By Matthew Halverson
Here’s the long and short of it: St. Louis doesn’t like dachshunds—at least not as much as the rest of the country does. The American Kennel Club reports that while the wiener is the seventh most popular dog nationwide, it doesn’t even crack the top 10 in the STL. What gives? “In a lot of the more affluent households, it’s ‘What’s the most popular It dog to get?’” says David Brown, president of the Dachshund Club of St. Louis. “I’ve noticed that the bulldog has enjoyed a resurgence in popularity, and I think that’s basically a fad.”
What’s not to love about the dachshund? It hunts badgers, and nobody likes those. It’s been bred not to stink. Heck, it even has its own race, for crying out loud. “That’s fun to watch,” Brown says. “Some of them can really scoot across the landscape pretty quickly.”
You don’t have to convince Brown of the wiener’s marketable traits—he owns three—but as for the rest of you, you Labradoodle-loving, trend-conscious, so-called dog lovers who don’t see the value in having a pooch that got its nickname from processed meat, he’s got one thing to say: “You’re missing out.”
