Dog owners are increasingly choosing where to eat, stay, shop and spend days out based on where their dogs are genuinely welcome. For tourism, hospitality and local service businesses, that shift is creating a clearer opportunity to reach visitors before they decide where to go.
Best Bark, the Belfast born dog friendly directory and verified services platform, has expanded across Ireland to help dog owners find reliable places, services, events and days out with their dogs.
The platform, co-founded by Amée Spence and Warren Giffin, began in Northern Ireland and now includes more than 1000 listings across the island of Ireland. Listings include dog friendly cafés, bars, restaurants, accommodation, parks, walks, beaches, events, pet shops and verified dog services.
Best Bark is already Visit Belfast’s official dog friendly partner for Belfast, helping visitors find dog friendly places across the city with more confidence.
“We partnered with Best Bark because more and more visitors are planning their trips around their dogs, and they need places they can genuinely trust. Belfast is a great city for dog owners, with cafés, walks and places to stay that really welcome them. Best Bark takes the guessworkout of planning a responsible trip with a dog, and we’re proud to support how they’ve grown,” says Gavin McKenna, Head of Marketing, Digital and Communications at Visit Belfast.
Best Bark says the growth of the platform points to a clear commercial opportunity for hospitality, tourism and local service businesses.
Over the past six months, Best Bark has recorded 116,000 page views, 55,000 unique visits and 18,000 returning visits. One of the platform’s top performing listings received more than 3,000 views over the same period, and in the past 30 days alone generated 317 website clicks and 221 direction clicks.
For businesses, those figures show that dog owners are not just browsing for ideas. They are actively deciding where to go, who to contact and which places are worth visiting.Amée Spence, co-founder of Best Bark, said dog friendly travel has shifted from a niche lifestyle choice to a massive economic driver for Irish tourism.
“As dog owners ourselves, we know there is a massive difference between a place that technically allows dogs and somewhere you can actually sit back and relax. When you are travelling, that difference is everything. If you cannot easily tell whether a spot is genuinely welcoming or just tolerating your pet, you simply won’t go. You will find somewhere else. We built Best Bark because we were fed up of relying on outdated blogs and random social media comments just to plan a simple weekend trip. The information was completely scattered. Our partnership with Visit Belfast proved just how much people want a trusted guide they can rely on, so expanding across Ireland was the natural next step. With so many people planning cross border staycations and road trips right now, it just made sense to map out the whole island.”
Alongside hospitality and travel listings, Best Bark verifies dog service providers such as walkers, groomers, trainers, sitters, boarding providers and wellbeing services. The verification process gives dog owners a safer way to find trusted local businesses, while giving serviceproviders a way to stand out in a busy market.
The platform is also building destination guides for key areas across Ireland, including Dog Friendly Dublin, to help owners plan trips with clearer information before they travel.
Amée added: “Being dog friendly isn’t a marketing gimmick anymore, it dictates where people eat, where they stay, and which businesses they keep going back to. We just want to bridge that gap. Dog owners get information they can actually trust, and brilliant local businesses get found by the exact people who are already looking for them.”
Best Bark is continuing to add listings across Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, with more destination guides, dog friendly events and verified service categories planned as part of its Ireland expansion.