Good Neighbor Podcast: Frisco
Bringing together local businesses and neighbor of Frisco. Good Neighbor Podcast hosted by Sophia Yvette helps residents discover and connect with your local business owners in and around Frisco, Texas.
Is your business serving the residents of Frisco? Then, we need to talk! Visit gnpFrisco.com to schedule your free interview.
Good Neighbor Podcast: Frisco
EP #60: Turning Passion into Pet Care Excellence: Susan Gary's Journey with Top Dog Pet Sitters and Personal Resilience
What makes Susan Gary with Top Dog Pet Sitters a good neighbor?
Ever thought of turning your love for pets into a successful business? Meet Susan Gary, the incredible founder of Top Dog Pet Sitters, who took a leap from being a retired minister to managing a thriving pet care service. In this heartwarming episode, Susan shares how she and her husband Eric transformed an idea into a company that has completed over 56,000 pet care requests since 2015. You'll learn about the meticulous care and professionalism that goes into their service, from being fully insured to obtaining pet CPR first aid certification. Susan's journey is a testament to how passion, coupled with dedication, can lead to unparalleled success in the pet care industry.
But that's not all—Susan also opens up about her personal life, sharing stories of camping adventures across 26 states in a 40-foot travel trailer, her love for gardening, and her attempts at quilting. She speaks candidly about the challenges faced during the COVID-19 pandemic and how her husband's financial expertise helped them navigate through tough times. Their resilience not only kept their business afloat but also made them stronger. Tune in to hear more about Susan's inspiring journey and the mission that drives Top Dog Pet Sitters to ensure every pet gets the care they deserve.
To learn more about Top Dog Pet Sitters go to:
https://topdogpetsitters.com/
Top Dog Pet Sitters
214-244-1629
This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Sophia Yvette.
Speaker 2:Welcome to the Good Neighbor Podcast. Are you in need of a professional dog walking and pet sitting company? Surprisingly, one may be closer than you think. Today I have the pleasure of introducing you to your neighbor, susan Gary, with Top Dog Pet Sitters. Susan, how are you doing today? I'm doing great. Thank you Great. Well, we're excited to learn all about you and your business. Tell us a bit about Top Dog Pet Sitters.
Speaker 3:We've been in business since 2015. We've completed over 56,000 requests for dog walking and pet sitting services. We are a professional pet care service. We're not hobby sitters. Professional means that we're fully insured, including workers' comp, bonding and liability. We are educated. We attend lots of conferences on how to care for pets, pet behavior, all kinds of aspects of administering medications, those kinds of things, and we are pet CPR first aid certified.
Speaker 2:And how did you get into this business?
Speaker 3:Well, I'm a retired minister. This is my second career. When I left ministry I went to work for a nonprofit in downtown Dallas. I was field staff, so I worked out of the home most days of the week. My husband, eric, was in the defense industry then and he would get up every morning at 6 o'clock to go to work, and I'd get up with him. I'd start my day at 6.15, and I'd be done by 2 or 3 o'clock in the afternoon. Our girls were in college.
Speaker 3:I had a lot of time on my hands Empty nesters, not a whole lot to do so I looked for something fun to do and, gosh, if I could get paid, that would be even better, right? So I found a pet sitting company here in McKinney Didn't even know such a thing existed and I went to work for her. She worked around my full-time job schedule. I loved it, but she didn't run such a great company. She didn't pay employees for all the time worked. Her pet visits were only 12 minutes and employees would forget to give medicine, they would forget to show up, they would forget to feed, they would leave doors unlocked.
Speaker 3:It was just horrible, and every day when Eric would come home from work I would say you never believe what happened. Today we could do a better job and the next day you'd never believe what an employee did. Today we could do a better job and after saying we could do a better job so many times, we decided we really could do a better job. We made our business plan on the way to a cruise in Galveston in 2015. In February we took care of getting our tax ID number, llc, all those things and we had our first client. In March we had our first client the first week we were open and we've never looked back.
Speaker 2:And outside of work. What do you do for fun?
Speaker 3:Oh, we like to camp. We have a 40-foot travel trailer and we so far have camped in 26 states. In the next few months we'll mark off five more states. I also love to garden. I pretend I know what I'm doing and I don't. Most of the time I'm just the best client that Calloway's or other nurseries have. I enjoy trying to be crafty. One of my goals after my girls left for college was to learn how to quilt. I haven't mastered that because I cannot sew a straight seam.
Speaker 2:And let's go ahead and change gears for a second, because I know we've talked about a lot of the fun stuff, but can you describe one hardship or life challenge? You rose above and can now say because of it, you're better and stronger. When I say that, what comes to mind? It would be COVID.
Speaker 3:A lot of our competitors went out of business during COVID. Fortunately, my husband has always been very smart with our finances and we were in a position where, when work died, we were still okay and we came out on the other side knowing more about how to manage our business, how to manage our money. And COVID was horrible and the world hasn't been the same since, but we came out better.
Speaker 2:Susan, please tell our listeners one thing, if only one, because I'm sure there is many great things they should remember about top dog pet sitters.
Speaker 3:We love what we do. And we don't just love what we do, we love pets. We respect a client's home and we exceed expectations. We're ranked in the top 10 best pet care services in the state of Texas and we've won best of McKinney numerous times.
Speaker 2:And how can our listeners learn more about Top Dog Pet Sitters?
Speaker 3:They can go to topdogpetsitterscom and learn about the services we provide in McKinney and Melissa.
Speaker 2:Well, Susan, I really appreciate you being on the show. We wish you and Top Dog Pet Sitters the best moving forward.
Speaker 3:Thank you so much, I appreciate it.
Speaker 1:Thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to gnpfrisriscocom. That's GNPFriscocom, or call 469-221-9345.