I got this to exercise my lab in a way that appeases her natural instinct to retrieve. After several months of use, the launcher is still going on a daily basis. She (the lab) doesn't like the fabric ball as much as the whistler ball we ended up buying her and using with this launcher, but it is still an excellent product to prevent touching the ball. In the winter it helps preventing my hands from freezing, and it consistently prevents me from touching a slobbery and dirty ball. We have a fairly large-sized back yard for a suburban neighborhood and the junior launcher was a perfect fit for our throwing needs (e.g. meaning that I didn't need the larger size as it would fly into my neighbors yard). The launcher is about a foot and a half and has withstood being lightly chewed on. Should I ever get a bigger or smaller yard, I will buy another Chuckit! to use for that yard.