Pet Boarding: Seven Tips for Outstanding Business Management
Pet boarding can be a highly lucrative and rewarding field. Proper management techniques are the key to making it so. Below you will find seven tips that should help you put your facility head and shoulders above your competitors.
Luxury Caging
Most pet owners wilt at the thought of leaving their beloved pet in the hands of a stranger. They envision them held captive in quarters such as those that might be found at Abu Ghraiib. Your job is to prove to them they are wrong. If you are building or retrofitting your kennel why not make it luxurious with all the amenities any pet might have at home? Some boarding facilities go so far as to add miniature couches and other amenities such as televisions and nanny cams to each cage area! Customers can simply call in on their cell phones to view their pet and assure themselves of its welfare.
Professional Personnel
The better trained your staff is and the better they present themselves, the better impression they make on your customers. The dogs and cats you are boarding will likely care less what your staff is wearing. Your human customers, however, will likely be much more impressed by neatly dressed staff in perhaps khakis and facility-logoed polo shirts than bedraggled looking staff in cut-offs and tank tops. Remember, even the guy whose primary job is to scoop up the poop is highly visible in the customer’s eye. Keep that visibility positive.
Bio-security
Bio-security is a must at a boarding facility. Although a clean bill of health should be a prerequisite for boarding at your facility, animals can still carry diseases and parasites. Have a cleaning plan in place and have the appropriate equipment and supplies to do the job the best way it can be done. Safe cleaning products and the correct application of those products are a must.
Top of the Line Equipment
Don’t settle for inferior equipment at your boarding facility. Your equipment reflects on you and, believe me, most customers will be open-eyed when it comes to showing off what you have. Consider, as an example, the Anivac pro heat system for cleaning floors and runs. It is far superior and far more impressive than the traditional mop and bucket.
Bathing Services
Many pet owners have come to expect their boarding facility to be a one stop place for nearly all their pet’s grooming needs. Decide if you will offer baths. They are a value-added addition to any facility. The Anivac pro heat system, equipped with bathing wands and the appropriate shampoos does double duty bathing the animals themselves. As it applies the pressurized water the dirt and grime are pushed away from the skin and at the same time the dirty water is being sucked away. What better way to give a dog a bath?
Nail Trimming and Grooming
Often a pet owner’s biggest nightmare is having to groom their pets themselves. Why not offer those services at your top of the line pet spa? The fear of clipping into the quick on a nail is just too great for a pet owner to bear and, while Fluffy loves petting, he can become quite aggressive when being groomed. Have the appropriate staff on hand, staff that is trained to trim nails and groom and you can easily double your income from your boarding facility.
Activities
Most owners don’t want their pet sitting isolated in a cage all day. Have an activity routine. Exercise runs are nice but they are even nicer if the pet is accompanied by someone who will throw a ball or frisbee at the dog’s beck and command. You might even offer basic obedience training while the owner is away. What owner wouldn’t want to come home to a better-trained pet?