So there I am just a regular guy working his 9-5 saying yes sir no sir three bags full sir, the funny thing is I was really enjoying the work, driving was the main part of it, I love driving!! travelling the length and breadth of the UK meeting new people, finding new faults p.s I was a photocopier "engineer" jumping through the corporate hoops never really making my boss "happy" then it started to dawn on me that I might be wasting my time trying to make other people happy and that I should only be responsible for my own happiness, this then lead me to want to start my own business, in the mean time I switched companies doing a similar role with promises that it would be better etc etc, similar situation at this company too, this sort of confirmed that yes I will be better than these "managers" at creating a happy environment that people enjoy coming in to and working along side me.
Then one day after Christmas...
One freezing day in January 2021 I asked my sister Janine if I could take their dogs out for a walk, she said it was too cold for one of them but I could take Pablo out, off I trot up Holcombe hill for an "easy stroll", I would say I was walking him but I'm not sure that would be an accurate description of the situation, most of the time it was me holding on to Pablo trying to keep up, panting and wheezy but hey they're minor details we should leave out the story......
I digress, so as I am approaching the tower (picture to your right>) I see a figure with around four dogs talking to another couple with their own dog, as I get closer the couple move on and I say hi to this woman with four dogs, all the dogs get to know each other (in their own special way (trying to keep this clean)) I start talking to this woman who is sort of looking a bit lost as to why I have stopped (trust me I had wondered the same thing) Ellie then tells me how she got started with dog walking and how she never looked back, my mind jumped into gear and started planning, she then added me to a WhatsApp group full of dog walkers, they all are really nice and a brilliant community that help and support each other.
Keep on planning...
A few weeks go by with me planning and thinking and replanning, brain dumping in the diary on sheets of paper, apple notes, and from there it started to grow, I was getting excited at this point and this tested my inner strength I had started to gain, with this my confidence grew again I had to contain my self, and then a friend of my mums that they used to work at bury college together when I attended after school messaged me, saying that Hopwood Hall College https://www.hopwood.ac.uk are offering a free dog walking class, I signed up for it there and then, it felt like the right thing to do, so if your thinking about doing something, just do it, and don't look back, you won't regret it.
The taster course which was on Zoom meetings in once a week was fun, we all had a good chat and found out lots of things that we never knew about animals, so by the end of the course when Sarah mentioned that they are doing a 6 week course in the evenings on campus in Middleton I said yes and dropped by the day after to enrol, it felt like a lifetime before the course started, then before we know it the course had finished, I had my first few full-time clients (this is thanks to another dog walker called Mike) walking some lovely dogs a few times a week, I had to hand my notice in at this point at my full time employment, it was weird feeling leaving a job to not go and work at another place, I had been employed since leaving college thanks to my best mate Daniel Heaton who had helped in me getting two of my four full time jobs over the years what a super star!
A few weeks later...
A few weeks later its leaving day, feelings were a bit flat on this day but looking forward to the new challenge ahead of me, with ideas now pouring out of my eyes about where we want to take Your Pets Pals over the coming years, most of them made it on to paper, this helps to keep the drive to move forwards with it, so the following Monday I'm working for my self my van had been delivered the month prior when I handed my notice in, had the van sign written the week later.... progress!! then wow another full time customer!! excitement sets in again and set brain to containment mode...
A bright idea
Then came the bright idea to sell our own brand of dog food which would care for our customers pooches health, I set to task to find out the process in selling pet food, researched the hell out of it, I then decided we can't make our own yet so why not collaborate with another company that can make it for us, so many phone calls and zoom meetings later we have agreed a deal with a company that uses local fresh ingredients from local farms (the duck comes from a farm in Goosnargh!!) they collect the meat and veg themselves in most cases, we are really impressed with the operation that they run and the care they put in to their food really rang true with us so we decided to go with it and agreed to use them to make our food for us, so along with all the treats and food we already sell, we can now advertise our own brand of dog food that is totally grain free, free from fillers and additives, we don't add anything that the animal has no use for, which makes our food excellent value for the quality of food that is produced this is available here you won't be disappointed with the results.
