge, I may never recoup!

Most of us come to this after untold years (forty years for me) of involvement in the “sport” of dogs, having given it our life’s blood. Many of us see it as a way to give back to the sport, never dreaming that our reward for this somewhat altruistic act would be to further drain our pocketbooks. In mid-May we were notified of AKC’s intention to charge judges an annual maintenance fee of $50 plus an additional $10 per breed per year. This is in addition to the $25 we all were required to fork up for each breed judging application. This fee, by the way, is non-refundable should a judge fail to be granted a breed. We have been further advised that delegate conformation judges would be exempt from the annual fee since delegates are prohibited from charging clubs other than their actual expenses. Junior Showmanship-only judges would also be exempt. It seems that provisional judges are stuck between a rock and a hard place since they rarely charge more than a nominal fee, if that, and show-giving clubs do not cover their expenses.

And what do our judges get from the AKC in return? They will continue to be provided with “Professional” Liability Insurance, and will receive “an AKC Judge’s logo Pin, identification card and breed standards upon request.”

The announcement has, needless to say, generated an uproar of monumental proportions. The ramifications of AKC’s plan are equally monumental. Delegate or not, the implications of imposing this fee structure is far more wide reaching in scope than the AKC seems to realize. What were they thinking? Filtering down to the show-giving clubs by judges tacking this fee onto their expenses, and, in turn, clubs increasing the exhibitors’ entry fees, the life-blood of this sport is going to be sucked out of it. Assuming down the road there is anything left of it, are we then doomed to return to the elitist days of yore when this was a sport for the wealthy alone…one in which only they can afford to play?

Another point arises. Is it really fair to punish clubs by passing this fee down to them, some already, as one judge pointed out, “hanging on by the skin of their teeth” because of declining entries? Most assuredly, clubs will pass it on to the exhibitor, already feeling burdened by the rising cost of attending shows in the first place, to say nothing of the thankless job of searching for majors and the difficult task of competing with professional handlers. How long can we expect the average work-a-day person to continue playing the game?

Surely the AKC did not expect the judges to take this fee business lying down! While there have been rumblings about the possibility of charging them a fee, I doubt any expected the outrageous amount proposed. Several judges, myself included, wondered if this was perhaps a ploy…AKC puts it out there; judges rant and rave; AKC pulls back and reduces their “tax;” judges are relieved; AKC wins and at the same time appears supportive of our plight. And another possible ruse has been suggested: if this truly goes into effect, AKC stands to lose approximately 1000 judges. Is this the method in their madness? Could this possibly be their ultimate objective?

But, never mind that. The situation is far more onerous than AKC’s appearing to view their judging force as a cash cow. Something is rotten at 51 Madison Avenue and the powers that be are hoping we can help fix it. Nonsense. We know the organization feels itself to be in serious trouble financially. At the same time it does not seem inclined to take the sort of action typical of most large corporations that regularly hire independent consultants to evaluate company structure and efficiency. If I am mistaken and they have done so, perhaps they need to choose their consultants more wisely.

We are looking at some outrageous salaries, preposterous travel expenses, and the outlandish expense of maintaining offices in New York City, to say nothing of retaining an “executive” apartment there as well. As one judge suggested, “heaven forbid one looks at cutting costs.” Perhaps cost cutting is not in AKC’s vocabulary.

It is my understanding that AKC feels hamstrung by the delegate body and would love nothing more than to be rid of it. But AKC’s constitution is clear in stating that this is a club of clubs, so they are stuck with it. It is bantered about that AKC holds the delegate body at least partly responsible for the corporation’s falling revenue. If the Hunte Corporation fiasco is being used as a case in point, surely AKC must realize by now that it was the presentation and handling of the deal and not the actual deal itself that created its downfall. We might have been born at night but not last night!

We understand there is no way hobby breeders can meet the demand for purebred dogs. But that is all water over the dam. The registrations are gone and AKC will never get them back.

Meanwhile, how do we feel about the fact that we can no longer expect them to uphold and adhere to their own mission statement, objectives and core values? The very first claim in the mission statement is currently in jeopardy, that of maintaining the integrity of the Stud Register. And obviously, we are no longer a club dedicated solely to the purebred dog.

Taxing judges will work a hardship on many of us, across the board, within the fancy. And in the final analysis, it will fail because of clearly unforeseen consequences. Looking at it from another point of view, what these fees would provide financially is but a drop in the bucket of AKC’s monetary needs.

There is no way we can deny that our world of purebred dogs is quite changed from what we knew it to be when most of us came aboard. It is obvious that we appear willing to change along with it. But when will enough be enough? Judges have seen this fee coming so it is not unexpected. Unexpected, however, is its structure, deemed arbitrary, flawed and discriminatory. Thank goodness AKC is going back to the drawing board.

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Posted by admin on Jul 20 2010. Filed under Editorial, Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry