Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Shari Johnson. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Hi Shari, thanks for joining us today. Folks often look at a successful business and imagine it was an overnight success, but from what we’ve seen this is often far from the truth. We’d love to hear your scaling up story – walk us through how you grew over time – what were some of the big things you had to do to grow and what was that scaling up journey like?

I am a single mom and in 2017 I needed to figure out a way to provide for my 4 kids. I was working part time during the day then I’d come home and groom dogs in my basement but it still wasn’t enough.

Some of my grooming clients asked if I’d be interested in watching their dogs when they went out of town for extra income.

I wasn’t sure if that was the best solution for me so I did some research on dog boarding & dog daycare and was blown away by what I found! I had no idea there was such a demand for dog daycare & boarding, especially in the Riverton area.

After my research, I made a simple post on my private Facebook page letting people know that I was going to be offering dog daycare & overnight boarding in my home. I had 8 dogs sleeping at my house that weekend.

After that, I was hooked! Not only did I love caring for the dogs, I loved learning about other businesses and how they worked. But I wanted to create a business model that didn’t exist in already established dog daycare facilities. I did research on dog sitting platforms & facilities; reading reviews to figure out what people liked & what they didn’t. I took a business class specifically geared to women, utilized the services offered by the WBDC and SBDC and learned what I could from them. I went to every networking event I could with the intention of connecting with other entrepreneurs. I wanted to learn and grow, not only in business but as a person.

I feel it’s important to mention that I received a fair amount of negative feedback from several business professionals. Yet, every time I was discouraged by people who had experience in running successful businesses, a new fire was ignited: I was determined to prove them all wrong.

After years of looking for a commercial space that would work for my business model and particular use (zoning being a huge factor) I finally found my current landlord. I will be forever grateful to him for taking a chance on me. We were unanimously approved for a conditional use permit for our current location and after 5 1/2 years of running a dog daycare & boarding business out of my home, we moved into our beautiful space in February 2023.

What started with 8 dogs in my home with my kids helping me has developed into a 3200 square foot custom built facility with 22 employees.

This has been an epic adventure and I am still just as passionate about my business as it continues to grow.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

Let’s see…a little about me:

I’m a single mom of 4 of the most amazing humans I’ve ever met! (+3 with their significant others)

I own 7 tree farms, a doggie daycare, boarding, training and grooming facility in Riverton, Utah. I started in my home 7 1/2 years ago as a way to provide for my little family. I had no idea it would become what it has when I started. It has been so fun creating new activities, policies & procedures and ways to connect with our clients as we have grown. Part of this growth included moving into a custom built commercial space that we designed for our specific business model 2 years ago.

At our facility we have created as close to a home environment as possible while still hosting a large number of dogs. We have created school themed rooms where we group dogs according to temperament and size. We have a number of activities for the dogs throughout the year that mirror traditional school activities, which include: school picture day, Halloween costume contests, Thanksgiving dinner for our slumber party guests and so much more. What sets us apart are the crafts we help the dogs make on various holidays for their families to enjoy.

Running a business is not for wimps! However, the connections and friendships that have developed over the years is the reward that makes it all worth it.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

Running this type of business out of our home became quite challenging as we continued to grow. At first, we had the dogs in the house. Eventually we had too many dogs coming so we renovated the garage to give us more space.

I started looking for commercial properties after a year. I could see that our growth rate would be able to support a larger facility.

In 2020 I was in communications with realtors to lease a build to suit in Riverton. They had a lot of requirements before they would sign a contract and I jumped through all their hoops. The day before we were scheduled to sign, the land owners decided to go another direction. I was completely devastated!

I cried it out then the next day I went to the Riverton City Planning and Zoning department. I’d been working with them to obtain my conditional use permit for the property I was about to lease. I told them the situation and asked for their help in finding another location. We looked at the zoning map for 30-45 minutes when one of them suggested I call the man who is now my landlord.

After meeting him, showing him a sketch I had drawn up of what I was hoping to do, we signed a contract in 2021.

Where do you think you get most of your clients from?

My business grew initially by word of mouth.
Now we have a lot of clients finding us using Google search.
We have great reviews by our amazing clients which prompts people to come take a tour.
Once we get people in the door, they enjoy the atmosphere and typically come back.
We have become more known in the community so we continue getting word of mouth referrals.
To this day I haven’t paid a dime for advertising.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.7treefarms
• Instagram: https://instagram.com/7treefarms
• Facebook: https://Facebook.com/7treefarms
• Linkedin: none
• Twitter: none
• Youtube: none
• Yelp: none
• Soundcloud: none
• Other: TikTok: @7.treefarms

Image Credits

Shari Johnson