06/17/2026
There are some things that owners may not consider before bringing their pet in for one-on-one grooming or grooming appointments:
* When you’re not feeling 100% the last thing you want to do is book a full shampoo, blow out, hair cut, manicure, pedicure, massage, and photo shoot; I know I would rather be home sleeping, recovering and do all those things when I’m feeling my best. Same goes for pets. If your pets been ill hours before their appointment, reschedule. They won’t enjoy it, it adds stress to everyone, and why risk it?!
*Vaccines can hurt or be uncomfortable. The vaccination site, just like us, can be tender after. Bringing them in for grooming, we have to use our hands, tools, dryers on the skin. Doing this over tender sites could cause unwarranted and out of character behavior, which then ripples into the pet beings stressed, unsure why they reacted that way, why did that hurt?…. It’s best and safer to space these things out. Not to mention the sensory overload from going to one facility to another… their cortisol levels spike, some may have noticed their dogs are a ton sleepier after, that’s because it takes their body’s longer to metabolize the stress hormones then it takes us. What is our minutes, is their hours.
* Contagious illnesses and parasites are a hard no! Sometimes fleas and ticks happen, but infestations need to be properly resolved before coming in. If you come in and there is an infestation, we have to not only cancel all other appointments for that day, we also have to sanitize and disinfect every inch of our facility past normal disinfecting regimen. This gets extremely costly.
* Pregnant or In-heat: I do not groom pregnant or in heat females. There is to much risk associated with being a solo groomer and grooming a pregnant dog. In-heat dogs cause for an extremly costly disinfecting protocol after services. If we do not do this process then our whole facility gets marked by any male dog that comes in after, and sometimes even female dogs. We lose to much time in closing the facility after the appointment or having to cancel. We ask that all female dogs are well off their cycle or spayed to come in. Male dogs cannot be markers for the same reason.
*I am a solo practioner, meaning I do not always have someone to assist me to lift or hold a dog for me. I do everything from start to finish solo. All pets must be willing and capable of standing, walking, being led on a leash, being lifted and walking through door ways. I not going to be taking highly reactive dogs at this time due to high risk of injury.
*Because I am a solo practitioner, I will not be able to take any pets with seizure disorders or major health conditions unless cleared by a veterinarian that they are safe to groom, consultations and meet and greet are done, and/or dependent on condition and state.
More to come…..
