We caught up with the brilliant and insightful William Regal a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, William thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Too often the media represents innovation as something magical that only high-flying tech billionaires and upstarts engage in – but the truth is almost every business owner has to regularly innovate in small and big ways in order for their businesses to survive and thrive. Can you share a story that highlights something innovative you’ve done over the course of your career?

Being a Doberman Breeder for nine years has definitely come with its share of complications. Issues like pet travel, advertising, and communication can sometimes be difficult. When it comes to innovation in the dog breeding industry, I knew that I had to be cutting edge. I had to bring something different to the table that would make life easier for my clients and myself.

Being a military Veteran has taught me that being versatile is the true key to success in the world of business. Seeing and dealing with so many diverse groups of people can open your mind to best help and deal with a wide range of customers. I learned that most people just want to be informed and feel safe when conducting transactions with each other.

I came up with a streamline way to get dogs safely and worry free to all of my out of state clients. I was hearing that a lot of clients were scared to have their new puppies shipped as “cargo” through the airlines. So I decided to hire a Travel Director! This was something that nobody had really done before because the old ways were to just put the puppy on the plane as cargo and ship them off. But that can be a bad experience for the puppy. They are alone and you don’t actually know if anyone has checked on them.

With a Travel Director my puppies are able to fly in the cabin safely and comfortably with an actual human right there with them the entire way. This made life so much easier for clients for many reasons. Instead of getting to the airport and searching for their dog, my travel director was right there with puppy in hand safe and sound. Also they had someone they could talk to about the dog and if there were any issues someone was actually there to help them out. I think this was definitely the most innovative move I have made for my business.

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?

My name is William Regal, I am the owner of Regal Empire Dobermans based in Atlanta GA.

I began breeding Dobermans about 9 years ago and see myself doing it for the foreseeable future. My passion for Dobermans began in the early 90’s when I saw a Snoop Dogg video back home in California.

There are many problems that can come with being a breeder but I solve most of them with simple things like open communication and being diligent about taking care of clients .

I’m most proud of producing great Dobermans and placing them with great families ! It feels good to see a puppy go home to a loving family. I want people to know that doing business with me will always be a great experience. My attention to detail is second to none. If something doesn’t go according to plan I will do my best to make things work.

How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?

When you are running a business the ability to pivot at the drop of a dime is very important. Nothing ever goes exactly the way you would like, and you have to be able to keep your customers happy. Recently we had a very unexpected loss of my champion doberman named (LAW). He was not only the top dog of my kennel but he was my best friend. When he died I almost wanted to shut down my entire business. I did not want to do anything anymore. At that point though, I had to make a decision, do I stop and let all the hard work we accomplished go to waste, or do I celebrate him and work even harder than before?

I decided to continue with the business. Luckily I had Law “collected” which allowed me to continue to produce litters from him even though he was no longer with us. I began to advertise even harder to spread the word of how great our dogs were and to continue to help the business grow. SInce i did not have him to walk around with and show off anymore I created a business book with beautiful pictures of him and his puppies so that people who were not familiar with us could see how great he looked.

I think making that move really helped my business not only survive but thrive. It was tough but as a business owner you have to be ready for every possibility. If you have a few ways to maneuver around potential issues , you usually will be ok.

Can you open up about how you funded your business?

Funding for a breeding business is very hard to do. It is not your typical start up company because the banks do not really understand how they are going to get their money back from giving you a loan. I went to bank after bank and was told that they couldn’t help me for many different reasons. So I got tired of asking and decided to start funding things myself. Every time I sold a puppy, instead of spending it on frivolous things, I put the money right back into the business. I would buy more dogs and better equipment with each sale. Then I started putting money into advertising.

When the time came to make big purchases I gathered a group of my friends who were very business minded, and had them become investors into my business. This worked so much better than using the banks because there was no interest. Once the money was now available I was able to move quicker and do more things which ultimately made more money. So it was a while before I started seeing an actual profit but it was well worth it in my opinion.

Funding a new business is always going to be a little difficult but if you can do it with the right group of people vs. a bank, i think it is better for you and the company. There are many ways to fund a business but you have to find what works for you and what you are trying to accomplish. Then when you become successful you will see how everyone will all of a sudden want to invest and help out. So you have to make sure you are making strong and smart financial moves that make sense for the business.

Contact Info:

• Website: Www.theregalempire.com
• Instagram: @regalempiredobermans
• Youtube: Regal empire Dobermans