About a year ago, I began a big new adventure: I started a mobile pet grooming business with a close friend of mine. She has been a talented groomer for the last 17 years, and with my 15 years of animal care and expert handling skills, we make a pretty phenomenal team.
I was hesitant at first, starting this journey, as I never had much interest in grooming and was coming out of a toxic work environment in which I repeatedly had drilled into my head that my experience and skills are worthless and my personal integrity was attacked. Deciding to continue in the animal care field was difficult, even though I have enormous skill and passion for it; I felt so defeated. Quickly though, with the support from my friend and business partner, I realized that finally I had fallen into a job that felt like the right fit. I have yet to say that I have any sort of passion for pet grooming, but I do have a skill for handling all sorts of animals (especially “difficult” ones with less than perfect behaviors) and I have been able to experience for the first time a relaxing, stress-free work environment, where I enjoy my entire day and my work ethic, skill level, and personality traits are recognized and appreciated.
Our business, Wild Rover Pet Grooming, has taken off faster than either of us expected. We have an amazing group of clients who are so supportive of what we are doing. In fact, the incredible support we’ve received from our Wild Rover family has encouraged and allowed us to take the next steps in growing our business: in addition to recently being able to hire on my best friend part time to assist us with administrative work we are drowning in, we were also able to get a VAN!!
Having a full functioning mobile grooming van means so much to us. It will allow us to offer more services (like baths) and to have some of our favorite products available for sale, and perhaps most importantly, our OWN SPACE. Until now, we have been reliant on the generosity of our clients to help find a quiet space in their home where we can set up our grooming table and plug in our clippers. Since the dawn of the COVID era, this has become increasingly more uncomfortable and challenging for everybody. Not only are there benefits to our health to have a designated work space of our own, but I’m excited at the idea of feeling slightly less scattered and transient (not having to throw all our tools in a bag and sort through everything again at the next house is going to be an enormous sigh of relief and huge time saver).
So a little more about the van: we love it. We found a van that fits our needs perfectly - super high ceilings comfortable to stand up in all day, and plenty of windows that open to put my slightly claustrophobic mind at ease. It is an older vehicle that has been maintained meticulously with very few miles put on it. A very kind gentleman was selling it for a wonderful price, and even more amazing - one of our favorite clients was incredibly generous and covered the cost of the van for us!
Now that we have the perfect vehicle - we have to convert it to fully function as a mobile grooming unit. That project is primarily falling on me, which is exciting but also a little overwhelming. There are lots of different things that must be tackled - beginning with dismantling seats and the currently installed wheelchair lift, to installing a tub with a working plumbing system and an electrical system that allows us to run all of our necessary equipment while parked at a clients house. I have spent countless hours researching different systems and am lucky to have access to tools and some expertise to help me sort through some of the logistics.
I started by making a scale model of the van (primarily to be able to help explain the picture in my brain to other people involved). There are going to be many steps of this project, starting with our Kickstarter campaign to raise money to fund the conversion.
This post has gotten longer than intended with all of my excitement about the thriving business and the upcoming changes. I will stop here for now with the promise of updates as the conversion progresses and the van gets even closer to being the work place of our dreams.
