When we purchased Dogwood Kennel, the kennel’s motto was “Where Pets Come First”. It’s not why we purchased the kennel, but we loved the motto and we kept it.
When you’re a business that cares for pets everything is important, everything. The kennels have to be clean and sanitized and the yards need to be cleaned regularly. Each guest’s food and medications must be right every time. Scared boarders need to be comforted. All boarders and daycare dogs need interaction, positive reinforcement and enrichment. Pets who are being groomed need understanding, comfort and careful care. These are just a few of the important things.
I used to manage veterinary hospitals. One of the things I realized early on is that when you’re a business that cares for pets, everything is important, but one thing is most important…the team who care for the pets.
People who are great at caring for pets are very special people. It is hard work. They are out in the elements every day, cleaning all day long, they get scratched, sometimes bitten, they get wet when they are cleaning kennels, they get their feet stepped on and, at the end of every day, they smile to themselves and say “I got to spend my day taking care of dogs and cats and it was great”.
We’ve been very lucky in our first year. We’ve made some personnel adjustments when a team member didn’t share our core beliefs and we’ve had some amazing people be part of our team. We had wonderful college students working with us. Some were here when we took over the kennel and they worked really, really hard through a very busy year. We are thrilled that one of our anchors is still with us while she studies to be a scientist. We’ve had new team members join us whose dreams were to get a chance to work with dogs and cats. An amazing trainer who thinks just like us found us. She is all about positive reinforcement. She helps me keep all of our guests happy and safe and she has helped me train all of the owners and their dogs who were looking to improve their relationships. And, we found an awesome groomer. She has an amazing eye for detail and makes the dogs she grooms look incredible. Just as importantly, she believes in using positive reinforcement and minimal restraint techniques so that the dogs and cats we groom are comfortable and happy.
We’re building a very strong team at Dogwood. You’re never really finished building a team. We keep training, learning and getting better at what we do every day. We are dedicated to providing exceptional care to every boarder, daycare dog, dog and cat we groom and every dog we train. Everyone on our team is committed to using positive reinforcement techniques with the pets in our care.
We’ve worked hard building our team over the past year. A team that is totally committed to make Dogwood Kennels a place where pets always come first.
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