We were lucky to catch up with Jessica Kirsch recently and have shared our conversation below.

Jessica, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Taking care of customers isn’t just good business – it is often one of the main reasons folks went into business in the first place. So, we’d love to get a conversation going around how to best help clients feel appreciated – maybe you can share something you’ve done or seen someone do that’s been really effective at helping a customer feel valued?

I personally write thank you cards for every one of my clients any time they board with me. I also send their dogs home with a little goodie bag of treats, toys, or other items as a thank you so they can spoil their dogs at home after their boarding stays.

Jessica, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I have been training my own dogs for over 15 years and I have competed in dog sports for over 8 years. The industry is truly lacking in experienced, safe, and caring places for dogs to board that are affordable for the average person. I don’t offer luxury condos for each dog, but I do bring my experience to the table. This allows me to have clients that cannot go to a standard boarding facility for a variety of reasons (reactivity, age, personal care requirements, etc.). I have also started offering training as a new service since I get the request so often from my clients or from people they know. It is a new service, but I have a wide variety of information and hands on training in a variety of dog sports to help teach dogs in a safe and appropriate way.

I offer in-home, small scale boarding. I only typically take 4 dogs at a time, as I only have 4 kennel runs. I will take additional dogs if they are crate trained. I also offer personalized board and trains and private lessons/classes as a new service.

I offer boarding for dogs that may be reactive or intact. This is not a common thing in my area that people offer. Each dog goes out individually and will never play/interact with another dog while they are staying here, even if they are dog social. They spend one on one time with me instead. This provides an option for people that have no other place for their dogs to go. I also own several reactive and high-drive dogs myself so my experience allows me to approach these dogs from a trainers standpoint to keep everyone safe and comfortable here. I have been told many times that no other boarding facility has ever worked out for their dog and my services have allowed them to take vacations and have some freedom again in their lives.

I am the most proud of my kennel space and the procedures that I have developed for my clients and their dogs. I offer updates at least daily and have an open texting policy. I also have upgraded my kennel space to be more like a home as much as I can. With laminate floors, fresh paint, DogTV, and pheromone/calming plug ins. I also give dogs a kuranda bed, blankets, and all the comforts of home that their owners what to bring along. Each dog also gets one on one time with me and gets to decompress without the stress of a kennel environment. They get yard time and some time wandering around with me doing chores or other tasks regularly to help them feel more comfortable.

Have you ever had to pivot?

I am actually a licensed attorney and I was working in the oil and gas industry, which had been struggling at the time. I decided to quit my part time job as a barista and started to offer dog boarding, which turned out to be a great success (with some bumps along the way of course). I then was offered a dream job at a law firm as an associate attorney, which I took. I decided that my clients needed me and I continued offering boarding, but to repeat clients only. Well, my repeat clients kept me really busy so I decided to go all in and create an LLC and the business I have today. My employer was not always okay with all my dog-related trips and weird hours to help accommodate client schedules for trips, but they humored me for awhile. I then was let go due to my lack of commitment to the firm and it just not being a good fit for what they were looking for in an associate. I was then faced with the difficult decision to look for another job, or go back to reviewing documents and focus on my business. I chose my business and I have been working on improving it and growing my services ever since. It was the best decision I had ever made and I am so much happier to have dogs as the primary focus of my life.

How’d you build such a strong reputation within your market?

My reputation comes from my love and dedication for my own dogs. I also have a fairly large network of fellow dog lovers that I call friends from a variety of dog sports, who all know how much I care about my personal dogs. As I expand my knowledge in the dog sport world, I continue to meet more and more people and I continue to grow my reputation as a dog lover. I know that my involvement in the dog sport community is truly where my reputation has been built, which has now started to transfer over into the pet dog world with my clients.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.jk9pet.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jk9_pet_services/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61551824024534
• Yelp: https://biz.yelp.com/biz_info/3AmHaqep2f6nCGPXgMsk5A