The Facts

Why are we so much cheaper than the rest?

We are often asked why our prices are so cheap in comparison to other retailers, so we thought we’d create this page to explain a little on how we work and how we offer the prices we do.

First, let’s clear up a myth that other retailers are trying to use to lure sales away from lower priced items like ours:

MYTH: Our products are cheaper because they’re not built as well and/or don’t work as well as more expensive brands.

FALSE. Having sold products from all the major brands at one time or another, the return/exchange rate on other brands as compared to the BARKMATE brand is identical. The customer satisfaction rate of BARKMATE products, compared to more expensive products, is almost exactly the same -- except the BARKMATE satisfaction rate is actually slightly higher, because people factor whether they got a bargain or not into their satisfaction levels! We back our dog training products with a Limited Lifetime Warranty, so that shows you how confident we are in our products doing the job we say they will. There's no reason NOT to try us out and see for yourself!

So then, if the products themselves are similar in quality and operation, how do we offer cheaper prices?

Cutting Out The Middle Men

With most products, by the time they end up in your hands, they’ve already passed through many other hands that have all added their own mark-up along the way.

A typical supply line looks like this:

Contracted Manufacturer > Branded Company > Importers/Wholesalers > Distributors > Resellers > Customer

The BARKMATE supply line looks like this:

Contracted Manufacturer > Branded Company > Customer

Low Overheads

Some companies want to razzle-dazzle you with how big and bright they are, with large factories, huge staff rosters, 24 hour sales/advice phone lines etc.

At BARKMATE, we like to keep it simple.

A handful of staff do everything from product assembly, packaging, order fulfillment and mailing – we even design all of our own websites and product packaging in-house! For every staff member or contractor we hire to make ourselves look more impressive, the more we have to add to the price of our products, and the more people you have to go through to get a problem solved.

We make no apologies for staying small, precise and focused. We offer direct sales, with great prices on great products, to people who already have a good idea of what they want or need. We don't offer dozens of different products for the one problem, because that's confusing for the customer, and we already know that our products do most of the job, most of the time.

Just Plain Good Value

We’ll be blunt about this one: before we first started business in 2005, the average anti bark collar sold for $250-$350, and sometimes even higher, for no other reason than there was very little competition.  At BARKMATE, we believe in great products at great prices, so we do not take the large mark-up that others do. We think these products should be affordable for anyone who needs them; not just the well-off minority.