A Quick Pick-It-Up : Laguna Teaches Dog Owners New Trick to Remove Waste

Here’s the scoop on the doggie-litter dilemma.

The city of Laguna Beach recently became the first in the country to buy a bright-green vending machine that dispenses “Oops! Scoop”--a disposable dog-waste scoop.

The machine and the plain, brown cardboard scoops (which come complete with directions) are the invention of Tom Stacy of Minneapolis. Stacy, who owns three pooches himself, discovered the need for the scoops after several cities adopted laws requiring people to pick up after their pets.

So Stacy did what any new manufacturer would do: conducted research. “In the initial survey I found one major reason people didn’t like to pick up was the sensory feedback--they didn’t like the feel, touch or smell of picking up the dog waste,” he said with a straight face.

He also learned that the potential marketplace is huge.

“It’s estimated that if we capture 1% of the market and people only use the scoops three times a week, that will equate to 12 million scoops per month,” he said.

And while Stacy hasn’t exactly been cleaning up, scoop sales started last August and have been brisk. Up to 40,000 biodegradable “Oops! Scoops” have been sold at $2.99 for a pack of seven--mainly through pet shops and directly to dog owners. About that number also have been given away.

In fact, it was a Laguna Beach pet-store owner who first told the City Council about Stacy’s hands-on solution and the vending machines. Stacy contacted some council members, and the rest, as they say, is history.

“Their ad hoc committee concluded (the machine and scoops) were the only way to solve the problem without banning dogs on the beach,” Stacy said.

Two machines (Stacy threw one in for free) were delivered to Laguna’s Moulton Meadows Park and Main Beach about two weeks ago and should be up by now, City Manager Kenneth C. Frank said.

And now Laguna is waiting to see if the scoops--which cost 25 cents--will do the trick.

“We have a lot of dogs on the beach after certain hours,” Mayor Dan Kenney said. “And it’s real important to get people to pick up.”