Every dog breed has a specific written standard put out by their breed club. Breed standards are written where each individual's perception can be slightly different. Breeders should have their standard ingrained in their memory and have a mental picture of what the ideal specimen of their breed would look like and focus their breeding program towards producing the mental specimen they see as being correct. Since each breeder will have a different mental picture of their perfect specimen when we attend a dog show we will see very similar, yet hopefully suttle differences between the dogs being shown within a particular breed. Show breeders were developed specifically to exhibit their dogs to judges in order to receive feedback on their offspring's structural soundness and then only the structurally sound dogs were the dogs to be used in future breeding programs.

Breed standards are very important. Breeders who show their dogs are always going to be the breeders who strive to produce the best offspring whether they become the next top show dog or that pet of a lifetime that every person who just wants a dog to love is searching for...show breeders know how to cultivate the best offspring a breed can produce.

Cavalier King Charles Spaniel Breed Standard