Your Dog Does Not Want a Spa Day
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Rituals calls it a wellness retreat for your furry friend. The range runs to a shampoo, a dry shampoo, wipes, a paw balm, a mouth spray, a collar, a water bowl, an air and fabric freshener, and a perfume.
A perfume. For a dog. At €698 a litre.
We want to say two things about this, and they do not cancel out. The first is that we think it is rather lovely. The second is that your dog has other plans.
What your dog thinks a wellness retreat is
- A puddle. Not a clean one.
- Something dead, on a beach, in August.
- The neighbour's lawn, at speed, on its back, with feeling.
- The bath — but the leaving part.
The distance between that list and the Rituals catalogue is the entire dog wellness industry, and it grows every year. We are not standing above it. We sell dog food and dog travel gear, so we are in it up to the elbows. We would just like to be clear about which half of the gap we are standing in.
What it actually costs
| The Dog Spa | Price | Per litre |
|---|---|---|
| Dog Shampoo, 300 ml | €17,90 | €59,67 |
| Dog Dry Shampoo, 150 ml | €14,90 | €99,33 |
| Dog Wipes, 40 pieces | €9,90 | — |
| Dog Mouth Spray, 85 ml | €12,90 | €151,76 |
| Dog Paw Balm, 50 ml | €16,90 | €338,00 |
| Dog Perfume, 50 ml | €34,90 | €698,00 |
| Air & Fabric Freshener, 400 ml | €19,90 | €49,75 |
| Water Bowl | €7,90 | — |
| Collar, S/M and M/L | €16,90 / €21,90 | — |
| Gift set M / gift set L | €39,90 / €69,90 | — |
Rituals' own figures, checked 2 October 2026.
Now the part where we are fair to them, which is less fun than you were hoping.
The shampoo is about twice the going rate
A mainstream 250 ml dog shampoo runs €5,92 to €8,41, which is roughly €24 to €34 a litre. Rituals is €59,67. So you are paying double for something that smells better and looks better on the edge of the bath. That is a defensible way to spend seventeen euros. We have all made worse decisions in a bathroom.
The paw balm is not the outrage it looks like
€338 a litre reads like a typo. Then you price the alternatives. A 100 ml tin at €12,95 works out at €130 a litre — but a 40 ml tin at €14,99 is €375, and a 30 ml one at €12,99 is €433. Rituals sits in the middle of its own category. Paw balm is simply expensive, because it is sold in tins the size of a lip balm and nobody has ever needed a litre of it.
The perfume has no comparison
There is no mainstream dog perfume to hold it against, for the straightforward reason that until recently there was no such thing as dog perfume. €698 a litre is a number without a peer group. Make of that what you will.
What is genuinely good in there
The wipes. At €9,90 for forty, this is the one item in the range you will actually finish. Muddy paws at the back door, a dog that has met a hedge, five minutes before visitors arrive. Everything else is optional; wipes are infrastructure.
The paw balm, in February and in August. Winter grit and road salt, then hot summer tarmac. This is the one product in the range with a season.
The idea itself. Calling it a spa day is a trick, and the trick does not work on the dog — it works on you. A bath you have decided to enjoy goes differently from a bath you have been dreading since Tuesday. Dogs read the room. If a nicer bottle and a better smell get you into the bathroom in a good mood, that bottle has earned its money, whatever is in it.
What is for you, not for the dog
The perfume and the air and fabric freshener. A dog's nose is its main instrument for understanding the world, and fragrance is a thing we add for our own benefit. That is not a scandal and it does not need a lecture — just be clear about which of you the product is for.
The freshener on the sofa where you sit: fine, go ahead. On the dog: that is a present to your own nose, wrapped as a present for your dog. Which, let us be honest, is most of the pet industry and quite a lot of Christmas.
How to actually have the spa day
Six things, none of which cost anything:
- Brush before the water, never after. A wet knot is a permanent knot.
- Lukewarm. Test it on the inside of your wrist, like a bottle. What feels pleasant to your hands is usually too hot.
- Dog shampoo, not yours. Different skin, different pH. This is the one rule in the article that is not a matter of taste.
- Less often than you think. Most dogs get washed when they are actually dirty, not on a schedule.
- Drying is the whole job. A damp dog will find the one surface in your house you care about. Two towels, not one.
- Treats on the bathroom floor before the water runs. You want the dog to arrive somewhere good, not to be paid off afterwards for something that already happened.
For the hardware — clippers, nail grinders, deshedding brushes — we went through the kits separately in Best At-Home Dog Grooming Kit.
The one place all of this stops being a luxury
A hotel room. Fletcher charges €25 for chemical cleaning if your dog has been on the bed, and another €25 if it fouls somewhere and you do not deal with it. Suddenly a packet of wipes and a bottle of dry shampoo in the overnight bag is not pampering, it is the cheapest insurance in the suitcase.
We went through what the chains and holiday parks really charge in What Hotels and Holiday Parks Charge for a Dog. Flying as well? The Dog Flight Checker gives the fee and the bag or crate size for 27 airlines.
And since we are the other half of this
Rituals has the outside of your dog. We have the inside: we sell the food. Which puts us in an awkward spot, because this is the paragraph where a dog food shop is supposed to tell you that a shiny coat starts in the bowl.
We are not going to do that. We sell four 500 ml oils at €6,95 — salmon oil, sheep fat, and two blends — and we are not going to tell you what they do for a coat. Plenty of people will tell you. We would rather you asked your vet, and we would rather keep the one thing we can actually promise, which is the price.
They ride along with a bag of food, which is how they are meant to be bought. Our delivery is free with no minimum order, and a single bottle in its own box is a sad little parcel. If you want to know how much food that bag should hold in the first place, the food calculator works it out for your dog.
So, is it worth it?
As a present for a dog owner: yes, honestly. The gift sets at €39,90 and €69,90 are a better idea than most things bought for people who already have everything, because they are for the dog and therefore cannot be judged as taste. Buy it for the owner, not the dog. The owner is the one who wanted a spa day.
And your dog will thank you by finding something to roll in within nine minutes. That is not the product failing. That is the product meeting a dog.
Prices checked 2 October 2026 on rituals.com and amazon.nl, and they move. We are not affiliated with Rituals, nobody paid for this, and nothing here is veterinary advice — if something about your dog's skin or coat worries you, your vet is the right call.