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Find the Gold in Your Own Client Base

How many of you do this?

You are out shopping. You see something you want to buy; a great pair of shoes or maybe a meal out at a nice restaurant. You see the cost of the item. You automatically transfer it to dog numbers. You think to yourself, “I would have to groom two and a half dogs to get that.”

If you have groomed dogs for any amount of time, my bet is you play this game with yourself all the time. I know I did!

I stopped thinking this way when I started understanding the bigger picture of my customer’s value. I discontinued thinking of the value of a single dog (although it remains important). Instead, I started looking at the bigger picture –figuring out the value of my clients over an entire year. Once I put my pen to paper and punching numbers into my calculator (I was never very good at math unless there were dollar signs in front of the numbers!)I discovered something amazing. I revealed a client’s potential revenue stream once I started crunching the numbers. I had a gold mine in my client roster, I just didn’t know it!

The key number IS NOT the actual price of a single groom. The golden number is the FREQUENCY you service the customer.

Then take it a step further. Have you ever thought about the value of your clients on an annual basis? What about over the lifetime of the pet? Pay attention to the frequency number when combined with the groom price.

Checkout the chart below for a small to medium sized haircut type pet:

Annual @ $50.00 each       Visit Times       Over 10 Years
                                                    per Year
8 week client = $300.00    6.5                      $3,000.00

7 week client = $350.00 7.2 $3,500.00

6 week client = $450.00 8.6* $4,500.00

5 week client = $500.00 10.4 $5,000.00

4 week client = $650.00 13 $6,500.00

Coat Maintenance Program @ $28.00 each visit
2 week client = $728.00 26 $7,280.00

Coat Maintenance Program @ $15.00 each visit
1 week client = $780.00 52 $7,800.00

*On 6 week clients, normally you will see the client 9 times per year due to the holidays.

If you want to find a gold mine in your business or in your established clientele, boost the number of times you see your customers annually. The most financially successful groomers and stylists are those that see their clients once a week, twice a week or even once every three weeks.

The healthiest skin and coat on a pet comes from keeping them clean and tangle free. With today’s gentle shampoos and conditioners, bathing a pet weekly or bi-weekly isn’t a problem anymore.

When we pitch this in our salons, this is a problem solving tactic that works well for us: First we ask if the pet sleeps with any of the family members. If they answer yes, then we ask, “How often do you change your sheet?” Typically, most people say weekly or every two weeks. We suggest they are bathed at the same frequency. Their eyes get huge but it offers the perfect opportunity to tell them about your ‘Coat Maintenance Program’ along with its benefits and the cost. Most people spend more on their morning coffee shop habit than what they would on having their pet bathed weekly!

What would you rather groom? A pet that comes in once or twice a year – whether they need it or not – or a client that you see frequently?

Remember, you would need to adjust the numbers based on your current pricing structure and the size of the pet, but you get the idea. Grab your calculator and pen. Crunch the numbers for yourself.

Hands down I’ll take the higher frequency every time. These are your loyal clients. They are easy to do. They are fast to do. They are your golden ticket to financial success in your grooming business.

Happy Trimming!

~Melissa

Lighting the Fire of Passion?

I don’t know about you – but I was a crummy student in school. How I ever got through high school, I’ll never know. Anything but basic math was a total mystery to me. Comprehending a foreign language? Forget it. And science? Ha. I spent my time doodling images of horses.

But get me outside the classroom and I excelled. I could never get enough of anything that had four legs and fur. Ship me to the barn for days on end and I was a very happy girl. Send me to a horse show and things were even better – I enjoyed improving my skills. I loved the arts and photography. I loved the outdoors. I loved creating things in the kitchen. Business intrigued me. Hard work never bothered me.

I had passion, it just wasn’t for academics. Typical classroom learning bored me- I just couldn’t understand why I needed to learn things I would never use in my life. However, one of my high school counselors always believed in me. It didn’t matter what my GPA was. She knew I had passion. She said “If you can do something you love, you are going to be really good at it.”

Luckily I found my calling even before graduation from high school. However, I didn’t know it at the time. I had landed a job at a kennel. I scooped a lot of poop and was thrilled. A few years into the job, the groomer was released. I had a new job at the kennel. I was the groomer – and I didn’t have a clue what I was doing.

My new job fulfilled my passion on many fronts. And the more I did it, the better I got. The more I learned – the more I wanted to know. My passion had been ignited. Success was at my fingertips.

Over the years, I’ve learned you don’t have to be the best student to excel or to succeed. Anyone can excel if you have passion.

Everyone has unique natural talents. But at times, you must step up to the mirror and ask yourself a very important question. Are you doing everything you can do to become everything you can be? If you become passionate about reaching your full potential, you can’t help but stay motivated.

Key to any success is passion. Maybe it’s with your career. Maybe it’s with your family. Or your health. Or a charity. Nothing can be successful without passion.

What I have learned over the years, success is more about passion than talent or having a great GPA; it’s more about reaching YOUR potential than being gifted.

So where is your true passion? More importantly, have you lit the match to set it on fire yet?

Happy Trimming!

~Melissa

Are You Prepared?

We were headed out of Michigan on our three week annual fall ride with our horses last week. Our big horse trailer and truck were packed to the limit. (Horses have LOTS of stuff!) Our passion is to horse camp and explore trails around the Tennessee area. We’ve made this trek every fall for the past 12 years. We love it.

So we’re cruising down I-75. We’re somewhere near the border of Kentucky and Tennessee. It’s getting mountainous. The sun is shining. The truck is humming along like a champ. Our book on CD is getting to a really good spot. My hubby and I are really starting to relax even before we’ve hit our destination.

Then we hear it… it sounded like an explosion behind us. Crap. We’d just blown a tire on the horse trailer. On I-75. In the mountains. On a hill. This wasn’t good.

We get the rig as far off the expressway as possible and hit the flashers. We go back to verify what we fear. Yep. Blown tire. Marc, my hubby, was a Boy Scout. He goes to work. This man lives by the Boy Scout motto: Be prepared. Out of that monster silver box in the bed of the truck come the tools we need. Flashing warning triangles, trailer lift wedge, hydraulic jack, tire iron… whatever he needed, he had it. In less than 40 minutes, we were back on the road.

I’ve changed my share of flat tires over the years. But I was thankful. Marc was NOT going to let me deal with this one. Believe me – I was totally OK with that! Instead I had the opportunity to watch and worry about the traffic that was zooming by at a very high speed. I stood in admiration with each snafu he ran into yet had a solution. I thought back to the last time I had to change a tire and was I as prepared as he was??

During my mobile grooming days, I changed a lot of tires. With a fleet of six units, flat tires just happened. So do water pumps, electrical issues, broken clippers, high velocity dryers and a whole host of other items. If it’s mechanical or a piece of equipment, at some time it’s going to stop working correctly for you.

In our field, time is money. Do you have the tools, replacement items and knowledge to correct the problem on the fly?

At one point in my life, I didn’t. The way I fixed problems was to call a repair company. After a couple of times of doing that – I learned quickly if I was going to stay on time and keep my appointments for the day, calling a repairman for basic problems wasn’t the best answer. I needed to live by that Boy Scout motto: Be prepared.

It doesn’t matter if you are in a mobile grooming unit or in a high end salon. Stuff breaks. Are you prepared? Can you finish your day with barely missing a beat? Here is a short list to get you thinking about some of the basic items that can cease working for you at the most inappropriate time. If they are not working – you are not working:

Clippers: If you don’t have spare pair with you at all times, you are dead in the water if your primary pair give out on you.

Shears & Blades: They go dull and stop cutting at the most untimely opportunity. Or worse yet, they fall to the floor and are rendered useless until they go to the sharpener. You need a full back up collection of most of your sharp tools.

High Velocity Dryers: What would happen if yours stopped working in the middle of an eight dog day – and one of those dogs is a Newfoundland? Do you have a back-up HV dryer that can be put into service?

Basic Electrical Knowledge: I’m not talking full-fledged electrical issues – I’m talking the basics. Stuff you could find in any home repair book. Like how to replace a cord? Or a plug? Or how much power each electrical items draws when in use. What your breakers are rated for? You can’t plug a powerful dryer into a 15 amp plug. You are going to blow the breaker every time.

Mobile Groomers – you have a whole host of added items. You have to consider all the above, plus:

Water Pumps: There can only be a couple things wrong if your water stops flowing. Every water pump that I’ve seen comes with a great troubleshooting guide. Memorize it. Carry a spare pump. My first water pump took me over two hours to change out and a lot of tears of frustration. However, before too long I could instantly identify pump problems at a glance (or a listen) and know the solution – including flipping out non-working pump for a new one in less than 10 minutes (and no tears!).

Generators: Maintenance – maintenance – maintenance. If your generator goes out, have a back-up plan. Normally that would be a landline power source that plugs into your van. When all else fails – carry a long power cord. Run it from the client’s house to your van. At least then you can power the key items you need to groom the dog by plugging is directly to the extension cord. (A power strip in the van is also very helpful) It may not be ideal, but you can get the dog(s) done while you seek professional help on your generator.

Mechanic: Again, maintenance – maintenance – maintenance. Personally I LOVED having a mobile mechanic. I only had to have vans towed to a service center a few times for big stuff. Everything else was fixed at the base or roadside by a mobile mechanic service.

Jumper Cables: It’s inevitable – at some point your battery is going to be dead. It’s a lot easier to get a jump if you have cables with you and/or a battery charger to keep a tired battery going until you can get a replacement.

Tires: If you drive a vehicle – it’s going to happen to you. Flat tires come with the territory. #1: do you KNOW how to change a flat tire? #2: Do you have all the times you NEED to change a flat tire? #3: Do you have the safety gear to put out in the event your flat tire happens in a high traffic area to warn other drivers you are stopped?

Anyone that has been in the grooming business for any amount of time knows the value of being prepared. Time is money. Dull, broken or non-functioning equipment cost us not only time – but money.

If you abide by the Boy Scouts motto, you’ll be back at the grooming table in no time – just like we were last week on I-75 with our flat tire and horse trailer!

Happy Trimming!

~Melissa

Independent Contractor or Employee – Who Do You Hire?

independent-4-4

I’m just like most of you. My first business was a mobile van. I was extremely successful. Within less than a year I needed a second van. I needed someone to run that unit. I didn’t want it complicated. I just needed help. I figured the easiest route to go was to find the person that could groom and send them out in a second rig. I didn’t need to file all that mumbo-jumbo with the government. Heck, this person was going to run solo — it was the perfect situation for an independent contractor. After all, everybody else was doing it!

Fast forward three years. I now had four rigs. I had hired an accountant. My accountant suggested I hire a CPA to do my taxes. Throughout the years I knew in my heart I was running close to the wire with my independent contractors. My father had been harping on me. My accountant was concerned. My new CPA really set me straight using a very effective tactic — fear.

If you work with independent contractors within your grooming organization, do you really know the current tax laws? The IRS is very strict with its rulings concerning employees vs. independent contractors. Being naïve is no excuse. If you are ever caught, it will be the IRS that makes the ruling on whether you actually have an employee or an independent contractor.

There are a number of different ways to get caught. It might be an audit of your business or one of your workers files an unemployment claim, a disgruntled worker simply turns you in are a few of the common ways but there are many more.

I know — I know. You can’t afford to hire employees. All those taxes you have to take out of the employee’s paycheck and all the taxes that you need to pay into the government both state and federal plus Social Security and Medicare for each employee. Whew – it’s a paperwork and budget nightmare.

But trust me, if you have your workers misclassified, you can’t afford not to have them as employees if that’s what they truly are. The IRS has no qualms about coming in, slapping you with heavy fines and penalties equal to the amount of all the back taxes owed plus all the interest on those back taxes. Plus, the IRS may turn you in to your state government as well. In one single sweep, your business and your livelihood can be destroyed.

Shortly after I switched from independent contractors to employees I started hearing real life horror stories from within our own industry. One of my personal idols virtually lost everything due to incorrectly filing with the IRS. They lost their business, their home, their personal relationship — everything. They confirmed the fear that placed into me by my CPA years before. The IRS will – and can – destroy your life if you do not play by their rules. The stories that were shared much later only reaffirmed I had made the right decision years before.

So here’s the scoop. The laws are complex, subjective, and inconsistently applied, but knowing the rules can keep you and your workers safe. So here they are, in a nutshell: Under United States common law, a worker is an employee if the person for whom he or she works has the right to direct and control the way he or she works, both as to the final result and as to the details of when, where, how, and in which sequence the work is to be done. It is the IRS’ view that the employer need not actually exercise control. It is sufficient that it has the right to do so.

Here’s a list of 20 questions the IRS uses to determine if a worker is an independent contractor or an employee. A ‘yes’ answer to any of the questions except #16 may indicate your worker is truly an employee. Take a look. Be honest with yourself — you can’t afford not to. (and yes did raise my grooming prices!)

IRS 20 Questions: Independent Contractor OR Employee

Is the worker required to comply with instructions about when, where and how the work is done?
Is the worker provided training that would enable him/her to perform a job in a particular method or manner?
Are the services provided by the worker an integral part of the business’ operations?
Must the services be rendered personally?
Does the business hire, supervise, or pay assistants to help the worker on the job?
Is there a continuing relationship between the worker and the person for whom the services are performed?
Does the recipient of the services set the work schedule?
Is the worker required to devote his/her full time to the person he/she performs services for?
Is the work performed at the place of business of the company or at specific places set by the company?
Does the recipient of the services direct the sequence in which the work must be done?
Are regular oral or written reports required to be submitted by the worker?
Is the method of payment hourly, weekly, monthly (as opposed to commission or by the job?)
Are business and/or traveling expenses reimbursed?
Does the company furnish tools and materials used by the worker?
Has the worker failed to invest in equipment or facilities used to provide the services?
Does the arrangement put the person in a position or realizing either a profit or loss on the work?
Does the worker perform services exclusively for the company rather than working for a number of companies at the same time?
Does the worker in fact make his/her services regularly available to the general public?
Is the worker subject to dismissal for reasons other than non-performance of the contract specifications?
Can the worker terminate his/her relationship without incurring a liability for failure to complete the job?