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hi guys what's up my name is laura ventura i am founder and owner of poznan mobile grooming and massage here in orlando florida and today i'm doing a highly requested video on how i started my own mobile grooming business so before this video ends my goal is to give you a clear road map on the steps that i took to start it so let's get to it before we begin i want to let you guys know a little bit about me and why you should even listen to me um i've been in the industry for 15 years i started out here in orlando florida at petco um i did the apprenticeship program i was a bather for a full year before i was accepted into the program and i was a full-time bather after five months after completing it uh after that i moved to orange county california i worked at petco again and then i moved to los angeles where i worked at a smaller mom-and-pop shop i worked there for two years and a half and in 2017 i decided to start my own mobile grooming business which in my business i service los angeles and san fernando valley and then a year and a half later i decided to pick up all my stuff and come back home so i drove cross country and restart with my van and restarted my business here bigger better and stronger and more efficiently so i'm gonna share all the tips and tricks that i have for you guys so um before we start i highly suggest you get a pen and paper to take any notes and if you have any questions whatsoever please feel free to leave them in the comments because i will be replying to them okay so here we go all right guys so the first step that i took before i did anything was that i researched two reputable mobile groomers in the los angeles area and i asked them if i could ride around with them if i bathe their dogs for free and if i help them out so they said yes they were more than willing to do that and the reason why i did that was because i was from a shop i always worked at a shop and i just wanted to see if it was something that i was willing to do they covered two different areas so i saw you know two different routes i also saw how they managed with their clients i also asked them how they scheduled and so i just got a better idea before investing any of my time and money into something so i really i highly suggest you do this so you know before proceeding you could have peace of mind that this is something that you really want to do the second step that i took was i sat myself down with a pencil and paper and i sketched out my roadmap to success which is what my business plan even though i didn't show this to any banks this was for me to understand who i was what my mission statement was what my target audience was what kind of dogs i wanted to do how many days i wanted to work and i'm really thinking about doing a video just on this because it's just there's so much to it but i i think it's very important for you to sit down and really sketch this out because you need to understand who you are and what your value is and what you're going to be offering and what services you're going to be offering so what my suggestion to you is and i'll put some links in the description but my suggestion to you is is go online get a business plan template and start filling that out to the best of your ability and you'll see things just really come to life also writing things down has power so i really advise you not to skip this step and just do the work first all right so step number three was i registered my business i educated myself on all the different entities that i was able to register my business as in california and i went ahead and did so i registered it as an llc that might not be the best option for you so what i would suggest is you research on what the best option for you is and or get a professional to help you such as a lawyer the next step that i took is that i got clear on what i wanted you could either get a van or you could get a trailer i went with the van i got a lightly used van i bought out the van and then i got it converted um the company that i got it converted at i really don't want to talk about because i wasn't happy with the conversion um i did have to put in money to fix it so i'm not going to mention it i do want to tell you that there is two leading uh band conversion companies that it's one of them is called hanby and the other one is called wagon tails they're beautiful vans one of them hanby works with an inverter system and wagon tails works with a generator system mostly but you could get an inverter system added my suggestion to you before you see any vans or any trailers please educate yourself on generators and inverters see which one works best for you and which one you're willing to deal with and or you could be wanting to deal with both in my van i have both i have both an inverter system and i have a generator and that is what's going to power your electricity now one thing i do suggest you do is that you get a van or a trailer that's self-sufficient i worked in the hollywood hills and the last thing that i wanted to do was have to ask my clients to plug in or or for electricity or depend on anything because i was just a very hilly area and i just needed my van to be self-sufficient um when you're pulling up to somebody's house it's it's just one less thing to worry about if you cannot afford an 85 000 van there are other options for you i am going to link down in the description about one or two links that have used vans lightly used vans for sale and trailers so there you could kind of scope out how much these things are going for and just be very clear on what you're getting into because the last thing you want is to start a business with a faulty ban a faulty generator a faulty inverter system so just you know just do your research all right guys the fifth step that i took was to figure out where i was going to store my van and where i was going to get water for it in los angeles i lived in a place where i only had street parking and commercial vans were not able to be parked there so i had to get a storage unit that is what i would suggest anybody that doesn't have a house or an apartment that will let them park there just be sure that you find a storage unit that is close to you um to be more convenient and make your life easier another thing is water are you going to ask your first client for water me again i like to be self-sufficient i don't want to have to deal with that when i go to my appointment so i have been fortunate enough to have a i lived at a guest house in los angeles so i just asked the owner to let me use his water and i just paid him a little extra a month and now i live in orlando florida i do live in apartment building so i run to my mom's house get some water fill it up there and pay her a monthly so that's an option too six step that i took i went to my bank and i made a business checking and savings account this is because from the start you have to separate your expenses and your income from your business and your personal account it's just going to make your life easier when taxes come and it's just you're you have to start organized and you it's also going to allow you to see what's coming in and what's coming out and i will be doing another video on this topic because i really think it's important on mobile groomers or groomers um learning how to save money spend money invest money so i will be talking about the nitty-gritty of that in another video all right guys so the seventh step that i took is that i went and sat down and i wrote down all my expenses to the best of my knowledge maybe at this time you are waiting to hear back from the uh bank to approve you for the loan for your ban or you have you're collecting the money to put a down payment just try to crunch numbers because you just want to see how much your expenses are going to be and kind of ballpark your income just to see how what you're looking at you know so you're not going into this blindly so it's really important jot down your expenses your expenses are your storage your water if you have to pay anybody extra um gas tolls if you have any uh supplies shampoos insurance okay so again i will do be doing a finance video which will break all of this down but right now literally just sit down with yourself and what you're trying to see is how much you're going to be spending versus how much you're going to be making all right guys step number eight assuming that you have the van picked out and everything's going through and say it's getting built right now during this time what i did is i went on to upwork.com and i chatted with a couple of web designers and graphic designers and i picked one out and that company or that person did all my marketing material for me my logo my graphics for my van and my website okay these are really three important things a lot of people i know they don't have website i do believe in websites um google is a very strong marketing tool so if you have a website on the world wide web it will help you out also how are you going to make these people book nowadays i don't really have the time to be picking up phone calls so i usually have people book on my website and it's really good because a website people get to know you from there that's their first impression really um you could do an about me you could talk about the products that you use you could um take pictures of your van and post it on there you could take pictures of your work and post it on there and you could also feed your instagram into your website so a website is an amazing tool to have also start up your instagram page start up your twitter page start up your facebook page start up your youtube page your youtube channel like where are you going to broadcast your work now we're in 2020 so everything is virtual and online if you love grooming and if you really want to be a mobile rumor there is no reason why you shouldn't be successful especially if you're putting quality content out there all right the ninth step before your van gets here pet insurance really important okay people are trusting us with their babies pet insurance is really important because it will cover you if anything god forbid were to happen to an animal under your care some people have it some people don't i have it i have it through heart for insurance i've heard about other types of insurances out there i will um suggest you to do your research to see which one fits your needs all right guys step 10 that i did because the conversion company that's in my van did not uh do the graphics on my van i got that done myself so you being that you already have your website done and your graphics done and your van graphics done you just have to send that over to the company of your choice to put the wrap or the vinyls on your van this is really important your van should have two important three things actually three things okay that are super important it is going to be your your mobile billboard all right it must have the way people could book all right mine has my website my instagram and my phone number and my phone number is in really really really really big numbers on the both of the sides of my van should also have your logo and it should also have your business name okay so who are you how can i book with you how can i contact you all right so just make sure your van graphics has those things all right guys the last step your van is here the graphics are done your website is done you have registered your business everything is ready to go you're super damn scared but you know what you're gonna do you're gonna jump in that van and you're gonna drive that van everywhere you can you're gonna go to the grocery store you're going to drive that van you got to pick up your kid from school you're going to drive that van you're going to the dog park you're going to drive that van and guess what that's when you're going to start getting clients you're going to start getting noticed all right remember you are driving billboard and you're going to tell your family and friends you're going to put out content on instagram you're going to figure out the hashtags and you're going to hashtag the crap out of your content and watch it's just going to be a ripple effect and word of mouth so just you have to stay patient and also you have to going back to the business plan you have to understand your target market and the dogs you do want to attract try not to say yes to everybody and everything your adrenaline is going to be at 100 you're going to want to groom a gerbil if they give it to you okay but you have to be mindful that this is going to be a long-term thing so you have to just know what dogs you're willing to take and what dogs you are in and how many dogs a day you're willing to take because burnout is real so just stay focused and just know that you will get clients and word of mouth in the grooming industry especially mobile is going to be your best friend but not to say you have to help yourself and you have to put out content it's 20 20. and if you have a business you have to be out there on the worldwide rep also one last thing that i did not talk about was scheduling i'm sorry i didn't talk about this but here i am talking about it now so let's talk about it when i started scheduling i um got it at glance planner and i wrote everything down i do not suggest that i still suggest writing things down but i also suggest getting a website where people could go and book themselves okay so you could just be more organized it will help you with their service areas you could just and you have everybody's detail in one place you don't have to be scattered around on where did i write this you know the website i mean the the uh booking app that i use is called moco i highly recommend them they've made my life so much easier and i will link them below i do want to let you guys know that if you're new to grooming before becoming a mobile groomer i do suggest you being under the wing of somebody for about two years why because mobile grooming is a very very independent work okay you're in a very small space with a dog or a cat and you really have to be knowledgeable on what you're doing um to just you know avoid mistakes avoid problems avoid headaches so if you're going to school for grooming amazing i you know i i can't wait for you to get out there but just be under somebody for two years and then i would i would say that you'd be ready to go on your own thank you guys so much and thank you to advance for all the comments or questions that you might have for me if you enjoyed this video or learned something new please don't forget to subscribe or like i will be sharing other videos like this so i wouldn't want you to miss out and i just want to let you guys know that because of the um world's climate right now mobile grooming is skyrocketing and this is because pet parents want their pet service in a fast efficient safe manner in front of their doorstep so if you're thinking about going into this venture the moment is now and i am here to guide you through so again thank you so much and i really appreciate your time take care bye and you thought it was over but it wasn't we're gonna do a little q a um of some of the questions that i've received all right first question how did you build your clientele i built my clientele in la i already had a clientele that was following me from a shop so when i transferred over to mobile they just found me i did not reach out to them at all um they were just able to find me when i moved to orlando i did use google adwords for a little bit uh until i got the things rolling and again just like how i stated in my video i would ride around with my van go to dog park go to dog parks and also instagram is a great tool what are the benefits of mobile versus shop in a mobile um i feel like you don't have too much going on it's just you and the pet it's very um just personalized attention and i just feel like if you're very sensitive to noise or if you don't like a busy shop mobile is great because you could just really just uh put your music on nobody's gonna go up to you telling you to check a dog in uh the phone's not gonna be ringing so it's just really peaceful and also um shops have hours versus mobile you you make your hours and when you don't want to work you just park your van up and that's that how did you go about acquiring the mobile van did you use a company that focuses on mobile grooming fans or brought the van separately and then had the grooming equipment installed well as i said in this video i did use a company that specializes in building mobile grooming vans uh they actually were in charge of buying the van for me so they bought my van in an auction and then converted it later on did the business success take off right away or did it take time for you to grow i think in los angeles within three months i was fully booked fully booked as in like every week i just had something coming in so every day i had about five to six dogs on my schedule and after about a year i closed my books and i was not accepting any new clients here in orlando it took about five to six months for me to be fully booked only because i started brand new and i didn't have any previous clients here what pet insurance did you use or recommend i use um hartford and um i've heard that there are other ones that are really good but hartford has worked for me um fortunately i have not used i have not had to use the pet insurance but yeah long before you had the whole business set up and ready to start i uh registered and started my business plan in january and in june second was the first dog that i did so that was back in 2017 so what that's six months so in six months i bought the van and did all of the steps that i told you guys in this video today what website did you use to start up your business i use upwork.com and i researched a graphic designer there that went ahead and took that um off of my hands yeah it might be you know it might be a little bit on the pricey side but the last thing that i wanted to do was deal with a website and coding and figuring that out so what advice would you have wanted to hear before starting the business that would help future people like myself um some advice that i would have liked to hear was that you didn't have you don't have to take every dog that calls you you don't have to take every animal that calls you um your adrenaline again is going to be at 100 when you start but you have to remember to slow down you have to remember that burnout is real and you have to remember self-care also take your days off take two or three days off grooming is a very physical and mentally exhausted job especially when you're on your own and you're doing everything for yourself so just pace yourself take it easy see how many dogs you need to do in a day really get organized with your scheduling get a scheduling app like moko it'll just make your life 10 times easier and listen always have money saved up because things might go wrong and you know what don't freak out if you have a bad week and something happens and your van is in the shop for something and you have to reschedule clients it is not the end of the world you will make those clients it will you will make it up to those clients and yeah so that's it for the q a guys thank you so much